Here’s the rerelease, 1949, pressbook for Undersea Kingdom. This and Phantom Empire are on my top favorites list for movie serials (Mystery Science Theater 3000 be damned!). Watching guys running around in their shorts must have been pretty thrilling for audiences back then. I still want a few Volkites and definitely a Juggernaut to drive them around in. Interesting that the Reflector Plate gizmo showed up on Star Trek’s Mirror, Mirror episode, but with a more deadly function. The Volkite robot became the go to automaton for Republic as it showed up in later serials. Wikipedia has an unusually extensive article on Undersea Kingdom, listing the re-shot cheats used in the movie. Cheats were cliffhangers that often fudged what happened at the end of the last episode with new shots of the “previous” action that changes what the audience had seen. Pretty cheeky if you ask me. So is the use of technology like rayguns and robots, while still using swords and catapults to fight with. One of the pleasures of watching these fantastic serials is to see how creative the wardrobe and prop departments were with a tight budget.
ComicRack reader version: Download Undersea Kingdom Pressbook
See more cheeky pressbooks from Zombos’ Closet.