Wednesday, July 23, 2008

BATMAN (1943)- Chapter 5

The Living Corpse!

When we left Batman last chapter (over two months ago) he was in the cab of a speeding armored truck about to go over a cliff. Of course, he dives out of the vehicle at the last moment marking the first time he’s saved himself from one of the these cliffhanger endings. The no-goodnick in the truck with Bats dies in the crash but the Dynamic Duo retrieve the Radium Gun from the wreckage.

Back in the secret Japanese spy headquarters Daka is peeved! He gets a message from a Jap sub hiding offshore. They will be delivering a box of supplies to the beach that night and order Daka to have it picked up.

In Bruce Wayne’s home lab he is examining clues to try to get a lead on the saboteur’s plans when a letter arrives. It’s a secret message from his government bosses warning of a possible attack on Lockwood Airfield. Bruce and Dick make plans to infiltrate the place the next day.

The sub’s package turns out to be a coffin containing a Japanese soldier. Not completely dead the poor fellow is revived with an electrical surge and lives just long enough to relay his orders to Daka. Besides being a pretty hideous way to deliver what amounts to a brief note this is where the title of this episode comes from. The message is to steal a new experimental plane from (you guessed it) Lockwood Airfield and rendezvous with the submarine. To carry this out the bad guys lure two Airfield maintenance workers into the hideout in the carnival haunted house and brainwash them. This is my favorite WTF moment in the serial so far. What are the chances that these two guys would show up on the right day, be the right fellows and be suckers enough to go into the haunted house? Crazy! Daka uses his machine on them and they become his zombie slaves.

The next day our heroes are working at the Airfield and Bruce takes the chance of sneaking aboard the new plane to hide. This pays off in spades when the newly zombified workers show up, knock out the pilots and take their place on the test flight of that new plane. Dick realizes there has been a switch and radios Bruce just in time to change into his Batman costume and go into action. Cue fisticuffs with the zombie pilots as the three men bounce around the interior of the plane.

On the ground Dick alerts the army who immediately starts shooting anti-aircraft shells at the plane. Proving to be pretty damned good shots the army nails the plane which then spirals toward earth in a screaming fall! Will Batman escape the plane? Will the helpless zombies find love in the cockpit of that big plane? Uh… I mean, will Batman finally find Daka and defeat his evil plans? Tune in for Chapter 6 whenever I get around to it!

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