Tag: audio drama

Audio Drama Review, Golden Age Article

Audio Drama Review: The Red Panda Adventures, Season Eleven

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With the end of Season Ten of The Red Panda Adventures, The Red Panda and the Flying Squirrel retired and are thought dead by the general public. Toronto has a new protector, so what exactly is left for Season Eleven? Six lost stories occurred between the Adventures of the Red Panda that we heard on audio.

Each episode has a framing device that sets up a look back at a never-before-told story. It’s a fun format that doesn’t carry the weight of trying to fit into the ongoing arcs of the previous seasons. The adventures are fun and imaginative and most tended toward the pre-war era for the Terrific Twosome of Toronto which had a nostalgic effect. My favorite episode was Twas the Night Before in which the young son of the Red Panda and the Flying Squirrel tells a story of the Red Panda and how he encountered Santa Claus. It’s easily the best Christmas episode Decoder Ring Theater ever produced and fun.

If I had one complaint, it was that a few framing stories seemed to be related and that they were all going to tie together with our heroes taking some (out of costume?) action but alas they weren’t going anywhere. Still, I’m not certain how much of that’s Taylor’s fault and how much it’s mine for having the expectation.

Overall, this is a nice little encore for the Red Panda and Flying Squirrel whose past adventures continue to be explored in comics and audiobooks.

Rating for the Series: 4.25 out of 5

Overall Thoughts on the Series:

The Red Panda Adventures was a cleverly structured series. The series has ongoing plot arcs throughout its run. Gregg Taylor was clever in the show’s early run with the way each series would seemingly be episodic but would also be setting up future events, such as the Red Pandas encounter with the Nazis before World War II, hints of magic influences that would culminate in the Occult War, and the mysterious disappearance of former Red Panda operative during the latter part of the War, which would be a big concern for the Flying Squirrel during Season Nine and paid off in Season Ten.

As a pastiche to mystery men and shows like the Green Lantern and the Shadow, it’s unparalleled. In one way, Taylor improved on these old radio programs and pulps. In the original stories from the golden age, these characters never aged, but did change to meet the needs and demands of wartime. Taylor gave his characters life. They changed and evolved. The Red Panda had an era of dominance and an apex of power that waned, giving way to the age of costumed and caped superheroes that succeeded him. It’s a good solid character journey through an exciting era.

Taylor’s stories used pulp-style stories of monsters, crime, and horror, but also was clearly influenced by later works as well, as Marvel and DC stories, along with Science Fiction franchises clearly were an influence that Taylor managed to translate back to his golden age setting.

The acting was good. Often over the top, but that’s  what the series called for and it did a good job delivering it. The series had a recurring ensemble cast that made it possible to bring Taylor’s vision of the Toronto of the 1930s and 1940s to life.

The show’s biggest consistent problem was its weak sound effects. These weren’t “cheesy like the old days.” In the old days on radio, they had sound effects men who could have produced much higher quality effects when the Shadow was on the air then were included in The Red Panda. The best thing that could be done to improve the series is remastering it with better effects. The series mostly avoids moments that call for big effects, but I can’t recall a single time a big effect landed.

Some ideas developed during the series weren’t fully explored. Taylor introduced characters featured only once, such as a new butler whose memory wasn’t wiped and the Flying Squirrel’s mother moving in to take care of the baby or different new superheroes or villains. The limits of the series left a lot of interesting ground unexplored.

The series also could try a bit too hard with modern-thinking characters existing in the 1930s and 1940s. But it never took itself too seriously, which makes such efforts clumsy but inoffensive.

Overall, The Red Panda Adventures is not only a pioneering series in the new world of original podcast audio dramas, but it also manages to capture the spirit of programs like The Shadow and the old pulp magazines and find new ways to make them fun for a modern audience. It overcomes its weak sound effects through well-plotted and interesting series and continues its legacy in books, audiobooks, and comics.

