The Space Eagle - Operation Star Voyage!

After a small wait of forty years or so I got to finally read the second Space Eagle book from Jack Pearl. The first Whitman novel starring the Space Eagle fell into my young clutches and I absorbed it at right the same time as I was discovering comic books like The Flash and Captain Marvel and getting to see flicks like Planet of the Apes. It was a Doc Savage-esque story of space exploration melded with Bondian intrigue and and derring-do. 

The hero Paul Girard through use of a Faster-than-Light spacecraft called the SWIFT and some gimmicks and disguises infiltrates a madman's lair and saves the world from utter atomic destruction. In this sequel Paul Girard and his genius twin sister Julie are back. She developed the SWIFT based on the work of a Russian defector scientist, and this scientist tips off the government that the Soviets (the Cold War still rages in this alternate future) are about to master FTL flight themselves using "Spartanium" the rarest of metals found only behind the Iron Curtain and a small particle of which powers the SWIFT. Paul adopts a disguise, goes behind the Curtain and infiltrates the prison camp that masks and mines the ore. He finds out the threat is real and that the source of the Spartanium is an ancient giant meteor. He returns to the U.S. after some gunplay and prepares to head to Alpha Centauri, the only place where Spartanium is found in the spectrum. 

He takes with him Samuel Aarons, a giant but gentle black man who is also a family friend. They go into space and using the FTL drive go almost instantaneously to a planet named Mega-3 where the Megans are not all that happy to see them. The Megans explain in fuller detail to the relatively witless humans the details of FTL transportation but uttlerly refuse to give the primitive humans anymore dangerous Spartnaium. As it turns out the Megans are all too familiar with us, having visited us in those pesky UFOs for quite a while. They do though after becoming convinced of the Space Eagle's virtue, and impressed with a speech given by Sam give the humans another element called Xenon that will make Spartanium useless. The Space Eagle and his deputy return to Earth but before they can make landfall they are intercepted by Space Pirates led by Luchesi Muta who survived his apparent death in the first novel and now wants the get the FTL drive for himself. Ultimatley Paul and Sam escape and defeat the pirates and attempt to drag their space ship the Ming 5 along with in an FTL jump, but the pirate ship is lost in the mists of time. The Space Eagle returns to Earth, seeds the Xenon in the clouds which destroys the Spartanium mine by rendering the mineral useless and the world is safe from tyranny once more. 

Pretty dang good stuff. The story this time did seem somewhat more outlandish, losing a bit of the spy intrigue of the first one. But the sci-fi elements are ramped up for sure. The Megans are pretty stereotypical aliens -- tiny pale eggheads -- and the whole trip to another solar system is presented in a somewhat bland way. The spectacle of the first novel is lost a little in the mad dash of this plot. The return of Luchesi at the end was a neat surprise, but it might've been one detail too many in an already crowded plot. Nonetheless, this is a slam-bang entertaining novel, and well worth the forty-year wait.

NOTE: This is a Dojo Revised Classic Post. 

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The Space Eagle - Operation Doomsday!

The Whitman novel The Space Eagle - Operation Doomsday was a big influence on my young self. The novel was written by Jack Pearl with illustrations by Arnie Kohn. The idea that "superhero" adventures expanded beyond the comics was enlightening and gave me a broader perspective about the nature of genres. Also, it plugged into neatly the very real excitement of the times, an era when the Moon landing was imminent and the exploration of space a real and thriving possibility. We live in less exciting, more mundane times now having given up the thrill of exploration for more prosaic pursuits. The Space Eagle remains a neat tie for me to all that excitement. 

Let reprise the plot briefly. Paul Girard and his sister Julie are twins in command of a large R&D conglomerate that has ties to space travel and cosmetics of all things. Paul is a famous handsome adventurer well-liked by almost everyone. His sister is a genius researcher who prefers the lab to the broader world. After using an experimental faster-than-light spacecraft to rescue some scientists stranded in orbit, Paul is called upon by the President of the United States to be a defacto Marshall of space. This is a world still ruled by the Cold War which has spread into the very cold reaches of space and the colonies established there. Paul takes the challenge and adopting the identity of Space Eagle he uses the SWIFT (his FTL ship) and other scientific breakthroughs from his sister to fight dark menaces. 

