Buck Rogers

Foreward...In a film made decades ago a fearless fighter and his young protégé are out fighting evil in 1939 when their zeppelin lands and freezes in snow-covered mountains. There the two bodies rest in a state of suspended life due to a newly invented gas thus preserving life for centuries. in the 25th century these two bodies are found, life is restored, and Buck Rogers and his faithful sidekick Buddy wade join forces of the Hidden City as it fights for its life again the cruel killer wade and his evil forces of reckless racketeers. That is in a nutshell the premise behind this serial and its not entirely a bad one. The story definitely has some strong aspects to it and we get to see some inventive science fiction as well, but Buck Rogers is NOT Flash Gordon nor is it ever really close to that. First of all let's see what we do have in common: a basic story that pits the few good against the evil majority, a fearless, indestructible hero both played by Larry Buster Crabbe, an evil villain bent on world and extra-world domination, and cheesy special effects. The major differences are not so much in the story but in its execution. Flash Gordon was a big budget affair compared to this. Here the sets look so much cheaper and the effects so much, well...cheaper. The acting too is excruciatingly bad as Crabbe is one of the best actors in the film, and that isn't saying too much as he says lines looking like a silent screen actor arching eyebrows, etc... Jackie Moran is the most fun as his sidekick Buddy, but everyone else ranges from acceptable(C. Montague Shaw as Professor Huer to terrible Anthony Warde as Killer Kane to one of the worst acting performances seen in a long time - Philson Ahn as Prince Tallen - boy he could use some presence. I wanted to pinch him to see if was really alive. The direction is crisp and their is only minimal use of flashback sequences, but the musical soundtrack really bothered me as Franz Waxman's score from The Bride of Frankenstein was repeatedly used throughout and used to ill-effect very often. Don't get me wrong - Buck Rogers is a fun serial. It has some cool action scenes, an inviting story, and cheesy effects like the spaceships sputtering about like a listless firecracker, but it is in no way close to Crabbe's previous serial Flash Gordon - perhaps the greatest serial ever made. One other note: Constance Moore playing Wilma Deering has virtually no personality and, as far as I recollect, is the only female in the entire production. Interesting.

BEGINNING its life in a humble enough manner, a story titled "Armageddon 2419 A.D. in an edition of AMAZING STORIES Magazine published in 1929, BUCK ROGERS was soon transcribed into the pages of the Nations Newspapers as a Daily and Sunday Color Comic Strip. Radio next beckoned with Hollywood waiting in the wings.

WHEN Universal worked out a deal to make a Saturday Matinée staple out of it as a Cliff Hanger Serial (aka "Chapterplay"), they were well acquainted with the new sub-genre of the Science Fiction Movie, the Space Opera. Universal Pictures, long known as the top producer of the Horror Films. With such classics to their credit as FRANKENSTEIN (1931), Dracula (also '31), THE INVISIBLE MAN (1933), THE MUMMY (1932) and the first and still greatest of sequels with BRIDE OF FRANKENSTEIN (1935); as well as so many more titles and sequels extending right up to the 1960's Space Monster Craze.

UNIVERSAL was also one of the three main purveyors of Serials. Having begun the practice in their earliest days, even pre 1920's Silent Screen Days; Mr. Carl Leamelle's Studio was joined later by Mascot and some independents like Victory Pictures and Weiss Brothers Artclass Pictures. Eventually Mascot merged with some others to form Republic Pictures; which was the numero uno producer of Serials (along with the "B" Western Series) for years. The third major Serial Company was Columbia.

FURTHER qualification for Universal was in evidence of its two previously highly successful outings featuring their adaptation of the Hearst King Features Syndicate's Comic Strip done by artistic giant, Alex Raymond by name.

THE Serials' entitled FLASH GORDON (1936) followed by FLASH GORDON'S TRIP TO MARS (1938) both starred former Olympic Swimming Champion, Clarence Linden "Larry"(Buster) Crabbe in the title character's role. Although Buster was a Contract Player with Paramount, he had already been lent out to Universal on three occasions; making three comic strip adaptations as Cliff-Hangers. In addition to the aforementioned two, he also did the honors as Earth-Bound Detective, RED BARRY (1937).*

SO, when BUCK ROGERS became their next project, who would be better to fill Buck's 25th Century Boots than the athletic, likable and talented (as a screen Thespian) Mr. Crabbe. It became a fait accompli in short order; taking to the big screen much like the proverbial Duck taking to the equally proverbial small pond or slough of H2O. (That's Water, Schultz!).

