Category: Golden Age Article

DVD Review, Golden Age Article

DVD Review: The Lone Wolf Meets a Lady

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Joan Bradley (Jean Muir), a secretary about to meet her boss’ son is confronted by a husband she’d believed dead who shows up at her apartment to blackmail her. He is murdered while she’s in the other room. She runs into the Lone Wolf (Warren William) and his butler sidekick Jamison (Eric Blore). The two try to help the secretary by chivalrously altering the crime scene in a way that makes her look innocent. However, the police catch a mistake and it’s up to the Lone Wolf to find the real murderer or else he and the secretary could go to jail.

Overall, the film is decently executed. The mystery and the supporting characters are adequate. Warren William has a decent turn as the detective, but was not a standout for the era. He lacked the energy he had in some of his earlier films and was not up to the standard of Chester Morris and George Sanders who played similar roles in the Saint and Boston Blackie films. The saving grace of the film was Eric Blore, who made a great comic sidekick. Blore steals every scene he’s in and provides just the right amount of comic relief to the film without becoming annoying as so many comic sidekicks of the era did.

The DVD is the definition of no frills: no DVD menu, let alone any extras. As a result, when you put the DVD in, it starts playing automatically. For me, this was a minor annoyance.

Overall, this isn’t a bad mystery, but I only recommend it if you want to see an example of the Lone Wolf in action.

Rating: 3.25 out of 5.0

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Book Review, Golden Age Article

Audiobook Review: Black Mask 1: Doors in the Dark

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Doors in the Dark gives is the first of several audiobooks that provide material that first appeared in Black Mask Magazine, perhaps the best known of the crime magazine pulps.

The collection begins with Keith Alen Deutsch’s history of Black Mask. It’s a great listen for fans of classic crime fiction, though skippable if you just want the story.

“Come and Get It,” is written by Erle Stanley Gardener, who’d become a mystery legend for writing Perry Mason. This story features Ed Jenkins, the Phantom Crook. This story is a self-contained short novel but in a series of novels involving the Phantom Crook’s battle with a crime syndicate who is trying to hurt a girl that Jenkins likes. Jenkins has some of the cleverness and cunning that would later be seen in characters like Leslie Charteris’ the Saint. However, he’s also a bit of a throwback to the “Crook with a Heart of Gold” character that was popular in the 1920s, and his sharp self-definition of himself as a “crook” is a dominant. Overall, this story is decent.

“Arson Plus” was originally published by Dashiell Hammett under the pseudonym of Peter Collinson. It’s the first story featuring Hammett’s Continental Op. It’s a quick moving arson case with a very clever solution.

“The Fall Guy” was written by George Harrison Coxe and features Flash Casey, the great crime photographer. Having listened to many episodes of the radio show, “Casey, Crime Photographer,” I found this to be a bit of a treat. The story itself is competent, but not “flashy” with typical noir characters.

“Doors in the Dark,” by Frederick Nebel features Captain Steve McBride investigating the apparent suicide of a friend, but he believes it’s murder. This story is from the series on which the Torchy Blane film series was based, though the series doesn’t feature Torchy with McBride being the hero. Still, there are some madcap/screwball moments in this story that set the tone for the Torchy Blane series.

“Lucky” by Doc Savage creator Lester Dent is one of the few stories featuring his crime solving Ship’s Captain/Insurance Oscar Sail. This story is fast paced and with a bit more violence than any other tale in the collection. Still, quite enjoyable with some clever twists.

Overall, I enjoyed this audiobook, but it’s one of those releases that fall under, “You will like if you like that sort of thing.” One negative review criticized the stories for having the same quality as old time radio. As someone who loves old time radio mysteries, I consider that a positive. The pulp genre is not high literature but much of it is still entertaining in its own way.

Ultimately, this audiobook offers talented narration of a good history of pulp fiction along with five classic pulp stories including a Flash Casey story and tales by the creators of Doc Savage, Perry Mason, and Sam Spade. If that sounds up your alley, then this is definitely an audiobook to pick up.

Rating: 4.0 out of 5.0

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Audio Drama Review, Golden Age Article

Audio Drama Review: The Wisdom of Father Brown, Volume 2

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Colonial Radio Theatre continues to bring the works of G.K. Chesterton’s Father Brown to the air in this second collection of four mysteries based on G.K. Chesterton’s Wisdom of Father Brown.

•The Duel of Dr. Hirsch-The reclusive French statesman Dr. Hirsch is accused of treason and Father Brown and Flambeau get caught in the midst of swirling political intrigue. This is a classic Father Brown story with a clever solution most listeners wouldn’t see coming. Colonial does a superb job on the adaptation and allows Chesterton’s misdirection to work its magic.

