Adventures of Captain Marvel

Adventures of Captain Marvel (1941)

THE MOST POWERFUL MAN IN CARTOONLAND BECOMES THE STRONGEST MAN ON THE SCREEN! All others pale in the light of this human fortress who finds no barrier too great in his amazing fight for justice

On a scientific expedition to Siam young Billy Batson is given the ability to change himself into the super-powered Captain Marvel by the wizard Shazam, who tells him his powers will last only as long as the Golden Scorpion idol is threatened. Finding the idol, the scientists realize it could be the most powerful weapon in the world and remove the lenses that energize it, distributing them among themselves so that no one would be able to use the idol by himself. Back in the US, Billy Batson, as Captain Marvel, wages a battle against an evil, hooded figure, the Scorpion, who hopes to accumulate all five lenses, thereby gaining control of the super-powerful weapon

Date of release
1941-03-28
TMDB
6.4 / 10 (31)
Runtime
3h 36m
Genres
Fantasy, Action, Science Fiction, Family
Director
John English, William Witney

Casting

Interesting facts

  • Based on: Captain Marvel

Adventures of Captain Marvel is a 1941 American 12-chapter black-and-white movie serial from Republic Pictures. The serial was produced by Hiram S. Brown, Jr., directed by John English and William Witney, and stars Tom Tyler as the superhero Captain Marvel and Frank Coghlan, Jr. as his alter ego, Billy Batson. It was adapted from the popular Captain Marvel comic book character, who at the time appeared in the Fawcett Comics publications Whiz Comics and Captain Marvel Adventures..

Production

Adventures of Captain Marvel was budgeted at $135,553, although the final negative cost was $145,588 (a $10,035, or 7.4%, overspend). It was filmed between December 23, 1940, and January 30, 1941, under the working title Captain Marvel. The serial's production number was 1098.

The serial was the outgrowth of Republic's lengthy, failed attempt at licensing Action Comics' (DC Comics today) Superman character. Paramount Pictures successfully tied up all the characters' theatrical exhibition rights for its series of color Superman cartoons, produced for them by Fleischer Studios, which was awarded the license by the publisher.

National attempted legal action to prevent Republic from developing their arch rival's most successful character, citing Republic's failure at adapting a Superman serial. Their attempt was unsuccessful, however, and Captain Marvel went into production. Writing in his autobiography of the period, William Witney revealed that in his court deposition he had claimed that both Superman and Captain Marvel were derivatives of Popeye.

The opening military scenes in the serial were reused footage lifted from Republic's 1938 film Storm Over Bengal.

Republic cast Frank Coghlan as Billy Batson due to his physical resemblance to the character. There was, however, some criticism that Tom Tyler did not sufficiently resemble the "beefy, baby-faced" Captain Marvel. At the time, Tyler was a weightlifting champion and the serial costume matched Captain Marvel's original comic book appearance, right down to his being slender.

Read on Wikipedia · Text from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0. Data from Wikidata.

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