Edgar Rice Burroughs Podcast: Episode #17: The Battle for Pellucidar, Part 2

Edgar Rice Burroughs Podcast: Episode #17: The Battle for Pellucidar, Part 2:   Tim, Jess and Scott finish their discussion of Tarzan: The Battle for Pellucidar, the 2020 novel written by Win Scott Eckert. Click HERE ...

Friday's Favorite OTR

 Halls of Ivy: "Lost Dog" 4/14/50

The Halls are on the way to a formal dinner in which they hope the host will write a large endowment check to the college. But on the way there, they find a lost dog. There's a lot of money to be lost if they miss the party, but they can hardly leave the poor animal on its own, can they?

Click HERE to listen or download.

When Bogart isn't Bogart

 

Written in 1977, The Man With Bogart's Face, by Andrew J. Fenaday, is a fun and loving tribute to Bogart and to classic detective and noir movies. A man with a past that is only hinted at (he was somehow wounded at one point in the past and probably worked in the movie industry) has plastic surgery to make himself a double of Humphrey Bogart, then changes his name to Sam Marlowe. He opens a private detective office and has a habit of "casting" people he meets as Golden Age Hollywood actors.

At first, we think he might just be nuts, but when he gets several clients that all turn out to want the same pair of priceless sapphires, he proves to be a good detective and more than able to handle himself in either a fist fight or gun fight. He follows up clues intelligently and the ability to "read" the people he meets and deduce their motives. He might think someone should be played by Peter Lorre if life were an old movie, but he'll be correct in his understanding of that person's character.

There is a level of parody here, with a plot and characters that key off The Maltese Falcon. Other classic crime films (both Bogie and non-Bogie films) get shout-outs. For instance, there's a The Lady From Shanghai shoot-out with a hitman in a Hall of Mirrrors. And, like all good parodies, it obviously loves the subject it is making fun of while still being sincerely funny. 

But it is also well-written enough to work as a straight detective story and get us to invest in characters we come to care about. The plot is convoluted, but ties up its various loose ends at the climax in a satisfying way. 

It begins with a lady named Elsa hires Marlowe because someone seems to be stalking her father. That leads to a shoot-out in the Hollywood Bowl. Then several different parties show up to hire him to find two priceless sapphires known as the Eyes of Alexander. A beautiful woman (whom Marlowe immediately casts as Gene Tierney) is soon involved--both in the case and with Marlowe personally. Not surprisingly, the sapphires prove to be linked to Elsa's father. Fists and bullets both fly as Marlowe works to get to the bottom of it all. 

So we have a strong detective story and a loving parody mixed together to form a tribute to a time when studios such as Warner Brothers and R.K.O. The novel is no longer in print, but it's worth tracking down.

Invader Fights Invader!

 

cover art by Jack Kirby

Prince Namor, the Sub-Mariner, doesn't think much of us surface people. How deep-seated this hatred is pretty much depends on the writer of any particular comic book, but in general he just doesn't like us.

But during World War II, after the Nazis attacked Altantis, he quick understandably and quite appropriately decided that he really, really hated the Nazis and he would be willing to work with the Allied nations to defeat Hitler.

All the same, Namor still has a quick temper and will occasionally strike out on his own. 

That's the premise of The Invaders #3 (November 1975), written by Roy Thomas and drawn by Frank Robbins. The team is returning to the U.S. after a mission in Europe when they spot a ship being torpedoed by a U-boat. The U-boat crew soon discovers that it's a bad idea to attack Allied shipping when a team of superheroes is nearby.

The U-boat commander is captured alive and the good guys discover he's carrying a coded message. So it's off to Washington to get it de-coded.

This doesn't take long and the Invaders learn that a super-powered being called U-Man, who is apparently an Atlantian with enchanced size and strength, has been assigned to kill Winston Churchill. The Prime Minister has been in the U.S. meeting with Roosevelt. The Nazis plan to tag him during his trip home. And he's already left.

The idea that one of his people might have turned traitor ticks off Namor and he immediately decides that he needs to deal with the U-Man on his own. Sadly, Namor isn't good at reasonably explaining his intentions, so the situation soon deteriorates into a brawl over the streets of Washington. At least it's not New York this time. Even as early as 1942, New Yorkers must have been getting tired of super-hero battles taking so frequently over their city.

Roy Thomas tosses in an interesting twist here. Captain America's sidekick Bucky sympathizes with Namor and takes his side in the ensuing fight, spraying Toro with a fire extinguisher before punching out his fellow sidekick. This nearly results in Captain America and a stunned Human Torch falling to their deaths, but Bucky sticks to his guns regardless. He's able to join Namor on the Atlantian plane/sub the Invaders have been using for transport. The two fly off alone to battle the Nazi supervillain.

