I was quite young when I would see Superman in the Saturday afternoon matinee serials. I never forgot Kirk Alyn as the 1st Superman. Can't tell you how many times I had to tell people that George Reeves was not the 1st Superman. He was the 1st on TV. It was Kirk Alyn who was the very 1st. BTW, I remember seeing Noel Nell and Kirk Alyn in the train scene in the first Superman movie with Chris Reeve. If I'm not mistaken I saw it at Graumann's Chinese Theater. I lived only a few blocks away from it at the time.
Kirk Alyn played another comic-book hero, Blackhawk, in a 1952 serial. At this time Blackhawk was still being published by Quality Comics, making Alyn the first actor to portray two different heroes from rival publishers.
Not quite. In 1949, Clayton Moore played Zorro in the serial 'Ghost of Zorro'. Then later that same year, he began playing The Lone Ranger on the television series. The two heroes were based on books by different publishers, in 1919 and 1936 respectively. Incidentally, the first Lone Ranger serial chapterplay was directed by William Witney and John English, who later made the Captain Marvel serial. Traditionally The Lone Ranger, John Reid, is said to be the ancestor of Britt Reid, The Green Hornet, which was another great serial.
@@owenorders5202 I was referring to characters created specifically for comic books. Zorro first appeared in the pulp magazine "All Story Weekly" in 1919. The Lone Ranger was created for radio in 1933. They were later licensed to appear in comics; but we're not the property of a publisher, such as DC, Timely/Atlas, Fawcett.
I love that Quality had at least some movie footprint. Shame more of their characters weren't done (I could easily see the Ray using the animated flying technique and even being more believeable) but I guess we're lucky we what we've got.
Kirk Alyn was an awesome Superman and Clark Kent. He was the first and the original "Man of Steel". I once meet him at Vererans Memorial Coliseum at a toy convention. He was so nice and friendly. He signed a picture of himself for my son Matthew. At one time he lived in Arizona. I'm proud that he was my cousin.
I don't like the way superheroes are portrayed in the movies nowadays. They have too many anger issues. Anyone with that kind of power would be totally scary if they couldn't keep their anger in check.
I hope you all enjoy my new Superman video on the Kirk Alyn movies. I rewatched both of these serials over the last month. Old movies are a lot of fun to watch again and again,
I never knew Kirk Alyn played the first superman until 8 years ago when I watched him on youtube all these years always thought George Reeves was the first
The Daily Planet also seems to have police powers, according to the serials. 8:16 Superman's insignia is backwards here. Probably several times in the serial too.... The casting of Tommy Bond as Jimmy really threw me off. When I first saw the serials in the 70s, I remembered Bond most as Butch, so even then I thought he was royally miscast. Especially when he's used as the whipping boy throughout. Butch being beaten up THAT easily? Not buying it. 😋 I've noted before that the serials uses the exact same method we do today to bring the special effects to life. Animation. Then, they used standard cell animation; now, we use computers. And the cell animation was more believable!!
Is there any one that reflects back on Flash Gordon and Ming the Merciless. There also was a show that has these silly puppets operated by strings that showed….lol…..Stingray I think it was. I know I’m aging myself but I’m grateful for each day. Especially when I look at what television shows the young now……….!!
I've always though George Reeves looked over weight and too old. Also the way they had is cape just tucked in the back looked wrong compared to the way they had Kirk Alyn's.
Word is that Alyn was offered the role again after Reeves' murder. Had he decided to accept, I wonder how well he would've been accepted. They probably would've had to replay the serials on television to put the unconvinced masses at ease.
Jack Larson said that they approached him to do a new series after Reeves died, "Superman's Pal, Jimmy Olsen," in which ALL of the effects would come from the Superman series and maybe the serials as well. Understandably, Larson was disgusted by the idea and refused.
@kali3665 Oh yeah, I heard about that. I don't blame him. How much footage would they be able to reuse? The Alyn recasting would have made more sense than that.
At least the hybrid of both live action and two-dimensional animation in the immortal "Who Framed Roger Rabbit" was far more believable (despite being overly complex) not to mention groundbreaking...hell, the film won four Academy Awards, for Christ's sake!