Rating: 4.5 out of 5

 

Audio Drama Review, Golden Age Article

Audio Drama Review: Black Jack Justice, Season Eleven

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Black Jack Justice ended its run as an audio drama with a six-episode eleventh season, once again featuring Christopher Mott as Black Jack Justice and Andrea Lyons as Trixie Dixon, Girl Detective.

The Eleventh Season was much the same as the first ten. The series has a very established beat at this point in the run. You get a typical mix of mystery, comedy, and glorious witty banter.

Big moments were rare. Perhaps, the biggest was the appearance of a federal agent leading to an explanation of the disappearance of a long-time supporting cast member. They did their best to manage it, but the fact that was the cast member left off-stage and they tried to give it as much weight as they could. The series finale featured Jack and his wife Dot going on a double date with Lieutenant Sabian (Gregg Taylor) and Dot’s supervisor in hopes of them getting together while Trixie is undercover as a waitress at the restaurant trying to get to the bottom of a client’s allegation that a mob is starting a protection racket. It’s a fun story.

It’s not what you expect from a series finale these days, though. However, writer Gregg Taylor argued that Black Jack Justice was one of those series that had no need for a big series finale and he’s right.

Serialized storytelling has become all the rage and with good reason. There’s something satisfying about watching characters not only have adventures, but grow and change, and having their world and life change as a result of the decisions made by them and those around them. To not have a big finale for these type of programs that ties up all the plotlines and character arcs would be a shame.

Black Jack Justice is an old-school episodic series. You can listen to any of its seventy-two episodes in any order without any real confusion. So there’s no need for closure, no requirements for the characters to come to a dramatic end.

Season Eleven does a fine job and is entertaining as always. At this point, it’s a comfortable blanket and a cup of cocoa. It delivers everything you would expect. I don’t think any episode would stand out as the series best, although I feel the finale was the best of the season with some great humor and some good moments for some supporting characters.

Season rating: 4 out of 5

Thoughts on the Series:

Typically, most hard boiled private eyes are solo acts. The Justice and Dixon combo where both narrate at different times, both have hard-boiled banter is, as far as I know, unique. The origins of this was a stage comedy act, and having dueling noirish narrators sounds like a Whose Line is it Anyway sketch, not a blueprint for a seventy-two episode series. So credit to Taylor, Lyons, and Mott for making it all come together.

The series came up with consistently good mysteries. The solutions rarely could be guessed from the beginning. Usually they were surprising and often added to the humor of the episode. The character of Lieutenant Sabian wasn’t incompetent, but was a smart cop who asked smart questions and even solved the case a couple of times. While Jack tended to solve more mysteries than anyone, really the solution could come from Trixie or Sabian as well.

While there was little character development, the characters were more complex than their typical jobs would allow. While Tracy and Jack act like they’re complete cynics, they both have shown moments of compassion and a desire for justice.

The series also breaks a key dramatic trope. From the first season, Jack and Trixie irritated each other, got on each other’s nerves, and were often nice to each other. Contrary to dramatic expectations, this didn’t mean they were destined to fall in love. This means they found each other mildly irritating and didn’t like each other. Bold move.

Justice and Dixon’s talents compliment each other well, but they’re not friends or buddies. Tolerance and a joy of annoying each other is probably the closest they’re going to get.

The series is a model of episodic fiction. There are changes that happen for our leads: Clearly establish Trixie as an equal partner in Season Two, the adoption of the office dog King, Jack getting married, and two other characters leaving the series stand out. But none of these really change the essential: Justice and Dixon sitting around the office, waiting for cases, chatting with clients, and going out and solving them.

At times, this series set in the 1950s does a stretch a bit too much to be modern but not too often. It’s a delightful throwback that has a real staying power. It’s fun and well-written. These 72 episodes stand up as a fun homage to the hard boiled detective drama and it’s been a delight to listen to them.