The first he is called upon to battle is a mad doctor named Luchesi who plots to use nuclear missles to draw the Superpowers into a conflict leaving him and his ilk to sort out the aftermath. Using special chemicals Paul adopts the role of Luchesi's son to infiltrate the hidden Himalayan lair and after much activity overcomes Doctor Luchesi and his robot agent. The Space Eagle then uses the SWIFT's ftl capabilities to effectively stop time enabling him to end the threat of the nuclear weapons stalling the threat to the world. As the story ends, he and his sister wait the next challenge. 

It's good rousing stuff. Paul is a blend of Doc Savage, The Avenger, and Flash Gordon with a healthy dose of James Bond dashed in too. The story is brisk and involving, offering up some neat suspense. The dilemma is worthy of a superhero and demands both physical skills and dexterity of mind. That's probably what I like most, the Space Eagle must solve most problems with his mind, or the mind of his sister through her special weapons and potions. It's a heady brand of adventure. There's a second novel in the series, and that will be subject of tomorrow's post. 

NOTE: This is a Dojo Revised Classic Post. 

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All The Munsters Fit To Print!

This Halloween month of October I was finally able to finish a project that has eluded me for many years --- watch all of The Munsters. I picked up the episodes on DVD many years ago and have watched them off and on over the years, but never all the way through and never with a mindset to see the development of the short-lived series. The Munsters and its similar-themed competitor The Addams Family was a shout out by the producers of television to the "Monster Kids", the generation of Baby Boom youngsters who had rediscovered the classic monsters of the vintage Universal cycle thanks to the burgeoning medium of television. 

The Munsters appeared all over the place at the time, such as TV Guide and especially in the pages of magazines like Monster World dedicated to bringing home the monsters in a limited way in those primitive days before home video was ubiquitous. Watching The Munsters it's easy to see how the series started, revved up into an exceedingly high and entertaining gear, and then slowly but steadily began to lose energy as the gags became repetitive. It would have worse by far for the series to have dragged on and subsequent attempts to mine the property have only proven this to be the case. The series was lightning in a bottle, great in its moment but not long for the world. 

But that didn't stop folks from trying. Munster, Go Home was an attempt to get the property into the theaters on the big screen and in garish color. It failed because of some ham-handed handling, but also because the jokes again and again felt all too familiar. The talent involved in this show was mighty indeed, with the practiced duo of Fred Gwynne and Al Lewis providing outstanding moments of exquisite comedy timing.

The Munsters did find some traction in the other pop culture outlets of the era. A couple of novels from Whitman for youngsters were created sporting handsome covers by Arnie Kohn. I have the second one titled The Last Resort around here somewhere, and have had it since I was a boy.  I need to get the other one, if only for the handsome cover art. Whitman's comic book branch of Gold Key tapped the characters for a respectable run which as was typical of the time sported photo covers.

The Munsters produced by the same fellows who gave the world Leave It To  Beaver, was a product of its time, a time when monsters were so commonplace that they were seen as fit for humor. That hasn't gone away with movies like Hotel Transylvania and its sequels proving quite popular. But never forget that when it comes to a comedy riff on classic monsters, The Munsters was the original.

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The Space Eagle - Operation Star Voyage!

After a small wait of forty years or so I get to finally read the second Space Eagle book from Jack Pearl. The first Whitman novel starring the Space Eagle fell into my young clutches and I absorbed it at right the same time as I was discovering comic books like The Flash and Captain Marvel and getting to see flicks like Planet of the Apes. It was a Doc Savage-esque story of space exploration melded with Bondian intrigue and and derring-do. The hero Paul Girard through use of a Faster-than-Light spacecraft called the SWIFT and some gimmicks and disguises infiltrates a madman's lair and saves the world from utter atomic destruction.

In this sequel Paul Girard and his genius twin sister Julie are back. She developed the SWIFT based on the work of a Russian defector scientist, and this scientist tips off the government that the Soviets (the Cold War still rages in this alternate future) are about to master FTL flight themselves using "Spartanium" the rarest of metals found only behind the Iron Curtain and a small particle of which powers the SWIFT. Paul adopts a disguise, goes behind the Curtain and infiltrates the prison camp that masks and mines the ore. He finds out the threat is real and that the source of the Spartanium is an ancient giant meteor. He returns to the U.S. after some gunplay and prepares to head to Alpha Centauri, the only place where Spartanium is found in the spectrum. He takes with him Samuel Aarons, a giant but gentle black man who is also a family friend.

