'Outpost in Morocco' is a fast-moving war pic

Outpost in Morocco (1949)
Starring: George Raft, Akim Tamirof, Marie Windsor, and Eduard Franz
Director: Robert Florey
Rating: Seven of Ten Stars

A French Foreign Legion Officer reknowned for his way with the ladies, Capt. Paul Gerard (Raft) is assigned to escort and seduce Cara (Windsor) in order to discover if her father (Franz) is plotting with other Arab tribal leaders to stage an uprising against the French forces. His mission becomes complicated when he falls in love with her in earnest... and it becomes deadly when it turns out that her father is not only plotting an uprising but he is unleashing it.

"Outpost in Morocco" is a fast moving film that features a perfect blend of war, espionage, and romance elements. I often complain about how movies have "insta-romances" that make little or no sense in context of character and story just to keep the plot moving, but the love that develops between the Capt. Gerard and Cara feels realistic and firmly rooted in the characters.

The acting and dialog is also top-notch all around. Stars George Raft and Marie Windsor are evenly matched on screen, and Akim Tamirof (as a hard-bitten veteran Foreign Legion junior officer who becomes Gerard's go-to right-hand man) switches gears easily from dramatic to comedic depending on the scene.

From NUELOW -- 'Princess Pantha: the Footsteps of Fate'

NUELOW Games has recently released another of its comics/rpg hybrid books co-edited by yours truly. This one is a stand-alone sequel to Princess Pantha: The Hunt for M'Gana. It contains four classic comics with art by Gene Fawcette, Ralph Mayo, and Art Saaf. It also contains a complete supplement for ROLF!: The Rollplaying Game.

By way of a preview of Princess Pantha: The Footsteps of Fate, here are the splash pages for the four included comics stories. You can click here to see further previews and to get your very own copy. (And if you do, please let me know what you think of it.)

By Art Saaf

By Gene Fawcette

By Ralph Mayo

By Art Saaf

Now available from NUELOW Games -- The Three Lives of Fantomah: Book Two

Fantomah has been accurately described as the first female superhero in comics. Readers were first introduced to her in Jungle Comics #2 (cover date Feb. 1940), a full two years before the celebrated debut of Wonder Woman. Fantomah soon lost the superhero flavor.

Fantomah, as drawn by Richard Case

When series creator Fletcher Hanks was replaced with a mixed bag of artists and writers who worked under the house-name "W.B. Hovious." From Jungle Comics #16 through #26, Fantomah moved away from the fearsome incarnation of nature's vengeance that she had been under Hanks, and became increasingly a "jungle girl"-type character. She still had magic powers, but they were increasingly de-emphasized as she gained a faithful pet panther, rescued and took charge of a lost boy--and generally came to seem more like a female Tarzan.

Fantomah's "jungle girl" period is the subject of The Three Lives of Fantomah: Book Two from NUELOW Games. It presents the six best episodes from Jungle Comics #16 - #26, together will all new roleplaying game rules that will let you bring Fantomah-style magic to your OGL Modern d20 games. For a sample of the game content, click here to visit the NUELOW Games Blog.

The majority of the art in The Three Lives of Fantomah: Book Two is by Richard Case, although some stories were penciled and/or inked by "W.B Hovious." I designed the new game content, as well as wrote a small piece of fiction intended to shed light on why Fantomah is transfirming -- and to set up her final transformation that will occur in Book Three.

I hope you will download a copy of The Three Lives of Fantomah: Book Two. Click here to see previews of the book. If you do, be sure to tell me what you think of it.

And please keep en eye out for Book Three some time after Christmas.

Fantomah: When she kicks ass, she doesn't bother taking names.

Halloween is here!

Ann Miller wishes everyone a spooktacularly fun Halloween!

Halloween is almost here...

... and Paulette Goddard is already in costume! Do you have yours picked out yet?

Halloween is coming...

... and Etchika Choureau wants to protect her new friend from all the ghosts and goblins that are going to be popping up. Or maybe she's just protecting the candy inside?