•The Man in the Passage-A great actress is murdered. Several men could have done it, but the case hinges on conflicting testimony as to what the suspects and Father Brown saw in the passage. This is probably one of Chesterton’s lesser mysteries and that it would be a mystery to the police that would end in a climatic court scene requires a greater suspension of disbelief than any other story in the Father Brown canon. The entire mystery is a joke and Father Brown’s conclusion is the punch line. The characters are played quite broadly and a bit over the top because of this, but Colonial is simply playing the story as it’s written. They do good job adapting a story that doesn’t easily lend itself to adaptation.

•The Purple Wig- A freelance journalist investigates a cursed aristocratic family and how that curse has apparently affected the latest Duke of Exmoor. This one has a great satirical element as it focuses on the efforts of a newspaper to shape public opinion by reporting facts that conform to the papers and the reader’s biases. The mystery isn’t bad and it’s wrapped in a clever bit of satire that feels as relevant today as it was when Chesterton wrote it more than a century ago.

•The God of the Gongs: Father Brown takes a winter holiday with Flambeau and they find themselves at a summer resort where Father Brown discovers a body and a dark mystery. This is the most straightforward and suspenseful tale on the CD and builds very nicely to its climax.

In taking on The Wisdom of Father Brown, Colonial has set out to adapt some of Chesterton’s most challenging stories for readers. Like Volume 1, Volume 2 to succeeds in making these stories entertaining and engaging for a modern audience while still being true to the source material with solid production values and good production values. Overall, another great Father Brown collection from Colonial Radio Theatre.

Rating: 4.25 out of 5.0

Disclosure: I received a free digital copy of this production in exchange for an honest review.

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DVD Review, Golden Age Article

Movie Review: My Gun is Quick (1956)

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My Gun is Quick stars Robert Bray as Mike Hammer, Mickey Spillane’s hardest of hard boiled private eyes. Hammer comes to the defense of a prostitute being beaten and gives her money to get home on. When he finds out later that she was murdered, Hammer sets out to find the killer.

The film is obviously low budget but competently made, with solid direction and editing. The less expensive production actually helps creates a gritty Noir feel.

Robert Bray was strangely given an “introducing” credit when he’d been appearing in films for fourteen years. However, he is a solid Mike Hammer. I’m not a huge fan of Mike Hammer, but I was pleased with Bray’s portrayal. He portrays Hammer as a rough character, but still makes him feel sympathetic and human as he goes about his journey as he cuts through the underworld to unravel this mystery which he takes on as a personal crusade.

The rest of the cast is mostly unknowns. The biggest name I recognized in this was Patricia Donahue, who played a bar girl in this and would later play Lucy Hamiltion in the Michael Shayne TV series. Despite the lack of star power, the cast turns in mostly solid performances.

Overall, the film is worth watching for fans of Mike Hammer, or those looking for a solid Noir film. It is available either as a DVD or for instant viewing through Amazon.com and can be watched by Amazon prime members for free.

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Book Review, Golden Age Article

Book Review: The Lone Wolf

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The Lone Wolf was a contemporary of Boston Blackie. Like Blackie, the Lone Wolf was a thief turned amateur detective who appeared in silent films, talkies, radio, and eventually television. Like Blackie, the Lone Wolf began in book form.

The Lone Wolf: A Melodrama” by Joseph Vance follows the career of Michael Lanyard, a boy abandoned in Paris to a life of hard labor, who became an apprentice thief and then a master thief who operated alone. He did this on the advice of his mentor who warned Lanyard of the pitfalls of letting his guard down. So Lanyard built a life of crime accompanied by a legitimate front that was a life of luxury, fine art, and expensive homes and solitude, thus why he became known as the Lone Wolf.

However, the Lone Wolf finds his secret veil pierced, and an international criminal syndicate is determined to force him to join with them…or not be able to either work or escape from Paris. On the run, from both the Paris police and this gang of criminals, Lanyard falls in love with the mysterious Lucille Bannon and vows to change his ways to make himself worthy of her. However, it becomes apparent she is not all she seems.

The Lone Wolf has a lot going for it. There’s plenty of plot-related mysteries and character questions to keep readers guessing and engaged. Lanyard is an interesting and sympathetic protagonist. He reminds me of Leslie Charteris’s early portrayal of the Saint, except the Lone Wolf is “tempted” to reform far earlier in his career than Simon Templar.

As the book’s subtitle promises, it has melodramatic moments and speeches which had me rolling my eyes, but Vance did warn readers upfront. The character of Lucille Bannon lacks definition, but that’s part of her being a woman of mystery, I guess. And the villains were more obstacles than real characters.

Despite its flaws, I enjoyed The Lone Wolf. The book has an amazing amount of action: fights, foot chases, car chases, attempted burglaries, and even an airplane chase make this truly action packed, add to that a lot of mystery, romance, and a fair splattering of comedy, and overall The Lone Wolf is an entertaining book that holds far better than you would expect an obscure book from more than a century ago to do.

