Due out on 10 /18 / 2005

The "Prequel" to the 1945 serial

Cast (in credits order)

Lewis Wilson .... Batman/Bruce Wayne
Douglas Croft .... Robin/Richard 'Dick' Grayson
J. Carrol Naish .... Dr. Tito Daka
Shirley Patterson .... Linda Page


Frank Austin .... Hotel Desk Clerk [Ch. 2] (uncredited)
William Austin .... Alfred Beagle (uncredited)
Lynton Brent .... Jim Bramwell, Mechanic [Chs. 5-6] (uncredited)
George Chesebro .... Henchman Brennan [Chs. 1-5] (uncredited)
Dick Curtis .... Agent Croft of Section 50 [Chs. 10-11] (uncredited)
Lester Dorr .... Henchman Lawson [Chs. 10-11] (uncredited)
Kenne Duncan .... Fred, the Mechanic [Chs. 5-6] (uncredited)
Robert Fiske .... Henchman Foster [Chs. 1-4] (uncredited)
Sam Flint .... Dr. G. H. Borden [Ch. 1] (uncredited)
Jerry Frank .... Cave of Horrors Thug (uncredited)
Terry Frost .... Male nurse [Ch. 7] (uncredited)
Gus Glassmire .... Martin Warren (uncredited)
Karl Hackett .... Wallace (uncredited)
Earle Hodgins .... Joe, the Cave of Horrors Barker (uncredited)
Mauritz Hugo .... Doctor [Ch. 3] (uncredited)
Jack Ingram .... Henchman Klein [Chs. 5-14] (uncredited)
Warren Jackson .... Bernie, Owner of Sphinx Club (uncredited)
I. Stanford Jolley .... Henchman Brett [Chs. 2-5] (uncredited)
Eddie Kane .... J. Hanson, Bail Bondsman [Ch. 11] (uncredited)
George J. Lewis .... Henchman Burke [Chs. 5-14] (uncredited)
Tom London .... Henchman Andrews [Chs. 8-14] (uncredited)
George Magrill .... Henchman at Sphinx Club [Ch. 9] (uncredited)
Knox Manning .... Narrator (uncredited)
John Maxwell .... Sam Fletcher (uncredited)
Charles Middleton .... Ken Colton [Chs. 6-9] (uncredited)
Ted Oliver .... Marshall (uncredited)
Pat O'Malley .... Policeman [Chs. 6, 15] (uncredited)
Bud Osborne .... Brown, Zombie [Chs. 14-15] (uncredited)
Gary Owens .... Narrator (1966 re-release) (uncredited)
Stanley Price .... Henchman Driver [Chs. 1-2] (uncredited)
Frank Shannon .... Dr. Hayden [Ch. 1] (uncredited)
Michael Vallon .... Preston (uncredited)
Anthony Warde .... Henchman Stone [Chs. 2-4] (uncredited)
Charles C. Wilson .... Police Captain Arnold (uncredited)

OOPS! I meant "Prequel to the 1949 serial"!

Was this a movie? What exactly did they mean by "serial"?

I'm not sure. My best guess is: this was a matinee shown on a weekly basis at the theater.

So...in a sense, I guess it was a movie....just broken down in several parts.....to keep the customers coming back for more.

I tried to put this in the "Batman" movie boards, but there's no "add new conversation" button there.

If any moderator wishes to move this discussion along with the discussion about the 1949 serial to the "Batman" board, I have no objections.

Um, a serial is (just like John said) a multiple part episodic movie shown weekly at theaters before a feature would start, just like the old Flash Gordon serials, for example. You've seriously never heard of these before?

Yes, I just didn't know exactly what the format was.

So then why isn't this under Movies?

I tried to put it under the "Batman" movies, but there is no "create new conversation" button there.

John, why didn't you put this under "Batman" movies?

Read my 08:39 am message again, Chico

Okay, ScottN, it's your turn to ask. Then Benn, Fitz, Pesti, Rona, Darth, Hannah, Vargo, Zarm, AdamBomb, etc.

Boy, try to be a straight man around here!

I've actually had all of these on VHS (two tapes) for a long time. They were pretty interesting but really simple (I don't want to give up too much). I may get the DVD's just to preserve them, because they had a fair amount of entertainment value when I was younger. I don't want to give too many details, but I would suggest them to any Batman fan as they are kinda cool.

