I have a number of projects I want to do, and I think that freeing up my Saturdays would be helpful. For one thing, finding time to track down Showcase entries is harder to come by. So the recent Rocketeer comics have induced some inspiration. I’ve mentioned before my love of the old movie serials, and many have fallen into public domain, meaning YouTube is less likely to take them down. (Granted, that may not be the case for this one so we’ll have to see what happens.) So for the next 12 weeks I will be posting one chapter in order of a chosen serial every week as a bit of an experiment. Not that I want to do this permanently, mind you; I like what I do with the Saturday Night Showcase, but I may do it again in the future if I need a long break, or make it a summer thing.
Of course this requires some doing on your part as well. I’m showcasing the experience of the movie serial, by posting them as they were meant to be viewed–one episode per week. It would be very easy for you, the BW readership, to simply find the other chapters yourself and make a marathon of it, but how patient are you, wondering what will happen to our hero each week the way your ancestors did?
And since it was Dave Stevens’ jetpack-wearing hero who inspired it, why not start with the movie that began the “rocketmen” genre with King of the Rocket Men, a Republic serial from 1949? Although Commando Cody would be the most famous of them, and probably the bigger inspiration for Cliff Secord, the first man with the rocket pack is Jeff King, and you may notice a few other interesting things about his serial and stories of later years.
For some reason episode 1 was posted in two parts (being the longest episode it should be the only one), so here are both parts of Chapter 1, “Dr. Vulcan–Traitor”!
Anybody else notice the wall shake during the fight in the office?
There is one element of this story that you would see in later tales, that of the scientist faking his death and now working in secret to give the hero the weapons he needs to battle evil. Republic liked having a villain that kept their identity secret, even from his own men. I’m betting that Doctor Vulcan (who was really stupid to tell his victims “hey, I’m going to kill you” over the radio–this is why gloating is a bad thing, bad guys) turns out to be one of the members of the Science Associates, because that’s also how Republic usually works.
I’ll add different bits of trivia to keep this an article. So will our hero pull out of his dangerous dive? Will he maintain a secret identity (which would be cool)? What IS Dr. Vulcan’s goal? See if any of these questions are answered next week in Chapter 2, “Plunging Death”. (That doesn’t sound good for the guy currently falling from the sky, does it?)
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