Rating 3.75 out of 5.0

This book is available for free download through Project Gutenberg.

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Audio Drama Review, Golden Age Article

Audio Drama Review: The History of Harry Nile, Volume 7

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The final dozen stories to wrap up Phil Harper’s historic run as Harry Nile are collected in the History of Harry Nile, Volume 7, containing twelve episodes including three double length episodes and Harper’s final episode before he died.

Some of my favorites are:

The Case of the Interstate Stalker: A case where Harry helps out his sister who is being chased across the country by an obsessed used car dealer. It’s not a typical detective story, but it does show Harry’s personal side, and shows the aging private eye relating to his family.

The Friends of Jules Riskin: Another personal story that follows up on a previous episode, this time involving the death of Harry’s younger brother Joey. Harry’s been told it’s an accident but finds out otherwise, and faces a mob vendetta that could wipe out his family.

Twenty Grand: A shady business deal investigation leads Harry on the hunt for a rare car, and an encounter with an even more unusual woman. There’s some great twists and solid tension.

The Mobius Matter: The last Harry Nile story starring Phil Harper. A husband comes to Harry and Murphy saying he believes his wife is trying to kill him. Independently, the wife comes to them saying her husband is trying to kill her. It’s a very clever case with a lot of twists. The story features Richard Sanders from WRKP in Cincinnati.

Motive: Russell Johnson (the Professor from Gilligan’s Island) appears and the story has solid and unexpected twists.

The stories in this set are well-written and well-acted. My only minor quibble is with the ending of, “The Miracle Mile,” a story which took Harry back to Los Angeles to solve a problem for an old friend and then ended without Harry doing anything for his friend.

Beyond that, this was really a joy to listen to. Phil Harper’s run as Harry Nile was an all time classic run that’s been a pleasure to listen to, and his chemistry with the late Pat French was superb.

This is a good buy for long-time fans of Harry Nile. There are many callbacks to prior episodes, so those who are new to the character may want to try the History of Harry Nile, Volumes 1 or 2, or pick up one of the Adventures of Harry Nile sets with Larry Albert, who took over the role after Harper passed away.

However, if you do want to purchase this, be aware that March 19th, 2017 may be the last day you can order. Jim French productions is closing and there’s currently no plan for the episodes to continue to be legally available. So if you’re interested in any of their products, March 19th, 2017 is the deadline.

Rating: 4.5 out of 5.0

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Golden Age Article

How Fans Can Create a New Golden Age of Audio Drama

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In last week’s article, I wrote about what audio drama producers could do to create a new golden age of audio. Now let’s turn to what fans can do.

1) Don’t Pirate Modern Audio Dramas

Anti-piracy talks from big corporations generates eye rolls from many. It’s hard to feel sorry for a multi-billion dollar corporation and its multi-millionaire producers, directors, and stars. However, modern audio dramas typically operate on a much smaller profit margin. For them, the consequences of piracy can mean they are unable to produce as much new material as they would like,

or may be unable to continue in business at all.

Most people who produce audio dramas professionally do so, first for the love of the art form, but they have to be able to support themselves, their actors, and their crew in order to be able to produce top-notch work. So this point is important.

2) Enjoy Audio Dramas through Legal Means.

How can listeners legally enjoy audio dramas? There’s the obvious answers of purchasing them through either the producers’ websites or through audible.com or the ITunes store. On occasion, an audio drama producer will make a large selection of their works available through a site called HumbleBundle. It allows downloaders to pay whatever price they choose for a whole bundle of video games, books, and occasionally audio dramas.

There are legal ways to listen to audio dramas for free. For example, some audio dramas are still broadcast over the air. Colonial Radio Theatre is on the Air with a brand new series on affiliates in Seattle and in Troy, Alabama with live internet streaming available from the Seattle station. The Twilight Zone radio series is syndicated throughout the U.S. and strong ratings can be a boon to the program. In addition to traditional radio stations, BBC Radio 4 Extra offers listeners a wide variety of radio programs from its own library of programs. It has also broadcast episodes of the Twilight Zone and in the past has featured Big Finish Doctor Who plays.

Also some audio dramas may be available to borrow from your local library. If a particular audio drama isn’t available, you can request the library purchase it. In addition, check and see what electronic lending services your library offers. I found hundreds of audio dramas available through one of the apps my library offers. In addition, Big Finish offers hundreds hundreds of audio dramas through Spotify.

These electronic services can allow producers to earn a small amount of royalties for each listen or download which can be better than the library buying one copy and all the royalties they receive are from the sale of one disc. As I stated, this does depend very much on companies using an active distribution system.

3) Promote Good Audio Dramas

Good Audio dramas need to be talked about. Reviews are always welcome if you have the time to write them. Even a short post on social media that you enjoyed something can be helpful in getting the word out about good audio dramas. Again, most of these companies don’t have a huge PR budget. You honestly sharing what you like is of immense importance. In addition, if you do purchase audio dramas through Audible or through Itunes, you can rate your purchase without writing a review which can also be helpful.