Rating: 4.25 out of 5

Audio Drama Review, Golden Age Article

Audio Drama Review: The Junebug Mystery Plus Six More

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Retired Police Captain Waverly Underhill (Dave Ellsworth) was the lead character in the Captain Underhill mysteries which were presented sporadically over radio from 1982-2010 as part of the Cape Cod Radio Mystery Theatre. He was joined by Wally O’Hara as Doctor Alexander Scofield, his friend and physician. This set collects seven total mysteries, with most ranging between 50 minutes and an hour and a half in length.

Most of the mysteries are set in the contemporary era of the program, although two episodes feature tales from the 1960s when Underhill was still an active policeman and encountered cases involving JFK and the Beetles.

This set was my first time encountering Captain Underhill and I enjoyed both Underhill and Doctor Scofield. The two have al New England “Holmes and Watson” vibe that works for them without seeming too derivative. They work well together and they’re fun to listen to.

Underhill makes a great lead detective character. He’s sharp and insightful but his methods have just the right amount of eccentricity to make the story interesting. You never quite know what he’s going to do next but he always has a reason for it in the end.

The lead performances are consistently good and as are most of the secondary performances. There were a couple of guest performances that were weaker, which could be irritating but not enough to ruin the story.

The mysteries are all intriguing with a great mix of real clues and red herrings and it’s always great to hear how Underhill works the solution out. For the most part, the length of the episodes gives the story more space to breathe and allows for more complex plots than half-hour radio programs. However, there are a couple of instances where it did feel padded. One key example was one story that featured eleven minutes of a radio report that wasn’t particularly relevant to the plot.

More than anything else, I love the atmosphere of the series. The series was recorded  in New England and there’s some  solid research into places and people that give it a real stamp of authenticity like you’ve traveled to Cape Cod. I really wish there were more programs like it: Entertaining, locally made radio drama that captures the sound and feel of a place.

I was somewhat disappointed to learn the first episode in the collection wasn’t the first episode of the series. Apparently, the early episodes are available on Audible as individual downloads. Still, it would be nice for all of the mysteries to be available as a collection.

My favorite story on this set was “The Case of the Shooting Star” where Captain Underhill is at a party on the night that someone is apparently is killed in bed by a falling meteor. The way he finds out what’s going on and delivers his deductions are just brilliant. My least favorite, “The Case of the Four Little Beatles.” The mystery is probably the weakest and feels more like a contrived bit of baby boomer nostalgia. Maybe if you’re more into the Beetles, you’d enjoy the story more, but it fell a bit flat for me.

Overall, though, these are still good enjoyable modern radio drama mysteries that I can recommend to fans of radio detective programs, particularly of the cozy sort.

Rating: 4 out of 5

 

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Golden Age Article

My Top 10 Big Finish Stories of 2021, Part Two

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Having counted down to number five in the previous post, in this post, I’m going to reveal the top four best Big Finish releases of 2021 that I listened to.

4) “The Curse of Lady Macbeth”  by Lizzie Hopply starring Christopher Eccleston from The Ninth Doctor Adventures: Lost Warriors

The story finds the Ninth Doctor (Eccleston) going back to Scotland and meeting the real lady Macbeth, trying to figure out who she is and also solving a mysterious affliction affecting children in the kingdom.

This is a great pseudo-historical. The era and the people have left enough of a mark on history to verify their existence, but also have left a lot of room to speculate. Writer Lizzie Hopley lets her imagination run free, particularly when working in elements of Gaelic myths. There’s also some really good character moments as the story works itself out, and of course a few nice nods to the Scottish play. I also liked how fleshed out and interesting Hopley wrote the real Lady Macbeth (played by Neve McIntosh)

3) The Doomsday Contract by Nev Fountain (based on a script outline by John Lloyd) starring Tom Baker and Lalla Ward:

The Doctor (Tom Baker) receives a summons to a galactic court where the preservation status of a certain planet is at risk and it turns out the planet has been targeted for development. But how much can the Doctor trust his friend who summoned him and runs a nature preserve?