The remaining Invaders get ready to follow, ready to battle both Nazis and Namor.

It's a strong story, coming up with a situation that, combined with Namor's temper, believably pits the heroes against one another. (Though the situation did devolve into a brawl too quickly--probably because Thomas only had so many pages in which to tell the story.) The other Invaders are shown as being sympathetic to Namor, but (except for Bucky) they realize they can't let personal feelings put their mission at risk. And for Bucky--well, the first page of this issue shows him bonding with Namor as the Atlantian instructs him how to fly the plane, providing a proper motivation for his decision to side with Namor. 

All this leads into the next issue, which we'll look at next week.

Edgar Rice Burroughs Podcast: Podcast #16: Tarzan: The Battle for Pellucidar, Pa...

Edgar Rice Burroughs Podcast: Podcast #16: Tarzan: The Battle for Pellucidar, Pa...:   Jess, Scott and Tim discuss the 2019 novel Tarzan: The Battle for Pellucidar, by Win Scott Eckert. This novel is part of the New ERB Unive...

Cover Cavalcade

 

A Bill Ely cover from 1956. If you live in a Comic Book universe, this is probably a really, really bad plan.

She/He MADE Me!: TIM MAKES ANGELA READ: Hands in the Dark (1932)

She/He MADE Me!: TIM MAKES ANGELA READ: Hands in the Dark (1932):   Hands in the Dark,"  by Walter Gibson (using the house name Maxwell Grant). First published in the May 1932 issue of The Shadow Magaz...

Friday's Favorite OTR

 Jack Benny: "The Maxwell is Stolen" 10/1/50

Jack's car is ancient, unreliable and ready to fall apart if you were to breathe on it to hard. But someone decides to steal it anyways.

Click HERE to listen or download. 

Two Great Westerns

 

Angela and I are in a really fun online book club in which, each month, we read one of Louis L'Amour's Sackett novels and another unrelated Western, then discuss them. But a visiting relative will mean we'll be missing an upcoming meeting. Though we're happy to have that visitor here, I'm bummed about missing the meeting. The books this time around are two of the best Westerns I've ever read. 

These were L'Amour's Sackett (1961) and Wild Times (1979), by Brian Garfield. And, by golly, if I can't talk about them at the book club, I'm gonna talk about 'em here.

{Update: My brother hadn't yet adjusted to the time change on Book Club Night and fell asleep early. So I got to attend the meeting anyways. But since I'd already written this post, I'm leaving it up.}

In terms of plot, the novels are very different. Sackett is about Tell Sackett, who is working to improve himself by teaching himself to read properly while working a hidden mine for gold, helping to establish a new town and facing off against the vengeful Bigelow brothers. The action takes place over the course of a few months.

Wild Times is the life story of an expert sharpshooter named Hugh Cardiff. Hugh is a crack shot--perhaps the best in the American West--who becomes the hero of a series of dime novels and the star of a less-than-realistic play about his adventures. He eventually opens his own Wild West show. But along the way, he has a number of real adventures, suffering loss and romantic heartache while also making a number of life-long friends. The action takes place over six decades, starting with the Civil War and ending in the 1920s.

Both books, though, have similar themes running through them. In each case, these themes give strength to the plots and additional life to the characters. In both stories, the importance of being educated is stressed. Themes of honesty and loyalty to one's friends are there, along with the benefits of having these traits. Also, the protagonists in both novels work for what they have and clearly earn their eventual success. 

Also, by coincidence, the best scenes in both novels parallel each other. In Wild Times, Hugh makes an epic journey through a desert, nearly dying along the way, in order to carry an injured friend to safety.  In Sackett, Tell makes an epic journey over a snow-covered mountain, nearly dying along the way, in order to carry an injured man (in this case, an enemy) to safety. 

So I've just read two books that stress the importance of family and friends. But then, because of visiting family, I thought I would miss hanging out with Book Club Friends. But then I was able to attend the book club anyways because my brother fell asleep early after a trip across four time zones. It's complicated, but it's probably easier than hauling a wounded man across a heat-seared desert or a snow-covered mountain. So I suppose I can't complain.

Dinosaurs Committing Suicide

 

As I've said in previous War That Time Forgot reviews, these stories existed entirely as an excuse to show World War II soldiers fighting dinosaurs. And that, by itself, more than justifies its existence. I don't want to live in a world in which WWII soldiers didn't fight dinosaurs. No sane person would want that.