Also consider giving the gift of audio dramas to people who you think might enjoy them. I was once leading a committee and I found there was an awareness of old time radio. I decided to give every member of the committee one of Colonial Radio Theater’s Father Brown CD sets because I thought that would be the most likely thing they would enjoy.

Of course, the gift of an audio drama CD would not appropriate for everyone, and the most important thing to consider in choosing the gift is the recipient. But if there’s someone on your gift list who you think might enjoy a good audio drama, you might open a whole new world to them with a gift no one else would think to give.

4) Join Audio Drama Crowd Funding Efforts

Crowdfunding is one of the more exciting developments of the 21st Century. Under the old model that dominated innovation and entertainment, consumers had to wait and see what would be offered to them by corporations. What food would they buy? What movies would they watch? The power of crowdfunding is that entrepreneurs and artists can bring their idea to people who can choose to invest a small amount of money in making it happen.

Audio Drama crowdfunding will come in two forms: Kickstarter and Patreon. With a Kickstarter campaign, an audio drama producer may ask people to help cover the cost of producing an audio drama or a series of episodes. There will often be rewards at various levels of support where you might get the physical product or a download when the item is released commercially.

With a Patreon campaign, you give monthly to support the audio drama production. It may be producing a podcast where all of its episodes are offered for free for listeners to download and rely entirely or mostly on listener support to continue going.

Whether it’s Kickstarter or Patreon, the concept is the same: You help support the creation of the art you enjoy and become partners in creating a new golden age of audio drama.

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Golden Age Article

How Audio Drama Producers Can Help Create a New Golden Age

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For the past forty years, Jim French has been a leading creator and advocate for audio drama. He’s produced around 1,000 episodes between all the programs Jim French productions has made. This Sunday will mark the 1,093rd and final weekly broadcast of Imagination Theater, and the final episode of the long-running Seattle based Detective series Harry Nile.

Yet, the end of French’s distinguished career doesn’t mean an end of audio drama in the United States. Far from it. There are many companies that are emerging, and of course, there are existing companies in the United States such as the Colonial Radio Theatre as well as the Twilight Zone Radio series which airs on 200 radio stations across America as well as several faith-based series like Adventures in Odyssey and Unshackled. In addition, there are great companies from Great Britain such as Big Finish and the production house of BBC radio 4.

Yet audio drama is shrouded in obscurity. To most Americans, it’s something that ended with the Golden Age of Radio. This belief is shared by many who would be an audience for it. Our twenty-first century world of high storage capacity, and streaming of wireless and data make audio drama attractive entertainment for life on the go. What’s required to make audio drama successful in the United States in the twenty-first century? There are several things that producers and fans can do to make this happen.

In this article I’ll focus on producers and next week I’ll focus on fans. My suggestions come from more of a “fan’s eye” view of how successful radio dramas work. The best audio producers I’ve mentioned are doing most most of these already, so I’m talking about the best practices I’ve observed. Hopefully new producers will join their ranks and provide a quality product that listeners will enjoy.

1) Focus on a Great Listener Experience:

Audio Drama is some of the least expensive media to produce compared to television and movies. However, a successful radio drama does require good script writing and good acting. The quality of the voice becomes more critical as there’s little that can be done if the acting is not right. It’s critical to think about the experience of the listener. I once purchased an audio drama where it turned out to be a recording of a stage play. It mostly worked, but I got lost as to what was going on at times due to physical actions that weren’t communicated for the audio. In such adaptations, adding linking narration in post-production can help keep listeners from getting lost.

2) Build a Great Community of Cast and Crew

One of the most striking things about the best audio dramas is how often the same names are repeated in the credits. Whether it’s Lincoln Clark at Colonial Radio Theater or John Dorney at Big Finish, great companies tend to use and develop talented actors, writers, and production staff.

3) Be Transparent About Content Issues

Not all audio dramas are for the whole family. However, many people may assume audio dramas will be relatively family friendly. Some will have heard old time radio and assume it would be like that. Audio producers may assume that anything goes since they’re telling a serious modern story without having to deal with FCC standards. Just because a story has a heavy topic doesn’t mean it requires strong language or graphic sex portrayals and it’s not wise to assume listeners will magically predict what producers will do. It’s advisable to include content warnings if your productions contain material that would get a film rated PG-13 or worse. Creators aren’t required by law or anyone else to post these notices, but if they don’t, they need to be prepared to get reviews from irate parents who decided to play their audio drama on a long car trip and their children were exposed to a torrent of F-bombs.

