It was early 2004 and I was transferring a bunch of my VHS tapes onto DVD. One of those tapes was the colorized and edited version of the 1952 Republic Pictures serial Zombies of the Stratosphere. At the time, I wrote down some of my thoughts regarding this shortened, colorized version. And now, through the magic of the written word, we take you back to that point in time in which I had just finished viewing all 93 glorious minutes of pulp thrills transferred to film.
In the early 1990s, emerging computer technology was being used to add color to old black-and-white films. You don’t see much of this done any more, but it was all the rage back then. The results were mixed, at best. Film purists were aghast that anyone would dare tamper with the integrity of the old classics. But when it came to such classics as Zombies of the Stratosphere… well, just like colorizing the first season of Gilligan’s Island. Nobody really seemed to care.
In 1990, Republic Pictures decided to colorize and edit two of their old serials for television release. They chose Zombies of the Stratosphere and The Crimson Ghost. How they arrived at these particular choices, I have no clue. But the idea was to produce a 90-minute movie for television broadcast that could be shown in a two-hour time slot. Instead of coming back every week, viewers would come back after every commercial break.
The idea, apparently, was to make these two serials more compatible to the tastes of modern viewers. Adding color made them much more marketable to television stations, which felt that no one would tune in a black-and-white program. And editing the episodes for length not only would let the serial fit in a two-hour time slot, but would also pick up the pace of the serial.
Admittedly, the old serials were pretty fast-paced as it was. They were designed for the short attention span of 10-year-old boys in the ’30s, ’40s and early ’50s. But apparently the attention span of television viewers in the 1990s had gotten even shorter. And so the pace was indeed picked up by some skillful editing. Skillful editing that could eliminate 44 percent of the original film footage, and reduce Zombies‘ original 166 minutes to a 93-minute television movie. And skillful editing that could still make sense of the convoluted plot that originally spanned 12 weeks and counted on the forgetfulness of the adolescent minds over that span of time.
The colorized and edited Zombies of the Stratosphere was released in 1991 to video and television. I bought the VHS tape back then, and also remember seeing this shown on a local TV station. And now, a dozen years later, I watched it again. The overall result: not nearly as bad as you might think!
Larry Martin, Sky Marshall of the Universe?
The lead character of Larry Martin is, for all intents and purposes, Commando Cody, Sky Marshall of the Universe. Of course, he’s not actually called that; he’s just Larry Martin. But he has the lab building, the aides, and that wonderful amazing flying suit as seen in Radar Men From the Moon (1952), the only “rocketman” serial to actually use the name Commando Cody. The flying suit was first seen in King of the Rocketmen (1949), and nearly all of the stock flying-suit footage was reused in Radar Men and Zombies, both from 1952. Why they didn’t use the Commando Cody name as well is something that I can only wonder. Perhaps it had something to do with their proposed television series by the same name?
The serial plot’s been rehashed many times, in various forums, but I’ll recap it briefly, because serial fans always expect a recap. Right? Okay, anyway, Larry Martin is hired by the government to track down the Martians who have landed on Earth. The evil Marex has enlisted the aid of Dr. Harding in his plan to blow the Earth out of it’s orbit so Mars can move into its place. This would probably be a bad thing, understandable to even those 10-year-old boys of 1952.
Commando Cody, er… Larry Martin, straps on his flying suit and sets out to save Earth from the sinister machinations of the evil Martians. And 12 chapters later, he has succeeded in overcoming the Martian hordes. Well, hordes may be overstating it a bit. It’s more like three inept guys in sparkly costumes: Marex, Narab and Elah.
Leonard Nimoy, the alien
The part of Martian Narab, as most of you probably know, was the acting debut of Star Trek‘s beloved Mr. Spock, Leonard Nimoy. And by the time this colorized version was being prepared in 1990, Nimoy’s fame had grown way beyond his inauspicious beginning in Zombies. With three seasons of the Star Trek television series and five of the theatrical Star Trek movies under his belt, Nimoy was a hot commodity.
