Supernatural sleuthing
Writer Ron Fortier reviews Lin Carter’s “Anton Zarnak: Supernatural Sleuth,” a collection of 16 stories featuring the weird, occultist detective. MORE …
The art of pulps
There may only be a few hundred original pulp cover paintings left in the world. If you’re in New York City this summer, head over to Brooklyn to feast your eyes on more than 100 on exhibition. MORE …
Double-barreled inspiration
An empty cabin, a shotgun-wielding old man, Hugh B. Cave and the idea for a popular pulp store. Romance With Attitude’s Conrad V. Sucatre recalls Cave’s appearance at the Windy City pulp show. MORE …
Tarzan on the tube
It’s official. The WB’s newly announced fall 2003 season includes Tarzan and Jane. The series, loosely based on the Burroughs’ tales, stars former Calvin Klein model Travis Fimmel, right, and Sarah Wayne Callies as the title characters. “Loosely” is key here. According to the WB’s PR, 20something Tarzan is captured by his billionaire uncle, Richard Clayton (played by Mitch Pileggi of The X-Files), who heads the powerful Greystoke Industries, and returned to his family’s home — contemporary New York City. That’s where he meets NYPD Det. Jane Porter. It will air at 9 p.m. ET Sundays.
End of the adventure
Back in October, we had a short item about AdventureStrips.com offering more than a dozen new online comics. During the intervening time, Ron Fortier (who also wrote the review of the Anton Zarnak collection above) and Rob Davis started a strip featuring the Paul Ernst character Doctor Satan for the subscription website. Unfortunately, AdventureStrips.com will stop publishing May 30. For Doctor Satan fans, fear not. Ron says the series will be moving to ModernPulp.com, where he’s been writing with Gordon Linzner a serialized pulp crossover featuring Doctor Satan and the Moon Man. Chapter 4 of the Hounds of Hell has just been posted.
Indy on DVD
Indiana Jones comes to DVD on Nov. 4 in a special four-disk collection, “The Adventures of Indiana Jones: The Complete DVD Movie Collection.” All three films — Raiders of the Lost Ark, Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom and Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade — are packaged with a fourth disk of bonus material. “In addition to the films themselves, of course, this collection explores every facet of how the films were made … from stunts to visual effects to the music and sound,” says Jim Ward, vice president of marketing for Lucasfilm, in announcing the set. “We take viewers around the world to explore the history behind the Indiana Jones legends.” The collection arrives in stores Nov. 4.
LXG goes online
If you’ve been checking out the teaser and the trailer of the upcoming pulp-like League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, you’ve probably clicked on the official website link only to discover a “coming soon” note. Well, no longer. The official site is up and mostly running (areas still under development include a look at the Nautilus and technology and the LXG). There’s basic information about the League and the main characters, from Sean Connery’s Allan Quartermain to Peta Wilson’s Mina Harker.
Pulp Q&A
I’ve read somewhere, but can’t remember the source, that either The Shadow or Doc Savage paperbacks have altered text. Is this true?
Yes, some of The Shadow and Doc Savage reprints (as well as those of other pulp characters, such as The Spider, Conan, etc.) were re-edited from their pulp originals. The Bantam and Pyramid/Jove Shadow paperbacks were largely intact compared with their pulp counterparts, but Grosset and Dunlop’s Shadow reprint, featuring “Grove of Doom,” “Murder by Moonlight” and “Voodoo Death,” and the Tempo paperback version of “Grove of Doom” were significantly cut.
Many of the endings in the Doc Savage paperbacks were trimmed or rewritten to eliminate teases to the next pulp. Check out Chris Kalb’s 86th Floor website for the original endings of many stories.
Then there were four Spider paperbacks published by Pocket Books in the 1970s that were rewritten and modernized.