The story in Star Spangled War Stories #106 (Dec. 1962-Jan. 1963), written by Bob Kanigher and drawn by Ross Andru (who also did the cover) is typical of the appeal of the series. The human characters are pretty much just ciphers--the human soldiers who are used as a gateway to bring us into their dinosaur-filled world. 

The humans have two gimmicks attached to them. One is that they are the crew of a 155mm cannon. The other is that all three keep having the exact same dream of being chased by dinosaurs.

At first, they laugh this off as coincidence. But then, while being transported by a glider, they fly through a strange cloud and end up on an island inhabited by dinosaurs.

This was early in the series and Kanigher never really made an attempt to link the tales together with a strong continuity. Usually, the dinosaurs are on an island (or islands) in the modern-day Pacific Ocean, which unfortunate soldiers, sailors and Marines continually stumble across. A few stories are set in the Arctic, with frozen dinosaurs getting thawed out. In this case, there is actual time travel involved, with the strange cloud being some sort of warp gate.  

Anyway, the soldiers make liberal use of both their cannon and their hand grenades to fight off dinosaurs. They lose their cannon, though, when a large pachycephlosaurus picks it up and inadvertantly commits suicide with it. Of all the dinosaur deaths we see in this series, this one is the most heart-breaking.

click on the above image to enlarge it.

All the while, the three soldiers are looking back up at the cloud, hoping to figure out a way to get up to it and hopefully get home. 

Well, it's rarely a good thing to be scooped up by a pterodactyl. But when it happens to the soldier and the creature flies them over the cloud, this proves to be serendipitous. A burst of tommy gun fire convinces the ptero to let them go and they fall back through the warp gate, splashing into the Pacific near a navy destroyer.

The story ends with the three men once again dreaming of dinosaurs and wondering if that meant they would be having another prehistoric adventure. But though the War That Time Forgot sometimes repeated human characters, I don't think our artillerymen put in another appearance.

That's it for now. Next week, we'll tag along with the Invaders as they fight among themselves when they should be rescuing Winston Churchill.

Cover Cavalcade

 

A cover from 1971 by an unidentified artist. I didn't know ghosts got thirsty. 

Friday's Favorite OTR

 Magnificent Montague: "Starring Role in Radio" 11/10/50

A noted Shakespearean actor is forced to take a part in (the horrors!) a radio show to make ends meet.

Click HERE to listen or download. 

On Trial for Murdering Himself

 

My wife was mocking me--MOCKING ME, I SAY--about the number of B-movies I've recorded off of TCM that I haven't gotten around to actually watching yet. So one night recently, while she was needle-pointing (and working on a pattern that didn't involve Star Trek or dinosaurs, so what's the point?), I watched one.

The movie was South of Suez (1940) and it didn't involve needle-point at all. It picks up in Africa, where violent-tempered Eli Snedecker owns a diamond mine and John Gamble (George Brent) works as his foreman. Gamble is good at his job, but trouble is afoot. He is openly critical of Snedecker's brutality towards the workers and Snedecker's wife is coming on to him. He rejects her, but she pulls a Genesis--Chapter 39 on him and Gamble is out of a job. 

But, when Snedecker tries to buy the claim of an alcoholic Englishman named Roger Smythe, Gamble interfers. He knows Smythe is being offered a raw deal, so he stops the sale and goes to work for Smythe.

Soon, a large star-shaped diamond is found on the Smythe claim. Shenanigans ensue and before long Snedecker has murdered Smythe and framed Gamble in a failed effort to get the diamond. Gamble, with that diamond and a number of others in his pocket, is forced to go on the run.

The movie then jumps ahead five years and switches the scene to London. Using the diamonds as a stake, Gamble is now a rich man with a new identity. But he also wants to track down Smythe's daughter and somehow give her a share of his fortune. But, when he does locate her, he discovers she is obsessed with finding her father's killer--the now "missing" John Gamble. Naturally, he falls in love with her.

The movie depends on jumping from one unlikely situation to another, but it has fun doing so. In fact, it successfully stretches credulity even farther when Gamble has a chance to fake his own death, but then ends up getting accused--in his new identity--of murdering himself. Snedeker has shown up in London and is the chief witness against him. 

As unlikely as the events of the film are, they do string together in a logical manner. With a competent cast and good direction, South of Suez is more fun than a barrel full of non-Star Trek related needle-point projects. 

Super Rabbit!

 

cover artist unknown

I didn't know Super Rabbit existed until I stumbled upon one of his stories recently. (And may I say that I love it that my life is such that I occasionally stumble across obscure stories? It's my superpower and I don't know why my wife isn't more impressed by it.)

