Batman in the 1960s Issue 38: March/April 1966

The Caped Crusader in the 1960s
by Jack Seabrook
& Peter Enfantino

Kubert

Detective Comics #349

"The Blockbuster Breaks Loose!"

Story by Gardner Fox

Art by Carmine Infantino & Joe Giella

The Blockbuster is back! How, you say? Well, hang on and I'll try to translate the ancient hieroglyphs known as a DC funny book script. Seems the BB survived the ocean's rage (see Detective #345 - editor) and hid in an undersea cave. Here's where it gets kinda sketchy. Either the undersea cave is right below a local department store or BB switches locales after an undisclosed amount of time. Anyway, the Mutant Monster of Mayhem cracks through the dept. store floor just as Batman and Robin are putting the kibosh on a trio of safe-crackers.

Robin escorts the thieves to a back room while Batman doffs his mask, revealing the face of Bruce Wayne to BB. Those of you who don't remember the thrilling details found in "The Blockbuster Invasion of Gotham City" (see Detective #345 - editor), I'll just say that Blockbuster's best friend in the whole world is, ironically, Bruce Wayne, and the millionaire playboy's face is a soothing balm to the soul of the Neanderthal Ninnie. But, what's this? As soon as Bats doffs, the mask reattaches to his face and refuses to let go. "Obviously," thinks the World's Greatest Detective, "Something's going on here!" 

BB beats Bats to a pulp and is about to deliver the killing blow when the Dark Knight imitates the voice of BB's brother, Roland Desmond, commanding him to leave the Batman alone and return to the Blockbuster headquarters. BB does so, leaving an exhausted and beaten Caped Crusader to lick his wounds. Back in the Batcave, the Dynamic Duo cook up a plan to defeat their nemesis, using "a special calcium compound only visible in a calcium light," wherein Bats takes on the features of Roland.

Obviously not bathing for a week, Batman sets out each night on patrols with the Teenage Tornado, but there is no sign of the Mammoth Mauler. Finally, while breaking up a theft at the Gotham Art Museum, the boys hear a thundering, rumbling crash and Blockbuster enters through a wall. Robin shines his calcium light on his partner and Batman magically grows a mustache and second chin, perfectly aping the features of Roland Desmond. The act lasts three or four seconds before all hell breaks loose. Pictures fly off the wall, statues hurtle through the air, rugs are pulled out, and Robin's attention is broken. The calcium light goes out and Blockbuster sees our hero for what he is: a caped and cowled enemy!

The Blockbuster delivers a crunching blow to the head of the Dark Knight and then turns away as a mysterious figure steps out of the shadows and encases Batman in a sarcophagus. The mystery man lets us know the tomb is laced with a special radiation that ages anyone who comes in contact. The tomb will be the death of the Batman! Luckily, the radiation has melted the calcium from Batman's face but somehow hardened the substance on our hero's glove (don't look at me - editor), giving him a rock-hard karate limb. Batman chops his way through the solid stone tomb and then uses the super fist to level Blockbuster. The boys turn their misunderstood enemy over to the scientists at the Alfred Foundation for research purposes.

Meanwhile, somewhere in a Gotham alley, the Outsider admits to us that he was behind all the oddball occurrences of the installment and vows to return someday!

In the end, most of the confusing lapses in credibility can be laid at the Outsider's feet (well, except for Batman's sudden use of dried milk to punch his way out of a thick sarcophagus), but the sophomore adventure of the Blockbuster is threadbare entertainment. Several of the pages are used to remind readers who the big ape is and the final page exposition, delivered by the shadow of the Outsider, is pretty lame. I will say, though, that the identity and purpose of the Outsider are still interesting me. Too bad the script is so bad, because the art is pretty darn good.-Peter

Jack-The best thing about this issue is Kubert's cover. Blockbuster is a character of limited interest and Infantino's art this time out isn't his best work. I was surprised to see the return of the Outsider; isn't it about time to reveal his identity?

Kane/Anderson

Batman #179

"Clay Pigeon for a Killer!"

Story by Robert Kanigher

Art by Sheldon Moldoff & Sid Greene

"The Riddle-Less Robberies of the Riddler!"

Story by Gardner Fox

Art by Sheldon Moldoff & Joe Giella

After three crooks wearing animal head masks succeed in stealing three million bucks from an armored car and killing the guards, the heist becomes the subject of a TV show called "Unsolved Crimes of the Century," where host Roger Kay promises to reveal the identity of the killer on tomorrow's show. Unfortunately, Kay has no idea who the guilty party is, so he visits Bruce Wayne to confess that he's terrified he'll be assassinated by the murderer. Bruce volunteers his pal Batman to be a "Clay Pigeon for a Killer!" on the TV show by impersonating Roger.

Bruce disguises himself as Kay and, as expected, the three robbers/killers show up and one shoots Kay/Batman point blank! Our hero awakens to learn that he was shot with an "anesthetic bullet" and that he is now prisoner in a tunnel that is rapidly filling with 1) water and 2) boastful words from Elon Musk Victor Iago, world's richest man, who can't help bragging about having committed the perfect crime. Iago was one of the trio of robbers; when they got to their hiding place after the crime, he had another man, who was wearing the same disguise as Iago, shoot the other two robbers. Iago then shot the shooter, making it appear that the three crooks had all been killed by an unknown person. The cops figured the three crooks did away with each other and closed the case.

