Renegade Satellite (1955)

‘One shot into the Gyrocentric Control, you go on a fine, bouncy ride!’

Space Ranger Rocky Jones and his crew visit a planet where the residents live in an underground city. Soon he finds himself arrested for attempted murder and the theft of a spaceship…

It’s the final mission for Rocky Jones and the loyal crew of the ‘Silver Moon’ as they police the space lanes one last time on behalf of the United Worlds of the Solar System and Roland Reed Productions of Hollywood, Calif. This was TV’s very first space opera, available weekly in 25 minute episodes, most of which told a complete story in three parts. Many were combined into ‘feature films’ and given a new title for rebroadcast.

This adventure was originally called ‘The Trial of Rocky Jones.’ And that’s exactly what we have here. Rocky (square-jawed, twinkly-eyed Richard Crane) intervenes when old friend and ‘lovable’ rogue Pinto Vertando (Ted Hecht) gets on the wrong end of a beating on the street. As a result, he’s arrested for attempted murder and banged up in the big house (or a small set in this case.) His list of crimes increases when he breaks jail and is caught afterwards in the captain’s chair of a rocket that’s been launched into space! The rocket doesn’t belong to him, of course, and neither does its valuable cargo.

With a record like that, it’s hardly surprising that he’s up before the beak pretty sharpish in the shape of no-nonsense planetary potentate Volga (Dayton Lummis). Luckily (I suppose!) Rocky’s co-pilot Biff (Jimmy Lydon) has read a book on law overnight and so is perfectly qualified to be his defence attorney! The rest of the story focuses on the trial, with Biff cross-examining both friendly and hostile witnesses, having his objections overruled and generally getting a bad time off Lummis on the bench.

Most of this involves a lot of talk, of course, as Lydon tries to besmirch the good name of Griff (Leonard Penn) the trader whose cargo ship Crane had ‘accidentally’ appropriated when drugged up to the eyeballs by person or persons unknown. Apparently. It’s not much of a defence if you ask me. Originally, Griff had been a space ranger himself, who betrayed the Earth a bit in much earlier story ‘Silver Needle ln The Sky’ (1954). Our ‘only’ traitor, Rocky muses, conveniently forgetting all the others that betrayed them on almost every episode of the show. Next to be subjected to Lydon’s crude attempts at character assassination are other principal prosecution witnesses Rudy Di Marco (Richard Avonde) and Dr Reno (Thomas Browne Henry). Just because they had tried to take over the planet Herculon in ‘A Cold Sun’. That was all just a misunderstanding. Obviously.

When it came to their latest pictures of the moon landings, people suspected that NASA hadn’t updated to the latest version of photoshop…

Of course, all this means a lot of verbal testimony, most of which is aided by a little cinematic device called ‘the flash back.’ Yes, it’s what old movie serials used to call the ‘recap’ episode, or, in more modern vernacular, a ‘clip show’! It’s a pretty cheap way to bring the curtain down on the series but, if you can believe it(!) the show was apparently quite expensive to produce, mainly due to the fact that it didn’t have the backing of a major network.

So it’s goodbye to the two-fisted Rocky Jones, blonde but dim navigator Vena (Sally Mansfield) and annoying young brat Bobby (Robert Lyden) as they sail off into the galactic sunset aboard the ‘Silver Moon.’ It’s nice to believe that they’re still out there somewhere in the cosmos; matching wits with alien queens who wear tiaras and sit behind big desks, watching out for strange, magnetic forces that pulverise spaceships made with wooden parts, putting on their goggles to prevent radiation getting in through their eyeballs, and beating the crap out of unnamed stunt players in uniforms decorated with lightning bolts. And that Secretary Drake (Charles Griffith) is still Earthside at Space Ranger HQ, worrying about everything, and getting betrayed by every minor functionary that happens to be hanging around in his office. And that Ranger Clark (William Hudson) is still on the astrophone on board Space Station OW9 privately wishing that the Service could afford at least one other member of staff to help him out, and, every now and them, dreaming of a 50-foot Allison Hayes…

‘Rocky Jones calling the Office of Space Affairs…come in, Secretary Drake!’

