Flash Gordon's Trip to Mars

Flash Gordon's Trip to Mars (1938)

15 Sensational Sense-Staggering Episodes!

When a deadly Nitron ray strikes Earth, Flash Gordon and his friends travel to Mars to battle Ming the Merciless and his new ally Queen Azura.

Date of release
1938-03-21
TMDB
6.3 / 10 (17)
Runtime
3h 49m
Genres
Science Fiction, Action, Adventure
Director
Ford Beebe, Robert F. Hill

Casting

Interesting facts

  • Based on: Flash Gordon

Flash Gordon's Trip to Mars is a 1938 Universal Pictures 15–chapter science-fiction movie serial based on the syndicated newspaper comic strip Flash Gordon. It is the second of the three Flash Gordon serials made by Universal between 1936 and 1940. The main cast from the first serial reprise their roles: Buster Crabbe as Flash Gordon, Jean Rogers as Dale Arden, Frank Shannon as Dr. Alexis Zarkov, Charles B. Middleton as Ming the Merciless, and Richard Alexander as Prince Barin. Also in the principal cast are Beatrice Roberts as Queen Azura, Donald Kerr as Happy Hapgood, Montague Shaw as the Clay King, and Wheeler Oakman as Tarnak.

Production

This serial, the first sequel to the Flash Gordon serial, was based on the 1936 "Big Little Book" adaptation of the strip "Flash Gordon and the Witch Queen of Mongo". According to Harmon and Glut, the location was changed to Mars to capitalize on Orson Welles' famous War of the Worlds broadcast.

Flash Gordon's Trip to Mars was less expensive to make than the first Flash Gordon serial.

Universal Pictures also prepared a feature-length version of this serial, which was already ready for release in October 1938 when Orson Welles astounded the country with his Mercury Theatre on the Air radio production of H. G. Wells's The War of the Worlds. Universal then quickly had the feature's title changed to Mars Attacks the World, and a week after the Welles broadcast, opened it at a Broadway theater as a major premiere event.

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