FLASH GORDON CONQUERS THE UNIVERSE (1940)

 

PHENOMENALITY: *marvelous*
MYTHICITY: *fair*
FRYEAN MYTHOS: *adventure*
CAMPBELLIAN FUNCTION: *cosmological, sociological*

I'm pleased to see that the final entry in the FLASH GORDON serials took a turn for the better. It's axiomatic that few if any other serials in any franchise ever emulated the pulpy, sexy extravagance of the 1936 outing. Still, the confused, repetitious events of FLASH GORDON'S TRIP TO MARS were more than a small comedown from those heights. By contrast, FLASH GORDON CONQUERS THE UNIVERSE-- UNIVERSE, for short-- is slick rather than sultry, and the 1940 installment places a greater emphasis on gadgets than on the monsters and semi-human hybrids of the first chapterplay. But UNIVERSE offers just as much bang for the buck as the original FLASH.

Like a lot of serials, the plot of UNIVERSE wanders like, well, the wandering planet Mongo. One has to assume that the world ruled by Ming the Merciless somehow became ensconced in Earth's solar system after bolding bursting upon the scene, since the hero and his friends can still rocket there in a few days. At the opening of UNIVERSE, Ming is believed dead, but he gets better and launches a new attack on Earth with "purple death dust." Flash (Buster Crabbe) once more jets off to stop the fiend, accompanied by the genius scientist Zarkov (Frank Shannon) and Flash's girlfriend Dale Arden (this time essayed by Carol Hughes rather than Jean Rogers). The trio seek out their old allies-- Ming's daughter Aura (Shirley Dean, replacing Priscilla Lawson) and her husband Barin (Roland Drew, replacing Richard Alexander). The original purpose is to seek a cure for the Purple Death on Earth, but as Ming starts unleashing more and more exotic weapons, the intrepid adventurers must continue trumping all of the tyrant's aces in one way or another. 

While the second serial was a shoddy bowdlerization of Alex Raymond's "Witch Queen of Mongo" sequence, UNIVERSE melds events from two then-contemporary strip-runs, later entitled "Ice Kingdom of Mongo" and "Power Men of Mongo." While TRIP pokes around as lethargically as its lumbering clay men, UNIVERSE is full of thrilling action-sequences-- explorations of snowy landscapes, an execution by death-ray, lots of hand-to-hand struggles, and a big explosion at the end that apparently destroys Ming for good (which in a roundabout way justifies the title about the hero conquering "the universe" controlled by Ming). Flash meets one of the many lusty queens of the comic strip, Queen Fria, but she only appears in the first two chapters, hardly having time to do more than cast admiring eyes in the hero's direction. The dynamic from the first serial, wherein Aura was a gutsy lady and Dale was a wimpy dishrag, is entirely reversed, with Dale being a definite heroine who fights for her man while Aura just mopes around, mostly as a captive to her tyrannical father. As if to make up for the lack of a vixenish royal, Ming introduces a lady spy into the good guys' ranks, name of Sonja (Anne Gwynne)-- and she, along with a heavy lifter named Torch, creates a lot of trouble for Flash's mob (hah) when Ming isn't lobbing missiles and exploding robots at the heroes. Ming, btw, is much improved this time out, lusting openly after delectable Dale and stabbing one of his enemies with a casually diabolical air.

Jerry Blake's review of this serial mentions that originally Universal had planned to star Crabbe in a sequel to the 1939 BUCK ROGERS. However, when BUCK's box office was less than impressive, the studio changed horses in midstream and made the BUCK-sequel into a FLASH-outing. This proves ironic since the FLASH GORDON strip started out as an attempt to chisel in on the financial success of the space-themed BUCK ROGERS feature, even though Raymond eschewed BUCK's concentration on gadgets for lots of sex and savage animal-battles. 

It does make me wonder whether or not the scripters for UNIVERSE had originally started to plot out the BUCK sequel before the word came down about the FLASH refitting. If so, that would explain what UNIVERSE is awash in wild, colorful gimmicks-- not only exploding rays and purple dust, but magnetic rays and electric ray guns, as well as a tribe of "rock men" whom I preferred to TRIP's "clay men." I also find interesting that the spy Sonja and her confederate Captain Torch work together so well. The first BUCK ROGERS introduced the serial's version of the perennial Rogers-rogue Killer Kane. Could the writers of UNIVERSE considered bringing back Kane for the sequel and teaming him with a serial-version of Kane's female partner from the strip, the ardent Ardala? I don't suppose I'll ever know, though. 

When I look at all three sequels-- all being broadcast on TV when young George Lucas was growing up-- I tend to think that UNIVERSE is the one that captures the adventurous (but not too sexy) feel of the original STAR WARS.

ADDENDUM: On the CHFB "Jerry Blake" mentioned that when he wrote his review he wasn't entirely sure about the fannish rumor that the 3rd FLASH serial had started out as a second BUCK project. However, a diligent poster confirmed, through research of online trade papers, that at one point Universal did announce a project entitled "Buck Rogers Conquers the Universe."