Robot of Regalio (1955)

‘You are kept in this sealed-off room because if you had any power on Herculon, you’d lead us to destruction as our father Bavarro almost did before us.’

The planet Hermes is mysteriously dragged out of orbit and, at the same time, senior officials at the United Worlds of the Solar System discover that strange, unknown aliens have arrived on Earth by parachute. Can the two events be connected? It’s up to Rocky Jones and his crew to find out!

Richard Crane starred as handsome, clean cut space ranger Rocky Jones in a 39-episode syndicated US TV show in 1954, called, somewhat unimaginatively, ‘Rocky Jones, Space Ranger.’ Most of his adventures played out over 3 shows of 25 minutes, allowing them to be cut together into features and rebroadcast as ‘films’ at a later date.

In what proved to be their penultimate adventure, Rocky and company find Earth being menaced by the machinations of the Nazam of Regalio (Ian Keith). He’s planning to use the magnetic charge generated by rogue moons Posito and Negato to destroy our planet and wipe the space rangers out of existence. If long-time fans of the show found this plan sounding a tad familiar, then yes, it’s just a rehash of Episodes 21-23 that were combined into ‘Crash of Moons’ (1955). Although the show wasn’t exactly noted for the originality of its plots or their development, this was the first time they could be accused of blatant repetition.

‘If I make a patronising, sexist remark will you hold it against me?’

The one wrinkle is the increased presence of Suzerain Juliandra of Herculon (Ann Robinson) who throws in with Rocky and his crew in their efforts to preserve the Earth and foil Keith’s dastardly scheme. But Juliandra has a secret; evil, twin sister Noviandra (Robinson, again) who is locked up in the palace but must surely be the worst guarded prisoner in science fiction history. And if you need definite proof that she’s the ‘evil twin’, well just check out her darker eyebrows and the way they slant at a sharp and sinister angle! Unfortunately, she doesn’t really cut it when compared with the show’s previous femme fatale Cleolanta (Patsy Parsons) but Robinson seems to be having fun and her cheerful performance is the only thing that livens up a very dreary 75 minutes. Apart from the robot.

By no standards can this mechanical man be regarded as one of the worst vintage robots that has ever graced the screen. They are plenty of cardboard box and tin can examples that are much, much worse. It’s obviously a man in a suit, of course, but the design is a little different and only vaguely silly. The scenes where we see him working amid showers of sparks in Keith’s power centre (the brilliantly named ‘Magnetorium’!) are actually mildly effective. But there was obviously some kind of a problem with mobility. At times, he seems to move ok, but, once he’s let loose all his victims seem contractually obliged to run headlong into his arms! As you can probably guess, it looks completely ridiculous. No idea what the issue was but it would be fun to know.

The other mystery around this effort is the strange presence of Robinson. Just a year earlier, she’d been second-billed to Gene Barry in George Pal’s smash hit ‘The War of the Worlds’ (1953) and, before that, she’d starred with Gloria Grahame and Vittorio Gassman in well-regarded noir ‘The Glass Wall’ (1953). Ok, she’d had little significant work before those projects, and afterwards she did a lot of TV, but still…what in the galaxy was she doing on a show like ‘Rocky Jones’? By 1956, she’d made a return to the movies, appearing opposite Doris Day and Barry Sullivan in the weird amalgamation of ‘Gaslight’ (1944) and ‘Airport 74’ (1975) that was ‘Julie’ (1956), but then committed career suicide by running off to Mexico to marry a matador! Not the done thing at all. She did return to take on the Martians again decades later on a few early episodes of the TV reboot of ‘War of the Worlds‘ (1988-90) and also featured in the Spielberg remake of the story in 2005 which starred Tom Cruise.

A dull adventure with a couple of fun moments courtesy of our mechanical star.