4) Make Programs Accessible and Affordable

It’s critical for producers to give the public a chance to get hooked on their productions. There are many ways to do this. For example, some audio drama producers make many of their older dramas available on Spotify, or they make them available through digital content distribution companies who provide them to libraries. Others will put full episodes of their series on Soundcloud or be featured in a broadcast like Imagination Theater. These may bring in small royalty checks or provide no income, but they allow listeners a risk free chance to discover what a company produces. Once the public discovers them, it’s important that companies find a way to balance the need for profit with the ability to keep their offerings affordable for the general public.

5) Keep Constantly Improving

Audio Drama producers should be constantly innovating and improving in every aspect of their business from cover art to music and sound design. With good companies like Big Finish or Colonial, you can tell their earliest productions from their later ones because they’ve stepped up their production values in every way.

A new company can start out doing productions with minimal sound effects and decent music. If they have good scripts and actors, it can still be entertaining provided they don’t try to produce a massive epic that can’t be done well with a 5,000 sound effects CD. As long as their reach doesn’t exceed their grasp, they can be in a good place. But it’s important to avoid complacency. The top-of-the-line audio productions sound much better than those that were made just ten years ago, and smart producers will work to reach that level.

There’s a great opportunity for innovative people to join those already making great audio drama. Talent and a dedication to quality are the keys to success.

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Book Review, Golden Age Article

Book Review: 400 Things Cops Know

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In 400 Things Cops Know, veteran Milwaukee and San Francisco Police patrolmen Adam Plantinga shares his experiences as a 21st Century big city police officer.

The book is divided into nineteen chapters, the first eighteen are centered on subjects ranging from what you would think would be the mundane issues in seasonal policing to the straight dope about shootings and car chases. The final chapter is fifty-four miscellaneous “things” that didn’t fit easily into the proceeding chapters. The “400 things” are a mix of short vignettes, quick tidbits of cop information, and longer reflections on the life and methods of police officers.

Plantinga makes each of these tips engaging. Some are humorous, some are poignant, and others are just plain interesting. Some of these include sharing the advice that when a police officer stops a car full of shady characters to do a search, that the passengers should be seated in a specific manner to avoid a sudden escape or interference with the search.

Or the fact that it’s possible for pedestrians to be hit so hard by a car, they fly out of their shoes.

If you ever wondered about criminals in TV shows and movies who were horrible shots and fire repeatedly at a target without hitting it, that isn’t necessarily unrealistic. “Most bad guys can’t shoot for spit,” writes Plantinga. The book also tells how police officers can recognize a shoplifter.

The book offers several rules of the road for patrolmen that you won’t find in a manual. For example, Plantinga says, if an officer comes across children selling lemonade or raffle tickets for their school or sports team, “you shall buy some, and if you have no cash on you, you shall go to an ATM and procure some.” He further states police officers should give an offending motorist either a ticket or a lecture but that’s “it’s not fair” to give both.

The book goes into deeper and sadder sides of police work in chapters about “being among the Dead,” “Domestic Violence,” and “Hookers and Johns.”  Plantinga’s insights are often poignant and always honest. Often the book’s language reflects the ugly and coarse world many metropolitan policemen operate in.

This insightful book is a must-read for anyone who writes modern day crime fiction. It’s further recommended for anyone who wants to know what real life on the street is like for a modern urban patrolmen.

Rating: 5.0 out of 5.0

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Audio Drama Review, Golden Age Article

Audio Drama Review: Avengers, The Lost Episodes, Volume 7

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Big Finish concludes its four-year promise of adapting all the episodes from the mostly lost first season of the Avengers starring Anthony Howell as Dr. David Keel and Julian Wadham as John Steed. There are three stories in this final release, but only one features both protagonists.

Dragonsfield is a superb Cold War story that finds Steed on his own and investigating espionage at a British lab. The lab is trying to create a top-of-the line space suit in order to sell it to the Americans. This story is a delightfully done mystery with plenty of suspects and manages to keep you guessing. We do see Steed using some enhanced interrogation methods on one spy, but other than that this is a very well-done story featuring Steed alone.

In the Far Distant Dead, on his way home from a South American holiday, Dr. Keel stops to provide medical relief in the wake of a cyclone. In the process, he encounters a fisherman with food poisoning and discovers the source–a can of hydraulic fluid mis-labeled as olive oil.

Keel sets out to get to the bottom of the deliberate act meant to save on custom fees. Following on the heels of a solo episode for Steed, this solo episode for Keel balances things out and we get a story that centers on Keel as a physician and where the mystery is driven by Keel’s compassion and righteous anger. Dr. Sandoval is an interesting supporting character. Is her outrage real or is she in on the conspiracy?

The story does suffer from a villain who is over-the-top. The way he says “Kill him!” is hilarious but I don’t know if that goes well with the tone of the story.

Finally, in The Deadly Air, Steed and Keel investigate sabotage at a laboratory trying to discover a vaccine. This story suffers from being in the same box set as Dragonsfield which is a much better story, rendering The Deadly Air a repetitive episode.