@1:19, Note the splintering shows OUTward holes, @4:32, I have seen more modern versions of this type of scene, where they used reverse motion to simulate Live stopping of a vehicle. Start with the vehicle stopped and reverse the vehicle film to make it look like it is approaching rather than pulling away. This ensures the scene is "On the Mark". @9:22, 'tossing bullets' ... pushing and 'snapping' guns forward when firing was common., especially in many westerns
I always laughed when someone tried to stab Superman with a knife. No person is so strong as to stab a hard surface and have them bend the blade over. They too would have to be as strong as Superman to accomplish that feat.
If Kirk Alyn had agreed to do the 1950s TV show we would have gotten more episodes well into the 1960s and its possible the series would have still been on the air when the Adam West Batman series hit the airwaves in 1966. Kirk was not the troubled soul George Reeves turned out to be. Kirk lived a full life, passing away at the age of 88 in 1999.
Could have been. It would have been interesting. I always like the idea of parallel worlds where things went just a little bit different from the real world.
Kirk Alyn was OK as Superman but the cartoon of him flying left much to be desired, especially after The Adventures Of Captain Marvel ,1941, was the first live action superhero and had great flying sequences.. He was asked to do the TV show but turned it down because he felt typecast in the role. He regretted it later because his career never took off again.
I'm watching Captain Marvel again right now, and you are right the flying sequences are really good for the majority. I plan on starting work on a video on it after I finish watching it again. Captain Marvel sure was ruthless with the bad guys. He didn't play around.
This one I'd heard of but didnt actually see it until I was an adult I think and definitely had seen George Reeves' series so many times that It did feel briefly wierd (thanks to Chris being Earth-One Superman in my noggin, and George being Earth-Two already), but it won me over fully quickly. The longer length, the action, a "new" adventure and especially an actual supervillain! That helmet though? I still haven't decided if that odd, huge helmet helped (I mean, it does look like a Golden Age comic alien) or hurt it (they had tons of Medieval helmets and even a couple Man in the Iron Masks laying around that were all a better size).
Too bad DC didn't let Republic do these serials Their flying effects were excellent Otherwise these are very entertaining and Alyn is obviously enjoying himself but he's no George Reeves
Of all the iterations of Superman, these serials my dad used to talk about I know the least about. Thanks so much for this all-encompassing video, I'm walking away knowing much more. Please continue these great Superman and other heroes videos. Proud to be a new subscriber.
Yes, and much as UA-cam has its faults, it's great that so many of the old serials have been uploaded onto here. Nevertheless, I'm also very pleased with my imported dvds of some of them, and my old VHS tapes of the serials of the Masked Marvel, Nyoka the Jungle Girl, Captain America, and the Son of Zorro.
The low-budget "Superman" live-action film serials released in 1948 and 1950 (produced by Columbia Pictures) both make the George Reeves "Adventures Of Superman" live-action television series look groundbreaking by comparison! Kirk Alyn's performance as the Man Of Steel (as well as his milquetoast alter ego, mild-mannered Daily Planet journalist Clark.Kent) was undoubtedly the only saving grace, ditto for Noel Neill's portrayal of Clark's Daily Planet co-worker and colleague, tough-as-nails reporter Lois Lane (as we all know, Noel later replaced Phyllis Coates on the aforementioned "Adventures Of Superman" live-action television series)! Alyn's midair flying sequences--a rudimentary (and rather slipshod, I must admit) combination of live action and animation--are not the greatest, but they were adequate and passable for its time. As for the two shoddy "Superman stops a runaway train" sequences, the first was far more convincing and believable, while the footage from the second pauses abruptly long before Alyn screeches the train to a halt. All in all, this was yet another wonderful video! Thanks for sharing, and keep up the good work! Enjoy your day, as well as your weekend!
I remember getting this at the video shop when was a kid with my granddad in the 80’s my granddad tell that it was the best thing he ever see when he was younger I like it to good memories 😢
The special effects were in general terrible, But they were for kids and it was a Saturday morning serial and they didn't have any money but, That train scene with him actually being there that was some serious s*** I didn't know about that
Very interesting I just wish this was streaming some place online so I can see it! I just watched the Green Hornet for the first at Tubi & was wondering if you take requests, would you make a video of goofs about The Green Hornet?
