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RIP: Peter B. Gillis

Yesterday the death of my friend Peter B. Gillis was announced.

Peter B. Gillis was a comic book writer who worked primarily from 1978-1990. He might be best-remembered as the creator of Strikeforce: Morituri. He was also the writer of the Defenders for many years with artist Don Perlin, who likewise passed away just the other month.

He became one of my favourite writers after I became enthralled by the Eternals. I loved the story he began in the 12-issue Eternals mini-series he started in 1985 with Sal Buscema and it was an enormous shame that he wasn't able to finish the story, leaving after the 8th issue.

But the earliest comic of his that made an impression upon me was What If #46: "What If Spider-Man's Uncle Ben Had Lived?" He was paired there with artist Ron Frenz, who did his best to ape and even recreate moments from Steve Ditko's earliest Amazing Spider-Man stories. In Gillis' story, Uncle Ben lives and Aunt May dies; Ben quickly surmisees Peter is Spider-Man and refuses to see his nephew meekly submit as his reputation is smeared in the newspapers. Gillis imagined that Ben had a real personality and I think it was the first time any Spider-Man story attempted to give Uncle Ben some depth.

Through Facebook I became friends with him and had a few private conversations with him. I'm happy I was able to tell him how much I loved his work. I found him very humble and sensitive. I fear that as he was embroiled in legal battles with Marvel over Strikeforce: Morituri that his legacy might not loom large compared to his contemporaries. But to me, at least, he was one of the greats.

Rest in peace, Mr. Gillis.

Radio Recap: The Player

The Player was a 15-minute syndicated program from 1948. It starred Paul Frees as virtually every character in the show ("your one man theater"), just as he would in the later series Black Book. Some places online refer to the Player as "Studio X."

The series called on a lot from Frees; he tended to narrate the stories while performing as the characters. It's not the most effective way to tell a story in radio (I prefer stories without narrators) but Frees was so adept at switching between voices that it works very well. The series was also augmented by the use of guitar as the primary musical accompaniment - that gives the series a sound that's very different from other radio programs. There are also plenty of sound effects, which make this series stronger than other shows I've heard which featured just one performer.

The stories on the Player vary; some are mystery stories, other adventure, some simply dramatic, other humorous. It seems as though primarily it was about demonstrating Frees' range, spending some time in his company as he narrates/performs a story. Four of the surviving episodes feature a character called "the Professor," a very smart and soft-spoken man who uses his wits to resolve conflicts in a light-hearted and humorous manner.

I found the Player to be pretty effective; Paul Frees was certainly a treasure and he was in fine form. My favourite episode is "Fate Upsets a Plan," concerning a bank robbery that goes wrong in a very Whistler-esque manner.

You can listen to the Player at the Old-Time Radio Researchers' Library.

Review: Le Horla

Guy de Maupassant's 1887 short story "The Horla" was my introduction to the author; I heard a production of the radio series Mystery in the Air with Peter Lorre in the lead role of a man being haunted by an invisible presence (here) and it made an immediate impression. Certainly the adaptation featured Lorre at the top of his range, closing with him in the midst of a ranting breakdown to beat all breakdowns.

I read a lot of Maupassant's short stories (possibly all of them, I haven't found a decent bibliography that takes into account all the variant English titles his stories have had). "The Horla" wasn't Maupassant's only supernatural tale but such themes are rare in his work. "The Horla" remains his most famous work.

The concept of an invisible presence isn't necessarily ideal for adaptation in a visual medium - perhaps why radio suited it so well - but it has been done. You might recall that in 2012 I reviewed an adaptation of "the Horla" in Ernie Colon's Inner Sanctum graphic novel. But that adaptation played pretty loose with the original work.

Perhaps Maupassant's work requires a fellow Frenchman to do it justice. Guillaume Sorel adapted the short story in a full-length 2014 graphic novel. I've looked at a few French graphic novels on the blog recently and I suppose I should reiterate - I don't read French. My Portuguese helps a little; exposure to French in my bilingual homeland helps a little; but what helped me the most in Sorel's Le Horla is that dialogue isn't what drives his adaptation of this familiar story. Most of the atmosphere and terror is visual in nature.

Sorel has a few means to make the invisible menace visible. One is by demonstrating the effects of the creature's presence upon the hapless protagonist, such as in this scene where it simply breaks a flower by the stem. It's eerie and suspenseful, taking good advantage of the Horla's unseen nature.