The story is okay, but it pales in comparison to Dragonsfield which has more suspense and more interesting characters. This adventure by comparison is an average story with a few good moments.

Overall, this is a good set in what’s been a good series. The Lost Episodes has filled a big hole in the history of one the 1960s most beloved and iconic programs with superb acting, good writing, and a dedication to authenticity.

Overall rating for this box set: 3.75 out of 5.0

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DVD Review, Golden Age Article

DVD Review: The Line Up

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The Line Up is a noir film based on the 1954-60 TV series of the same name (later syndicated as San Francisco Beat.) The film begins with an exciting scene where a cabbie flees police and drives erratically until he’s shot. Lieutenant Guthrie (Warner Anderson) and the police discover a smuggling ring which smuggles heroin through the baggage of innocent people and then retrieves the heroin from them.

There are two basic reasons to see this film:

The first are the stars are not the police but the villains. Dancer (Eli Wallach) is a psychopathic gangster and is assisted by his wiser mentor Julian (Robert Keith) in collecting the drugs and disposing of those who know too much which turns out to be most people.

Unlike in an earlier era where these two would walk around sounding dopey, Dancer and Julian are constantly well-spoken, polite, even friendly when the job calls for it. However, in an instant, they turn deadly. Julian sums up Dancer well, “There’s never been a guy like Dancer. He’s a wonderful, pure pathological study. He’s a psychopath with no inhibitions.” Wallach makes the character very believable and menacing.

Johnny Dollar star Bob Bailey has one scene in this film as a finger man telling Dancer who the drugs had been smuggled in with. It’s a decent performance.

Also, though he only appeared in one scene where he barely spoke, Vaughn Taylor turns in a memorable performance as the drug kingpin, “The Man.” It’s practically an acting clinic on how much can be communicated using only facial expressions.

The second big reason to see this is San Francisco. So much of the movie is shot on location in the City by the Bay. The locations aren’t only good looking but they’re used in some innovative ways in the story. It really makes for a unique look.

The film’s biggest issue is the police characters. The film’s intent was to rope in the 30 million fans of the TV series, “The Line Up,” which is why stars of that series were brought in. However, these scenes are the least interesting in the film. Not bad per se, just obligatory. Policework can be interesting in a Noir film (see: He Walked by Night) but it doesn’t happen here.

In addition to the trailer, the DVD release includes a kind of interesting special feature with Dark Knight Director Christopher Nolan discussing how the NOIR genre influenced him. I was surprised that this film had a commentary track, but listening to it, I found it a bit unpleasant as one of the commentators was just randomly foul-mouthed rather than insightful or funny.

Overall, The Line-Up is a solid film and there’s much to recommend it to those who love Noir films, San Francisco, or Bob Bailey. Ironically, the only thing you won’t get out of it is a sense what the classic radio series the Line Up looked like on film.

Rating: 4.0 out of 5.0

Available for purcahse on Amazon.

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Book Review, Golden Age Article

Book Review: The Sinister Shadow

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Doc Savage and the Shadow are two of the greatest pulp heroes of all time. Yet, they’ve never met in their original book medium. There have been attempts to do this in comic book form, but the ones I’ve read have been somewhat underwhelming.

The Sinister Shadow by Will Murray takes an original idea by Lester Dent in order to bring these two legends of the 1930s together in one book.

In the books, “Lamont Cranston” was not the true identity of the Shadow. Rather, the Shadow forced Cranston to let him impersonate him when Cranston was away from the city (which was most of the time) on the threat that, if he didn’t, the Shadow would completely steal Cranston’s identity, leaving Cranston without a place in the world because somebody’s got to fight evil, right? In the pulps, Cranston’s amused by this and agrees. In this book, Cranston isn’t as much amused as resigned.

However, Cranston receives a blackmail notice from a villain identifying himself as the Funeral Director who threatens to kill Cranston unless he gives him $50,000. Cranston thinks the villain is the Shadow and turns to Doc Savage’s aide Ham Brooks for help. Before they can get to Doc, both are kidnapped. This leads to both the Shadow and Doc Savage being on the trail of the Funeral Director.

The book has a lot to offer. Much of it is spent with Doc and friends suspecting the Shadow as the creepy methods of the Funeral Director seem his style and the Shadow works outside the law while Doc is an honorary Inspector for the NYPD. In addition, Doc and his men have a no killing rule, while the Shadow has no qualms about dealing out rough justice to the criminal world. Thus our two protagonists spend time hunting and battling each other before turning to the real bad guy. These parts of the book are fun and Murray does a good job writing both characters. Doc’s men are their usual selves while Doc remains ever the unflappable and brilliant man of bronze. The Shadow is mysterious and baffles the great Doc Savage with his strange methods. Doc’s assistants also are great though they’re pushed more to the background than usual. The Shadow’s henchmen are generic and lack a lot of personality.