Batman removes his Roger Kay disguise, avoids being drowned, and exits the tunnel to find himself on the grounds of Iago's mansion, where he must escape being mauled by a lion and other big game. The Caped Crusader is caught by Iago's gunsels and brought to the rich guy himself; he quickly overpowers them all. In the end, Iago is in the looney bin, having gone insane.

Bob Kanigher certainly knows how to keep a story moving and, while this one isn't very good, at least there's plenty of action. Moldoff and Giella's art is below average, even for them. You'd think Batman would wear some sort of bullet proof vest, but apparently not. He is shot in the chest and recovers immediately.

The Riddler escapes from prison and vows to stop tipping off Batman to his crimes with riddles. The first time he tries to commit a crime, however, he can't go through with it because he hasn't sent out any riddles beforehand! He vows to cure himself of his compulsion by means of psychoanalysis. After much work, he succeeds in robbing old coins from a soda factory.

While the Riddler has been working on his brain, Batman and Robin have been busy stopping other, more run-of-the-mill crimes. Finally, the Riddler's soda company theft occurs and he is seen running off, leading Batman to wonder why no clues preceded the felony. Batman and Robin soon determine that the Riddler actually has been leaving clues that they did not realize were from him. New clues begin to appear and the Dynamic Duo foil the Riddler's plan to rob the Corsican Glove Factory. Upon capture, the Riddler deduces that he was subconsciously leaving clues while he thought he was taking cat naps during his studies! He returns to jail and vows to outwit Batman soon.

I have been a big fan of the Riddler ever since I was a kid and saw Frank Gorshin on the Batman TV show, so I'm always happy to see a new story with this member of the Rogue's Gallery. Gardner Fox turns in an interesting script, filled with the usual goofy riddles and some unexpected psychoanalysis. Peter, what did you think?-Jack

Peter-I found the plot device of "Riddle-less Robberies" to be an intriguing one but the story was way too talky for my tastes. For a comics-code-approved funny book aimed at an audience of eight-year-olds, "Clay Pigeon for a Killer!" sure has a high body count. Why does millionaire Victor Iago shoot Kay (Bruce Wayne) in the chest with a tranqui-bullet if he's going to drown him hours later anyway? I find most of these stories illustrated by Moldoff and (whoever) to be almost unreadable due to the clunky art. Teasing us with Joe Kubert and Gil Kane covers just to serve up the same old Swanson's on the inside seems, to me, tantamount to bait-and-switch.

Kubert

Detective Comics #350

"The Monarch of Menace!"

Story by Robert Kanigher

Art by Sheldon Moldoff & Joe Giella

Dick Grayson arrives at the airport after a visit to a buddy's crib, only to witness Batman taking on a group of escaped cons armed with dynamite on the runway.  With a little help from the Teenage Twister, Bats puts the dynamite and the cons out like a light. Dick grabs ahold of one of the Dark Knight's biceps, rolls his eyes heavenly, and blurts out that "Batman is the King!"

The World's Greatest Detective sighs and admits to his underage ward that he is not the "king" as long as his old nemesis, the Monarch of Menace, walks the streets a free man! In a frenzied flashback, we learn that the Monarch had a quartet of Little Lord Fauntleroy impersonators who talk like Bowery Boys and carry very little muscle, if their battle with Batman (shown in flashback) is an indicator.

But the Monarch didn't seem to need his henchmen since he had a clutch of deadly weapons at his disposal (including the nefarious AC/DC Scepter!). Batman could only watch in abject disgust and horror as the Monarch ventured out on an unparalleled crime wave and then disappeared without a trace. Bad memory over, Bruce and Dick (now back at the Bat-Cave) both sigh and admit they hope there's a chance they'll have a crack at the Monarch again someday.

Coincidentally, thousands of miles away in his jungle retreat, the Monarch relives his glory days with his merry men in tights and his own son, a kid he belittles as the court jester. Tired of his father's derision, the youth dons his pop's costume and heads to Gotham to make the old man proud. Only problem is, the kid is a klutz; he robs a bank, runs into Robin while exiting the building, and can't seem to operate his dad's weapons. Robin puts Monarch Jr. down like dirt and escorts him back to the Batcave.

After rubbing his victory in the face of the man who made him what he is, Robin unmasks the Monarch and Batman snickers at his ward; a fool caught by a fool. Monarch Jr. confesses he's a fraud and only took up a life of crime to impress the old man. Taking advantage of having the Monarch's costume and tools in the Batcave, Bats examines the articles in great detail, obviously forgetting Jr. is just hanging around, hoping these guys will forget about pressing charges. But the Dark Knight knows that all the data is useless unless he can smoke the real Monarch out of hiding (or, I guess, he could ask the kid where pop's lair is located?), so the World's Greatest Detective unleashes brilliance: he has Gotham's reporters write up stories on how Batman finally caught the Monarch of Menace.

The plot works. Pissed off by his bad press, the Monarch leaves his jungle burrow and flies to Gotham to reclaim his crown. Unfortunately, he discovers too late that Batman has an answer to all his wonderful devices. The final blow is delivered and the Monarch is finally put on ice after all these years. The Caped Crusader visits Jr. in the pen and is flattered when the kid vows to become a superhero rather than a villain. 

Despite (or more likely, because of...) the total inanity of "The Monarch of Menace," I actually enjoyed this adventure. Jr.'s descent into full-blown stooge would be genuinely funny if you erased the bits of parental abuse. Where's Mama Monarch? Also, can we put on hiatus the villain who returns only hours after being discussed?

