Film Year: 1942
Genre: Horror
Director: Sam Newfield
Starring: Johnny Downs, George Zucco, Anne Bagel, Reginald Barlow
MST Season: 1
Featured Short: "Radar Men from the Moon: Chapter Two - Molten Terror"
The Short
After narrowly escaping the Moon Men’s base, Commando Cody immediately goes back because he’s stupid. This time he successfully escapes with the diabolical ray gun that threatens humanity, but the Moon Men are on his tail.
Second verse same as the first. If you’ve seen one serial, you’ve seen them all. There might be little tweaks to the costumes and set design between each, but not in format. And if you’ve seen the first chapter of any serial, you might as well skip to the last because you really aren’t missing much of anything in between. In the case of Molten Terror, it definitely feels as if little plot progression has been made. Cody escapes from the evil aliens, as a brief chat with his comrades, then just waltzes back because they had to fill time for twelve of these suckers. The rest of the short is just small pieces of people punching each other and a prolonged chase scene thrown in for good measure.
So yeah, that’s about twenty minutes of my time I’ll never get back. It must have been boring being a kid in the 40s and 50s if this was considered entertainment. I can only imagine paying my hard earned allowance to see a serial and realizing walking out that nothing really happened. Sure, I got my repetitive plot lines out of shows like Transformers and Power Rangers, but at least on television those were free.
The Movie
Mad scientist experiments on a handyman, transfusing his blood with that of a wolf, turning him into a wolf monster. After this scientific breakthrough that will advance the study of…stuff…he decides to use his creature to kill his rivals.
Poverty Row production was obviously made to cash in on the success of Universal’s The Wolf Man the previous year has none of the production value or the talent of its inspiration. In this film the monster is actually played by Glenn Strange, who wound up taking the mantel of Frankenstein’s Monster for the final films in Universal’s Frankenstein series (including the legendary Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein). It’s a fairly standard rush job monster movie, with very little to distinguish it from other movies of its ilk, though everything to distinguish it from the best monster movies of the period.
The movie doesn’t waste time into getting to our title monster, as the opening scenes are dedicated to its first transformation. Then it goes for lengthy exposition, before setting the monster loose immediately afterward. This is good, because there is no substance to the human drama, which is typical mad-scientist-revenge-on-those-who-mock-him nonsense. Maybe the movie realizes this and feeds an audience’s desire to cut to the chase, which it does. The set pieces aren’t extraordinary, but they’re serviceable. Sometimes even a bit dark, as the film implies that the monster’s first victim is a little girl no older than five.
Mad Monster lacks creativity, but the movie wasn’t made to be creative. It was made to appeal to that monster movie crowd that just wants a hairy fiend and a fog machine. They get what they pay for.
The Episode
Riffing Mad Monster is pretty much child’s play. While the movie itself isn’t unwatchable (poor print aside), the movie opens itself up to being made fun of in many ways, such as an early sequence in which our mad scientist has an argument with a condescending group of imaginary pupils (which Servo points out that if he was imagining them they could have at least been afraid of him). I found myself laughing quite a bit here, as our boys take a liking to mocking the science scenes, which includes a hearty laugh at the werewolf’s expense when they claim that our lycanthrope was created as a cure for baldness (and some people say the first season isn’t funny. Nuts to that, I say!). As the film goes on we’re treated to quite a few bits that put on the giggles, such as Servo’s interestingly enough on-point sitcom references during werewolf scenes, Joel’s wonderful telephone conversation with a movie character, and of course the pre-requisite treating the wolf monster like a pet puppy. Servo also does a few Of Mice and Men references to our simple-minded monster, which may or may not be a conscious reference to Wolf Man Lon Cheney Jr. (whose other claim to fame was a film adaptation of said novel).
Unfortunately the riffing on Commando Cody is a brick wall. There’s so little happening combining with similar beats with the first chapter that they seem utterly lost with it. They do introduce the “Nipple tweak” joke, which they run on throughout the serial, though the rest of the short is a bummer.
Like Robot vs. the Aztec Mummy, the tint on the silhouettes shifts constantly in this episode. Unlike the previous, the shifts aren’t nearly as subtle. It feels like somebody did a painful frame by frame re-coloring of the Shadow-Rama depending on the point of the film they’re watching, so they’re constantly changing color. When watching this episode, it’s best to keep your eyes on the movie because glaring at Joel and the bots will hurt your eyes like an eclipse. Unfortunately the movie has quite possibly the worst print any film has ever had on the show, so that’s of little comfort.
Fun is the best word to describe the host segments. Top prize is a quality remake of Humanoid Woman's host segment where Tom Servo hits on a blender. There’s also a cute segment where Joel switches the heads of the bots, and the Mads give off one of my favorite closing lines (“Of course we’re not pleased, can’t you see that a mad scientist has just DIED?!”). Theme of the invention exchange is fire, which provides a safety system for stolen purses and a flamethrowing Godzilla toy.
Poopie!: Joel accidentally calls Servo Crow at one point in the theater. Josh and Trace cover this up pretty well.
The Commando Cody short is such a lull that I hesitate to recommend this episode. But the truth of the matter is that when the ball gets rolling it’s pretty funny. Mad Monster is another first season episode I enjoy.
Good
The DVD
When Shout Factory announced Volume XIV, MSTies around the country were stunned to see a first season episode listed among the episode list. Rhino had only bothered to release two during their entire run, and then Shout tapped into that well almost instantly. Not that I’m complaining. All episodes deserve their fair shot. Presentation is as good as these early episodes could ask for, with clear picture and sound. The only special feature is a trailer to the film itself.
The short is featured with all the other Commando Cody chapters on Shout Factory’s website exclusive DVD paired up with Volume XXV.
No comments:
Post a Comment