Sorel's second means is to simply depict the Horla; it appears as an outline of a figure when it hovers over the protagonist at night. I'm not sure how I feel about those scenes - Sorel's Horla is terrifying, but giving the creature even an outline makes it somewhat comprehensible. I feel some of the terror of the story is in the creature's unreality.

Maupassant suffered from mental illlness (namely, syphilis) and it's hard to avoid seeing that in the story of the Horla - that the protagonist's increasingly unhinged rants were coming from a place that Maupassant knew all to well. Sorel's interpretation of the protagonist is a bit more restrained and keeps the ranting to a minimum. Still, Sorel's Le Horla is the most faithful adaptation I have found of Maupassant's story and I do strongly recommend it to fans of Maupassant.

The Acolyte: Lite

Last week's episode of the Acolyte is garnering a lot of hate online. I didn't hate it. I thought it was pretty funny. Recap follows.

Atop the Hoover Dam, OSHA and MAE are raised by a colony of lesbian mimes. Their mothers AUNTIE SEPTIC and DARTH MAULY demonstrate the Thread.

AUNTIE SEPIC: Children, we call it "the Thread." Other people, whom you have never heard of and will never meet, call it "the Force." It's important that you know they're wrong.
DARTH MAULY: Now watch as the power of one creates an invisible wind.
A lesbian mime flails in response.
MAE: Sign me up for that!
DARTH MAULY: And so you see the power of many. We are all individuals.
LESBIAN MIMES: We are all individuals!
OSHA: I'm not. I don't wanna be a lesbian mime.
DARTH MAULY: Too bad, there's no job economy atop the Hoover Dam. Get ready for the ceremony tonight.

The lesbian mimes perform a super-secret special ceremony to induct the children on top of the Hoover Dam. They fail to notice the JEDI sneaking up on them.

JEDI: 'Sup, witches?
DARTH MAULY: Get out of here, we certainly aren't hiding any children we couldn't possibly have.
JEDI: Like those two who are clearly hiding behind you? Hi, children.
OSHA: Wow, people other than the two dozen lesbian mimes I've lived with all my life!
JEDI: Hey kids, wanna join our cult?
OSHA: Are you lesbian mimes?
JEDI: No, joyless eunuchs.
MAE: Pass.
JEDI: But we carry laser swords and have qualified immunity!
OSHA: Sign me up for that!

The lesbian mimes order OSHA to flunk her Jedi tests.
JEDI: Don't think of the number three.
OSHA: Is the number three?
DARTH MAULY: Dammit! You fell for their Jedi mind tricks!
MAE: If you leave, it will destroy our family!
OSHA: So?
MAE: Well, I wanted to be the one to destroy our family.

A fire breaks out, all the lesbian mimes die from apparent asphyxiation.
OSHA: What have you done?
MAE: What have you done?
OSHA: What have you done?*

*actual dialogue

Radio Recap: The Black Chapel

There are only two surviving episodes The Black Chapel and precious little written about it among OTR fans - and that's a shame. It was a very cheaply-made 15-minute program that starred Ted Osborne as the narrator and sole performer. The only musical effects were provided by an organ which, one source claims, Osborne played himself!

The Black Chapel aired over CBS from August 19, 1937 until July 21, 1939. It was a horror program and aired from 11:45 to midnight (an appropriate hour). It was preceded by Lights Out and the Witch's Tale and doesn't appear to be as influential as either of those programs - yet, the two surviving episodes are intriguing examples of what the series was like:

• "The Mahogany Coffin" (January 6, 1939) A gravedigger who has prepared a very nice coffin for his own eventual death has to contend with a rival who wants to speed up his demise.
• "The Crawling Terror" (December 23, 1937) A horrifying blob-like creature lurks around a man's farmhouse, devouring everything that comes near it.

Ted Osborne was a prolific New York performer who appeared in just about every kind of program. According to the Suspense Collectors Companion, he's the only performer who appeared in both the first and final episodes of Suspense, aired 20 years apart!

There's nothing flashy about the Black Chapel; it depends entirely on how well you can follow Osborne's narration (I do find him difficult to follow when he drops his voice into a whisper). The stories themselves are true supernatural terrors like other 30s horror radio shows; if you count yourself a horror fan, you ought to give these short stories a spin!

The Old-Time Radio Researchers' Group has copies of the two surviving episodes of the Black Chapel in their Singles and Doubles collection on the Internet Archive. You can hear "The Mahogany Coffin" in this file and "The Crawling Terror" in this file.