Just got my copy from AMAZON.COM. Here's my reviews....

GREAT MOMENTS:

Whenever Batman captures a crook, he dumps them off at the front steps of Police Headquarters. Every crook has his forehead stamped with the Batman emblem.

When the crooks make their first getaway, the license plate on their car flips around to a different number and the car instantly changes color from black to white...A VERY COOL DEVICE!

Episode 1 starts with Batman sitting at a DESK with a huge emblem of a bat hanging on the wall.
(Why would Batman need a desk?)

There are two times in which Batman & Robin take off their masks in plain sight. Thankfully, no one saw them.

There is NO preview for "next week's episode" after Chapter 2 is over. My guess is, they could not restore that part of the film. The film quality in some areas is kinda poor as well as the sound and the music. But overall, a good serial.

There are NUMEROUS "politically incorrect" remarks in this serial. Frequent uses of the slang word "Japs" is used many times as well as "Nips" and "Squint eyed" Even Batman uses the word "Jap". Also, Chapter 11 is called "The Nipponese Trap"

Chapter 7 is called "The Phoney Doctor"
"PHONEY"? I always thought is was spelled "Phony". (This may have been the Star Trek-TOS Season 1 End Credits person's first job!)

In the same episode, when Batman falls to the bottom of an elevator shaft, it is VERY OBVIOUS a dummy was used.

In another episode, when Batman uses the ray-gun on the armored car roof, you can see the outline of hole that Batman will make on the inside of the armored car BEFORE Batman blasts through it.

I forgot to mention when the Army guns fire at the plane, they flip the footage around on one of the scenes of the guns firing to make it appear that more than one set of guns are firing at the plane.

One MAJOR gripe I have is in the final chapter where they go back to the previous episode's last moments and ADD additional material to it.

What they added was showing Batman locked inside the coffin & sending out a Morse Code message to Robin. He enters & rescues Batman & they put the bad guy inside the coffin.

(In the previous episode, we're led to believe that there was no rescue & Batman was tossed to the alligators.)

My gripe is...they shouldv'e HINTED "something" happened before this.

Lewis Wilson, who plays the caped crusader in this serial, is the father of James Bond movie producer Michael G. Wilson.

My main compliment for this series is that it actually had more realistic fake punching than some of Clint Eastwood's first Westerns

NANJAO. The Batman serial originally ran from July 16, 1943 to October 22, 1943.

Years ago I remember reading Bob Kane telling of meeting Lewis Wilson years later & Wilson blaming the Batman serial for killing his career.
I don't think the serial was really to blame. Sure one could argue that with a better script, or a script that allowed him to show more emotional range, might have helped, I think the main problem was that Wilson just lacked that spark or charisma that successful leading men have. He played the part as it was written and... that was it.

Some other things I read about this commented on how annoying Robin was in it.
Weeeeeeelllll... he was kind of annoying at the beginning, but either I got used to it, or Douglas Croft figured out how to play the part better as filming went on.
That being said when you look at how Robin was being written in the comics at the time the odds of the "laughing young daredevil" not being annoying in a live-action format was slim indeed. ;-) (Some characters play better in print, then being listened to.)


The Electrical Brain

Batman mentions being given a job by Uncle Sam & Robin wonders what he's going to tell Linda about not being in the Army, indicating that Bruce Wayne was given the job of Batman by the government. (Later scenes back up this idea.)

For that matter I'm not sure if any explanation was ever given in the comics for Bruce Wayne not being drafted. I wonder if the fact that he was Dick Grayson's guardian was a factor, but if that was so, then why not tell Linda that instead of claiming he's 4-F?

Why would the Little Tokyo part of Gotham be nearly deserted?
I seem to recall reading that Japanese people were forced to sell their property at less than honest rates before they were rounded up. You'd think the new property owners would be trying to do something with their new property.

When Daka is trying to find out what's happening he tunes in a device that shows him the "zombie" fighting Batman. Why did he happen to have a camera mounted at that location?


The Bat's Cave

At the end of the last chapter Batman was thrown off the roof, here he lands on a scaffold.
So why didn't the zombie who jumped off the roof last chapter also land on the scaffold?