Halloween is coming...

... and Paulette Goddard is picking out the mask she's going to wear. How about you?

'Up in the Air' has strong cast and weak script

Up in the Air (1940)
Starring: Frankie Darro, Mantan Moreland, Marjorie Reynolds, Tristram Coffin, Lorna Gray, and Dick Elliot
Director: Howard Bretherton
Rating: Six of Ten Stars

When the obnoxious singer (Gray) headlining a radio station's anchor program is murdered, Frankie (Darro) gets his friend Jeff (Moreland) to help him find the killer. Along the way, he tries to fulfill his dreams of stardom while also helping a beautiful young singer (Reynolds) to become the program's new headliner.

Jeff (Moreland) and Frankie (Darro) prove themselves not ready for prime-time.

"Up in the Air" is a film where the cast is doing there very best with weak material. Darro and Moreland are great together--as they are in every teaming I've seen so far--and the other performers are also at the top of their game. If only more effort at been put into the script, as well as the set-piece musical performances by Lorna Gray and Marjorie Reynolds, this could have ranked among Monogram's best efforts. It's always a shame to see actors giving it their best but being undermined by weak material.

I think the film is still worth seeing if you are a fan of either Frankie Darro or Mantan Moreland, and a must-see if you like them when work together. One part of the film that I'm curious about is the "minstrel show" sequence where Frankie and Jeff are trying out for a spot on the radio show. Their routine is intentionally embarrassing--and even more so when viewed through 21st century eyes. Given that black-face was already falling out of favor by 1940, I wonder if that medium wasn't chosen to make Frankie and Jeff's comedy routine seem even more hackneyed and bad.

Psst....

.... didya know that Halloween will be here in just 30 short days? You better get ready!

NUELOW reveals the lives of Fantomah

Many comics fans will tell you that Wonder Woman was the first female superhero. Others will tell you that it was Phantom Lady. True masters of trivia will tell you it was the Woman in Red.

Truth is, they're all wrong.

The first female superhero, Fantomah, saw print in Feb. 1940, in the pages of Jungle Comics #2.

Created by writer/artist Fletcher Hanks (working as Barclay Flagg), the earliest "Fantomah" stories carried his trademark powerful character type dishing out extreme supernatural justice against evil-doers. Here's a splash panel from one of the early Fantomah stories that tells you everything you need to know about her -- other than her habit of turning villains into strange creatures or dispatching them violently. Oh -- and her own ability to turn into a terrifying skull-faced Furie when angered.

The "first life" of Fantomah

Unlike other Hanks creations, Fantomah continued past his involvement with the strip, evolving as it passed through the hands of other creators (working under the name W.B. Hovious). The surreal, macabre flavor that Hanks brought to most of his work faded quickly from the series, and for a time Fantomah was not very different from jungle girls, such as Sheena, Queen of the Jungle.

Fantomah, with Ken and Fury, during her "second life."

Eventually, it was revealed that she was the lost ruler of the City of Khefra, and for the final 20 or so episodes of the series she ruled justly while fighting off challengers to her throne. As she claimed her inheritance, the last vestiges of the powerful magic she had once wielded seemingly faded forever. The series came to a close in Jungle Comics #51.

The undead stalk Fantomah, Daughter of the Pharohs, during her "third life."

NUELOW Games has just released The Three Lives of Fantomah: Book One. It contains four of Fletcher Hanks' best Fantomah stories, as well as one by "W.B. Hovious," all spotlighting Fantomah during her "first life" as a vengeful demi-goddess. The book also contains an all new OGL Modern/d20 System prestige class and related feats that set out to capture the unusual nature of Fantomah's development over the course of her series.

Like most of NUELOW Games' releases, it's co-edited by yours truly, and I am also responsible for the game design. I hope some of you will check it out and let me know what you think.

And, of course, I hope you'll like it well enough to come back for Books Two and Three!