Angola in the Comics #23: Mary Kingsley: La Montagne des Dieux

Once more looking at European publications, we have a 2012 French graphic novel titled Mary Kingsley: La Montagne des Dieux. This was created by writers Esteban Mathieu and Guillaume Dorison with artist Julien Telo, under the supervision of Christian Clot. It's an early entry in a series of similar graphic novels published by Glénat titled Explora, biographical works inspired by the lives of famous explorers.

Mary Kingsley is one of the few female explorers in this series and I'm ashamed to admit I hadn't heard of her before nor read her books (which are in the public domain). Based on the graphic novel and what little I've gleaned about her, Angola was a small part of her overall travels but it was one of the (many) African nations she visited and wrote about.

Mary Kingsley is only available in French so I didn't entirely follow the dialogue of the adaptation and I have yet to read her books, but it does seem like this book is inspired by her life and events and isn't necessarily an authentic account of her life. Nonetheless, the graphic novel opens with her arriving in Angola in 1893 and she spends about a third of the novel in Angola before moving on, eventually heading north to Cameroon.

As always, Europeans are very good at depicting Africa and avoiding the usual tropes I find in North American works. Julien Telo's art is very appealing, energizing the scenes of Kingsley's travels while still rendering them believeable. It's a well-made graphic novel and I'm sure I'll have even more interest in it after I've read Mary Kingsley's own writings.

"Can you show me what a bag looks like again?" Looking back at Alias

Over the last year I watched the entire run of the television program Alias (5 seasons, 2001-2006). My wife was a fan of the program and encouraged me to try it out. I'd never seen it before; in fact, I knew precious little about Alias. I think the sum total of what I knew is that Jennifer Garner starred as a spy who went on undercover missions and sometimes wore wigs. Oh, and her father was a spy too. Yeah, that's all I knew.

I didn't even know it was created by J. J. Abrams. I'm certainly not a fan of his work - I tried and bailed on his later programs Lost and Heroes - but in some respects, knowing it was an Abrams program meant I was prepared. I knew from experience that while he was pretty good at establishing a mystery (his "mystery box" storytelling engine) he was pretty lousy at following through on those mysteries.

The big "mystery box" of Alias is a Renaissance inventor called Rambaldi who created all sorts of fantastic inventions hundreds of years ago; throughout the series a variety of villains - chief among them, Arvin Sloane (Ron Rifkin) - try to obtain Rambaldi's manuscripts and inventions while Sydney Bristow (Jennifer Garner) attempt to keep them out of his hands. It's the only science fiction material in a program that otherwise was reasonably grounded.

The Rambaldi material drives a lot of episodes across all 5 seasons but since it was J. J. Abrams, I anticipated that there wasn't much point in speculating as to where the Rambaldi plot was headed. Instead, I resolved I would enjoy the ride - take in the Rambaldi plots as just a MacGuffin that keeps the storytelling engine running. I think it helped a lot - I think I enjoyed the series much more than I otherwise would have. Certainly online, it seems that a lot of people complained during the show's original airing that the Rambaldi plots were basically impossible to follow and the least-interesting aspect of the show.

In time, I even grew fond of the Rambaldi stuff. It disappeared for most of season 3 (apparently in response to criticisms from the network) and when it came back in the last half of that season, I was actually happy to see it return - even though it led to maybe the least believeable bit of sci-fi nonsense in the series (where a drug created by Rambaldi caused a character to write out an algebraic equation using "muscle memory").

Alias changed quite a bit from one season to the next and I have thoughts about all of them. Be warned that I am going to spoil a lot...

Season 1

The series begins with Sydney Bristow as a grad student who confides to her fiancé that she's really a CIA agent. Sydney's superior Arvin Sloane has the fiancé assassinated in retaliation. It's only then that Sydney learns Sloane isn't really with the CIA, he's running a rogue faction called SD6 and most of her fellow agents are likewise deluded into believing they're running CIA missions. Sydney learns her father Jack (Victor Garber) is likewise in SD6 but he's working as a double agent for the CIA. Sydney shares her information with the real CIA and agent Michael Vaughn (Michael Vartan) becomes her handler; to help bring down SD6, Sydney must work as a double agent.

One very appealing part of the first season is that every episode ended on a cliffhanger. I'm sure that helped bring back viewers during the original airing - it certainly keeps you watching until the end of each episode as during this season the action would always ramp up in the last few minutes, rather than wind down the way other television programs did.