Based on the script outline by John Lloyd for Season 17 of Doctor Who when Douglas Adams was the script editor. This is very much in the same style and tone of Adams’ scripts of Pirate Planet and City of Death. Nev Fountain turns in a script that captures that quality with imaginative high concept ideas, hilarious characters, and some well-done satire of the legal system. It manages to be very funny and offers witty social commentary without ever becoming flippant. If you love Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy or Adams’ other work, this is truly a worthwhile story to listen to and easily the best lost story release in many a year.

2) The Seamstress of Peckham Rye starring Nicholas Briggs and Richard Earl written by Jonathan Barnes

The only non-science fiction entry on this list, but what an entry. This 3 hour Holmes Adventure is a wonderful release. (See my full review here.) What can I say about it? Briggs and Earl are very comfortable in their roles and work beautifully together. The guest cast is on point. Jonathan Barnes is probably my favorite writer of Modern Day Holmes stories. He knows these characters inside out and he knows the type of stories that work for them. The Seamstress of Peckham Rye sounds like the type of story Doyle would write if he had to structure his plots for modern listeners. What results is a beautiful combination of accessibility and authenticity that rarely is seen in Holmes Pastiches

1) Monsters in Metropolis starring Christopher Eccleston, Written by John Dorney from The Ninth Doctor Adventures: Lost Warriors

The Doctor arrives on the set of the classic silent film Metropolis only to find that legendary director Fritz Lang has abandoned his previous plans and instead brought in a Cyberman to play the robot part.

This is a story that had mixed expectations for me as lone Cybermen out of time used by the unwary has been done before and quite effectively. Could this really blaze new ground? The answer was yes, most definitely.

The script is a John Dorney classic. It has a fair bit of humor at the beginning. It features well-developed three-dimensional characters who provide quite a few surprises throughout the story. The last ten minutes are absolutely gut-wrenching thanks to the writing and great performances by Christopher Eccleston as the Doctor and Nicholas Briggs as an unusual Cyberman.

The sound design throughout is great and a perfect fit for a Cyberman story that pays tribute to the classic film. This was an unforgettable story and a highlight of Christopher Eccleston’s long-awaited return to the role.

Honorable mentions:

As I wrote in my full review, I thoroughly loved the Avenger’s Comic Strip Adaptation story, “Mother’s Day.” adapted by Sarah Grochala from a TV Action Comic strip. It was such a brilliant romp and featured the return of the original Tara King (Linda Thorson). Masterful by James Goss featured an astounding number of incarnations of the Doctor’s archvillain the Master all trying to play off of and outdo each other. It’s a bonkers story with a ridiculous amount of twists, but it features many great performances, and Goss deserves credit for making it a coherent story. “Planet at the End “by Timothy X Attack is a superb story from another Ninth Doctor Adventures box set, Responds to All Calls. It features the Doctor landing on a graveyard planet for thousands of extinct species where no one could have sent him a message. This is a story with a lot of great high-concept ideas and some fantastic plot twists.

 

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Audio Drama Review, Golden Age Article

My Top 10 Big Finish Stories of 2021, Part One

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Big Finish puts out a lot of Audio Dramas and I’m a huge fan. I listen primarily to their officially licensed Doctor Who audio dramas and multitudinous spin-off but also a few of their non-Doctor Who offerings. In this column, and the next one, I’m going to list the top ten best stories I heard from them that were released last year. Now, as usual, I don’t listen to everything they put out, so this list is not definitive, and of course, the opinions are my own:

10) “The Laughing Policeman” by Jonathan Barnes, Adapted as an Audiobook by Justin Richards, and read by Duncan Wisbey from Jago & Litefoot Series 14:

With the passing of co-star Trevor Baxter (who played Professor George Litefoot), the Doctor Who spin-off Jago & Litefoot came to an abrupt end after thirteen series. They tried to cap off the series with the release of Jago & Litefoot Forever, a Jago-heavy adventure where Christopher Benjamin carried the bulk of lines and Litefoot appeared briefly using lines pasted in from past adventures. (see: My review here.)