Super Rabbit was created by cartoonist Ernie Hart, with first adventure appearing in Marvel's Comedy Comics #14 in 1943, then jumping over to All Surprise Comic later that year. The story we're looking at is from All Surprise #8 (Fall 1945--writer and artist unknown). It's an indication of how popular Superman was that parodies such as this one were showing up within a few years of the Man of Steel's first appearance.

Super Rabbit, by the way, is not the first super-powered rabbit. Hoppy the Marvel Bunny beat him to this honor by appearing five months before Super Rabbit. 

Super Rabbit's secret identity is Waffles, who is sometimes a newspaper boy and sometimes a shoe-shine boy (Or is that newspaper rabbit and shoe-shine rabbit? I'm uncertain of the proper nomenclature for a world inhabited by anthropomorphic animals.) Waffles has a magic ring which he can rub to turn into Super Rabbit.

[Thanks to Don Markstein's Toonopedia entry for most of this background information.)

Poor Waffles is having a hard time getting shoe-shine customers, leaving him unable to afford a new alarm clock. But he soldiers on, moving to a different neighborhood and soon earning himself a big tip from a customer who appreciates his enthusiasm. Waffles buys his alarm clock, but his joy is short-lived. A crook steals the clock.

It turns out that a villian named Tick Tock is stealing every clock in town, figuring he can then force anyone who wants to know the time to pay him for this information. 

Waffles, in the meantime, has transformed into Super Rabbit. He catches Tick Tock and his gang trying to rob the local clock store and lays into them. But a bump on his one weak point--the top of his head--knocks him out. Tick Tock and his gang get away with all the remaining clocks in town.

Super Rabbit wakes up and begins to search the town with his super vision. At first, he can't find the bad guys. But then his super hearing picks up Tick Tock's triumphant laughter from underneath the streets. Now that the bad guys are located, they are soon subdued. The day is saved and everyone once again knows what time it is.

Super Rabbit was Marvel's most popular funny animal story and this story shows why. It's a simple but clever story with fun character designs and an appealing protagonist. Heck, it's impossible not to like a character named Waffles.

In the late 1950s, a publisher named Israel Waldman began putting out comic books consisting of unauthorized reprints. This included a Super Rabbit tale. This wasn't very ethical of Mr. Waldman, but it does mean there's a copy of this story online for us to enjoy. You can find it HERE. 

Next week, we'll return once again to the War That Time Forgot.

Cover Cavalcade

 

From 1952--the artist is Lawrence Stevens. When Date Night goes horribly wrong.

Friday's Favorite OTR

 X Minus One: "Reluctant Heroes: 12/19/56

Chapman has spent three years on a small moon base and is anxious to return to Earth. Even when offered a huge amount of money to stay, he refuses to do so. There's nothing that will make him stay. 

Well, perhaps one thing might make him stay.

Click HERE to listen or download. 

Martian Rhetoric

 

I'm writing this about two weeks before it will post. At the same time, Angela and I are reading A Princess of Mars (1912)--Angela for the first time and me for the umpteenth time. I'll be recording a series of mini-episodes for the Edgar Rice Burroughs podcast analysing the novel on a chapter-by-chapter basis. 

The fun thing about reading a great book with the intention of writing about it is that it guides you to noticing things that I never consciously noticed before. For instance, this time around, I discovered that people on Barsoom can make wonderful off-the-cuff speeches. 

In Chapters 9 and 10 of "A Princess of Mars" (1912), three characters give short but eloquent speeches that vividly demonstate Burroughs skill as a storyteller. Each of the speeches is a masterpiece of rhetoric.

From Chapter 9, in which Sola the female Thark is defending her show of concern for a captive human woman:

"I see nothing wrong with my expression of interest in this red woman," retorted Sola. "She has never harmed us, nor would she should we have fallen into her hands. It is only the men of her kind who war upon us, and I have ever thought that their attitude toward us is but the reflection of ours toward them. They live at peace with all their fellows, except when duty calls upon them to make war, while we are at peace with none; forever warring among our own kind as well as upon the red men, and even in our own communities the individuals fight amongst themselves. Oh, it is one continual, awful period of bloodshed from the time we break the shell until we gladly embrace the bosom of the river of mystery, the dark and ancient Iss which carries us to an unknown, but at least no more frightful and terrible existence! Fortunate indeed is he who meets his end in an early death. Say what you please to Tars Tarkas, he can mete out no worse fate to me than a continuation of the horrible existence we are forced to lead in this life."