The oddest thing about the series set-up is that Sydney was supposed to be a grad student. She only occasionally appeared on campus during the 1st season and had just a few scenes here and there where her professor would express disapproval with her work. Her studies were supposed represent her real life and what she wanted for herself, but it was almost always out-of-focus in the series. Instead, she was a CIA double agent working with SD6 who, additionally, had given her a cover identity as a bank employee. It was way too much; the bank cover identity was likewise unimportant (she would pay lip service to it as an explanation to her friends as to why she was constantly making international trips). Season 2 dropped the grad student aspect as Sydney declared she'd graduated off-screen, with Vaughn even quipping, "When the hell did you have time to take a class this year?"

Part of Sydney's attempted "normal life" drama also involved her friends, who were not (initially) part of the spy dramas - Will (Bradley Cooper) and Francie (Merrin Dungey). Francie primarily supplied relationship drama with her boyfriend troubles; Will was a reporter who gradually got drawn into the spy drama as he was unwittingly pursuing a story that led him directly to SD6. The season 1 Will plot is very good, as we in the audience possess knowledge Will doesn't and realize how much danger he's placing himself into.

The character of Jack Bristow is difficult to get a reading on at first and that's by design (the original intro would include Sydney referring to him as "a man I barely know - my father"). During the 1st season at times I was left to wonder if he really was a double agent or if he was playing the CIA and SD6 at the same time. As it turns out, what I was slowly picking up on is that Jack is extremely devoted to his daughter and places her wellbeing (or, what he believes to be her wellbeing) above any other considerations. It helped make Jack a stand-out character and throughout the series they'd find good ways to use his love for Sydney resulting in his taking extreme measures.

I knew of actor Ron Rifkin's work only from a season he spent as a recurring character on ER and now that I've seen him as the series' arch-villain Sloane, I wonder why I haven't seen more of Rifkin's work. Even though Sloane began the series by ordering the assassination of Sydney's fiancé, Alias loved to introduce Sloane's sympathetic qualities and continue to suggest that he might be repentant and seek atonement almost all the way to the end of the series. What kept him pretty firmly in the villain camp was that Sloane was pathologically unable to accept personal responsibility; he continually lectured Sydney how "circumstances" had forced his hand, as though he had no agency of his own. He would be an infuriating character in the wrong hands but Rifkin managed the balancing act very well.

I should also note this season had a very good two-parter with guest star Quentin Tarantino as an agent of a third power who broke into SD6 to pilfer their Rambaldi archive. It's a dynamic story inspired by Die Hard that raised the stakes just when the first season really needed it.

Season 2

This is the year where Sydney's personal life was phased out and not only because she finished grad school off-screen. Francie's new thing this season was running a diner. You'd think the diner would be the new civilian hangout place for Sydney between missions but nope, apparently this was an ABC series, not a WB series. Instead the diner barely ever turned up and Sydney's moments between missions continued to be set in her apartment.

I found Will's 2nd year plot to be a bit disappointing; him being drawn further into the world of espionage was a welcome development because he was such a fish-out-of-water compared to the rest of the cast. But Will spent about half the season drifting by in the background with no particular arc until in the 2nd half he became an unwitting security leak and the series repeatedly dumped terrible things upon him.

The series made a huge change in the season's 12th episode, where the CIA successfully shut down SD6 and their bosses, the Alliance. It's effective - a very abrupt termination of the ongoing plot that does leave the viewer wondering what will happen next. At the same time, what was the point of all the Alliance plots through the first year and a half, beyond giving Sloane something to do? The same episode Sydney and her friends finally went after the Alliance is the episode the Alliance were beaten for good (off-screen, of course).

I guess the premise of Sydney as a double agent couldn't go on forever, but I had been looking forward to seeing how a new wrinkle would develop. The show had been building up the villain Sark (David Anders), who was working for Sydney's mother Irina (Lena Olin) against SD6. Sark seemingly defected to SD6 but Sydney was well aware he wasn't truly loyal to the organization. This created a new dilemma for Sydney - how to maintain her front of supposed loyalty to SD6 when Sark was aware she was really with the CIA and her likewise unable to expose Sark to them. But almost as soon as Sark joined SD6, SD6 went away. Dilemma averted!

The 12th episode is also where Sydney and Vaughn became a couple. There'd certainly been plenty of romantic tension between them, although I was a little taken aback when they stated in that episode that they couldn't be together until SD6 were beaten; then they beat SD6 later that episode and hooked up. That again felt like something that could have been teased out longer.

Still, these are pretty minor quibbles; what made the 12th episode so good is that they stopped the SD6 storyline before it got boring. That there were still plenty of stories left in the premise is only to the series' credit.