The panels of Batman wallowing in his own pity, continually moaning that he's a failure because he couldn't bring the Monarch to justice, brought tears to my eyes. Tears from laughing. Why, if this defeat was so overbearing, had we never seen our hero leaning against a lamppost in the middle of an adventure, reminding Robin that, sure, it's a jewel in the crown to put the Joker back in jail for the third time in a twelve-month span, but what about the Monarch? 

Clearly, Big Bob Kanigher wasn't paying attention to his own script, since we clearly see Monarch Jr. coming out of a bank with a bag of loot in his fist but, eight panels later, MJ claims Robin caught him "before he could rob that bank!"-Peter

Jack- Once again, a great cover hides a mediocre story inside. My biggest question is how these villains find henchmen willing to dress in silly costumes and to keep wearing them even when the boss is retired and they're just hanging out and shooting the breeze. Don't the skirts and lace-up shoes get uncomfortable after a while? By the way, an ad in this issue claims that DC sells twice as many comics as any competitor. Take that, Marvel!

Kane

The Brave and the Bold #64

"Batman versus Eclipso"

Story by Bob Haney

Art by Win Mortimer

One night on a Gotham City pier, Batman saves a pretty redhead named Marcia from being shot with an arrow. They embrace and kiss passionately before she shows him the Cat Emerald and explains that her ex-fiance, Nicky Jarvas, stole it from a museum to get rich and prove he was Batman's equal. He was pursued and killed by Cyclops, the international crime syndicate, and just before he died, he gave the emerald to Marcia to return to the museum. An assassin targeted Marcia in order to get the emerald, so she gives it to Batman to return to the museum.

The not so Dark Knight recalls how he met and fell for the rich playgirl, even going so far as to propose marriage, until she dumped him and broke his heart. After agreeing to help her, Batman sneaks into the museum and replaces the Cat Emerald in its case. Hours later, he is arrested by Gotham's finest after a photo showed him seemingly stealing the emerald, which has again gone missing. In jail, Batman overhears two goons discussing the imminent arrival of someone named Mister E, who will join another person named Queen Bee!

In far-off Solar City, an eclipse causes Eclipso to separate from the body of Dr. Bruce Gordon. A pair of crooks dressed in bee costumes appear and grab Eclipso, taking him to the Apis Enterprises building, where Queen Bee is planning to take over Gotham City in Operation Sting! Mr. E arrives and turns out to be none other than Eclipso, who gets busy that evening with Queen Bee and her drones committing jewel robberies. After a crime wave hits Gotham City, Batman breaks out of jail and trails a crook to Queen Bee's hideout, where he is knocked out with gas and thrown into the river. The Caped Crusader wakes up and surfaces before avoiding a police patrol boat, which leads the cops to think he's dead.

Commissioner Gordon receives a visit from Dr. Gordon, who offers to help fight the crime wave and who happens to be an expert on Eclipso. Back at the Hive, Queen Bee's hideout, Eclipso puts the moves on the pretty redhead (hmmm....) just as a hooded agent from Cyclops arrives and announces that he is taking over the criminal operation.

Eclipso tries to zap the agent with a ray beam, but the agent runs and his hood flies off to reveal that it's Batman! Queen Bee saves the Dark Knight in the nick of time and he immediately recognizes her as Marcia, who explains that she undertook a career in crime to save her father from Cyclops. She wanted Batman in jail to keep him safe and helps him escape the Hive, handing him the Cat Emerald once again. Batman bursts out of the building, avoids attacking drones, and battles with Eclipso high above the city street. Just in the nick of time Dr. Gordon appears and shines a light on Eclipso that causes him to be reabsorbed into Gordon's body. Batman hands the emerald to Commissioner Gordon, Dr. Gordon makes a hasty exit, and the Caped Crusader is left holding Queen Bee's costume, wondering where the woman who broke his heart has gone.

"Batman versus Eclipso" is 25 pages of dense plot and high action and it's more entertaining than most of the run-of-the-mill stories we've been reading in Batman and Detective. This is Batman's second appearance in The Brave and the Bold and soon he'll take over the comic for good. Win Mortimer's art is certainly better than that of Sheldon Moldoff, but not as good as Carmine Infantino's. I'm looking forward to reading more team-ups!  The editor points out in this issue's letters page that this is the first time that B & B has featured a hero fighting his co-star, rather than teaming up with him.-Jack

Peter-I knew nothing about Eclipso, a villain who's nothing more than a DC version of Jekyll & Hyde and had to read a few blog posts to bring me up to date. The character ran as a back-up in House of Secrets from #61 (August 1963) through the 80th issue (October 1966). HoS slipped into limbo for three years and was rebooted as one of the DC mystery titles (see here for that story) and Eclipso became a footnote in comic history until he was rebooted in the '90s and became a first-class badass.

I love the x-ray panel that shows the inside of "The Hive" but I'm struggling with the fact that Queen Bee keeps her helicopters on an enclosed third floor. Maybe this gal isn't such an evil genius at that. Hearing Bats use the word "baby" is off-putting, maybe because I don't want the inevitable hippy era to come so soon but seeing him put an attractive babe across his knee for a good Wertham-enraging spanking is gold. Don't tell any of the eight-year-olds reading this strip, but Professor Gordon's head-first leap from atop a high building into a fireman's net would break his neck and put a damper on any victory celebration.