However, Big Finishhad scripts paid for and completed for a fourteenth series. After waiting an appropriate time, they set about adapting Series 14 into an audiobook. Each story had its own individual reader with some link to the past seasons. The series focused on a sinister new secret regime using mind control and having established itself in Victorian London. “The Laughing Policeman” is the second of four stories adapted:

This story is told in first person by a policeman trailing Jago and Litefoot, believing them to be seditionists against the new regime. But who is following who?

This is a remarkable piece and works great as an audiobook. Inspector Gilhooey provides a combination of atmosphere, humanity, and humor, as our two heroes take a slightly less prominent role in a corker of a mystery. There are some great twist and turns and so many superb surprises. I also love how his view of Jago and Litefoot evolves throughout the story and how he changes as well.

The fine story is given a great reading by Duncan Wisbey as the set continued its momentum from the opener.

9) The Gulf by Tim Foley starring Tim Treloar and Sadie Miller from The Third Doctor Adventures, Volumes 7

The Third Doctor Adventures began by recasting the role of the Third Doctor, originally played by Jon Pertwee (1919-96) so that surviving Third Doctor cast members like Katy Manning, who played the Third Doctor’s companion, could appear in full-cast Doctor Who stories. This box set brings back the daughters of the late actresses Caroline John and Elisabeth Sladen to play the roles their mothers played as the other Third Doctor Companions.

“The Gulf” finds the Doctor and Sarah Jane Smith landing at a mysterious disused sea-based mining rig that’s become a retreat for artists.

There’s a spooky/disturbing atmosphere about the place and the sound design. Sadie Miller fits right into the role of Sarah Jane Smith and gives a solid performance. The all-female guest cast is well-written with British Acting legend Wendy Craig (who I had no prior familiarity with) turning in an incredibly engaging performance as Marta, the leader of the group.

The story is clever and thoughtful and misses some frightening scenes with some spot-on character work.

8) The Trojan Dalek by John Dorney and starring David Tennant and Jane Slavin from the Box Set Dalek Universe 2

This story sees Mark, Anya, and the Doctor going in the front door of a base where an old friend of Mark’s is being treated for severe battlefield wounds and where they hope to find a lead on the scientist who possesses the time travel tech the Doctor needs to return to the TARDIS. When they fail to get cooperation on the latter issue, the Doctor suspects something far more sinister is going on.

The most remarkable aspect of this story may be that this wasn’t originally John Dorney’s story but he filled in for another writer. This is a superb script. It has elements that could easily be discordant. In the first half of this script, the Tenth Doctor has some of his most hilarious lines for Big Finish, but as the story goes on, we discover serious elements of body horror involving some experiments to fight the Daleks and an ending that hits like a punch to the gut.

However, rather than discordant elements, the humor at the start of the piece serves to make what happens later all the more horrible. It’s a mix of comedy and tragedy that makes for one of the strongest Big Finish stories of the year so far.

7) Unfinished Business by James Goss

6) The Sincerest Form of Flattery by James Goss

5) A Quiet Night In by Lou Morgan

All three stories comes from the War Master: Killing Time set starring Sir Derek Jacobi.

The plot of the box set features the Master (Jacobi) during the Time War trying to gain control of a system known as the Stagnant Protocol, a place whose inhabitants do not die but also are incapable of reproduction. He sees a way to exploit them for his own long plan, however finds a rival on-world in Calanthia (Alexandra Riley).

Unfinished Business and The Sincerest Form of Flattery are first and last stories of the set and heavily focused on the rivalry between the Master and Calanthia, as well as the complex relationship the two develop. To see the Master forced to deal with someone who is his equal in cunning and ruthlessness works well. Jacobi, an acting legend, is great, but so is Riley, who does rise to the occasion with an incredibly solid performance.