I should also make mention of the appearances of Sydney's mother Irina in this season. Irina spent most of the 1st half of the season as a prisoner in CIA custody. The first time Sydney went to see her - and the camera carefully panned around the bars of Irina's cell, showing just subtle glimpses of Irina - I remarked to my wife, "why are they filming her like she's a Jurassic Park dinosaur?" That became my repeated remark every time someone went to see Irina in her cell.

There were some really big guest stars this season that included Faye Dunaway, Rutger Hauer, Ethan Hawke, Christian Slater, David Carradine and Danny Trejo.

Season 3

This season shouldn't work, but it did. The previous season's cliffhanger ending revealed Sydney had forgotten an entire year of her life. Usually when an ongoing work of fiction performs a massive time-skip it doesn't pan out, but this worked - partly because it left Sydney with a mystery to figure out (and the solution was actually good, despite the show's creator).

The first half of this season where Sydney was constantly befuddled at how her friends' lives had changed and her old relationships had become fraught (other than that of her father - Jack remained reliable as ever) was good character drama and kept the show from getting too comfortable. This is also probably the only season where Sloane was more-or-less one of the good guys.

Some big guest stars this season included Djimon Hounsou, Quentin Tarantino, Vivica A. Fox, Ricky Gervais, David Cronenberg and Isabella Rossellini.

Season 4

The big addition to the cast this season is Nadia (Mia Maestro), Sidney's half-sister. I liked Nadia but I don't think she really fit the program. Her presence should have resulted in good character drama because she was devoted to her father (Sloane) and her sister (Sydney) and would therefore be torn between them. But the series never pushed Nadia too hard; she was never forced into the sort of moral compromises that Sydney so often had to make. There was a sense that Nadia was too pure and wholesome to do anything wrong; that left her kinda just there. I was interested to see how her dynamic with Jack would pan out (particularly as the season opened with Jack having supposedly murdered Irina) but not much happened there either. She was also set up with Vaughn's friend Weiss (Greg Grunberg) as a romantic interest but they basically remained forever at the same stage - flirtatious but not serious.

Some big guest stars this season included Angela Bassett, Joel Grey, Michael McKean, Isabella Rossellini and Gina Torres.

Season 5

And this is where the series ended; apparently ABC axed the show mid-season but gave them enough time to wrap up their story. Just about every character of significance came back for the last season, even unimportant characters like Sydney's old professor or Vaughn's boss from the 1st season.

This is the season where Jennifer Garner was pregnant and there were a lot of cast shufflings going on. Three new characters were introduced to replace those who'd left, the newbies being Rachel Gibson (Rachel Nichols), Renne Rienne (Elodie Bouchez) and Thomas Grace (Balthazar Getty). And now -- come on! -- if your real name is Balthazar Getty you have got to get a more dynamic character name than Thomas Grace!

Since Sydney was pregnant in the season 5 opener I assumed the two new female characters (Rachel and Renee) were brought in so that the series would retain strong female leads even if Garner had to miss a few episodes (or at the very least, couldn't perform any stunts for a few episodes). As it turned out, Garner took a 4-month break after giving birth but Alias just took a hiatus on her behalf; when she returned, it was to wrap up the series.

Consequently, Renee's character didn't get too far off the ground. She was set up as a terrific spy and fighter but not a team player. She would disappear for long stretches of time so I don't think audiences were given enough to connect with. Rachel, however, worked out very well; as basically a normal person caught in an espionage plot, I felt Rachel covered Will's season 2 plot more successfully and her backstory as being a CIA agent recruited into a rogue agency gave her obvious parallels to Sydney. Episodes where Sydney would coach Rachel in how to become an undercover agent were pretty good and certainly showed a different side to Sydney.

It all wrapped up with a two-hour finale that I felt was very solid. I enjoyed delving into this program and I'm certainly pleased my wife encouraged me to give it a chance.

Radio Recap: The Croupier

"Madames et monsieurs - place your bets!"

The Croupier was an ABC mystery anthology program that aired from September 21 to November 16, 1949. It seems as though ABC were constantly looking for a decent mystery anthology series in the post-war era; there was Dark Venture; the Clock, Quiet, Please, Starring Boris Karloff - they even hosted Lights Out and Inner Sanctum Mysteries, each for one season.

