movieguru

I didn't realize before that Pep Comics featuring The Shield came out well over a year before Captain America. The character origins are somewhat similiar. Both received their powers from a chemical serum by a chemist that would later be killed by Nazi's. Captain America's original heater shield was also too similiar to the shield that the Shield wore as part of his costume to be a coincidence. I had never really paid much attention to the Shield character but I had always figured it was their attempt to rip off Captain America until I noticed recently when the first Pep Comics was released.

Trevor

Wow, never knew that. But then, comics have a rich history of borrowing ideas from each other, so one should never assume anything in comics is original.

mrhan

Same with the Doom Patrol and X-Men. They were released only months apart with Doom Patrol coming out first. Obviously, different powers but the same premise.

ddrknghtrtns

Outside of their mentor/leader being a professor there is just enough differences where they are not a carbon copy.
a. The X-Men where born with a mutated chromosome that gave them their powers.
b. The X-Men were teenagers.

Red Hood

Yes, it has been pretty common knowledge that Marvel "borrowed" the idea from the Shield character in Pep Comics. Even Cap's shield was triangular, similar to the Shield's costume. How they got away with this, I don't know.

Professor X idea also came from a character named Tad Carter that Stan Lee and Ditko created in Amazing Fantasy #14. This character has very similar powers as Charles Xavier but then Carter was introduced as part of the 616 Universe in the X-Men Hidden Years book.

brayzie

I read at another forum that they changed Cap's shield because of complaints from a rival company, Archie Comics I'm presuming. There were no cites though.

Josh-da-man