A Quiet Night In is the second story of the box and has the Master returning to Earth and pretending to be the Uncle of Jo Jones Manning.) She takes a trip out to the country to meet her uncle and finds herself as his mysterious house. The atmosphere of the story is heavy and brilliantly done. The story takes many unpredictable twists and turns. Both Jacobi and Manning turn in spellbinding performance in a solid bit of psychological terror.

Continued next week.

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Audio Drama Review, Golden Age Article

Audio Drama Review: Mutual Radio Theater, Volume 1, Week Four

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This is the final part of our review of Radio Archives’ Mutual Radio Theater, Volume 1 covering the third week of the series. For a look at an overview of the set, see the first week review.  Also see week two and week three

The Blind Gun:  The town bully murders the father of a nineteen year old blind man right in front of him. The local law refuses to do anything reasoning that it’s the boy’s word vs. the murderer’s and a blind man’s word isn’t worth as much as that of a man who can see. The young man asks an elderly alcoholic former gunslinger to teach him to shoot so he can get vengeance for his father’s death. Golden Age Stars: Vic Perrin, Marvin Miller, Parley Baer, Howard Culver 

Review: The story is about what you’d expect from this genre and hits all the right plot notes. Not only that, but the murdered father, the gunslinger, and the young blind man are written well and are quite likable characters. There’s no real shock in the outcome, although it does take a turn I wouldn’t have predicted in order to get there. It’s a good listen and delivers everything you could ask of a story like this. Grade: B 

Fontaine Harris, Hollywood Producer: It’s 1928 and a con man has bought a stake in a movie studio. However, the company’s head honcho has some odd ideas about films and our protagonist begins to suspect something’s off. Golden Age stars: Harold Peary, Barney Phillips, Shepard Menkin, Sandra Gould, Jack Kruchen, and Shirley Mitchell 

It was great to hear Harold Peary acting on radio as his performance as the Great Gildersleeve were so iconic. This one had funny moments, but didn’t reach a definitive conclusion. Doing some research, I found this story was a continuation of two prior stories that had appeared on Sears Radio Theater.  In the Sears Radio Theater, Pat Buttram (famous for playing Mister Haney on Green Acres.) plays the lead character. Here, Jesse White takes the role and he’s passable at best. 

The ending is unsatisfying and more than anything else, it just seems to stop.  It sets up a bit for the final sequel story (which would air six months later.) That’s a dubious decision that makes this hard to judge. Grade: C 

An International Sport: A young Soviet Ice Skater is planning to defect at the International Championships in London over the objections of her loyal Soviet patriot father. The KBG is aware of this and has plans to use this to their own advantage. Golden Age Stars: Shepard Menken,  Ben Wright, June Whitley-Taylor

This is fairly standard Cold War fare. Shepherd Menken does as good a job as the father as he possibly can, giving some warmth that lends believability for where his character goes in this story. It also does have a good mystery around why the Soviets are letting her go, knowing she intends to defect and what their agenda is. 

The biggest problem is that the Soviets are played in acartoonish way. When production treats them as bad guys who are figures of menace, it can work. When a production portrays them in silly stereotypical ways, it’s hard to take them as a serious threat, which undermines the story. Grade: B- 

Those Who Can…: An acting instructor and two of his students help coach a temperamental singer who is set to star in a big movie but has no movie experience. Golden Age Star: Byron Kane 

Review: This is an intriguing and engaging story. The acting instructor is an interesting character. He’s dedicated to his profession and got a lot of ideas but doesn’t always practice what he preaches. I like how the singer was played. She was stuck up, entitled, used to getting her own way, and full of herself, yet still in a way that wasn’t over-the-top and you could believe she could get by in most places by the strength of her celebrity. And of course, there’s Sandra, the acting student, who comes off a bit timid at first but really comes into her own at the conclusion of the story.  