The Croupier was written and directed by Milton Geiger, who had a lengthy career in radio, mostly writing for Hollywood Star Time, the Adventures of Philip Marlowe and Screen Directors Playhouse. Just as the Clock was hosted by Father Time, the Croupier was hosted by a, uh, croupier, who would pontificate on people's fate, as depicted on radio as the result of a roulette wheel spinning: "I am the croupier. I spin the wheel of life; you, the players, make your fortune, your future what you will. It is for you to choose the path: jealousy, envy, hatred, fear, happiness, love, peace - these are the bright and the dark colors of the soul. So, madames et monsieurs, the wheel of life spins; place your bets!"

The Croupier's sole surviving episode is the first broadcast, "the Roman," and it leans heavily into the supernatural - but as fantasy, not horror. The story concerns a couple who find themselves on a haunted aircraft carrier commanded by an ancient Roman, doomed to wander the seas until he experiences forgiveness. It's basically a variation on the legend of the Flying Dutchman. Vincent Price stars as the ghostly Roman and he's terrific in the part; if this is truly representative of what the Croupier was like, then it was a great pity that the rest of the series was lost.

You can hear the first and sole surviving episode of the Croupier - "the Roman" - in this file, from the Old-Time Radio Researchers' Group "Singles and Doubles" collection on the Internet Archive.

Radio Recap: The Bishop and the Gargoyle

I've looked at a number of old-time radio programs that have as few as only two surviving episodes, but I don't normally examine a show that has just one surviving episode. However, I'm breaking that unwritten rule so that I can talk about The Bishop and the Gargoyle!

Ken Lynch (Gargoyle) and Richard Gordon (Bishop). Photo from the Wikipedia page about the series.

It's a little surprising that The Bishop and the Gargoyle has only surviving episode; it aired on the Blue network from September 30, 1936 to February 22, 1937; then revived itself for a second run on NBC's red and blue networks from July 7, 1940 until January 3, 1942. With such a long run, you'd think there'd be more episodes out there! They even had a sponsor: Chase and Sanborn Coffee.

The series was directed by Joseph Bell and written by Frank Wilson. Richard Gordon starred as the Bishop, a retired clergyman who sat on a parole board, which is where he met the Gargoyle (played by Milton Herman, later by Ken Lynch). The Bishop helped parole the Gargoyle and thereafter they were inseparable; together, they solved crimes.

It's a bit like the Archie Goodwin/Nero Wolfe dynamic with the Bishop providing the brainpower, the Gargoyle doing the legwork - but unlike Wolfe, the Bishop would leave his home to take part in the investigation, leaving the Gargoyle to handle any fighting that might occur. There's a good exchange in the surviving episode concerning the Gargoyle's moniker:

Bishop: "Gargoyle, you really are worthy of your name."
Gargoyle: "Why?"
Bishop: "You're so obvious."
Gargoyle: "Okay, I'm a sucker, make me know it."
Bishop: "A gargoyle is an architectural whimsy; a stony decoration in a profane manner to relieve the austerity of a saintly structure. But, obviously, obvious."

One aspect of old-time radio that I've mentioned before is the need for actors to have distinctive voices, especially when there's more than one protagonist performing most of the speaking. In this instance, we have the well-spoken, erudite Bishop contrasted with the 'street' persona of the Gargoyle. The Gargoyle spoke in a Brooklyn accent similar to Ed Gardner's on Duffy's Tavern - plenty of humourous slang. The listener immediately knows who's speaking.

I found the surviving episode a delightful detective program and I certainly would appreciate it if more episodes were found.

The Old-Time Radio Researchers' Group has a copy of the sole surviving episode, which you will find at this link (it's part of their "singles and doubles" collection).

Another Radio Recap of a lone episode tomorrow!

Radio Recap: Results, Incorporated

Results, Incorporated was a very short-lived Mutual series that ran from October 7 to December 30, 1944. Mutual programs didn't typically make use of big stars, but Results, Incorporated had two significant leads: Lloyd Nolan as Johnny Strange and Claire Trevor as Theresa Travers. Perhaps the big salaries (and lack of sponsor) contributed to the show's brief run.

In the first episode, Johnny Strange explained how he envisioned his business:

"Results, Incorporated, your problem is our problem, will locate your long-lost uncle, work your crossword puzzle, hold your baby."

Results, Incorporated just barely took itself seriously; for the most part, it was a madcap comedic version of popular detective tropes. In the three episodes that remain, Johnny and Theresa look up a haunted house to help inspire a mystery author; assist a cowardly man whose family are part of a long-standing feud; and help a museum night watchman who insists the mummies keep leaving the museum at night. It's an appealing program, very easy to listen to and with a lot of vivacity thanks to Nolan and Trevor's lead performances.

