Not Just Volcanoes

At left, image from US Department of Energy. The towers on the right belong to Windscale - a nuclear facility which caught fire in 1957.

I love the lairs of evil mad scientists.

Were I a better illustrator, I might have produced a coffee-table book of fanciful abodes with all their twinkling lights and death-rays-in-process.

I was thinking on the way home: volcanoes? Must we always put these hideouts in hollow volcanoes or deep beneath the traffic in New York City?

What about abandoned nuclear facilities? Great place. No one really poking around too hard. If you build your lair beneath a cooling reactor pile, well. You're guaranteed a bit of privacy.

Where do you set your crimes? The living room?

Trite.

Try solving the case of Professor Malice dead outside his lair's entrance. Who'd want to kill a sweet old crackpot with designs on world domination?

You need the right sort of detectives for these sort of crimes. Luckily, I have them.

Off to the body count. There isn't enough folly in crime.

We need more Thin Men.

Thin Mints aren't bad either. Apologies to you gluten-free readers.

That's a mad crime if every I've heard.