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Watching Any Good Serials?
Topic Started: Apr 12 2006, 09:28 AM (88,364 Views)
riddlerider
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igsjr
Jun 25 2008, 05:06 PM
Smilin' Jack is a really first-rate serial, although it's kind of like the Rodney Dangerfield of chapter-plays: it don't get no respect.

I couldn't agree more. I've always liked this one, even though it doesn't have a damn thing to do with the Smilin' Jack comic strip. I think it's the last great Universal serial.

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Black Tiger
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Smilin' Jack:
I love Fraulein Von Teufel and that murder mystery they wove into a couple of chapters.


Am 7 chapters into Zorro's Black Whip. While it probably won't make many top 10 lists,
(pedestrian plotting, understated lead villainy by Francis McDonald), it still has enough action and energy to keep it moving at a sprightly pace. One question: since Republic paid for the right to use the Zorro character's name in the title (and a credit to Johnston McCulley), why didn't they use the Zorro character in the serial? I like the Black Whip character, but "Zorro's Black Whip" is a bit deceptive as far as titles go.
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riddlerider
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Black Tiger
Jun 25 2008, 07:14 PM
Am 7 chapters into Zorro's Black Whip. While it probably won't make many top 10 lists [....]

Hell, it wouldn't make my Top 50 list. I think it's the weakest serial Republic released during World War II, with the possible exception of PURPLE MONSTER STRIKES. "Pedestrian" is the right word for this one, IMO.

Hey, Tiger, were you at the convention (a Nashville show, I think) where a group of us watched BLACK WHIP with George J. Lewis himself? Pa, were you there? That was quite a treat, even if I didn't particularly care for the serial. As I recall, he had never seen the whole thing before ("I was too busy working") and sat through all 12 chapters in one sitting.

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Black Tiger
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Hey RR - didn't see George J. Lewis at a Zorro's Black Whip screening, but did see him at the convention and talked with him a little bit. Said he did well in real estate after his film career. Sold Robert Young his house and more.
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Laughing Gravy
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The kids LOVED Zorro's Black Whip. I mean, LOVED it.
"I'm glad that this question came up, because there are so many ways to answer it that one of them is bound to be right." - Robert Benchley
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Black Tiger
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I loved Linda Stirling as the Black Whip whipping the beejeebus out of the outlaws and gunning them down as well. One tough lady.
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panzer the great & terrible
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My grandkids (two girls and a boy) love it too. They also love Jungle Girl and Perils of Nyoka, and the old Wonder Woman TV show. I suspect they like serials with girl heroes, the girls because they like the role model, the boy bercause he thinks it's sexy (he's 13 now). I think it's all because tough girls in the movies are still a novelty, Death Trap being the rare exception.
Life is just a bowl of cherries, it's too mysterious, don't take it serious...
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Laughing Gravy
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For the first time in weeks, I watched a serial chapter over breakfast today! Episode 8 of The Mysterious Pilot. Reminded me why I haven't been watching serial chapters lately. Classic dialog, from Frank Lackteen to his hapless victim, from whom he is trying to garner information of some sort:

"Oh, no! DEAD would be too EASY way to do!"

If Chico Marx had been a hit man...
"I'm glad that this question came up, because there are so many ways to answer it that one of them is bound to be right." - Robert Benchley
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Laughing Gravy
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One thug to another, in chapter 9 of A Woman in Grey:

"That's the bird what busted up our little party with his pop-gun yesterday!"
"I'm glad that this question came up, because there are so many ways to answer it that one of them is bound to be right." - Robert Benchley
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Laughing Gravy
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Lois Collier meets Edward Norris and Eddie Quillan in chapter one of Jungle Queen:

She: "Are you from the United States?"

Norris: "I am, but my friend's from Brooklyn."
"I'm glad that this question came up, because there are so many ways to answer it that one of them is bound to be right." - Robert Benchley
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rodney
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I only have one chapter left in Haunted Harbor, a serial that I really like, even though you wouldn't know it. Seems like I've been watching it forever. Alas, that's the way it works sometimes.

Next up, is The Mysterious Mr. M.........
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riddlerider
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This week I got five VCI serials in one fell swoop: DICK TRACY RETURNS (on which I've already commented), BATTLING WITH BUFFALO BILL, JUNGLE QUEEN, WHITE EAGLE, and JUNIOR G-MEN OF THE AIR, which I'm four chapters into and enjoying it. Another childhood favorite I remember seeing in the mid '60s on New York's WNEW-TV -- I love the smell of nostalgia in the morning!

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Stony Brooke da Mesquiteer
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Yesterday I finished The Adventures Of Capt Marvel. Wrapped up nicely and the enemy is revealed...and then he's gone! I like the 12 chapter ones. The ones I'm watching now that are more than 12, I think could've been cut back to 12...they get redundant.

Today I finished up The Phantom Empire. The last chapter starts out like the Smiley and Pete show. Smiley takes off one of his boots and bashes baddies in the head. Good stuff.
It's like Rodney King used to say, "Can't we all get a bong."
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Stony Brooke da Mesquiteer
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Last night I finished Gangbusters. One last time thru the manhole in the subway. I enjoyed this although every time I heard Tim speak I could imagine....Kong, the 8th wonder of the woild.
It's like Rodney King used to say, "Can't we all get a bong."
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rodney
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Started The Mysterious Mr. M last night, and I liked it a lot, though I'm a little confused already. I thought Mr. M was the guy who was thought to be dead, but was in Africa, but he got a record from Mr. M. There are two of 'em?
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