Republic’s Adventures of Captain Marvel 7 years earlier had better flying effects. Republic almost made a Superman serial but the rights fell through and the replaced him with a masked hero named The Copperhead. The serial was named “the Mysterious Dr Satan”.
The scene at about 2:15 where Superman leaves a criminal with Perry in his office is the second episode in a row showing how dumb Superman was in these series. This channel has another video asking if Superman committed murder to keep his identity a secret. In that episode, Superman leaves two criminals that discovered his true identity on top of a snowy, freezing mountain until he can figure out the best way to handle them. Well, they were not restrained or locked up, so they tried to climb down the mountain and fell to their deaths. Same as in this video, he leaves a criminal in Perry's office, no restraints, and he tries to kill Perry.
Kirk Alyn and Noel Neill also appeared on Neal Adams' classic wraparound cover (alongside Jack "Jimmy Olsen" Larson and countless other celebrities) for the tabloid-sized one-shot Superman vs. Muhammad Ali in 1978!
Did they consider a Superman animation that was closer to the actor? Did they reject it do to the 'robot theory' that too close to reality is worse than not-so-close?
Sometimes i say to friends that everyone that find the special effects in action and superhero movies these day's are bad should watch the old movies for a long while i think they wil be glad what whe have now.Yes sometimes its bad even with what they can do now but its still better than in the past.
I have a couple of times. Here's a Spider-man 70's TV facts video - ua-cam.com/video/giyr3jDeTCE/v-deo.htmlsi=xTLt0db0iiTw5wto and this one I talk about what if Spider-man and the Hulk had teamed up in the 70's or 80's ua-cam.com/video/lsdX-SnUFeU/v-deo.htmlsi=aMUFYj0h09x5uTcG Check them out when you get a chance. Thanks.
I was quite young when I would see Superman in the Saturday afternoon matinee serials. I never forgot Kirk Alyn as the 1st Superman. Can't tell you how many times I had to tell people that George Reeves was not the 1st Superman. He was the 1st on TV. It was Kirk Alyn who was the very 1st. BTW, I remember seeing Noel Nell and Kirk Alyn in the train scene in the first Superman movie with Chris Reeve. If I'm not mistaken I saw it at Graumann's Chinese Theater. I lived only a few blocks away from it at the time.
Finally kirk Alyn getting some love
Great post on 2 legendary serials. Enjoyed it, thoroughly.
Thanks 😀
Enjoyed the video!!!
Tommy Bond Was Great as Jimmy Olsen But His Claim to Fsme Was as "BUTCH" in the LITTLE RASCALS. Scared The Crap Outta Me as a Kid. 😮
He was mean on the Little Rascals. That's for sure.
It's funny, but those 1940's animation transitions do remind me of current CGI, lol!
Kirk has a better cape
HAI CRAZY MAN!
I have both videos
Do the batman serial next!
Tommy bond was great as Jimmy Olsen...he had lots of energy for the role.And spider lady Carol Forman was super hot...
Kirk Alyn played another comic-book hero, Blackhawk, in a 1952 serial. At this time Blackhawk was still being published by Quality Comics, making Alyn the first actor to portray two different heroes from rival publishers.
1:00 Projection is probably the movie thing I am most annoyed by. This one makes me roll my eyes 😂😂
Not quite. In 1949, Clayton Moore played Zorro in the serial 'Ghost of Zorro'. Then later that same year, he began playing The Lone Ranger on the television series. The two heroes were based on books by different publishers, in 1919 and 1936 respectively. Incidentally, the first Lone Ranger serial chapterplay was directed by William Witney and John English, who later made the Captain Marvel serial. Traditionally The Lone Ranger, John Reid, is said to be the ancestor of Britt Reid, The Green Hornet, which was another great serial.
@@owenorders5202 I was referring to characters created specifically for comic books. Zorro first appeared in the pulp magazine "All Story Weekly" in 1919. The Lone Ranger was created for radio in 1933. They were later licensed to appear in comics; but we're not the property of a publisher, such as DC, Timely/Atlas, Fawcett.
I love that Quality had at least some movie footprint. Shame more of their characters weren't done (I could easily see the Ray using the animated flying technique and even being more believeable) but I guess we're lucky we what we've got.