When they edited the serial and cut out 73 minutes of footage, they were careful to leave in most of Nimoy’s “Narab” scenes. This had the effect of enlarging his part in the final edited version. The VHS videotape box even went so far as to put a yellow blotch on the front, proclaiming “Starring Leonard Nimoy.” Boy, talk about hyperbole. It was a small part, editorially enhanced. But, hey, it sells…
There’s no outer space in this serial. All the action takes place on Earth and in the skies above. And there are no ray guns. Everyone uses a pistol here, even the Martians. You’d think that any self-respecting Martian out to blow a planet out of orbit would carry at least one ray gun. It’s a bit disappointing. But the biggest disappointment was that there are no zombies. “But, it’s in the title!” you cry. Yes, you were cheated! I don’t think they even used the word “zombies” in the entire serial, although it might have been spoken once at the very end… albeit without explanation. Aw, quit complainin’, ya whiner. So there are no zombies. This serial is still good pulpy fun.
The invincible (?) robot
There are motor boats, submarines, space ships (that never seem to go into outer space), and robots. The robot in this serial… hey, I’ve seen this guy before! He was used in other Republic serials. I seem to remember it from The Undersea Kingdom among others. But just as the robot in Bela Lugosi’s The Phantom Creeps was a creampuff, this one isn’t much of a threat, either. That one was downed with a single bullet. The one in Zombies is put out of action with the single swing of an axe. You know, they just don’t build them like they used to!
And then there was the flying suit. It was designed with a “wow” factor that really worked for adolescent boys. Many, I’d imagine, felt they could design such a wonderful rocket pack, themselves. Just grab Mom’s egg-timer and strap it to the front of a leather jacket. Sling a jet-pack on your back — hey, you could probably find one of those jet-packs at the local hardware store — and you were set!
Commando Cody… er, I mean… Larry Martin (doggone, I gotta stop doing that) in the flying suit makes for a quite respectable hero. He’s really good at take-offs — step, step, step, jump! But he needs to work on his landings. An uncomfortable number of them were done on his belly. Ouch! That’s just gotta hurt. And probably leaves the mark of an egg-timer on his chest, to boot!
The colorization of this serial was competently done. Larry Martin’s spaceship is gray. The Martian’s spaceship is appropriately red (the red planet, you know). The Martians wear slightly baggy, but supposedly skin-tight suits of glittering purple. I wonder if that was the colorist’s homage to another Republic “Martian” serial, The Purple Monster Strikes. And the Martian’s faces were green. Oh yeah, little green men from Mars! Whoever chose the colors for this version definitely knew his stuff. A professional.
Better than you might expect
The editing was done surprisingly well. I didn’t miss the 73 minutes of footage that was deleted. And I could actually follow the storyline, something which isn’t always possible when watching a serial in its original form. I suppose that’s because the original versions of serials were designed to be seen over a 12- to 15-week period, whereas this version was specifically designed and edited to be seen in a single two-hour sitting.
So, it was fun… pure pulp all the way. It was color. And it was a mere ninety-three minutes out of my life. A 93 minutes that I feel was well-spent. Although this doesn’t seem to be shown on TV anymore, you can fairly easily find it on the internet. Check out YouTube among others. So find it, watch it, and fight the irresistible urge to borrow Mom’s egg-timer.
No egg-timer, but I did have a piece of cardboard that I drew the controls on taped to my shirt. 🙂
When we were kids, we knew how to play, didn’t we!
I watched the film on the USA Network with a host popping up in the commercial breaks. Well done. (This was much better that the serial compilation “J-Men Forever.” That one only existed to put Cheech & Chong style drug humor (an oxymoron, IMO) to clips from Cpt Marvel, Cpt America & Rocketman footage.)
BTW, in the opening credits, the final cast credit was, “And Introducing Leonard Nimoy.”
I’d like to see that show up on TV again, but I guess they’d have to edit even more material to make it fit into today’s two-hour time slot. It seems that 20 minutes of commercials and 40 minutes of programming makes up each hour, by current standards. So the 93 minute version would have to be further trimmed to 80 minutes. If things keep going at this rate, one of these days, there’ll only be enough time left for the credits!