As for the villain, the Funeral Director is a perfect foil for our protagonists. He’s a creepy, evil villain whose theme is centered around death and dying complete with coffins. It seems like an obvious idea for a supervillain but I’ve never read it done before. Why the Funeral Director came after Cranston is never satisfactorily explained and it comes off as a plot convenience.

This book is enjoyable, though it’s not Shakespeare or even Raymond Chandler. It’s a new pulp adventure team up from the man who is better at recapturing the spirit of the original pulps than any other writer today. While I won’t say it exceeded my expectations, it certainly met them. After nearly eighty years, Will Murray finally created a story worthy of these two great characters and if you’re a fan of either one, it’s a worthwhile read.

Rating: 4.0 out of 5.0

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Golden Age Article, Sherlock Holmes, Telefilm Review

Sherlock Series 4 Review

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Sherlock Series 4 features three feature-length episodes, “The Six Thatchers,” “The Lying Detective,” and “The Final Problem.”

The series was certainly different from the prior three. It would be inaccurate to say there’s no mystery in this season but they’re definitely very different sorts of mysteries.  We’ll go ahead and examine each episode in turn.

Warning, spoilers ahead for the first episode.

“The Six Thatchers” follows the events of Series 3 and the nightmare trip which was, “The Abominable Bride,” with Holmes having been given clemency for committing murder at the end of Series 3 in order to confront the seeming return of Moriarty. Holmes’ reaction is to put that off until something happens with Moriarty or whoever’s impersonating him. He returns to being a detective and texting all the time. While showing texts in Series 1 was interesting, it became incessant at the start of this episode. Characters should text far less than people in real life do.

There are some things I liked about this episode. I thought it was funny when Holmes offered to give Lestrade credit for solving a case, and Lestrade pointed out he’d done that before, and Watson wrote about it on his blog, making Lestrade look foolish. It’s a subtle dig at the original stories which were published by Dr. Watson in-universe, including stories where Holmes agrees to let Lestrade take credit for solving the case while the story exists in-universe and reveals otherwise.

The first half of “The Six Thatchers” is a well-done modern retelling of “The Six Napoleons,” which I really enjoyed. It leads into an ex-spy colleague of Mary Watson hunting her down for betraying him and the rest of her team.

Mary runs away. Sherlock tracks her down and searches for the real traitor. They confront the traitor unarmed and the traitor tries to kill Sherlock and Mary throws herself in the way of the bullet and is killed.

I found the “Mary has another secret” plot to be a bit of a rehash of plot points from Series Three. It was sad to see Mary go, but she died in the books, so it’s hard to complain about that. This episode was okay, not great, but it had some good moments.

“The Lying Detective,” finds Watson having cutting Holmes out of his life for failing to fulfill his vow to protect the Watson family. Holmes’ health is deteriorating, even as he pursues a rich man named Culverton Smith who may or may not be a serial killer.

This story leaves you constantly questioning who you can trust. Holmes has been taking drugs, and we’re given reason to question if what the audience sees is real or drug-induced fantasies. At the same time, Watson is hallucinating about Mary, with Mary even being helpful enough to tell him that she’s a hallucination created by his own mind.

This story does keep you thinking as there’s suspense about what exactly has happened. There’s not a question of who did it since there’s not a specific crime being investigated. That lets the central conflict be a battle of wits between Holmes and Smith.

Not being sure what you’re seeing is true makes for an interesting story, but I wouldn’t want to see another episode like this.

The series wraps up with, “The Final Problem,” in which we finally find out what was behind Moriarty’s re-appearance after dying in Series 2 as well as Sherlock finally learning the truth of his own past. I enjoyed this episode for the most part. It is much more psychological thriller than a typical murder mystery, but it has more use of deductive skills than any other episode this series. The final few minutes are superb as they say a lot about the man Sherlock has become without him saying much of anything.

On the other hand, to enjoy this, you have to accept Sherlock’s opponent in this story is a supervillain with the power to control any person if they get within three feet of her and speak to her alone. It can be disconcerting when a Sherlock Holmes story takes a giant step outside the realms of reasoning that’s such a hallmark of the character. To be fair, Steven Moffat is far from the first to do this. Sherlock Holmes has appeared in numerous pastiches that have put him up against supernatural creatures, aliens from outer space, and all other sorts of weirdness. This sort of thing certainly has been done worse.

The decisions this series have certainly been controversial, but I understand why they were made. When this series started in 2010, Moffat set Sherlock on a journey. In Series 1, Sherlock could be far more cold and oblivious to how others feel, and in many ways he couldn’t care less. In the first episode, Inspector Lestrade expressed his hope for Holmes, “Sherlock Holmes is a great man, and I think one day, if we’re very, very lucky, he might even be a good one.”