Next Week...
Can a Little Colan
Save Jack and Peter
From the Mid-50s Doldrums?

The Hitchcock Project-Don't Look Behind You by Barré Lyndon [8.2]

by Jack Seabrook

"Don't Look Behind You" is based on the 1944 novel, Don't Look Behind You! by Samuel Rogers (1894-1985), a WWI veteran who taught French at the University of Wisconsin from 1920 to 1960. He wrote six mainstream novels between 1927 and 1942 and, after a bout of writer's block, he wrote three crime novels in the mid-1940s: Don't Look Behind You! (1944), You'll Be Sorry! (1945), and You Leave Me Cold! (1946).

Don't Look Behind You! is set in the summer of 1943, when a young nurse's aide named Daphne Gray walks alone through the woods along an empty road near the college town of Woodside and ends up at the home of Dr. Terry Macfarlane, where a party is being held. Also at the party are Paul and Wanda Hatfield, Edwin Voigt, and Dave Fulton. Daphne's fiancé Harold soon arrives. Daphne thought that she heard someone else in the woods on her walk and she is nervous because the murdered body of another young woman had been found recently. The partygoers, a mix of college professors, their wives, and hospital staff, discuss the murder. Dave, a handsome, unmarried biologist, admits that he arranged to meet Daphne at the party after seeing her on campus.

First edition

On their walk home, Harold and Daphne hear a scream and find a young woman who has been stabbed in the arm. Daphne stops the bleeding and they go home after the police arrive. Daphne visits the woman the next day at the hospital and learns that a man jumped her and she fought him off. In the week that follows, Daphne begins seeing Dave regularly while having dinner with Harold each evening. One night, she is frightened when someone tries to climb a tree outside her bedroom window.

Harold finds a napkin from the Macfarlanes' party in the woods and deduces that the man who committed the attack must have been at the party. He acts as an amateur detective and decides that the way to catch the killer is to use Daphne as bait. He begins to suspect Edwin, a brooding pianist and, two weeks after the first party, another get-together at Terry's home ends with Harold sending Daphne alone through the woods after dark. Edwin suddenly appears beside her and is caught as the killer and sent to an asylum.

1950 paperback reprint

Despite Edwin's capture, Harold tells Daphne that someone else may have been affected by recent events, so danger may remain. Daphne grows closer to Dave and realizes she no longer loves Harold; meanwhile, Harold grows more and more troubled. Eventually, Harold takes Daphne to dinner and she considers telling him that she is breaking their engagement. He takes her to Science Hall on campus, where he traps her and tells her that he knows she loves Dave and that he is going to kill her. She runs and is rescued by Dave, Terry, and Paul, who had begun to suspect that Harold was losing his mind.

Anthony Boucher noted "some fine chilling moments and a uniquely brilliant psychological plot" in Don't Look Behind You! in which the fictional town of Woodside is based on the real city of Madison, Wisconsin, where the University of Wisconsin is located. Science Hall, where the climax of the novel occurs, is a real place and Rogers drew inspiration for the book from it. Today the novel seems dated, but it is a brisk and entertaining read.

Barré Lyndon was assigned to adapt the novel for television. Barré Lyndon (1896-1972) was the pseudonym of Alfred Edgar, who wrote the screenplays for several good films, including the Laird Cregar vehicles The Lodger (1944) and Hangover Square (1945) and George Pal’s The War of the Worlds (1953). He penned three episodes of Thriller, including the Bloch adaptation, "Yours Truly, Jack the Ripper," as well as two Hitchcock hours; "The Sign of Satan" was the other.

Jeffrey Hunter as Harold

The TV version of "Don't Look Behind You" (the novel's exclamation point is omitted) is the first episode of The Alfred Hitchcock Hour to be aired that was based on a novel and it premiered on CBS on Thursday, September 27, 1962, as the second episode of the hour-long series. It is the first of many examples of the difficulty in adapting a book to an hour-long TV time slot, a practice that the producers of The Alfred Hitchcock Hour relied on less and less as the series went on.

The opening scene effectively dramatizes Daphne's frightening walk through the woods on the way to the party, an event which had already taken place when the novel opens. Daphne is dressed in a bride-like white dress, with white gloves and a white shawl completing the illusion. It quickly becomes apparent that the events have been updated from 1943 to 1962 and, at the party, dialogue reveals that Daphne is not a nurse's aide but rather a student in medical school. Vera Miles, who plays Daphne, was thirty-two years old at the time of filming and thus about a decade older than the character in the book. Harold is played by the extremely handsome actor, Jeffrey Hunter, who was thirty-five years old, while Dave is played by thirty-two year old Dick Sargent, who does not share Hunter's matinee-idol looks. In the book, Dave is very handsome and Harold grows jealous of him; in the TV version, Harold's jealousy seems to be driven by Daphne's habit of paying attention to (or attracting attention from) other men.

The events at the party are similar to those in the novel, though their order is shuffled around a bit for dramatic effect. The TV show omits any mention of Harold's childhood, which had been a factor in the novel that seemed to influence his descent into madness; instead, once the party ends, Harold and Daphne set out through the woods, hear the young woman scream, and find her, wounded. This discovery ends the first act on a note of heightened action.

