El Carim (Earth-S)

El Carim was a man of magic and techno-wizardry, who fought all manner of crime in the early 1940s.

History

El Carim was born in 1913,^[2] and he studied both science and magic, until by 1940 he undertook a crusade against crime. He also worked as a stage magician,^[3] in a big American city. He wielded amazing magical powers AND used fantastic inventions of his own design, and he defeated a variety of evildoers, ranging from common kidnappers,^[3] to gimmick-reliant costumed villains.^[4]

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El Carim maintained an office, in Washington, D.C., and employed a secretary named Gladys.

Powers and Abilities

Powers

• Astral Projection El Carim could project a spirit from from his true body, which could fly and could catch a falling person in mid-air.^[5]
• Conjuring From nothing, he could instantly create a length of rope, and by saying the magic word "EXTENDO," could adjust the rope to any desired length.^[3]
• Illusion Casting He could make any animal or man see whatever he wanted them to see, without even speaking.^[6]
• Magic El Carim could instantly paralyze a person with his "Arrestor" item. The correct magic word for releasing people from this effect was "SEGHIR."^[3]
• Psychokinesis El Carim could safely convey himself and at least one carried person from a cliff-top to the ground, by saying the magic word "GROUNDO."^[3]
• Super-Leaping El Carim had a "famous prehistoric frog jump" that could overtake escaping felons.^[7]
• Teleportation By invoking the Great Spirit, El Carim was wafted to any location with the speed of thought.^[6]

Abilities

• Escapology
  • El Carim's secret escape technique was to magically animate the ropes so that they would untie themselves.^[3]
  • El Carim's other escape technique was to burst free of the ropes by sheer strength.^[4]
• Gadgetry
• Hand-to-Hand Combat (Basic) El Carim was not, at first, a very capable hand-to-hand fighter. In his first adventure, two thugs were able to jump him, knock him out, and abduct him.^[3] He got better later, and once broke an attacking swordsman's neck with a single punch.^[6]
• Occultism El Carim invented the Spectrograph, described as "a magic vision device".
  • By writing the name of a missing person on a slip of paper and inserting it into a slot in the machine, and inserting his monocle into another slot, he could learn that person's whereabouts. The Spectrograph would transform the name into radio "vision" waves, then record its findings on the monocle. A nonmagician person could then look at this monocle and remotely view, in real time, the missing person. But without distance waves, the early model Spectrograph could not place the person's location.^[3]
  • El Carim later was able to incorporate distance waves into the Spectrograph.^[8]
  • El Carim later was able to incorporate direction waves into the Spectrograph.^{[citation needed]}
  • Using the Spectrograph and his magic monocle, El Carim could capture an image from one location and project it to another.^[4]

Weaknesses

• El Carim's magic can be rendered powerless by covering his eyes.^[9]
  

Paraphernalia

Equipment

• El Carim relied more on his gadgets than his own magic powers, but his gadgets are so fantastic that they might as well be magic themselves. Examples include:
  • a bulletproof monocle that attracts bullets. A pistol bullet could be drawn off its trajectory and made to hit this monocle, and harmlessly bounce off of it.^[3]
  • by saying the magic word "SERPENDO," El Carim could use the monocle to send mental waves at an enemy, to project an illusion of giant snakes and a surrounding desert.
  • the world's most powerful magnet, small enough to wield with one hand, carried in the cummerbund of his tuxedo. Rifle bullets could be drawn off their trajectories and rifles could be yanked away from their owners.^[3]
  • invisible paint. An airplane could be spray-painted with this formula and would become invisible, from the outside, while remaining visible from the inside.^[8]
• El Carim has a Magic Crystal ball, in which he can see what needs to be seen.^[6]
• El Carim had an ornate mirror, through which he was able to summon Fate himself. It was broken in 1942.^[10] But in a later encounter, El Carim was able to summon Fate with a simple spoken invocation.^[11]

Weapons

• El Carim's "Arrestor" stopped a person's motion, just by waving it at them.

Notes

• El Carim's name spelled backwards reads "miracle".
• El Carim is directed by the spirit of his mentor, Wizzar, the father of all magic.^{[citation needed]}
• This version of El Carim, including all history and corresponding appearances, was erased from existence following the collapse of the original Multiverse in the 1985–86 Crisis on Infinite Earths event and later restored following the rebirth of the infinite Multiverse during the Dark Crisis of 2022-2023. Even though other versions of the character may have appeared, this information does not apply to those versions.
  

Trivia

• El Carim smoked cigarettes until at least 1942.^[12]

Related

• 33 Appearances of El Carim (Earth-S)
• 1 Images featuring El Carim (Earth-S)
• 2 Quotations by or about El Carim (Earth-S)
• Character Gallery: El Carim (Earth-S)

Footnotes