Classic Horrors Club

Prior to watching Captain Video: Master of the Stratosphere (1951), I had never seen an entire serial. To be fully transparent, I still haven’t. I watched one-half of it, which is 10 chapters and a nearly three-hour running time. (One, 26-minute introductory episode and nine 16-minute episodes.) I didn’t dislike it. It’s just a big commitment of time at the moment, and I gleaned enough from it to be able to start a discussion.

First, when comparing to the television show, which ran from 1949-1955 and you can read about here, the big screen version was made with a budget. Granted, it may still have been a small budget, but compared to the live-action episodes on the small screen, it makes a huge difference. Even the fact that it was shot on film instead of videotape makes it look like an entirely different production.

With no actor reprising their TV role, assumably because the show was still in production, the cast is also different. Judd Holdren plays Captain Video. After a series of uncredited supporting roles, this was his third movie. He continued to appear in serials (Zombies of the Stratosphere, 1952, and The Lost Planet, 1953, an unofficial sequel with different character names.) He also appeared in the female version of Man in the Iron Mask, Lady in the Iron Mask (1952.)

He and his sidekick, Ranger (Larry Stewart), are usually wearing helmets (football helmets with giant goggles), so facial expressions are particularly important. Holdren is rather nondescript, but Stewart, at times resembling a young Shia LeBeouf, is quite good. He’s invested in the role, reacting promptly to his mentor and expressing more emotion. 

George Eldredge plays Dr. Tobor, a local villain whom it takes our heroes way too long to figure out is a bad guy. Captain Video is too trusting, even after several trips to his house to ask questions. I mean, Tobor has a scarred assistant, Retner (Skelton Knaggs)… that’s a dead giveaway. Nevertheless, it’s only after a Mu-ray camera reveals is was Tobor wearing an invisibility cloak who sabotaged headquarters that Captain Video learns for sure. (The cloak is referred to as “Dr. Pauli’s,” a reference to the TV show’s primary villain.)

One of the most fun things about Captain Video: Master of the Stratosphere is the variety of gadgets and machines. I couldn’t always catch their names, but was able to find them online. There are at least 30 of them, and I didn’t see them all in the first 10 chapters. My favorites are the space platform, atomic eye, sonic air cushion, super geiger counter, sonic barrier, paralysis gas, scanning screen, and electronic disintegrator.

With names like this, you can imagine the danger our heroes must constantly face, providing cliffhangers every 16 minutes. Their methods of escape are revealed at the beginning of each subsequent chapter (after a quick replay of where the action left us at the end of the last.) Sometimes we didn’t see something that happened, or we didn’t see enough to realize they weren’t really in danger at all.

Dr. Tobor is working for an evil alien dictator, Vultura (Gene Roth) on the planet Atoma (tinted red.) Waging war on the planet Theros (tinted green), Vultura now sets his sights on Earth, ordering Tobor to initiate his plan to cause human-destroying climate change. (How timely, even today!) We see global disaster depicted through stock footage in only one episode of the first 10, though, “Chapter 3: Captain Video’s Peril.”

The rest of the time, Captain Video and Ranger are speeding here and there in their “jet mobile” or launching into space in a “space projectile,” or riding a “space platform” (elevator) to Atoma. They bravely assist Theros in their war. They narrowly escape from Atoma. They continue to question Tobor. I have no doubt when I continue to watch, which I will do, that our heroes will survive at least nine more deadly traps and emerge victorious.

Now that they know by “Chapter 10: Menace of the Mystery Metal” Tobor is a villain, I assume they’ll return to space for a final battle with Vultura. Or will Tobor flip-flop to help them? Serials aren’t intended to be watched back-to-back. Audiences had to return to their local theaters each week to see the next chapter. Therefore, you can’t make the same criticisms as you can with a self-contained movie. I will say, though, that these are fun and worth watching… a few episodes at a time.