Universal Monsters Wiki
Register
Advertisement
Ace Drummond
Acedrummond8
Film poster for Chapter 8
Directed by Ford Beebe
Clifford Smith
Starring John 'Dusty' King
Distributed by Universal Pictures
Release date(s) 1936 (1936)
Running time 15 chapters (258 min)
Country United States
Language English

Ace Drummond is a 1936 film serial based on the Ace Drummond comic strip drawn by Clayton Knight and written by Eddie Rickenbacker. It featured aviator Ace Drummond and his adventures in Mongolia. A mysterious villain who calls himself The Dragon is attempting to prevent International Airways from beginning service there, in order to protect the secret of the mountain of jade for himself. It features a dungeon in the nearby monastery, the kidnapping of an archeologist who stumbles onto the secret, his daughter's attempts to rescue him with Ace's help, a death ray The Dragon uses on the airline pilots, a radio system by which The Dragon communicates with his henchmen via the rotation of Buddhist prayer wheels (each transmission concluding "The Dragon commands!"), and a squadron of his own fighter planes. Ace also regularly performs his theme song, "Give Me a Ship and a Song". Never explained is why International Airways selects flying boats for their planned Mongolia service instead of landplanes.

Cast[]

  • John King as Ace Drummond
  • Jean Rogers as Peggy Trainor
  • Noah Beery Jr. as Jerry
  • Guy Bates Post as the Grand Lama
  • Lon Chaney Jr. as the henchman Ivan
  • Jackie Morrow as Billy Meredith

Production[]

Ace Drummond was based on a comic strip by Captain Eddie Rickenbacker.[1]

Ace Drummond gained good publicity following a set visit by Amelia Earhart. The famous aviatrix had driven out to the San Fernando Valley, after hearing that the serial was being shot there on location, where she watched the filming of the chapter two cliffhanger.[2]

In the traditional foreword at the beginning of each chapter, Ace Drummond used comic strips to summarise the story so far. This worked well and Universal, who had been trying to get away from using written text in its forewords, used "similar gimmicks" in their succeeding serials.[2][3]

Critical reception[]

In the words of Cline, Ace Drummond "exuded the futuristic aura of Flash Gordon combined with the eerie mystery of Baron Frankenstein's castle laboratory."[4]

Chapter titles[]

Source for titles:[5]

See also[]

  • List of American films of 1936

References[]

  1. Cline, William C.. "2. The Perils of Success". In the Nick of Time. McFarland & Company, Inc.. p. 17. ISBN 0-7864-0471-X. 
  2. 2.0 2.1 Harmon, Jim; Donald F. Glut. "7. The Aviators "Land That Plane at Once, You Crazy Fool"". The Great Movie Serials: Their Sound and Fury. Routledge. pp. 149, 151. ISBN 978-0-7130-0097-9. 
  3. Stedman, Raymond William. "5. Shazam and Good-by". Serials: Suspense and Drama By Installment. University of Oklahoma Press. p. 138. ISBN 978-0-8061-0927-5. 
  4. Cline, William C.. "3. The Six Faces of Adventure". In the Nick of Time. McFarland & Company, Inc.. p. 32. ISBN 0-7864-0471-X. 
  5. Cline, William C.. "Filmography". In the Nick of Time. McFarland & Company, Inc.. pp. 215–216. ISBN 0-7864-0471-X. 

External links[]

Preceded by
The Phantom Rider (1936)
Universal Serial
Ace Drummond (1936)
Succeeded by
Jungle Jim (1936)
Th UniversalMonsters This page uses content from Wikipedia. The original article was at Ace Drummond (serial).
The list of authors can be seen in the page history. As with Universal Monsters Wiki, the text of Wikipedia is available under the GNU Free Documentation License.
Advertisement