 

The Magnetic Moon (1955)

‘These particles move at 10 million, billion volts!’

During a routine space patrol, ranger Rocky Jones gets into difficulties when his ship is seriously damaged by a mysterious energy force. Further investigations reveal that the disturbance has been created by nuclear eruptions on a rogue moon. Unfortunately, the Earth is directly in the path of these deadly emissions, and the planet is only being protected by its own moon…

‘Rocky Jones Space Ranger’ was a US TV show broadcast in 1954. Typically, stories played out over three 25-minute episodes, making them perfect to combine into stand-alone features for the small town movie circuit and rebroadcast on television. This was the eighth in a total of the 10 examples, harvested from the 39 episode run. Of course, the show followed a tight, familiar formula, but any members of the juvenile audience who’d not been watching on the small screen might have been a little surprised by this one.

The previous ‘film’ had been ‘Crash of Moons’ (1955) and back then beefcake Richard Crane had still been flying his trusty Orbit Jet XV2, accompanied (as always) by wacky sidekick Winky (Scotty Beckett). But, in the intervening seven episodes of the TV show (none of which were combined into movies), much had changed. For a start, the Orbit Jet had been destroyed! lt was crushed by an avalanche of rocks on an unnamed planet in Part 2 of a story called Blast-Off!’. This episode also contained the last reference to Winky; a passing comment that he was off searching another area of space for the lost jet. In reality, Beckett’s run-ins with various law enforcement agencies proved incompatible with his continued employment on a children’s television show.

Arch villainess Cleolanta (Patsy Parsons) had also gone permanently AWOL (boooo!!), although probably for far less questionable reasons. The ‘Blast-Off!’ adventure also featured the last appearance of boffin Professor Newton, as actor Maurice Cass died of a heart attack shortly after filming completed. The following three-part story was called ‘A Cold Sun’ and the scriptwriters weren’t slow to ring the changes. The scientist role was recast with Reginald Sheffield playing Professor Mayberry and the audience got a new alien queen, the much friendlier Juliandra (Ann Robinson), Suzerain of Herculon. She offers star pilot Biff Cardoza (James Lydon) to the United Worlds, and he becomes Crane’s co-pilot on brand new ride the ‘Silver Moon’. Luckily for the production designer, it’s the sister ship of the original Orbit Jet so there’s no need to put in any overtime on pesky new set designs or dressing. Oh, and pretty blonde navigator Vena (Sally Mansfield) got a brand new hat.

‘I just don’t think it suits her, Rocky…’

So this time out, it’s Rocky and his new crew getting their first encounter with serious bother when Mansfield’s navigation reports disappear, along with her super-scientific clipboard! Then their rocket’s controls literally start falling apart. Yes, they’ve encountered an invisible force that pulverises one of the most important substances used in the construction of spacecraft…wood!

Luckily, Rocky is able to get them back to Earth where the craft is refitted with radical new materials. Made of metal. Meanwhile, new boffin Sheffield spends two days and nights trying to work out what’s going on. His conclusion? It’s a mysterious energy force that destroys wood. Err…yeah, thanks for that. Eventually, he does come up with a plan to neutralise the lethal rays approaching the Earth: deflect them with Space Mirrors. Building them in such a short time seems a big ask, until you realise that they’re all the size of shaving mirrors, and his plan is for the entire population of the planet to hold them up in the air all at once! (Stop laughing at the back!)

Muddying the waters is old adversary Agar (Charles Davis), who is determined to have his revenge on Crane and sabotage Sheffield’s brilliant plan. He’s teamed up with bad girl Shima (Pamela Duncan), who brings along Naboro to help. This dim muscleman is played by everyone’s favourite bald Swedish wrestler, and Ed Wood veteran, Tor Johnson! Of course, Crane and he fight, but, for once, Crane comes off second best, especially after they lurch into the wall of the spaceship and it clearly wobbles! lt’s a moment Ed himself would have been proud to call his own. Also on the side of the bad guys is the duplicitous Dorton (John Alvin) who works at the Headquarters of Space Affairs. I’m going to say it one more time: Secretary Drake (Charles Griffith) really needs to get his recruitment and screening procedures sorted out. Over the course of the show, it seemed that almost everyone working there was a traitor of some kind!