Vera Miles as Daphne

The second act focuses on Harold and Daphne, omitting Daphne's nightmare and streamlining her developing relationship with Dave. Harold visits Daphne and tells her that he found a napkin from the Macfarlanes' house in the woods; he has a lot of dialogue and Lyndon's script allows him to explain the reasons for his growing interest in the case. After Harold asks Daphne to act as a decoy, there is another effective scene where she wakes up at night and hears a noise outside her window. The viewer sees a black-gloved hand reaching up the wall outside and, after Daphne frightens off the intruder, she sees a man leap down and run away. She immediately telephones Harold and agrees to act as a decoy. This ends the first half of the show on another heightened dramatic moment.

The third act skips most of the central section of the novel and jumps right to the night where Daphne will walk through the woods again as bait for the killer. She and Harold leave the Macfarlanes' house and set off along the path; once again, Daphne is alone in the woods, dressed in white. Suspense builds as the viewer sees the shoes of the man following her before Edwin is revealed. He admits that it was he who followed her through the woods in the first scene and the attack is more straightforward than in the novel, as Edwin prepares a cord behind his back and attempts to strangle Daphne with it. She runs, he chases her, and Harold suddenly appears with a flashlight and a gun, shooting and wounding Edwin. Subsequent events are foreshadowed by a shot of Harold staring at the cord and the knife.

Dick Sargent as Dave

Later, at Edwin's apartment, Harold continues to show his jealousy of Dave, even though much of the novel's depiction of the deepening relationship between Dave and Daphne has been deleted. Instead, Lyndon's script increases the focus on Harold and his gradual unraveling. Act three ends with him visiting Edwin in the asylum, where he bends down close to the bedridden patient, who lies silent, staring into space. Harold asks: "'Tell me, that time with the girl in the wood, when Daphne and I interrupted you, that was all for nothing, wasn't it? We came too soon and you began it wrong; you tried to take the life without the ceremonial, so the compulsion stayed with you, then you had to try again with Daphne.'" Harold tells Edwin that he'll come again and Edwin replies, "'I know you will. I'm looking forward to it."

Up to this point, "Don't Look Behind You" has been a reasonably entertaining show, compressing the events of the novel into a series of scenes highlighted by a few scares. When Harold speaks to Edwin about "ceremonial" and "compulsion," however, the episode starts to lose its way as Lyndon attempts to inject language and themes of abnormal psychology and mystical rites into the narrative. At the start of the final act, Harold and Daphne are together, but he is starting to look insane, his hair growing more unkempt and his facial expressions highlighted by lighting that makes him look unhinged. The theme of jealousy continues, as Harold expresses his envy of Dave, and Dave joins Harold in spouting psychobabble to Daphne as he tells her that Edwin was "'yielding to an urge; such men worship dark and nameless gods--they act out the fantasies that obsess their unbalanced minds.'" This sort of dialogue comes out of nowhere and suggests that teleplay writer Barré Lyndon was trying to take the story in a Lovecraftian direction.

Alf Kjellin as Edwin

The climax of the show takes place at the college. Harold does not take Daphne out to dinner and then to Science Hall, as in the book. Instead, he is seen alone in his office, handling a cord and knife (the same ones used by Edwin in his failed attack on Daphne?) with reverence before placing them carefully in a desk drawer. Daphne joins him and he pours wine for them both, calling this a special occasion. Daphne assures Harold that she has no feelings for Dave, which is a big change from the novel, where she falls in love with Dave and plans to break off her engagement to Harold. In the TV version, jealousy drives Harold insane and he acts on his feelings by trying to fit them into some sort of strange ceremony.

Harold opens the desk drawer and tells Daphne that she will be a "'final sacrifice'"; he takes out the knife and the cord and tells her that "'pain is only a secret name for pleasure.'" One can only wonder how TV audiences in 1962 reacted to this rather transgressive statement! Harold continues, adding that there can be "'no complete feeling of love unless the victim dies.'" Daphne runs into the lab next door and Harold pursues her slowly, walking almost like the Frankenstein monster at one point, holding the cord pulled taut between his hands. Dave arrives at the last minute and he and Harold struggle before Harold falls to the floor, unconscious.

Abraham Sofaer as
Dr. Macfarlane

The TV show ends differently than the novel. In the book, Dave visits Daphne and explains what happened and it's clear that they will marry soon, before he must report for active duty. In the TV version, the last scene occurs at the asylum, where we see Harold in a strait jacket, struggling against two guards who shove him into a room. Dave spouts more nonsense as he tells Daphne, "'He really caught this contagion, this spirit of killing, from Edwin; a strange and ancient illusion that by blood sacrifice you can reach a more intense communion. Jealousy unbalanced his mind.'" But the show's final lines are spoken by Edwin, who is in a nearby room: "'Harold is here. I knew he would be. I've been looking forward to it.'"

The last shot of Edwin, clearly insane but speaking calmly, recalls the last shot of Psycho, where Norman Bates is also captive and insane and speaks in a similar way. In adapting Don't Look Behind You! from the novel to the small screen, Barré Lyndon chose to focus on the book's moments of heightened suspense and to omit much of the character development, surely due to the limited time available. One of the book's biggest problems lies in the characters' motivations. It's never clear why Edwin killed one woman, stabbed another, and tried to kill Daphne. In fact, while reading the novel, I was not convinced that Edwin was the guilty party, though no one else is shown to be a suspect. Even worse is the conclusion, when Harold suddenly becomes a copycat killer for no clear reason. Lyndon must have understood that more motivation was needed for the TV version and he chose to focus on Harold's jealousy of Dave, even though it is misplaced.

Harold is looking mad!