@@ivane5110 The Captain Marvel and King of the Rocketmen serials both showed what can be done with flying effects if they're done right.
Kirk Alyn was an awesome Superman and Clark Kent. He was the first and the original "Man of Steel". I once meet him at Vererans Memorial Coliseum at a toy convention. He was so nice and friendly. He signed a picture of himself for my son Matthew. At one time he lived in Arizona. I'm proud that he was my cousin.
Cool!
The cell animation is okay, but I think it would have been much better if they made a Superman puppet and did the scenes using stop motion.
They could have gone the same route like they did for the Captain Marvel Serial.
@WCWFanForever Yeah, that too.
I don't like the way superheroes are portrayed in the movies nowadays. They have too many anger issues. Anyone with that kind of power would be totally scary if they couldn't keep their anger in check.
I hope you all enjoy my new Superman video on the Kirk Alyn movies. I rewatched both of these serials over the last month. Old movies are a lot of fun to watch again and again,
Didn't that Lois Lane Transfer to the Reeves series for the first season?
I Thought it was the 1st season My bad
Thank you! I most certainly did! Keep up the good work, bro!
@@charleighh.990she came in to the t.v. show 2nd season
Very cool stuff thanks for the post ☺️☺️
I never knew Kirk Alyn played the first superman until 8 years ago when I watched him on youtube all these years always thought George Reeves was the first
Also when he stop the train you'll notice it's different number
The Daily Planet also seems to have police powers, according to the serials.
8:16 Superman's insignia is backwards here. Probably several times in the serial too....
The casting of Tommy Bond as Jimmy really threw me off. When I first saw the serials in the 70s, I remembered Bond most as Butch, so even then I thought he was royally miscast. Especially when he's used as the whipping boy throughout. Butch being beaten up THAT easily? Not buying it. 😋
I've noted before that the serials uses the exact same method we do today to bring the special effects to life. Animation. Then, they used standard cell animation; now, we use computers. And the cell animation was more believable!!
Kirk Alyn was Awesome ! Those animated flying sequences were the first CGI !
Still amazes me how they managed the special effects in those days 😀
Yeah, they had to be really creative.
Is there any one that reflects back on Flash Gordon and Ming the Merciless. There also was a show that has these silly puppets operated by strings that showed….lol…..Stingray I think it was. I know I’m aging myself but I’m grateful for each day. Especially when I look at what television shows the young now……….!!
I had never seen ( or heard of) the Kirk Alyn Superman. Fascinating!
I've always though George Reeves looked over weight and too old. Also the way they had is cape just tucked in the back looked wrong compared to the way they had Kirk Alyn's.
It's actually kind of cool how when he flies it turns to animation. for the 40s, anyways. 0:36 nice comic book collection.
Thanks! 😀
By far Columbia had to be done on the lowest of budgets
Actor Talbert son played Gilbert on leave it to Beaver.
Word is that Alyn was offered the role again after Reeves' murder. Had he decided to accept, I wonder how well he would've been accepted. They probably would've had to replay the serials on television to put the unconvinced masses at ease.
Jack Larson said that they approached him to do a new series after Reeves died, "Superman's Pal, Jimmy Olsen," in which ALL of the effects would come from the Superman series and maybe the serials as well. Understandably, Larson was disgusted by the idea and refused.
@kali3665 Oh yeah, I heard about that. I don't blame him. How much footage would they be able to reuse? The Alyn recasting would have made more sense than that.
Lyle Talbot as Lex Luthor always struck me as a character who was not "A Happy Camper"!
Asking "why" is what makes your channel what it is. Never stop. Combining animation reminds me of Roger Rabbit.
At least the hybrid of both live action and two-dimensional animation in the immortal "Who Framed Roger Rabbit" was far more believable (despite being overly complex) not to mention groundbreaking...hell, the film won four Academy Awards, for Christ's sake!