You can hear the 3 surviving episodes of Results, Incorporated at the Internet Archive.

Angola in the Comics #22: Carthago Adventures Vol. 3: Chipekwe

I've previously noted that when it comes to comic book depictions of Angola, European comics tend to be much better at depicting the country than North American creators. Part of what I enjoyed about both Insiders and Alter Ego was that the creators had clearly taken the time to find good contemporary references for the country's visuals.

This time I'm looking at Carthago Adventures Vol. 3: Chipekwe, a French publication from 2014 which was released in English by Humanoids in 2017. It's written by Christophe Bec and drawn by Fafner. I haven't read any other books in the Carthago series, but based on this story, it concerns a wealthy man named Feiersinger who is really into cryptozoology and travels around the world trying to prove that semi-mythical creatures really exist. He's accompanied by his ally London Donovan, a hunter who provides a lot of the muscle.

Chipekwe is the name given to a creature who is believed by cryptozoology enthusiasts to live in Zambia, although sources suggest it might also live in Angola. I'm not really into cryptozoology but I have a good friend who is and I think Carthago Adventures would be very appealing to him. The story even begins at Loch Ness as Feiersinger investigates what turns out to be a false lead.

Once the action moves to Angola, artist Fafner demonstrates some terrific visuals of the country. Heck, they go so far as to depict the TAAG airline logo on the airplane! The story turns out to have an interesting connection to Loch Ness - that is, the locals at Lake Dilolo (an actual lake in Moxico province) where the Chipekwe is said to appear, are aware of the massive tourism industry surrounding Loch Ness. When Feiersinger shows up with his expensive crew to find the Chipekwe, the locals really want to encourage him, hoping it will bring in valuable tourist dollars!

I can't say enough about Fafner's art. I mean, look at these visuals - a moonlit night in the marshes of Lake Dilolo; utterly gorgeous depictions of the Angolan countryside appear in this story. But do Feiersinger and Donovan find the Chipekwe? Is all just a big hoax? I recommend you read Carthago Adventures Vol. 3: Chipekwe and discover for yourself!

Radio Recap: Think

Think was a 1953 ABC radio anthology program that featured science fiction stories. The series is also referred to as ABC Radio Workshop; it was produced by John Ippolito and hosted by Dave Ballard. Unfortunately that's about all that I know about it. 1950s ABC radio has not received much attention from OTR fans. No one has yet determined how many episodes there were; we have two episodes of Think and we'll just have to extrapolate something from them.

"You - live in a world made by you. A world of fact and fantasy. But where does fact end and fantasy begin? This is a program to make you: Think"

What's interesting about those two episodes of Think is that both are very familiar stories to old-time radio fans. First, we have a production of Arch Oboler's play "The Word." This one was first broadcast on his program Arch Oboler's Plays in 1939. The story concerns two people who descend from the Empire State Building to find themselves the last people alive. This is a concept Oboler really liked - beyond producing it multiple times on his own, his 1951 movie Five was basically an extended version of "The Word." Think's adaptation is about as good as any of Oboler's versions.

The other episode is an adaptation of Ray Bradbury's short story "Mars Is Heaven!" This one was also adapted for Escape and Dimension X, but Think's adaptation is a unique script, adapted by Morton Fine and David Friedkin. The script makes an odd addition to Bradbury's story (an early sequence where radiation causes an astronaut to age rapidly) but otherwise it's very faithful to Bradbury's original text, moreso than the other radio adaptations.

These two episodes are so strong that I wish we had more examples to draw from; heck, information on Think is so scarce I half-expect to learn these were merely pilots and the programs were never actually broadcast.

You can hear the two surviving episodes of Think using the Old-Time Radio Researchers' Library "Singles and Doubles" page at the Internet Archive; here's the file for "The Word" and here's the file for Mars Is Heaven!.

Radio Recap: Jason and the Golden Fleece

Jason and the Golden Fleece aired for just one season on NBC radio from October 29, 1952 to July 19, 1963. The series starred MacDonald Carey as Jason, the owner of a bar in New Orleans. He also chartered a boat called the Golden Fleece and each episode he would take a patron out to sea for an adventure. His bartender and sailor was Louis, portrayed by William Conrad. At the time, Conrad had already been playing Matt Dillon on Gunsmoke for a year, yet he was still gamely taking on odd supporting jobs such as this.