Alfred is nervously reading a Detective magazine* when Bruce & Dick enter through the clock from the Bat's Cave** and Bruce fires Daka's ray gun to destroy a vase and make Alfred jump.
Holy Superdickery! I mean really, they know this thing can destroy a concrete chimney and the crook they captured said it was used to break into a safe! Bruce is lucky the beam didn't continue through the vase and punch a hole through several walls and that Alfred didn't suffer any collateral damage.

* Not Detective Comics, sadly.

** The serial was the first time the place was named & treated as a headquarters rather than just a secret tunnel under Wayne Manor or a place to store batmobiles & batplanes. The term Bat Cave seems to have been first used in the October 28, 1943, Batman comic strip and Batcave in Detective Comics #83 (cover dated January 1944).

Missed Opportunity. When Dick is disguised as a newspaper paperboy he wears a shirt that says "Daily Record". Shame they didn't use one that said Daily Planet. ;-)

Did Bruce just happen to have a batch of today's newspapers in the car when Dick was pretending to be a paperboy?
Good thing the crook who bought a paper didn't look at the date and say something like, "Hey, this is from three weeks ago!"

At the end Batman is walking on some cables or wires carrying an unconscious Linda. It's clearly a dummy in most shots.


The Mark Of The Zombies

The shot of the train approaching looked more like a scale model train than the real thing.


Slaves Of The Rising Sun

So why didn't Batman just use the radium gun on one of the armored car's tires instead of climbing aboard and blasting a hole in the top?

So what did happen to the men inside the armored car? Did the sound of the explosion knock them out?

Wow. What a realistic car-going-off-the-edge effect. *rolls eyes*


The Living Corpse

Alfred is going to throw out what he considers junk mail, although looking at the front there is nothing that screams junk mail about it, it looks like any other letter someone might receive.

My nephew Brandon thought the stamp cancellation lines looked hand drawn.

Bruce Wayne's address is 1918 Hill Road, Los Angeles, California.
Who knew Gotham was a suburb of LA?

So the Japanese send a soldier in suspended animation, who would die shortly after being revived, just to deliver a message???
You'd think they could find easier ways to send a message?

Daka tunes in his television and is able to see his slaves in the cockpit, then he gets a shot of the cabin behind the cockpit.
Okay, maybe Daka had his slaves put a camera in the cockpit so he could contact them after they had stolen the plane, but why would he have a second camera in the cabin behind the cockpit?


Lured By Radium

Linda tries to escape the crooks by ducking down the trap door in the cabin. However she leaves the door open for the crooks to follow her.


The Sign Of The Sphinx

Batman has captured one of Daka's men, Marshal. Bats leaves him alone in the Bat's Cave. Marshal can't find a way out, but he does find a phone (all part of Batman's cunning plan). Marshal calls Bernie and tells him that he's going to leave the phone off the hook so he can put a trace on it.
*shrug* NNAN I suppose, assuming Marshal is thinking that the phone in the cave comes from a residence nearby, although if he's thinking the phone company actually installed the phone in the cave, well, that's just goofy.

Bruce's Chuck White disguise is... um... basically Bruce Wayne with a different nose. And yet, everyone, including Linda, sees him as a completely different person.

Robin leaps off a boat and into the water. As he's jumping you can see him turning in mid-air (as the actor is probably jumping to land on his back on one of those air mattress thingies), but he hits the water in a dive.


Flying Spies

Batman pulls a dry Robin out of a net, but previously Robin had jumped into the water and was nowhere near a net.


Embers Of Evil

NANJAO. Batman sets off a flare which causes smoke to rise making the crooks think that a fire has started and one of the crooks thinks the place will burn quickly. They head downstairs, find it's just a flare, Batman & Robin attack and one of the crooks drops his cigarette into some flammable junk that starts the fire they were worried about.
I just found that oddly amusing.


The Doom Of The Rising Sun

Usually when one of Daka's men puts their hand on a scanner a screen shows an x-ray with a 5, but when Batman puts his hand on one of Daka's scanners the screen shows the x-ray of a hand and a bat symbol.
What? Shouldn't it just be an x-ray of a hand without the 5 symbol?