@1:19, Note the splintering shows OUTward holes, @4:32, I have seen more modern versions of this type of scene, where they used reverse motion to simulate Live stopping of a vehicle. Start with the vehicle stopped and reverse the vehicle film to make it look like it is approaching rather than pulling away. This ensures the scene is "On the Mark". @9:22, 'tossing bullets' ... pushing and 'snapping' guns forward when firing was common., especially in many westerns
Thanks, I did not know about the reversing the car trick. That makes sense. It would be the safest way to pull that off.
Back in 1948, there was SuperTVCrazyMan.
NOEL NEILL Was AWESOME as LOIS LANE and The Sweetest Person One Could Hope to Meet Which I Did in 2005. ❤
In 1940! Republic was going to make a Superman serial 😮w/ Buster Crabbe! But National pub. change there mind 😢so they pick up Capt. Marvel 😅
I always laughed when someone tried to stab Superman with a knife. No person is so strong as to stab a hard surface
and have them bend the blade over. They too would have to be as strong as Superman to accomplish that feat.
I always thought Kirk Alyn had the best 'Superman smile'. Not a great Clark Kent 'though.
I don't know if anyone else notice but in the credits it says Kirk Allen as clocked in and Superman as himself
If Kirk Alyn had agreed to do the 1950s TV show we would have gotten more episodes well into the 1960s and its possible the series would have still been on the air when the Adam West Batman series hit the airwaves in 1966. Kirk was not the troubled soul George Reeves turned out to be. Kirk lived a full life, passing away at the age of 88 in 1999.
Could have been. It would have been interesting. I always like the idea of parallel worlds where things went just a little bit different from the real world.
I think the gun theory is by thrusting the gun forward while firing, it's supposed to help control the kick-back.
That was what I was thinking. Your hand going forward would absorb some of the kick-back force.
Very interesting.
I think it was just a cinematic technique to make the gun firing look more dramatic on screen.
You should do Lois and Clark goofs.
Kirk Alyn was OK as Superman but the cartoon of him flying left much to be desired, especially after The Adventures Of Captain Marvel ,1941, was the first live action superhero and had great flying sequences.. He was asked to do the TV show but turned it down because he felt typecast in the role. He regretted it later because his career never took off again.
I'm watching Captain Marvel again right now, and you are right the flying sequences are really good for the majority. I plan on starting work on a video on it after I finish watching it again. Captain Marvel sure was ruthless with the bad guys. He didn't play around.
This one I'd heard of but didnt actually see it until I was an adult I think and definitely had seen George Reeves' series so many times that It did feel briefly wierd (thanks to Chris being Earth-One Superman in my noggin, and George being Earth-Two already), but it won me over fully quickly. The longer length, the action, a "new" adventure and especially an actual supervillain! That helmet though? I still haven't decided if that odd, huge helmet helped (I mean, it does look like a Golden Age comic alien) or hurt it (they had tons of Medieval helmets and even a couple Man in the Iron Masks laying around that were all a better size).
Spiderwoman looked hot.
The old Captain Marvel used a balsa wood dummy for the flying scenes, looked a heck of a lot better.
Too bad DC didn't let Republic do these serials Their flying effects were excellent Otherwise these are very entertaining and Alyn is obviously enjoying himself but he's no George Reeves
Of all the iterations of Superman, these serials my dad used to talk about I know the least about. Thanks so much for this all-encompassing video, I'm walking away knowing much more. Please continue these great Superman and other heroes videos. Proud to be a new subscriber.
Thank you very much! I appreciate it. Welcome to the channel! 😀
Yes, and much as UA-cam has its faults, it's great that so many of the old serials have been uploaded onto here. Nevertheless, I'm also very pleased with my imported dvds of some of them, and my old VHS tapes of the serials of the Masked Marvel, Nyoka the Jungle Girl, Captain America, and the Son of Zorro.
The low-budget "Superman" live-action film serials released in 1948 and 1950 (produced by Columbia Pictures) both make the George Reeves "Adventures Of Superman" live-action television series look groundbreaking by comparison!
Kirk Alyn's performance as the Man Of Steel (as well as his milquetoast alter ego, mild-mannered Daily Planet journalist Clark.Kent) was undoubtedly the only saving grace, ditto for Noel Neill's portrayal of Clark's Daily Planet co-worker and colleague, tough-as-nails reporter Lois Lane (as we all know, Noel later replaced Phyllis Coates on the aforementioned "Adventures Of Superman" live-action television series)!