The biggest problem with the TV version of "Don't Look Behind You" is the nonsensical dialogue in the later scenes about dark rites and rituals. The teleplay doesn't lay a strong foundation for this and it seems to come out of nowhere; it's one thing for Harold to spout it, since he's going insane, but it's another for Dave to make these remarks, since he's depicted as normal. The result is an unsatisfying episode that has a few highlights--the walks through the woods, the hand creeping up the side of the building, the final scene in the office and the lab--but that doesn't hold together as an overall story where characters act in a way that makes sense. Director John Brahm's camera is unusually mobile, especially in some of the early scenes, and Vera Miles gives a good performance as Daphne, but Jeffrey Hunter is not credible as Harold and the music by Lyn Murray fails to create or maintain much suspense. One wonders what Bernard Herrmann might have done with the score for this episode.

John Brahm (1893-1982) directed fifteen episodes for the Hitchcock series, including "The Hero." Born in Germany, he began making films in 1936 and moved to TV in 1952.

Edwin in the final shot.

Born Henry Herman McKinnies Jr., Jeffrey Hunter (1926-1969) had a successful career in film and on TV from 1950 to 1969, when he died following an accident. He is best known for his role in The Searchers (1956), for playing Jesus in King of Kings (1961), and for starring in the pilot episode of Star Trek. This was his only appearance on the Hitchcock TV show. He has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.

Vera Miles (1929- ) was born Vera Ralston, and she was Miss Kansas in 1948. Miles was seen in three episodes of the Hitchcock TV series, including "Revenge," the very first episode of Alfred Hitchcock Presents, and "Death Scene." Hitchcock first saw her in a small role in For Men Only, a 1951 film directed by Paul Henreid. Patrick McGilligan writes that "during the making of 'Revenge' Hitchcock grew so excited about Miles that he signed her to a five-year contract." She then starred in his 1956 film The Wrong Man as a character who becomes depressed and requires hospitalization after her husband, played by Henry Fonda, is wrongfully accused of robbery. She was supposed to star in Vertigo but when she got pregnant, she was replaced by Kim Novak. She later had an important supporting role in Psycho (1960) and she also appeared in two classic John Ford films: The Searchers (1956), with Jeffrey Hunter, and The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance (1962). Her TV and film career included roles on The Twilight Zone and The Outer Limits and she remained a busy actress into the mid-1990s.

The hand outside Daphne's window.

It's tempting to view the male characters' obsession with Daphne in "Don't Look Behind You" through the lens of Hitchcock's oft-discussed obsession with Miles and other blonde actresses; surprisingly, Miles sports dark hair in this episode.

Dick Sargent (1930-1994) was born Richard Cox and appeared on screen from 1954 to 1993. This was his only role on the Hitchcock TV show. He was best known as the second Darrin Stephens on the popular TV series, Bewitched; he replaced Dick York and co-starred on the show from 1969 to 1972.

Alf Kjellin (1920-1988) plays Edwin. He was born in Sweden and started out in the movies in 1937 as an actor. He began acting on TV in 1952 and continued until 1979. He started directing films in 1955 and worked as a director on American television from 1961 to 1985, concurrent with his acting work. As an actor, he appeared in the 1966 film adaptation of Jack Finney's Assault on a Queen and in "Don't Look Behind You." As a director, he was at the helm for one episode of the half-hour Hitchcock series ("Coming Home") and eleven episodes of the hour series.

Finally, Abraham Sofaer (1896-1988) plays Dr. Macfarlane; he was on screen from 1931 to 1974 and appeared in three episodes of the Hitchcock series, including "The Changing Heart." He was also on The Twilight Zone, Thriller, The Outer Limits, Star Trek, and Night Gallery. 

Watch "Don't Look Behind You" online here. The DVD is not available in the U.S.

Sources:

"Don't Look Behind You." The Alfred Hitchcock Hour, season 1, episode 2, CBS, 27 September 1962.

Grams, Martin, and Patrik Wikstrom. The Alfred Hitchcock Presents Companion. OTR Pub., 2001.

IMDb, www.imdb.com.

Rogers, Samuel. Don't Look Behind You. Wildside Press, 2018. [1944.]

Tramp, The Passing. “Carnival of Death, Part Two: The Life of Samuel Rogers, 1894-1985.” The Passing Tramp, thepassingtramp.blogspot.com/2018/12/carnival-of-death-2-life-of-samuel.html.

Tramp, The Passing. “Reprint of the Year--Carnival of Death, Part One: You’ll Be Sorry! (1945) and You Leave Me Cold! (1946) by Samuel Rogers.” The Passing Tramp, thepassingtramp.blogspot.com/2018/12/reprint-if-year-youll-be-sorry-1945-and.html.

Wikipedia, www.wikipedia.org.

Listen to Al Sjoerdsma discuss "A Man Greatly Beloved" here!

In two weeks: "Make My Death Bed," starring Diana Van der Vlis!

Journey Into Strange Tales Issue 127: Atlas/Marvel Science Fiction & Horror Comics!

 

The Marvel/Atlas 
Horror Comics

Part 112

July 1956 Part II

by Peter Enfantino

and Jack Seabrook

Marvel Tales 148

Cover by Bill Everett

"Where Did They Go?" (a: Jim Mooney) ★1/2

"The Many Worlds of Henry Adams!" (a: Werner Roth) ★★1/2

"The Hollow Suit" (a: George Roussos) ★1/2

"Earthquake!" (a: Bill Everett) ★★

"Scared Away!" (a: Bob Bean) ★★

"The Despot!" (a: Joe Certa) ★★★

The 148th issue of Marvel Tales gets off to an illustrious start with a marvelously inane yarn about UFOs and missing showgirls. I've no complaints about the Mooney art but the payoff (the dancing gals are the aliens) of "Where Did They Go?" is fumbled so badly it's hard to understand just what's going on. Never mind that, we've got five more tales to wade through...

