‘The Shadowed Circle’ #5

The fifth issue of the pulp fanzine The Shadowed Circle arrived recently. The focus is on The Shadow, and I subscribed for issues #4-6. So to help promote this new fanzine, I’ll be doing individual issue reviews.

As before, The Shadowed Circle is 7- by 10-inches with color covers and black-&-white interiors on nice white paper (not slick). Subscribing does get you some extra perks, as I got a nice Shadow coaster.

Issue #5 (Spring 2023) again has a great collection of articles and artwork. We get the second part of several articles.

Dick Myers looks at how The Shadow could have financed his organization, first looking at the major agents and how much he might have had to pay for some, as some were full-time agents. Then looks at the other costs of the organization, such as vehicles and places. There will be a third and final part in the next issue.

The location of the B. Jonas office is the focus of Tim King‘s article. The B. Jonas office was a “dead letter drop” for The Shadow’s agents, but not, as one person claimed, the location of his sanctum. We also get some speculation as to where the name came from as well.

There are two articles on The Shadow author Walter Gibson. One by Will Murray on Gibson’s 1938 sabbatical. Another by Lloyd Auerbach is on his interest in parapsychology.

Todd Severin‘s series on The Shadow in the comics continues by looking at the horrid comics from Archie (including some info on the Belmont books), and then the excellent comic from DC in the 1970s with work by Mike Kaluta. I’ve also posted on both of these comics. This series will continue in a future issue.

The article by Malcolm Deeley looks at the effect of the Russian Revolution on The Shadow, in particular, a sequence in DC’s The Shadow Strikes comic. Considering the ideas of The Shadow’s involvement with the Czar, it makes sense that the revolution would have an effect on The Shadow stories.

The Shadow was, fortunately, to have been able to appear in other media, including several serials, movies, and even some attempts at TV. One I was somehow not aware of was a TV pilot from 1954. I was aware of another attempt, but not this one. Sam Oatley‘s article gives a good overview of it.

The next issue will apparently focus on The Shadow’s agent Myra Reldon. This should be great, and I think might be an excellent way to keep things going by having various themed or focused issues.

As I subscriber, I’ll get it automatically, and will most likely re-subscribe. While you can get these issues off Amazon, I recommend doing that, as you usually get some nice perks.