This was just a nice piece of writing and acting. Grade: A- 

The Whale Savers: An aspiring photojournalist lands a berth on a whale saving ship bound for Antarctica. Golden Age Stars: Parley Baer 

“The Whale Savers” definitely has a viewpoint on the very hot 1980s issue of saving the whales and has a few educational moments about whaling and what whale-saving ships do as they try to stop a pirate whaler from killing a blue whale. However, this story never forgets it’s an adventure tale and it delivers. It mixes its thrilling sea and whale plot with a believable relationship that develops and resolves sensibly with the ship’s only female crew member and our glory-seeking photographer protagonist. It’s story that’s well-researched, not afraid to show it, but also never gets bogged down in unnecessary details.  

Having Leonard Nimoy narrate is fun given his most famous character, Mr. Spock, would go on a Whale-Saving mission of his own in Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home, a film that Nimoy also directed and wrote the story for a few years later. 

Whether this story had any indirect influence over Mr. Nimoy in writing Star Trek IV, I don’t know. However, whether you agree with its message or not, this story was one whale of a tale and a fine conclusion to the set. Grade: A 

Overall Thoughts

By nature of being an anthology program, there’s a wide variant in quality with the series. I’m so glad I got to hear certain episodes while other episodes were awful. The Western Night provided the most consistent quality. The Love Night was surprisingly strong, with some good dramas, and only one effort that was slightly subpart in week three. The mystery night was consistently passable, with no stories that stood out for either being good or bad. The adventure night was a mixed bag. After a so-so first week and a dreadful second, the third and fourth week featured some of my favorite stories of the set. Alas, the Comedy in this series is really a weak point, as so often it just wasn’t funny or wasn’t that funny.

On the other hand, the sound quality of the set really does shine through. The sound is superb from start to finish. However, at its price point, it’s a dubious value for a set where the stories vary in quality so much.

If you’re nostalgic for the show or remember the 1980s and want to go back, this could be a good set to purchase. If you love great sounding audio and have the cash, this is also a really superb listen. In addition, if your library has the Hoopla app, you can check this out and enjoy the stories that sounded like they interest you at no charge.

Rating: 3.5 out 5.0

Audio Drama Review, Golden Age Article

Audio Drama Review: Mutual Radio Theater, Volume 1, Week Three

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This is the third part of our review of Radio Archives’ Mutual Radio Theater, Volume 1 covering the third week of the series. For a look at an overview of the set, see the first week review.  Also see week two.

Oh Really, No O’Reilly: In a Western town that’s dying out since the railroad came through Denver, a crooked saloonkeeper and a dishonest undertaker engage a corrupt insurance salesman to take out a policy on a drunk drifter named O’Reilly when plans to poison him and collect the insurance money. That becomes a lot harder than they think. Golden Age Stars: Tyler McVey, Daws Butler, Marvin Miller, Don Diamond, Barney Phillips, and Howard Culver 

Review: This was based on a true story that was the basis of many stories including the 1955 Johnny Dollar serial “The Indestructible Mike Matter.” The story is hit and miss as a dark comedy but really does turn in a few very good plot twists at the end. Grade: B- 

The First National Radio Aptitude Test. An on-air radio aptitude quiz is conducted with some interesting answers.  Golden Age Stars: Alan Young, Marvin Miller, Daws Butler, Lillian Buyeff, Mary Jane Croft, Shepard Menken, Don Diamond, and Jerry Hausner 

This is a bit different. Andy Griffith gives a monologue about radio, its history, and the golden age of radio. I did have to chuckle when Griffin said he wouldn’t say anything about those headsets being worn by joggers and young people and wondered what he’d say to our modern world’s ubiquitous all-ages use of earbuds. He then sends the show over to a radio quiz master (Young) who provides a wacky quiz while receiving constant interruptions. 

There’s a lot to like. There are some funny jokes and if you’re a fan of the golden age of radio, there’s a boatload of talent from the era represented in this little production. 