MOST everyone that screens the Serial today expresses the opinion that the movie is okay, but they prefer the Flash Gordon roles of the previously made productions. All of the viewers of the Serial when it went into its initial release of 1939 must have felt pretty much the same way. The young Mr. Crabbe may also have become strongly identified with the part of the Wealthy Yale Graduate and Polo Player (from Flash Gordon's Comic Strip Origin).

AT any rate, there was no 2nd Buck Rogers project at Universal until the BUCK ROGERS Feature Film of 1977 with its subsequent BUCK ROGERS Television Series on NBC TV Network.

AS for the BUCK ROGERS Serial, our subject today, it was as familiar a character as one could be; for everyone (and we mean literally EVERYONE was familiar with the character and its legend of 20th Century Man Buck getting put into a deep sleep (suspended animation) for 500 years only to awaken in a future Earth where criminals ruled the country. (You know, Schultz, kinda like Chicago's Daley Machine!) Just about everything is the same, EXCEPT the methods of Buck's being anesthetized.

IN the original Prose Story in AMAZING STORIES Magazine, Mr. Rogers was out Spelunking all by his lonesome, when he was put under by some gas present in the cave he was exploring. In the Serial, he and Buddy 'Wade' crashed their dirigible near the North Pole, getting chilled into a deep, five century long nap. In the 1970's version, Buck is an American Astronaut who is in a space suspended animation thing for the time.(Buddy was Buddy Dearing in the Newspaper Strip, ergo was already in the 25th Century where he was born. There was no 'Buddy' character in the 1977 movie or its TV Series spin-off.)

AS we said, there was little need for any origin exposition with the Universal Serial. Buck really "landed on his feet" and "hit the ground running"; as he was immediately commissioned an Officer in the underground (literal term).

THERE'S no double talk in the BUCK ROGERS Serial whatsoever. Those were much more innocent times-at least for the kids!

ROUNDING out the cast were serial veterans Constance Moore (Wilma), Jackie Moran (Buddy), C. Montague Shaw (Dr. Huer), Jack Mulhall (Captain Rankin), Anthony Warde (Killer Kane also referred to as "Leader Kane"), Guy Usher (Aldar), William Gould (Air Marshall Kragg), Phillip Ahn (Prince Tallem as "Philson Ahn), Henry Brandon (Captain Laska), Wheeler Oakman (Lieutenant Patten), Keene Duncan (Lieutenant Lacy), Carleton Young (Scott), Reed Howes (Captain Roberts) and last but not least Wade Boteler (Professor Wade). Also has a whole blank-house full more!

NOTE: * Universal would have Mr. Crabbe do a third Serial portraying their most successful spaceman in FLASH GORDON CONQUERS THE UNIVERSE (1940).

POODLE SCHNITZ!!

This one could have been better. Still interesting and good to look at. The re-recorded music is somewhat diluted because the orchestra was smaller than the one used in the original recordings. Warde is only fair as Killer Kane but Crabbe does a good job as Buck. Worth a look but it is no "Flash Gordon".