The ‘Rocky Jones’ series was never noted for even a passing acquaintance with basic scientific and astronomical facts, but this particular adventure is even more clueless than usual. But, of course, that’s one of its many charms.

Unfortunately, the lack of action, budget, compelling characters, a good script, SFX, and excitement may make it a bit of a long haul for some members of a modern audience.

The Forbidden Moon (1954)

‘That ship’s radioactive! l’m going inside!’

When a space station sends out a mysterious distress signal, Rocky Jones and his loyal crew are dispatched to investigate. An alien ship from the planet Medina is already docked when they arrive and it’s contaminated with cosmic radiation. ls it an accident or are the United Worlds of the Solar System facing a new intergalactic threat?

Square jawed tough guy Richard Crane starred as ‘Rocky Jones, Space Ranger’ on 39 episodes of Roland Reed’s syndicated TV show, initially broadcast throughout 1954. Most of the stories took place over three 25-minute shows and some were combined and issued to theatres as features. There were 10 ‘movies’ in all, which shows that Reed was a smart cookie, presuming this was all part of a planned strategy.

Not surprisingly all the ‘films’ follow a familiar pattern. There’s some kind of emergency in space. Secretary Drake (Charles Meredith) decides that only Rocky can deal with it (the Space Rangers seem to be woefully understaffed). Our clean-cut hero takes off in his Orbit Jet X-V2 accompanied by ‘comedy’ sidekick Winky (Scotty Beckett), hopeless blonde navigator Vena (you have to make allowances, she’s only a woman, after all!), egghead Professor Newton (Maurice Cass) and Newton’s annoying pre-teen ward Bobby (Robert Lyden). On this occasion, they tangle with Agar (Vic Perrin), an alien ruler with a severe ‘Napoleon’ complex due to his lack of height!

The story begins with Ranger Clark (William Hudson) in trouble on the space station. Not only is he apparently running the place entirely by himself (see what l mean about understaffing?!), he’s been poisoned by the Cosmic Radiation brought on board by Agar and his goons. He blocks the door to the communications room with his desk, but passes out in the midst of sending an S.O.S. to Earth. Secretary Drake calls in our heroes and briefs them on their mission, using some charts laid out on his desk. Rocky won’t let Bobby come along for the ride, because it’s too dangerous. Of course, that doesn’t go down well with the trainee Ranger. After take-off, there’s an immediate problem. All their instruments start running backwards! But, no worries, it’s only happening because of a lump of quartz from Bobby’s rock collection. He’s brought it along (for some reason) as part of his completely unpredictable plan to stowaway (bet you never saw that one coming, Ladies and Gentlemen!)

‘Is it true you’re going to turn into Patrick Troughton at the end of this episode?’

Once they’ve arrived at the station, Rocky goes aboard the alien ship without a protective suit, even though it’s hot with radiation. There’s nothing to worry about because the Professor has brought along plenty of his anti- radiation serum! Rocky identifies the ship as from the planet Medina after reading some papers he finds on a clipboard (stop laughing at the back!) but soon everyone is captured by Agar and whisked off to his home world anyway.

This empty sound stage is actually run by Agar’s sensible sister Yarra (Dian Fauntelle). She does have nice dangly earrings like the series’ usual villainess Cleolanta (Patsy Parsons), but her evening gown isn’t nearly so classy and she’s not even wearing a tiara! Worse than that, she doesn’t even have a desk! I can’t emphasise enough how important desks are in our shiny, space going future.