They go into space and using the FTL drive go almost instantaneously to a planet named Mega-3 where the Megans are not all that happy to see them. The Megans explain in fuller detail to the relatively witless humans the details of FTL transportation but uttlerly refuse to give the primitive humans anymore dangerous Spartnaium. As it turns out the Megans are all too familiar with us, having visited us in those pesky UFOs for quite a while. They do though after becoming convinced of the Space Eagle's virtue, and impressed with a speech given by Sam give the humans another element called Xenon that will make Spartanium useless. The Space Eagle and his deputy return to Earth but before they can make landfall they are intercepted by Space Pirates led by Luchesi Muta who survived his apparent death in the first novel and now wants the get the FTL drive for himself. Ultimatley Paul and Sam escape and defeat the pirates and attempt to drag their space ship the Ming 5 along with in an FTL jump, but the pirate ship is lost in the mists of time. The Space Eagle returns to Earth, seeds the Xenon in the clouds which destroys the Spartanium mine by rendering the mineral useless and the world is safe from tyranny once more.

Pretty dang good stuff. The story this time did seem somewhat more outlandish, losing a bit of the spy intrigue of the first one. But the sci-fi elements are ramped up for sure. The Megans are pretty stereotypical aliens -- tiny pale eggheads -- and the whole trip to another solar system is presented in a somewhat bland way. The spectacle of the first novel is lost a little in the mad dash of this plot. The return of Luchesi at the end was a neat surprise, but it might've been one detail too many in an already crowded plot. Nonetheless, this is a slam bang entertaining novel, and well worth the forty-year wait.

Rip Off

The Space Eagle - Operation Doomsday!

As I mentioned in an earlier posting, this Whitman novel The Space Eagle - Operation Doomsday was a big influence on my young self. The novel was written by Jack Pearl with illustrations by Arnie Kohn. The idea that "superhero" adventures expanded beyond the comics was enlightening and gave me a broader perspective about the nature of genres. Also it plugged into neatly the very real excitement of the times, an era when the Moon landing was imminent and the exploration of space a real and thriving possibility. We live in less exciting, more mundane times now having given up the thrill of exploration for more prosaic pursuits. The Space Eagle remains a neat tie for me to all that excitement.

Let reprise the plot briefly. Paul Girard and his sister Julie are twins in command of a large R&D conglomerate that has ties to space travel and cosmetics of all things. Paul is a famous handsome adventurer well liked by almost everyone. His sister is a genius researcher who prefers the lab to the broader world. After using an experimental faster-than-light spacecraft to rescue some scientists stranded in orbit, Paul is called upon by the President of the United States to be a defacto Marshall of space. This is a world still ruled by the Cold War which has spread into the very cold reaches of space and the colonies established there. Paul takes the challenge and adopting the identity of Space Eagle he uses the SWIFT (his FTL ship) and other scientific breakthoughs from his sister to fight dark menaces. The first he is called upon to battle is a mad doctor named Luchesi who plots to use nuclear missles to draw the Superpowers into a conflict leaving him and his ilk to sort out the aftermath. Using special chemicals Paul adopts the role of Luchesi's son to infiltrate the hidden Himalayan lair and after much activity overcomes Doctor Luchesi and his robot agent. The Space Eagle then uses the SWIFT's ftl capabilities to effectively stop time enabling him to end the threat of the nuclear weapons stalling the threat to the world. As the story ends he and his sister wait the next challenge.

It's good rousing stuff. Paul is a blend of Doc Savage, The Avenger, and Flash Gordon with a healthy dose of James Bond dashed in too. The story is brisk and involving, offering up some neat suspense. The dilemma is worthy of a superhero and demands both physical skills and dexterity of mind. That's probably what I like most, the Space Eagle must solve most problems with his mind, or the mind of his sister through her special weapons and potions. It's a heady brand of adventure. Good stuff.

There's a second novel in the series, one I've never ever owned nor read. I'm anxious to tear into it.

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