Flash Gordon’s Trip to Mars (Mars Attacks the World) (1938)

Top: From this serial, one of many iconic spaceships in the Flash Gordon series.
Bottom: Title card for this serial.
Special photo juxtapositions by Thomas Kent Miller; copyright © 2016-2017 by Thomas Kent Miller.

It’s entirely possible that some, perhaps many, readers of my book and/or this blog may not have ever seen a serial, or, for that matter, may have no idea what the word “serial” means. While researching my book, I’ve met a number of “twenty-somethings” who have just relished the new Star Wars: The Force Awakens film (released December 18, 2015) but who drew a blank when I mention that the film is the seventh chapter in George Lucas’ homage to Flash Gordon and Buck Rogers serials. For that matter, neither of those proper names rang any bells either. Therefore, a brief recap of serials is in order before I discuss the films themselves.

One-sheet poster.

In a simpler time, during a period from the mid–1910s to the early 1950s, some movie studios believed that they could entice moviegoers into the theater each and every week—regardless of what feature film was playing—by getting them so wrapped up in multi-chapter stories, with each 15- or 20-minute chapter ending in a suspenseful “cliffhanger,” that they would happily pay to see what happens next. This ploy worked so well that hundreds of action-adventure serials were produced: westerns, science fiction, super heroes, secret agents, jungle adventures, and lurid mysteries, among other genres. It was only the episodic shows on that newly invented medium television that killed the serials.

Cover of Kinnard, Crnkovih, Vitone book.

Flash Gordon’s Trip to Mars (1938), with 15 chapters, was the middle of three Flash Gordon serials, the first called merely Flash Gordon (1936) comprising 13 chapters and the third called Flash Gordon Conquers the Universe (1940) with 12 chapters.

In their volume The Flash Gordon Serials: 1936–1940, Roy Kinnard, Tony Crnkovich, and R.J. Viton explain the allure of Flash Gordon and the success of serials:

“Artist/writer Alex Raymond’s newspaper comic strip Flash Gordon debuted on January 7, 1934, and was an immediate hit with a Depression-era public sorely in need of escapist adventure. Conceived by Raymond and the Hearst newspaper chain as competition for the already established rival strip Buck Rogers, Flash Gordon soon eclipsed Buck in popularity...."

Example of original Alex Raymond's Flash Gordon comic strip, which debuted in newspapers in 1934.

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"... In 1935 Universal Pictures—the studio that had startled the world in 1931 with Dracula and Frankenstein—acquired the film rights to several newspaper comic strips published by King Features Syndicate, including properties like Secret Agent X-9, Ace Drummond, Jungle Jim, and Flash Gordon, correctly speculating that the established popularity of the strip characters would virtually guarantee the success of any serial based on them.... [Today] the theatrical movie serial is a long defunct neglected screen format almost forgotten.... Yet these old serials, three of them in particular— the trilogy of Flash Gordon serials starring Buster Crabb—have had a continuing influence on modern films, especially the work of George Lucas in his Star Wars series.”

Universal Pictures was adept with elegant matte paintings. Most of the top of this wonderful establishing shot is a painting.

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The “cliffhanger” was a gimmick that annoyed as much as it pleased. Each serial chapter would end with the hero in a terrible situation that could only end in his death—for example, a building blowing up with the hero still inside—and the next week’s chapter would quickly summarize in words or drawings the previous week’s story and then show a recap of that bad business, but this time including a shot or two that had been conveniently left out the previous week, shots showing how easily the problem was resolved, allowing our hero to live for another day. In the above example with the exploding building, the start of the next episode would include a brief shot showing the hero dodging debris as he ran out of the building just as it exploded.

But how could such a thing influence Star Wars? In point of fact, George Lucas grew up during the 1950s when the Flash Gordon serials were often shown on television, usually Saturday mornings. These shows captured the imaginations of the ten-year-olds who watched them, positively enthralling them because the shows were so wildly fantastic, making all too real all sorts of odd beings in armor and helmets and wielding strange weapons, and the whole effect was mesmerizing. When the time came for George Lucas to follow up his super-successful American Graffiti, he decided he wanted to pay tribute to those entertaining serials—that featured real good guys and real bad guys—and that enchanted him as a child. 

Top: Crawl from Star Wars: A New Hope.

Middle: From Buck Rogers.

Bottom: From Flash Gordon Conquers the Universe..
 

Lucas envisioned 1977’s Star Wars as the fourth chapter in a hypothetical serial and began it with the yellow scroll (often used in serials) that summarized the hypothetical (but then nonexistent) third chapter and then dropped viewers right into the middle of the action. 

In 1977, there were many in his audiences who shared that same thrill of watching serials when they were younger and who understood the serial references. But that was forty years ago. While the thrill of seeing a new chapter in a continuing series still is very, very much alive (for that is precisely what Star Wars is and has done with each of its succeeding seven chapters to date, with more to come), the cinematic awareness of historical serials has faded. As stated above, “The theatrical movie serial is a long defunct neglected screen format almost forgotten....”

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Emperor Ming Charles Middleton.