We have only three episodes of Jason and the Golden Fleece. What I've described above makes the series sound like a weekly version of the Bogart film To Have and Have Not, yet that's not quite what the series was like - at least, so far as the three surviving episodes are concerned. In each episode, Jason is more-or-less an observer to the drama going on in the lives of his passengers. On each voyage of the Golden Fleece, some minor crisis emerges in which his passengers' personal dramas are tested and in some manner overcome. For instance, one episode concerns a young man who is trying to win the approval of his stern father. In another, a district attorney finds himself aboard the Golden Fleece at the same time as the sister of a woman he convicted of murder.

Jason and the Golden Fleece is definitely unusual and it's a shame we only have the three programs to judge it by. Those three shows have pretty crisp audio, well-written stories and a supporting cast of players such as Bill Johnstone, Jeanette Nolan and Herb Ellis. You can hear the 3 surviving episodes of Jason and the Golden Fleece at the Internet Archive.

Radio Recap: I Fly Anything

I Fly Anything was a short-lived adventure drama that aired on ABC from November 29, 1950 to July 19, 1951. It starred singer Dick Haymes as Dockery Crane, an air cargo pilot who would frequently drop the series' title as he cheerfully exclaimed, "I Fly Anything!" For example:

"I got a tradewind tan, a tall tale about a tribal treasure, a tropical tramp and a torrid Tahitian tomato. You know me - I fly anything!"

We only have two surviving episodes of I Fly Anything (hardly surprising since it aired on ABC, who seem to be the spottiest network at preserving programs). Haymes was supported on the program by Georgia Ellis as his office manager and George Fenneman as his co-pilot. Fenneman doesn't have much to do in the earliest surviving episode (dated January 30, 1951) but has a lot more banter with Haymes in the later episode (March 27, 1951). The banter and premise is basically very similar to the series Island Venture, which you'll recall was another very similar short-lived program about cargo pilots. It seems as though post-World War II there was a recognition that this was a career that would make for exciting adventure stories and one which a lot of veterans would relate to (see also the post-war comic strip Steve Canyon). Yet none of them really made a deep impression.

I'm not sure why Dick Haymes starred in this program; I guess he wanted to flex his muscles and show he could do more than just sing? He'd been a pretty constant presence on radio throughout the 40s, starring in his own music program from 1944-1948. But I Fly Anything didn't have a sponsor, so it didn't have much of an opportunity to open up a new career path for Haymes.

I Fly Anything is a pretty typical radio adventure program but a charming one. Haymes is pretty fun in the lead role. The March 27, 1951 episode has a bit where Dockery Crane and his friends sing a chorus of "Alouette." Crane quips, "About time somebody broke that up. I never could carry a tune."

You can hear both surviving episodes of I Fly Anything at the Internet Archive.

Cinema, meet entropy

There are any number of editorials on the internet - particularly the entertainment pages of news sites - on the troubles of the cinemas. Why have so many big budget movies recently failed in their theatrical releases? What do audiences really want to see? What will bring numbers back up to their more predictable pre-pandemic tallies?

And every author has their theories. I'm certain there is no single reason why movies have been struggling recently. Is it competition from other venues? Foreknowledge that the films will be easily available online? Studios out of step with what audiences are interested in? Sure, all of that.

But last weekend I went to the cinema for the first time since last December and I have to say, it wasn't a great experience. I can accept a certain amount of discomfort in the cinema; if the theatre is dirty or the seats are uncomfortable, I'll bear it for the sake of watching the film. Where I draw the line is when the cinematic experience is ruined by the presence of other cinema-goers.

I'm sure we all have examples of fellow cinema-goers who've been a real detriment to our enjoyment of a film, but when I see opinions from cinephiles who, with mist-laden eyes and quivering lips contemplate the tragic possibility of cinema chains going out of business, I don't ever see them comment on this.

I had a guy in the row in front of me who apparently had a very important conversation that could not wait -- because about every three minutes he pulled out his phone to text. And my wife informed me that the person seated in front of her was constantly talking during the film. We enjoyed the film, but we did not enjoy the experience of going to the cinema.

And ultimately, you can't dismiss this - moviegoers are most interested in their own comfort. Some of them want an environment where they can take out their phones any time they like or talk over the movie. Others want just the opposite! My wife and I like going to the cinema, but ultimately when we want to see a movie we enjoy it just fine no matter what screen it's presented on.

I've had some great experiences watching movies that were heightened by the presence of other people in the cinema and how they reacted to what was on the screen. But, generally speaking, I'm just as happy to watch films in my home and avoid having to endure the behaviour of strangers.