On the other hand, this is a production that tries to overwhelm you with jokes, a lot of which don’t hit. There’s a Groucho Marx/You Bet Your Life parody that goes on too long. In addition, there’s a lack of logic. It was decided they wanted to include parodies of old time radio shows and poke fun at collectors, so without explanation they stop the quiz and do that. 

Still, this was entertaining. It plays well to nostalgia, has some funny bits, but could have been better. Grade: B 

The Mask: A businessman/art collector steals an old, sinister-looking mask from Africa with a bad reputation. He gets home and finds that reputation is deserved. Golden Age Star: Ben Wright 

This is an odd one, honestly. The businessman and a corrupt local official steal the mask and then the official is hospitalized with serious burns when his stove blows up and the businessman’s family start having minor fire-related injuries. Than the story has a twist…that’s almost absurd, but I think gives it a Twilight Zone feel to it. It does have some interesting turns, but there are also some flaws in the story logic. Still, it wasn’t a bad listen. Grade: B- 

For the Love of Laura: An actress and party girl frequently proposes marriage but never follows through until she asks herself who she’d really like to marry. Golden Age Stars: Janet Waldo, Shepard Menken,  Barney Phillips, and Vic Perrin.   

Janet Waldo does as good a job with the material as anyone could and the same can be said of all the actors. That said, Laura is just not a likeable character. The whole of the story is a combination of Laura leading men on, and imagining how good/how bad it might be to be married to each one.  She remains self-absorbed and shallow and strings each of these men along while she made up her mind. I will say she does show some character growth. She’s still shallow by the end, but not nearly as shallow as when she started. She’s self-absorbed but without being as foolish about it. 

I also think there are too many guys in the story. She has five beaus: a smart guy, a weightlifter, a golfer, her agent, and a guy who looks good but whose chief personality trait is breaking out a racist joke whenever there’s a lull in the conversion. Each time she remembers or fantasizes about one of them, she has to do it with each of them in turn. With so many male characters, they end up as shallow as her. If people wanted that much shallowness, they could just watch TV. Grade: C- 

Yes, Sir, That’s My Baby: More than a thousand years in the future, a couple are permitted by their government to get married and when they get a family-sized housing unit, they think the government is going to let them have a baby. They hope to be given a pink or blue card for their new baby. Instead, they’re horrified to draw a yellow card and find the extra room is designated for a seventy-five-year-old man who was cryogenically frozen in 1975 after having a near-fatal heart attack. Golden Age Stars: Herb Vigran, Marvin Miller 

This story deals with the idea of over-population, which was a huge environmental concern of the 1970s and 1980s. But I have to give writer Elliott Lewis credit for taking a different tact than many writers of the era. He doesn’t imagine some environmental cataclysm that wipes out the human race or humans going into space. He imagines humans continuing to find ways to survive until every inch of the planet is claimed and filled, the human population is in the trillions and has a powerful computer-led government running everyone’s lives, approving decisions to get married, where they can live, and how much food they’re given.  

The government that runs the plan does horrible things but is assured of it own beneficence, even stating so after having made a mistake that ruins this young couple’s life.  Whether you agree with or like Lewis’ setup, it was strikingly different. Of course, the radio program does dance around some of the ethical implications of this society.  

And it manages to get away with it because it acknowledges some broader human themes it chooses to explore through this world that manage to work. Herb Vigran is great as the man who finds himself more than a millennium out of time, awakened by Earth’s government because they need him for some purpose they don’t tell him. The character’s humanity pushes against a bureaucratic world. The character is very likable even as he makes questionable choices. 

The story also raises questions about the wisdom of cryogenic freezing, as it shows serious downsides with a little bit of upside at the end.

I do question its inclusion for a Friday program. Given its focus on having a baby, love, and relationships, this doesn’t fit with much with the “Adventure” theme Fridays were supposed to offer. Given a Sci-fi Comedy was played by comedy day, this might been a better fit on Thursday’s love day. 

Still, this merits a grade: B+ 

Our series will conclude on January 1st