"Buck Rogers" (Episodes 1-12, 1939): This stuff is interesting to me for more than its comic book/kitsch style, weak acting, poor production, low grade special effects, lame story, and bad costumes. In 1938 & 1939, audiences were treated to Serials before the main movie at their local theater. Each section of these ongoing stories was about a half an hour in length, and a new one was shown each week. To see all 12 episodes (the entire story) you had to attend the movies 12 weeks in a row. Did you know the good guys would win? Of course. Did you know that at the end of each week's installment, there would be a "cliffhanger" moment leaving you wanting more next week? Of course. The Great Depression was still on, and television was invented but not yet available except to a few rich people in New York City. Once a week, especially on the weekend date nights and Saturday matinees for the kiddies, the Movie was IT...A SPECIAL experience to be savored for a nickel or dime. You got the NEWS, a CARTOON, a SERIAL installment, and THE MOVIE, plus some "private" time with your date...IN THE DARK, IN AIR CONDITIONING!! What a deal!! When I look beneath the surface of this serial (I go back and forth whether I like the characters in Flash Gordon OR Buck Rogers better, both having the same Space/Future theme, but I definitely prefer the décor and the hidden symbology of Buck) I see, as always, a "future" depicted by what we ARE at the moment, in our own time - considered the most "modern" of styles available to us. The cities, room sets, machines, costuming, transportation, and tools expected to be available to us in the future, are all shown in the Middle Art Deco style of America – Zig Zag, Geometric, Jazz, Skyscraper – applied (slathered) to everything from a pair of shoes to a rocket ship and an entire city. And, since the most modern symbols of the 1930's were our very own skyscrapers - with their skeletons of riveted steel - everything in the future is made of…riveted steel, even if it should float. Wonderful and silly. The city designs are direct ripoffs from various buildings of the 1933 Chicago and 1939 New York World's Fairs. The costumes are a mix of para-military horse riding jodfer outfits, and objects that can serve as both helmets OR trash cans for example...trash cans with lightning bolt wings, anyhow. Radio microphones FLOAT (on a fishing line) for some reason, but their speakers still look like turn of the century wind-up record player speaker horns; doors are toothy, biting jaws that open and close with intimidating chews; every object of any importance has a few vacuum tubes or power line insulators on it, along with the rivets; the powerful rocket ships snap, crackle, pop, fizz, and smoke like a used Desoto pouring sparks out its tail pipe, but somehow they get from planet to planet in minutes. Fight scenes: Buster Crabbe's (Buck's) stand-ins do all the work – and you KNOW they're stand-ins because you can SEE them fighting, and they look NOTHING like Buster/Buck. "Hey look, some OTHER guy's fighting now! Oh wait, he's Buck's stand-in!" Then we have the Zoggs – a dark skinned race of dolts, with large spirals of forehead flesh that hang in their eyes, serving as the gophers and laborer/minions of governments. Bad guys wear tight black uniforms. And here is where we get glimpses into the world of 1938/39, when Hitler, like the "Killer Kane" maniac leader in our story (a name that would have been recognized as the powerful "Citizen Kane" character who represented publisher William Randolph Hearst), who was attempting to take over the world, the solar system, the universe...controlling the minds of everyone. The good guys are working on alliances, some are ready to roll over for Killer Kane, others want to fight, and politics & leadership councils are being put to use as everyone decides who is on which side. In Buck Rogers, the American/English Caucasians/Earthlings are joined by the Chinese/Asians Saturnians and the Russian/Caucasians (of some other planet) to fight the power-mad German/Aryan race. The parallels were simple enough for all of that movie audience to "get". (The Japanese/Asians Aliens were not in the mix directly, but the audience would've known that the alliance with the Americans meant China, who was being attacked by Japan.) On and on the serial goes... battles, spying, espionage, meetings, weapon races, disguises, and science dedicated to winning wars not curing diseases. It was low-grade info-tainment – mild propaganda on a weekly basis – expressions of contemporary concerns and fears, which reached so many millions of Americans every week. Those hidden in the top back rows of the balcony didn't notice.

Buck Rogers, accidentally frozen and revived in the 25th century, was the first space opera comic strip hero, adapted from Philip Francis Nowlan's book "Armageddon 2419 A. D." (and changed quite radically in the process). His most successful imitation was Flash Gordon, who saves contemporary Earth from being destroyed by a bizarre alien attack.

As the hero of a Saturday morning cliffhanger movie serial, however, things are reversed and Buck Rogers (1939) is an inferior imitation of Flash Gordon (1936, 1938, 1940). This serial has the same main actor (Buster Crabbe) as the Flash Gordon serials, but that does not completely rescue it from a repetitive plot and mostly unenergetic acting. It seems possible that the problem was caused in part by the attempt to target a younger audience. It is no wonder that no sequel was ever produced.

Buck Rogers fights on the side of American freedom fighters. In the original book they were fighting against Chinese occupations, but for the comic and the serial this was changed to a home-grown corrupt regime. Great care is taken to present the situation as the fight of the (underground) legitimate government against a criminal usurper rather than the fight of revolutionaries against an unpopular government. For modern tastes this semantic trickery is perhaps a bit too obvious, but something else has aged even worse: the Zuggs, a naive and easily manipulable race naturally subordinate to the human master race of Saturn. Which itself appears quite unable to get anything done without help from humans from Earth.

Compared to all other serials of this nature, this one is about average. It is only in comparison to the Flash Gordon serials, which are simply more fun, that it is really weak. My rating of 6 is a compromise between an intrinsic rating of 5 or 6 ('meh' or 'not bad') and a rating of 7 ('good') for the serial's historic significance.

I found the 1979 film, which again reworked the story completely, far more enjoyable.