#republic serials

THE FIGHTING MARINES (Mascot Pictures, 1935)

Adventures of Captain Marvel Chapter 3: Time Bomb (1941)

Poster for the first chapter of the Captain America serial (1944).  Only on the posters would you see Cap’s ears and head wings.

This was the last superhero serial, and most expensive serial as well, from Republic Pictures, the studio that had given us 1941′s The Adventures of Captain Marvel.

Poster for Return of Captain America.  This was not a sequel to the original serial, just a 1953 re-release.

The Captain America serial was also the first live action appearance of any Marvel Comics (then known as Timely) character in film or television.  The next time wouldn’t be for another 30 years, when Spider-Man started appearing on PBS’ The Electric Company.

Dick Purcell as Captain America

Besides the name and some costume similarities, the serial Cap had absolutely nothing in common with his comic book counterpart.

There was no Army Private Steve Rogers,no super-soldier formula, no sidekick named Bucky, no indestructible shield, no Red Skull or Nazis to fight.

Instead, Captain America was really Grant Gardner, crusading district attorney by day, masked crime fighter at night (which was the description of quite a few other comic book heroes).  His identity was known by his secretary and confidante and ready-made hostage, Gail.  

Did people just have sinks randomly placed in their apartments back in the 1940s?  Or did this guy forget to build the rest of his bathroom?

This Cap used his fists to fight but, since he was REALLY bad at fighting bad guys, he usually ended up shooting them with a pistol.  His enemy was a generic bad guy named the Scarab who was trying to obtain a couple of “super weapons; “ again, generic serial stuff.

Then there’s Dick Purcell, the actor who played Captain America/D.A. Grant Gardner.  Unlike Tom Tyler, the stuntman turned actor who played Captain Marvel, Purcell was just an average guy with an average physique.  Actually, he was starting to run to the chubby side; not in very good shape at all.  He certainly was not someone you’d picture in your head when you think “superhero,” or even “super-soldier.”

Production of the serial occurred over 6 weeks in October and November, 1943.  The first of the 15 chapters was released in theaters on February 5, 1944, and it was a great success.  Tragically, Dick Purcell did not live to enjoy that success.  He collapsed and died on April 10,1944 after playing a round of golf.  He was 38 years old.

Timely Comics was NOT happy about the many changes made to Captain America, especially the gun use, and made that known to Republic Pictures.  Republic replied that as the serial was already in production it would be too expensive to stop and rework everything to more resemble the comic.  Then Republic added a “neener neener neener” bit by adding that their contract with Timely basically just licensed the name “Captain America,” and they could do whatever they wanted.

But why was the serial Captain America so different than the original source?  If you go beyond Republic’s practice of making adaptations that were drastically different from the source material, there are two prominent theories:

First, the original script and serial was supposed to be a sequel to an earlier Republic effort, Mysterious Doctor Satan, which featured a costumed adventurer named The Copperhead (and by costumed I mean a regular schmoe just popped a copper-colored hood over his head while wearing a business suit).  Mysterious Doctor Satan was originally going to be a Superman serial, but Republic hadn’t been able to secure the rights to the character at the time.  So, they tweaked the script a little bit, created The Copperhead to replace Superman, and filmed it anyway.

The second theory is that the Captain America script was originally for a serial featuring the comic book hero, Mr. Scarlet.  Republic had remarkable success with Fawcett Comics ‘Capitan Marvel a few years earlier; why not produce a serial with another Fawcett character, albeit without so many expensive special effects?  Mr. Scarlet was a crusading district attorney by day, costumed crime fighter at night (where have I heard that before?), so he would be perfect --

-- EXCEPT Mr. Scarlet never turned out to be as popular as folks thought he would be.  His comic book stories were relegated to the back of books, and he rarely appeared on covers anymore.  So Republic merely licensed another, more popular character, made some minor changes to the script and costume, and VOILA!

Republic Serials were the main thing for fantasy/science fiction drama in the 1930's. Where the idea of "Saturday morning serials" came from.