To escape the pressures of his everyday life, Henry Adams heads into the desert where he finds a strange blue stone. As he holds the rock in his hand, he disappears and finds himself in a "state of transdimension." Henry travels through a set of dimensions that test his patience and skills, and all the while he must hold on to the blue stone. As he enters the 7th dimension, he loses his grip on the stone and finds himself back in his old life again. He heads back to the desert, determined to finish this time.

Though I found "The Many Worlds of Henry Adams!" to be quite confusing at times (in one world, Adams must fight off a pit of vipers while another man is at his back, so I assume others are on the same journey), I still admire it for the chances it takes and the deep message not found in any of the other stories in this issue.

Three hoods hide from the law in a museum in Mexico and learn about Cortez and his band of merry Atzecs [sic] but it's the lost chest of gold, which fell in a "raging mountain river," that perks them up. Hearing a noise, they turn to witness a terrifying sight: "The Hollow Suit" of an Atzec warrior shambling after them. They run out of the building but the clanking creature follows. Finally, they knock it into a river and then realize which river they've knocked him into. The river!

They hire a diving bell and plunge to the bottom of the river, where they discover a mysterious dry cavern. In the dwelling, they find several chests of gold but they also run across an army of Atzec hollow suits. Without missing a beat, the three stooges head back to the surface world where they turn themselves in and receive protection. "The Hollow Suit" is a groaner and even the eight-year-old target audience wouldn't get chills. The Roussos art is far from outstanding but at least you can tell what's going on and the artist spent a bit of time on detail.

The great Bill Everett contributes the three-page "Earthquake!" When our world is rocked by natural disasters, blame falls on invisible rays fired from the moon. In the end, the solution is more down-to-earth. Though the Everett work is, as always, solid, I'd prefer he was on something a little more substantial than talking head panels.

The first manned flight into the density of space drills into a new world but the crew is attacked by a giant with a ray gun. They turn tail and drill back down into the Earth. Turns out the giant is a kid in a space costume who ran across the tiny people in the park. I like the Bob Bean graphics in "Scared Away!" but the big twist is hardly earth-shattering. It actually raised more questions than it asked (How do the "little people" know there's something above the "density"? Where do they get their oxygen from if they live in the center of the Earth?). A moderately entertaining bit of fluff.

Even after "The Despot!" has defeated all enemies and become the ruler of the world, he worries he'll be overthrown by a public that has no enemy. He invents a race of warriors on the moon and lets the population know the aliens are about to attack, transforming his sleepy public into an armed mob. The dictator boards a rocket to the moon, vowing to destroy all adversaries. The ship gets to the moon, the dictator fires a couple of rockets for the hometown crowd, and then he watches in horror as cannons rise from the craters and fire back. The surface of the moon is unpopulated but the underworld evidently holds surprises.

Best Story of the Month award goes to "The Despot!" which ends with a twist that elicited a smile from this hardened old vet. The GCD credits Jack Oleck as the writer, which is odd since, as far as I know, this would be his only Atlas credit. It does jibe with the type of clever material he would contribute to the DC mystery line a decade later. The Joe Certa art is cartoony in a 1960s superhero strip sort of way but it works nonetheless. A solid sci-fi yarn.-Peter

Mystery Tales 43

Cover by Bill Everett

"The Idol" (a: Pete Morisi) ★1/2

"Punishment!" (a: Ross Andru & Mike Esposito) ★

"Waiting... Waiting!" (a: Gene Colan) ★★

"The Man Who Failed" (a: Bob Forgione & Jack Abel) ★★

"The Silent Ones" (a: Robert Q. Sale & Charles Nicholas[?]) ★1/2

"I'm Afraid!" (a: Vic Carrabotta) ★

Disregarding a menacing curse, Fred Harris buys a jungle idol known as "The Yearning One" from a buddy and immediately regrets his rash decision. He takes the idol to his apartment where he and his girlfriend, Julie, study it, when all of a sudden Fred and Julie find themselves transported deep into a sweltering jungle. The idol makes the trip as well.

A savage tribe comes upon the hapless couple and threatens to shrink their heads since, as the head native explains, the Yearning Idol is the god of their enemy, the Worubi tribe. Fred and Julie can only wait while the native women toss garlic and carrots into a big pot. Fred uses his noggin and gets them out of a precarious situation. They find themselves back in their apartment, counting their blessings. Fred grabs an old Jungle Tribe Mythology book and explains to Julie that the wood the idol is carved from gives off hallucinogenic vapors; therefore their trip was just that... a trip! "The Idol" starts off interestingly enough but then falls into the familiar post-code trap of unsuspenseful suspense. The explanation at the end definitely doesn't help.

Simon Andrews travels to the future where there is no violence and, therefore, no laws. He steals some gems but is captured before he can climb back in his machine. He bargains with the government officials and they let him take his booty back to their past/Simon's present. But on the way, his machine blows a fuse and the poor dope ends up a rich man in the dinosaur era. "Punishment!" is the best title I could come up with for this nonsense. The author doesn't even let us in on Simon's time machine; it's as if he had written a five-page story and Stan cut the first page out! Awful, almost primitive art by Andru/Esposito. Yeccch!