From Chapter 10, in which Dejah Thoris, despite being a prisoner and facing torture and/or death, calls on the Tharks to set aside their brutal customs and join with the red men in their work to keep Barsoom from dying:

"We were unprepared for battle," she continued, "as we were on a peaceful mission, as our banners and the colors of our craft denoted. The work we were doing was as much in your interests as in ours, for you know full well that were it not for our labors and the fruits of our scientific operations there would not be enough air or water on Mars to support a single human life. For ages we have maintained the air and water supply at practically the same point without an appreciable loss, and we have done this in the face of the brutal and ignorant interference of you green men.

"Why, oh, why will you not learn to live in amity with your fellows. Must you ever go on down the ages to your final extinction but little above the plane of the dumb brutes that serve you! A people without written language, without art, without homes, without love; the victims of eons of the horrible community idea. Owning everything in common, even to your women and children, has resulted in your owning nothing in common. You hate each other as you hate all else except yourselves. Come back to the ways of our common ancestors, come back to the light of kindliness and fellowship. The way is open to you, you will find the hands of the red men stretched out to aid you. Together we may do still more to regenerate our dying planet. The granddaughter of the greatest and mightiest of the red jeddaks has asked you. Will you come?"

Also in Chapter 10, John Carter makes it clear that he will remain true to his moral code no matter what:

"I hear you, Tars Tarkas," I answered. "As you know I am not of Barsoom; your ways are not my ways, and I can only act in the future as I have in the past, in accordance with the dictates of my conscience and guided by the standards of mine own people. If you will leave me alone I will go in peace, but if not, let the individual Barsoomians with whom I must deal either respect my rights as a stranger among you, or take whatever consequences may befall. Of one thing let us be sure, whatever may be your ultimate intentions toward this unfortunate young woman, whoever would offer her injury or insult in the future must figure on making a full accounting to me. I understand that you belittle all sentiments of generosity and kindliness, but I do not, and I can convince your most doughty warrior that these characteristics are not incompatible with an ability to fight."

Each of these speeches serves to establish character, establish mood and advance the plot. What schools and universities need today is to invite Martian teachers of Rhetoric to Earth as visiting professors. Eloquent speechmaking like this is pretty much a lost art and it would strengthen our own culture to re-capture that skill.

Defeating Evil with.... Niceness?

 

cover artist unidentified

Casper's Ghostland #38 (October 1967) teaches us an important lesson. If you are nice to your enemies instead of mean, then... you'll be able to get away from them when they start fighting each other?

Many stories appearing in Harvey Comics can be accurately described with the word "Delightful" and "Spook School" (drawn by Warren Kremer; writer unidentified) can certainly be included in this. It begins with the Ghostly Trio--Casper's uncles--once again being aggravated with Casper for being so friendly all the time. Ghosts are supposed to be scary, not friendly!

They decide to send him to Spook School, where young ghost are taught how to boo, curl wallpaper, crack windows and do other scary stuff. Sadly, Casper's boo is weak and he can only manage to uncurl wallpaper and uncrack windows.

The story then takes a bizarre twist. Over in Goblandia, the Goblin king is annoyed because his people are so busy farming and growing food that they don't have time to be scary themselves. So they come up with a plan to raid the Spook School, capture a bunch of ghosts, using Spook-proof bags, and forcing the ghosts to do the farm work.

The plan goes well at first, but the ghost rather understandable dislike being used as slave labor. They keep stunning the goblins with loud Boos, while the goblins retaliate with mean tricks.

All but Casper, who begins to act friendly towards the goblins. The goblins actually like this and begin to question why they aren't nice to one another. 

Which, in turn, leads to the goblins fighting one another because each objects to the other being mean. The ghosts easily escape amidst the ensuing confusion. 

So, the next day, when the Ghostly Trio look in on Casper, they are horrified to see him teaching other ghosts to be friendly. A loud Boo is used to destroy the Spook School before this heresy can continue, because one Friendly Ghost is more than enough.

I love this story. I love how it teaches a lesson about being nice, but twists that lesson about in an ironic and hysterical way. I love how it can show so many of the characters being mean without the story itself being mean-spirited. I love Kremer's clean and imaginitive art work. 

And I love that I now know that if I'm ever captured by goblins, I can get them to destroy each other by being nice to them. And knowing is half the battle.

I enjoyed looking at a whimsical tale this week, so we'll do the same next week as we follow Super Rabbit on wacky adventure.

Cover Cavalcade

 

From 1970. A superb Frank McCarthy cover for Elmore Leonard's second-best Western.