Events culminate in a trip to ‘The Forbidden Moon’ of the title where Agar has discovered the deadly Cosmic Radiation lying about, and a plant which is a far better cure for it than the Prof’s rubbish serum. Eventually, Rocky overcomes Agar and his men by turning off the artificial gravity in the Orbit Jet, which makes everyone throw themselves dramatically to the floor rather than float, because…Science, I guess!

This is one of the weakest of the ‘Rocky Jones’ features. There’s hardly any action, and without Parsons and her wonderful hissy fits, there’s little entertainment to be had elsewhere. The only enjoyment a modern audience can really get is from the script’s somewhat ‘interesting’ attitude to radiation. It makes a moon glow in space. It can be collected and stored in a box. It can throw spaceships off-course. Special goggles can prevent it from entering through the pupils of your eyes and paralysing your brain. Enough of it can make a radiation mountain, which you can detonate like an A-Bomb! And so on…

Cardboard science fiction space opera at its finest!

The House of Secrets (1936)

‘Hey, Jumpy! We found the other half of that crippled gam.’

An American adventurer in London inherits a title from a distant English relation. He visits his new home but is driven off by its mysterious occupants, who seem to have the protection of the British Government and the Chief Commissioner of Scotland Yard…

Fairly feeble ‘Old Dark House’ type mystery, which features Leslie Fenton as our Yank on this side of the pond, who becomes increasingly frustrated in his efforts to penetrate the mysteries of ‘The Hawk’s Nest’ despite being the legal owner of the crumbling pile. The fact that ‘the gang’ in possession of his ancestral home includes blonde Muriel Evans, who he’d saved from the inappropriate attentions of a fellow passenger on the boat over from Calais, only increases his determination to get to the bottom of things. Luckily, his best friend (Sidney Blackmer) is an American detective in pursuit of a murder suspect and offers to help.

This is a fairly typical, low-budget independent production of its era, with the requisite bouts of unconvincing fisticuffs, a sinister butler, a hidden treasure and some (very) vague touches of science fiction. Proceedings are relentlessly talky in between the brief ‘action’ scenes, and the inclusion of a trio of Chicago gangsters is hopelessly contrived. In fact, it’s just a stew of underdeveloped story elements, none of which are strong enough to carry a film on their own, even one just over an hour long. Crucially, the film builds up no head of steam on its way to its underwhelming climax and neither the romantic or comedic aspects are nearly strong enough to prop it up.

This was a production of Chesterfield Films, and directed by Roland D Reed, a man who went onto form his own company and give us TV’s ‘Rocky Jones, Space Ranger’ two decades later. Unfortunately, his camera is almost completely static here; even in dialogue scenes, and this does not assist a script that is seriously dull and performances that are professional, but unremarkable. The cast included two actors who went onto become veterans of the Basil Rathbone-Nigel Bruce ‘Sherlock Holmes’ series; Holmes Herbert (as the Home Secretary) and Olaf Hytten (in a typical unbilled bit).

‘Sssh! If we keep quiet, the director might actually move the camera…’

Fenton was born in England, but emigrated to the U.S. as a young child. His career began in silent pictures and, by the time talkies arrived, he’d worked his way up to supporting roles opposite James Cagney in ‘The Public Enemy’ (1931) and Spencer Tracy in ‘Boys Town’ (1937). Returning to the old country to assist the war effort, he became a British Commando and was seriously wounded on a mission on the French coast in 1942. After the war, he returned to Hollywood, moving behind the camera to direct over 20 pictures, most notably ‘Saigon’ (1948) with Alan Ladd and Veronica Lake, and ‘The Streets of Laredo’ (1949) which starred a young William Holden.

Evans pitched her trade in the b-movie arena, mostly Westerns, and this included an appearance starring with John Wayne in ‘King of the Pecos’ (1936), three years before John Ford made him a star in ‘Stagecoach’ (1939). Blackmer became a familiar face in supporting roles on both the big and small screens over half a century, but is most recognisable now as the coven leader in Roman Polanski’s ‘Rosemary’s Baby’ (1968).

A dreary, unremarkable programmer that’s probably best forgotten.