Doc Savage - Part 4 Star of All Media

Today, I conclude my look at the history of Doc Savage, originally posted in April 2010.

Doc Savage starred in 2 radio series during the pulp era. The first was a 15-minute serial which ran for 26 episodes in 1934. A second series aired in 1943. No tapes exist from either series, although some scripts have been collected. In 1985, NPR aired The Adventures of Doc Savage, as 13 half-hour episodes.
In 1975 Doc finally made it to the big screen in a campy Warner Bros. feature that owed more to the BATMAN TV show than James Bond.

The film was released internationally and was supposed to launch a franchise, but it's lackluster performance put the kabosh on any hope of a sequel.

The posters were pretty sensational though.

TV Tarzan (and future FACE THE MUSIC and MISS AMERICA PAGEANT host) Ron Ely was cast as The Man of Bronze.

The film was released on VHS.

And was made available on DVD on demand through the Warner Archive Collection.
The movie is a mid-70s curiosity, as is the soundtrack by John Philip Sousa!

As an addendum to my look at Doc in comics, you may want to check out Wildstorm's brilliant PLANETARY series, which featured a thinly disguised homage to Savage named Alex Brass. That's all I've got on Doc, hopefully someone out there appreciated this exhaustive (and exhausting) look that the classic pulp character. I know I enjoyed pulling it all together!

Doc Savage - Part 3 The Cape-free Crusader

From April 2010: Continuing my look at the history of Doc Savage, today let's look at the many comic book lives of the character.

In this Gold Key issue from the 60s, Doc wraps his hands around a spitting cobra! Get you minds out of the gutter!

Doc headed over to Marvel in the early 70s with an all-new series done in the mighty Marvel style.

Readers (such as I) were introduced to Doc's team of fearless friends in this campy take on the character.

Doc is depicted as a "heart-stopping sight" - and his costume consists of tight white slacks and a skimpy black leather vest.

The text page in Issue #1 goes into detail about Doc's loyal teammates: Monk, Ham, Long Tom, Renny and Johnny!

Issue #2 featured the fearsome foe called The Feather Serpent!

Some dude called Silver Death was the villain in Issue #3.

Doc went topless and took on the Hell Diver in #4.

And then he faced the Night of the Monsters in Issue #6.

A giant sized adaptation of Warner Bros.' feature film  DOC SAVAGE: MAN OF BRONZE  followed. (More on the movie tomorrow!)

And oddest of all, Doc teamed up with The Fantastic Four's very own Thing in MARVEL TWO-IN-ONE.

A magazine-sized movie tie-in featured this iconographic image of Doc in all his manliness.

Doc donned rocket-powered skis for this magazine-sized adventure, but his tenure at Marvel was nearing it's end.

Years later, Doc & company showed up at DC, starring in an acclaimed four-part miniseries (recently collected into a trade paperback. Oddly enough, DC will be soon reprinting the Marvel stories in another trade collection).

A monthly series followed and ran for a while, but soon Doc was in comic book limbo once more.

Next he resurfaced in a short-lived series from an indie publisher called Millennium.

The homoerotic covers continued to follow Doc during this brief run.

So, that brings us right back to DC, where the new DOC SAVAGE comic debuted in April 2010. Doc also recently teamed up with Batman in a one-shot special and was featured in a miniseries called FIRST WAVE, which I covered in my tribute to Rima, the Jungle Girl. Come back tomorrow for my final Doc post.

Doc Savage - Part 2 Paperback Pulchritude

Continuing a repost from April 2010. Yesterday, I briefly traced the pulp magazine origins of Doc Savage. Today, let's look at the gorgeous painted covers that graced the popular Bantam paperback series which ran from the 1960s through the 1990s.

As I mentioned yesterday, Doc often was depicted with a ridiculously torn shirt barely covering his massive heaving manboobs.

 Though at times, the climate called for more appropriate attire, as seen above.

Or sometimes less clothing was required, as in the case of The Frightened Fish!

So apparently Doc took on Hiltler, Hercules and some frightened fellow, all of whom cause him to thrice again tear his shirt apart. What was this guy's clothing budget?

Here Doc looks like he's waiting for someone to, ahem, bow down before him, and then he meets his torn shirt-wearing twin in The Land of Fear!

Here Doc experiences deja vu as the cover painting is recycled. At this point the story titles seem to have gotten a bit silly as well: The All-White Elf?, The Angy Canary?, The Running Skeltons? and The Swooning Lady?

Yikes! What the hell is that bird creature? And just who is The Metal Master? Ozzy?

Before you know it, Doc is back underwater and then he's fighting off a giant case of the crabs.

At times he even explored religious and mystical themes such as resurrection and black magic.

And finally Doc took some shirt-busting disaster movie plots. I wonder how I would look on the cover of a Doc Savage novel...

Now I know. If I haven't frightened you away, come back tomorrow for a look at Doc's comic book career.

Doc Savage - Part 1 Bronze Skin & Torn Shirts

Back in April 2010, DC Comics was about to launch a new DOC SAVAGE comic book series. I asked my readers if they were wondering..."who is Doc Savage?"

The character, Doctor Clark Savage Jr., first appeared in 1933 in a series of pulp magazines from publisher Henry W. Ralston, editor John L. Nanovic and author Lester Dent.

Doc has often been noted as being one of the possible inspirations that led Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster to create Superman.

After all, Doc was called a "superman," his name was Clark, he was dubbed "the man of bronze" and he had a secret headquarters called The Fortress of Solitude. Coincidence? I think not,

Unlike the last son of Krypton, Doc was an Earthling whose only "costume" was his khakis and torn off-white shirt.

Doc somehow managed to always appear either shirtless or in a terribly mangled shirt that emphasized his bulging biceps.

 

 And sometimes Doc even appeared...well, you know...

...naked! Talk about pulp fiction!

Things got a little creepy at times for Doc,

but this Savage always knew how to get his man.

Mystery on Happy Bones? I'm not even touching that one! Come back tomorrow when I take a look at the swinging, sexy paperback novel covers that made Doc a sensation and pop culture icon all over again in the 1960s.