Sunday, October 27, 2024

Halloween Week, Day 3: "Murder from the Grave"

The Shadow, of course, featured a hero with the hypnotic power to cloud men's minds so that they could not see him; although that's a pretty fantastic ability, most episodes of the Shadow pit the hero against normal men. Sometimes they were extremely dangerous men, men who were arsonists, poisoners or submarine commanders. But there are only a few episodes where the Shadow is pit against an enemy who is, like himself, something paranormal.

An exception is "Murder from the Grave." In this episode, a doctor at a morgue gets the bright idea (in retrospect, very poorly-thought out idea) of resurrecting a dead mobster with his secret formula. Before long, the mobster has control of the formula and is using it to raise recently-killed criminals from the grave, building an army of dead men to go on a crime spree!

This episode is from the era of the Shadow where the hero was portrayed by the excellent Bill Johnstone, with Marjorie Anderson as his faithful companion Margo Lane.

"Murder from the Grave" aired on the Shadow on April 6, 1941. You can hear this episode on YouTube.

Tomorrow: "Somebody's done a perfect job of framing me. Either that -- or I'm a murderer."

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