At a time radio's bogeymen were trying to help us overcome our fear of the dark, movie bogeymen were encouraging it.

The master bogeyman we never saw, only heard.  That was The Invisible Man.  But our favorite serial killer, The Creeper, was there big as life and twice as ugly.  You couldn't miss him.

Then out of some nerve-jarring nightmares came Cueball, Splitface , and Dr. Cyclops.  Serials gave us The Whispering Shadow, The Iron Claw, and The Clutching Hand.

The Lightning struck in "The Fighting Devil Dogs" while The Tiger Shark battled in "The Fighting Marines."  The Rattler climbed "Mystery Mountain" while The Wrecker derailed "The Hurricane Express."

Aboard a train that never stopped rode The Mysterious Traveler.

The heart stopper was the ghoulish phantom Vincent Price portrayed in Warner's 3-D experiment, "The House of Wax."

"He scared the hell out of me," Price told friends. "We weren't allowed to see the dailies, so I couldn't tell how well the character performed until the picture premiered."

All those wonderful old phantoms are in video stores now, including the greatest of all, The Shadow.  He knew what evil awaited us in the dark.

Grand National Films went to Walter Gibson for a story that made no mention of The Shadow having special powers, then dressed silent film star Rod LaRocque in black for "The Shadow Strikes."  In 1940, it was Victor Jory dressed in black for a 15-chapter serial titled simply "The Shadow."  On location in Arizona for an episode of TV's "High Chaparrel," Jory recalled the serial was fun to make, but the script was "a mess."

"In one scene, The Shadow dropped from a skylight into a crowded courtroom to wrestle with a defendant on trial.  Ridiculous!  But the film had a very interesting heavy, as I recall.  And I did win the leading lady at the end, so it wasn't a bad film.  I was told Orson Welles found it rather amusing."

The serial was a hit, but it was another five years before The Shadow appeared back on the screen.  Monogram tagged leading man Kane Richmond for not one but three films -- "The Shadow Returns," "Behind the Mask" and "The Missing Lady."   Comedy was stressed in these three films.  In '59, some minds must have been clouded over at Republic Studios because "The Invisible Avenger" tiptoed into theatres and right back out again.  Little is known about this film because few people remember it.  Richard Derr was another man in black.  It was re-released under the title "Bourbon Street Shadows."

Universal did some homework before it brought us "The Shadow" in '94.  A Walter Gibson story was adapted, new technology created some truly awesome images of our hero, and all the magic of the long-running radio show was there.  At last, The Shadow was more than just a man dressed in black.


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