Alyn's midair flying sequences--a rudimentary (and rather slipshod, I must admit) combination of live action and animation--are not the greatest, but they were adequate and passable for its time.
As for the two shoddy "Superman stops a runaway train" sequences, the first was far more convincing and believable, while the footage from the second pauses abruptly long before Alyn screeches the train to a halt.
All in all, this was yet another wonderful video! Thanks for sharing, and keep up the good work! Enjoy your day, as well as your weekend!
Thanks, I appreciate it.
You're very welcome, @@tvcrazyman. Keep up the good work.
New goof ok tim
I remember getting this at the video shop when was a kid with my granddad in the 80’s my granddad tell that it was the best thing he ever see when he was younger I like it to good memories 😢
Atom Man is better than Wrestling's The SHOCKMASTER!!!
GREAT CEASER"S GHOST!
2:01 oh my. EYEBALL POWERS. You say its impossible 😂😂😂 plus this is where they got idea for Chris to do it. Superman can do ANYTHING
If you love Atom Man's head/helmet, you'd REALLY love "The Shockmaster" in his debut on WCW TV 🤣🤣
The special effects were in general terrible, But they were for kids and it was a Saturday morning serial and they didn't have any money but, That train scene with him actually being there that was some serious s*** I didn't know about that
Very interesting I just wish this was streaming some place online so I can see it! I just watched the Green Hornet for the first at Tubi & was wondering if you take requests, would you make a video of goofs about The Green Hornet?
Republic’s Adventures of Captain Marvel 7 years earlier had better flying effects. Republic almost made a Superman serial but the rights fell through and the replaced him with a masked hero named The Copperhead. The serial was named “the Mysterious Dr Satan”.
The scene at about 2:15 where Superman leaves a criminal with Perry in his office is the second episode in a row showing how dumb Superman was in these series.
This channel has another video asking if Superman committed murder to keep his identity a secret. In that episode, Superman leaves two criminals that discovered his true identity on top of a snowy, freezing mountain until he can figure out the best way to handle them. Well, they were not restrained or locked up, so they tried to climb down the mountain and fell to their deaths.
Same as in this video, he leaves a criminal in Perry's office, no restraints, and he tries to kill Perry.
I noticed that also with the shooters trying to push the bullets along, like in the series HAVE GUN WILL Travel with his side stance.
Thought that was the actor that played Butch from the little Rascals...glad to know my guess was right...lol
I saw and goof. In the beginning of this video you have on a tank top........ later a t-shirt. 😻
You got me on that one. 😀
@@tvcrazyman 😹😻😹😻
Note in the 1978 Superman movie, young Lois Lanes parents were played by Noel Neil, and Kirk Allyen.😊
Kirk Alyn and Noel Neill also appeared on Neal Adams' classic wraparound cover (alongside Jack "Jimmy Olsen" Larson and countless other celebrities) for the tabloid-sized one-shot Superman vs. Muhammad Ali in 1978!
Did they consider a Superman animation that was closer to the actor?
Did they reject it do to the 'robot theory' that too close to reality is worse than not-so-close?
Sometimes i say to friends that everyone that find the special effects in action and superhero movies these day's are bad should watch the old movies for a long while i think they wil be glad what whe have now.Yes sometimes its bad even with what they can do now but its still better than in the past.
Absolutely charming video.
I missed the serials but grew up with George Reeves. Now I really want to see them. Thank you!
The 2nd train looks more believable
Well, it was the 1950's!!!?
These effects were great at this particular time gotta love theses
I would love to see you talk about the live action Spiderman series from the 70s if you have not done it already.
I have a couple of times. Here's a Spider-man 70's TV facts video - ua-cam.com/video/giyr3jDeTCE/v-deo.htmlsi=xTLt0db0iiTw5wto and this one I talk about what if Spider-man and the Hulk had teamed up in the 70's or 80's ua-cam.com/video/lsdX-SnUFeU/v-deo.htmlsi=aMUFYj0h09x5uTcG Check them out when you get a chance. Thanks.
Always interesting . . .
Interesting
Second
They did an amazing job with Superman back then! And yeah, Kirk Alyn was great in the role!