Republic Pictures’ 12-chapter serial
Directed by: Fred C. Brannon
Written by: Ronald Davidson
With: George Wallace as Commando Cody, Aline Towne as Joan Gilbert, Roy Barcroft as Retik, Ruler of the Moon, William Bakewell as Ted Richards, Clayton Moore as Graber, Peter Brocco as Krog.
Long before the Rocketeer there was Command Cody, (later, Commando Cody: Sky Marshal of the Universe) and his atomic powdered jet pack, which enabled him to buzz around the air like a determined insect. Lunar invaders, take notice. The story here is so inane it should appeal to the most diehard George Lucas/Stephen Spielberg fans. Things for our neighbor the moon are tough. The air is gotten so thin the Lunarians can’t grow crops, so in order to survive they resort to the same tactics as all desperate races, yes, you guessed it; they plan to invade Greater Los Angeles!
In order to soften us up Retik, Ruler of the Moon, sends the fiendish Lunarian villein Krog to a cave headquarters in the Santa Monica Mounts, where he assembles a lunarium powered ray canon (lunarium is far super to uranium, ‘couse it’s from Luna). Krog hires the most inept henchmen this side of DOGE, Daly and Graber to reek havoc. And reek they do!
Using the Lunar ray canon, they blast railroad trains, office buildings, orphanages, hospitals and finally, oilfields! With the oilfields they had gone too far, the bastards. A government man visits Commando Cody at Cody Labs in Studio City, California (part of Greater LA) and tasks him with saving the LA Basin and parts of the Valley (especially Tarzana, home of the recently deceased great American novelist, Edgar Rice Burroughs).
Cody knows the destruction is being directed by those Lunatics on the Moon. His rocket ship is parked in the Hollywood Hills, not far from Laurel Canyon Blvd. It’s one of those bullet shaped jobbies with fins. No landing gear, it bellyflops. Fins were in that year. Cody and his minions take a couple of trips to the moon causing all manor of grief for Retik, Ruler of the Moon. After a few chapters his gets fed-up with Krog and his henchmen and arrives on Earth via his own spaceship. He gets blasted out of the sky by his own ray canon while trying to escape Hollywood justice, the dirty rat. I’ll bet he was a rotten commie, to boot.
Every chapter has at least one donnybrook involving Cody and a minion vs the henchmen, and a gunfight both sides armed with .38 caliber revolvers. Low tech and about as effective as a Star Wars blaster. While I’m at it, the Cody/jet pack flying stuff along with the rocket looked pretty realistic. The surface of the moon looked like a bright sunny day at Vasquez Rocks Park. The architecture of the Lunar city was definitely Classical. Outer space is well lit and starless.
Henchman Graber was played by Clayton Moore, soon afterward to become…”A fiery horse with the speed of light, a cloud of dust, and a hearty ‘Hi-yo, Silver!’… The Lone Ranger!” Who was that masked man? As cliffhanger chapter-plays go, this was not so bad. It put just enough thrill in a kid-heart on a Saturday afternoon to keep one guessing chapter to chapter.
To be honest, and I know as a Ruthless reader you value honesty above all else (unlike those others), so I must confess that I prefer the 1936 Buck Rogers serial with Buster Crabbe as Buck. Galpal Dale Arden and Dr Zarkov aid Buck in his battle with the evil Ming the Merciless, Emperor of Mongo.
Honesty is the best policy, especially when dealing with Merciless Lunatics.
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