Believing they have watched Ming the Merciless die in a fire on his planet Mongo (which had been on a collision course with earth in the previous 13-chapter serial called simply Flash Gordon), Flash Gordon, Dale Arden and Dr. Zarkov are glad to have gotten home safely in a rocketship and to be feted by a relieved world populous for their troubles. 

Source of mysterious ray on Mars.

But a mysterious ray aimed at earth from space is creating earthquakes and huge storms. It’s nearly certain that the earth will be destroyed if something isn’t done, but all the brightest scientists have no idea about the ray, have no idea of what is happening, let alone how to stop it—all except Dr. Zarkov, of course, who has photographed the otherwise invisible ray, which he believes is coming from Mongo. Knowing they are Earth’s only hope, Flash, Dale, and Zarkov get back in their rocketship to return to Mongo. 

From top center, clockwise: “Happy” Hapgood

Donald Kerr. Flash Gordon Larry (Buster)

Crabbe. Dr. Zarkov Frank Shannon. Dale Arden

Jean Rogers.

But they have company; an enterprising reporter named “Happy” Hapgood has stowed away and is surprised he’s on his way to Mongo. But, before they leave the solar system, Zarkov realizes the beam is not coming from Mongo, but from our own planet Mars.

Queen Azura Beatrice Roberts.

They change course, crash land, and are pursued by soldiers loyal to Queen Azura, Queen of Magic, ruler of Mars. They escape into a cave only to be astonished by the presence of the Clay People, creatures who were once men but punished for various indiscretions and turned into mud by Azura’s magic.

Clay King Montague Shaw.

It seems that Azura has been at this for quite a long time, because the Clay People have not only established their own kingdom ruled by the Clay King, but they have been waging war on the queen, much to her dissatisfaction. Which begs the question: why would Queen Asura continue to punish her people, turning them into clay, thereby adding to the Clay People population that’s waging war on her? Be that as it may, Queen Azura has the perfect means to defeat them. All she needs to do is suck all the nitrogen out of the earth’s atmosphere to make the ammunition for her army’s ray guns. That is the source of the beam that is wreaking havoc with the earth’s land masses and climate. Before long, our heroes are amazed to discover that Ming the Merciless had escaped the fire on Mongo and has come to Mars to join forces with Azura ... 

All three serials are available in boxed sets.

.... and that is only the first two chapters titled “New Worlds to Conquer” and “The Living Dead.” The remaining thirteen have titles that shed light on the arc of the whole story: “3-Queen of Magic,” “4-Ancient Enemies,” “5-The Boomerang,” “6-Tree- Men of Mars,” “7-The Prisoner of Mongo,” “8-The Black Sapphire of Kalu,” “9-Symbol of Death,” “10-Incense of Forgetfulness,” “11-Human Bait,” “12-Ming the Merciless,” “13- The Miracle of Magic,” “14-A Beast at Bay,” “15-An Eye for an Eye.” In the end, we discover that Ming is planning to take control of Mars and he succeeds in killing Azura. Before she dies, she tells Flash how to change the Clay People back into men. Ming’s plan to control Mars has been thwarted and he loses his mind, bent on destroying the earth. Flash saves the day, Ming dies, and our heroes return to earth, glad to be home and feted for their troubles.

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The special visual effect of the Clay People emerging from and returning into their cave walls is stunning and still shocking. However, the serial’s spaceship special effects were never especially good, but they have the benefit of inspiring nostalgia.

The dialog is, more often than not, stunningly infantile and redundant and incompetently presented. Yet this serial’s costumes and set design are often quite marvelous. In other words, Flash Gordon’s Trip to Mars is a mixed bag, but that can easily be said of the entire Flash Gordon series and, if truth be told, the whole serial format.

Nevertheless, I adore all three Flash Gordon serials, not so much for reasons of quality but more due to the nostalgia and pleasant memories that are inseparable from the shows themselves. Besides, it is all too true that the Star Wars series is little more than Flash Gordon writ large—very large.

One-sheet for Mars Attacks the World.

Once the serial had run its course, Universal recut the 300-minute serial down to a 68-minute theatrical feature named Mars Attacks the World.

Flash Gordon’s Trip to Mars (Mars Attacks the World) (1938)

USA. Universal Pictures. BW. 15 Chapters. 1.37:1. 300m.

CREW: Directors Ford Beebe, Robert Hill. Script and Original Story Ray Trampe, Norman S. Hall, Wyndham Gittens, Herbert Dalmas. Based on The Newspaper Feature Entitled “Flash Gordon” owned and copyrighted by King Features Syndicate. Comic Strip by Alex Raymond. Associate Producer Barney A. Sarecky. Director of Photography Jerome Ash. Art Director Ralph DeLacy. Editors Joe Gluck, Saul A. Goodkind, Louis Sackin, Alvin Todd. Costume Designer M. Berneman.

CAST: Flash Gordon Larry (Buster) Crabbe. Dale Arden Jean Rogers. Dr. Zarkov Frank Shannon. Emperor Ming Charles Middleton. Queen Azura Beatrice Roberts. “Happy” Hapgood Donald Kerr. Prince Barin Richard Alexander. Clay King Montague Shaw.

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