And that’s been the journey Sherlock’s been on. It’s not unheard of to do this in modern detective programs. In Monk, Adrian Monk was on a journey to become whole and find peace. The big difference between Sherlock and Monk is Monk aired sixteen hours of new episodes per year for eight seasons and worked Monk’s emotional journey into that series.

The challenge with Sherlock is they’ve gotten three feature-length episodes every two to three years due to the rising popularity of the series stars. Benedict Cumberbatch and Martin Freeman have both become major stars in Hollywood and scheduling has become more difficult. Who knows when they will be able to do a Series 5 or if they will be able to. Moffat seems to have wanted to ensure that character arc was completed, so a lot of character-related stuff was shoved into Series 4 in order to give the series a good stopping place.

The challenge is Moffat squeezed so much character work into this series, the mystery elements suffer. And to further along Sherlock’s character story, the show does some things that compromise Watson’s character.

Whether you enjoy it will depend on what you’re looking for. If all you want is a simple, well-written detective story, you’re going to be disappointed. The more invested your are in these characters, the more you’ll get out of it and the more forgiving you’ll be about the series’ flaws as you get to see Sherlock’s personal growth.

I was invested enough that I enjoyed the series,  but I’ll be okay if there’s not an additional series or future one-shot movies. Unlike the previous three finales, “The Final Problem” doesn’t end with a cliffhanger that demands another series. Unless Moffat plans on bringing viewers the type of mysteries that got people into Sherlock in the first place, it’s probably best just to leave it there.

Rating: 3.25 out of 5.0

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Audio Drama Review, Golden Age Article

Audio Drama Review: The Avengers: The Comic Strip Adaptations, Volume 2

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The second and final volume of Big Finish’s Avengers Comic Strip adaptations offers four more hour long adventures featuring Julia Wadham and Olivia Poulet playing the iconic roles of of John Steed and Emma Peel.

The set begins with “Playtime is Over” in which Steed and Peel investigate a series of daring robberies apparently committed by children. When a man who has offered them a lead is murdered by a toy boat, that sets them onto a toy factory run by an eccentric man who never quite grew up.

This takes the offbeat nature of the Avengers and ups the zaniness to the level of a 1960s Batman TV episode. It’s incredible fun, if a bit predictable at times.

In “The Antongoniser,” after several strange deaths, Steed and Mrs. Peel are put on the case and discover the cause of death is animals gone bad. This is an entertaining program, with some fun moments, but it doesn’t measure up to the better episodes in the series with a mystery that’s too quickly solved and a villain that’s not that interesting. Still, worth a listen due to the fun one-liners.

In, “The Mad Hatter,” a visiting foreign princess becomes a target for assassins. As the title implies, a theme villain is behind it, but the story has a lot of twists on its way to the big reveal. The dialogue is hilarious as are many of the situations. Although, the idea of a rattlesnake being hidden in a bowler hat does cross the line from hilarious to ludicrous. Still, a fun episode.

“The Secret Six” is a perfect finale for the comic strip stories as Steed and Mrs. Peel find themselves prisoners at a country estate where they are held by six master criminals from around the globe who have decided that eliminating Steed and Peel is critical for their evil plans to succeed. It’s an action packed and dizzying ride as the two have to dodge bullets and even a tank in their quest to stay alive. Overall, this is a fun and exhilarating conclusion to the series. My only complaint is  several of the six villains were not quite credible as crime bosses. In the end, that doesn’t stop this finale from being a pleasure to listen to.

Ratings: 4.0 out of 5.0

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Book Review, Golden Age Article

Graphic Novel Review: The Ocean of Osyria

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The Ocean of Osyria is the first book in the Hardy Boys graphic novel series from Papercutz setting the Hardy’s adventures in modern day.

The basic plot is that the Hardy’s old pal Chet Morton gets into trouble when he accidently buys an art treasure off of an online auction site. Now, the Hardys have to clear him in a globe-trotting adventure that takes them to the Middle East and Europe.

The book does a good job capturing the Hardy Boys’ basic personalities. The mystery is kind of light and the focus of the book is on adventure. The numerous locations in the story are very well-drawn. The book does borrow a bit from the Hardy Boys Case Files of the late 1980s and 1990s with the involvement of a secret government agency in setting the Hardys on the case. In addition, we do get Frank and Joe’s girlfriends involved in the adventure which didn’t usually happen either in the original series or in the later books. The art is vibrant and exciting.

As someone who devoured the Case Files in the 1990s, I do find the graphic novel format weaker. You lose a lot of relationship moments between Frank and Joe and really don’t get to know a lot of the side characters. The story is also simple compared to the complexity that could be developed in a 150 page paperback novel. But then again, I found of Ocean of Osyria fast-paced and fun. Frank and Joe Hardy lived the life and had the adventures that every boy dreams of and the graphic novel still captures that spirit nicely. Overall, this is a solid book and it’s a nice way to introduce younger comic fans to the Hardy Boys.

Rating: 3.5 out of 5

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