The Adventures of Captain Marvel: Time Bomb

"I don't think the police will hear about this..."

This third episode, while being absolutely a straight-up movie serial with all the tropes and limitations thereof, not least in stopping every seventeen minutes or so for a moment of peril, continues to show that The Adventures of Captain Marvel gets the superhero movie serial just right.

I like that the baddie is credited just as “the Scorpion”. I like the recap stills at the start of the episode that imprint in our memories the characters and the plot. Little things like this tend to be done right. But so far the plot has a nice, simple, but engrossing structure in that the Scorpion is after the lenses and, moreover, we know the Scorpion is one of the expedition. I like that there are several ostensibly sinister individuals amongst the group, and not just the obvious foreign red herring Tal Chotali.

And the cliffhangers, so far, are done with suspense- the time bomb on Billy’s plane is no exception, as the tension bounds and builds until the plane (a biplane with a propeller!) falls apart in the air.

This may not be big or clever, but it’s done very well indeed.

The Adventures of Captain Marvel: The Guillotine

"Whoever controls this device will have power such as men have dreamed of since the beginning of time!”

It's fascinating to compare this second episode with that of the rubbish Batman and Robin: the difference in quality is all the clearer from the similarities in format. Again, after a longer first episode, we’re now into a much shorter length. The music is very similar. There’s a hooded and masked baddie with a loaf of very ‘40s behatted hoods working for him. There are fights. It all points towards a cliffhanger every seventeen minutes. And, after the cliffhanger, the action shifts from vaguely oriental lands to the USA, a similar setting to Batman and Robin, and the racism (although everyone seems to be white!) is no longer so apparent.

And yet it’s all so much better done. The direction and acting remain clearly superior. This is still a movie serial, and not exactly great art, but it all looks perfectly competent. Captain Marvel in action- flying, being impervious to bullets although one can’t help wondering why he never gets shot in the face- looks bloody good. The dialogue is functional, but does its job well.

But it’s also at plot level that this is obviously superior. The guillotine is used as the cliffhanger at the end, but it’s introduced earlier in a nice little Chekhov’s Gun moment. And it’s established that the Scorpion is really one of the archaeologists, so we have a nice little whodunit going on.

I’m enjoying this, and relieved to be.