Some okay Gene Colan graphics are about all you'll discover in "Waiting... Waiting!" wherein a trio of youths wander into a strange town where the occupants are anything but hospitable. Though one cute girl is kind to them, they end up scramming out of town. And just in time too. The town is actually an A-Bomb testing site and the villagers are mannikins. Why? How am I supposed to know? The most hilarious thing about the story is the three teenagers who seem almost on the verge of lapsing into full J.D. mode any moment if not for that dang Code.

Dr. Earle Fulton is "The Man Who Failed." At least, until now he was. Fulton invents a formula for a protein that will "supply all the nourishment man needs to live" and he's on the cusp of becoming the most important and famous scientist of all time. The tests on lab rats and monkeys go wonderfully (well, I mean, great until the ape disappears) and it's time to conduct human experiments. 

The subjects are prisoners of the worst kind: lifers, murderers, comic book salesmen. Fulton gives the injections and the cons disappear, only to reappear later, smarter, and bigger. In fact, they're brilliant giants! But, luckily for the Prof, the formula has some flaws and the inmates return to normal very soon. Fulton sighs and admits he's a failure to the public at large but inside he knows he's God's gift to nutty professors. 

There's some fun stuff here if you don't think about it too much. I love when the guard at the prison who's there to oversee the inmates at the testing tells the egghead that he's going to get something to eat and he'll return soon, leaving Fulton at the mercy of the prisoners, giant or not. The formula itself is a bit of a mystery; it's never really explained past the "this will make it so man will never have to go hungry again" part.

A crew of space travelers land on a faraway planet that makes no sound. The inhabitants welcome them (without talking) but two of the visitors decide to take advantage of their hosts and steal priceless gems from their rooms. They try to take off on their rocket ship but are caught by the commander, who explains that "The Silent Ones" don't need to speak since they can read minds. Last up is the truly awful "I'm Afraid!" wherein mountain climber Hans Mueller falls into a crevasse and discovers an underworld race of ice men. Vic Carrabotta's scratchy art is perfect for this unreadable mess.-Peter

Mystic 49

Cover by Bill Everett

"Girl in a Trance" (a: Lou Cameron) ★★

"Prisoner in Nowhere" (a: Pete Morisi) ★

"The Pushovers!" (a: Harry Lazarus) ★

"They're Coming Closer" (a: Bob McCarthy) ★1/2

"Behind the Mask" (a: Dave Berg) ★★

"Torn and Tattered" (a: Manny Stallman) ★★

After Steve Morgan met pretty Joan Brent at a party, he had a string of successes at work and Joan was not surprised by any of the promotions he received. One evening, he spies on Joan from outside her window and observes that she's a "Girl in a Trance"; he concludes that her deep love for him allows her wishes for his success to work like magic. Surprisingly, the next day all of his promotions turn to demotions and he is fired from his job! After he leaves the office, a bolt of lightning sends a tree crashing into the roof of the building where he worked. Steve realizes that Joan's magic saved him again and he can't wait to tie the knot!

I know I'm grading on a curve after reading the terrible Marvel Tales 148 and the marginally better Mystery Tales 43, but I thought this was a pretty good story with decent art. It must not have been written by Carl Wessler because I was able to follow the plot from page one all the way through page four. The panel of Joan I've reproduced here looks like a swipe from a photo, but it's still nice to look at.

A psychiatrist named Paul Machas has an unusual patient named Philip Jason who believes that he has the power to enter a parallel world where he is Jason the Ruler. Machas insists that Jason is imagining the whole thing and decides that the only way to cure his patient is to go along with the delusion. Machas takes Jason's hand and (of course) is transported to another dimension, where Jason the Ruler wants to make him "Prisoner in Nowhere" as punishment for not believing him. Machas makes a run for it before heading to Jason's palace, where he grabs a guard's sword after receiving a shoulder wound. Machas convinces Jason to send him back home and, when he returns, the psychologist is certain he imagined the whole thing. But why is his shoulder injured and where did the sword come from?

 How many of these stories do we have to read where someone thinks he imagined an unusual experience and can't explain an object that he brought back with him? It's so predictable. Pete Morisi is not an artist I'll be looking for a "best of" collection by anytime soon.

Howard Phelps is a traitor! He agrees to destroy his munitions plants throughout the world in exchange for $10 billion dollars, thus ensuring a successful Martin conquest. General Xua's spaceship sets off for Mars but the crew notice a light on Earth and decide to take it back to the Red Planet. Everyone on Earth is saddened by the loss of the light; when Phelps's son explains how much it means to him, Howard's attitude changes. He tells the Martians that the deal is off and they come to take him back to Mars. On the Red Planet, Phelps explains to the emperor that the light is very important to the people of Earth, so the emperor calls off the invasion. No reader is surprised by the last panel, which shows that the State of Liberty has been returned to its place in New York Harbor.

I knew right away that the light in "The Pushovers!" was the Statue of Liberty. Wessler's script makes such a point of hiding the details of the light that the whole, dopey story hinges on creating suspense that is relieved by the final panel's revelation. When the secret is this easy to guess, reading the story (a long four pages) becomes an exercise in tedium.

King Hazid hires a soldier of fortune named Jock Nelson to help fight off a robot army that Rudolf Dailer has raised to overthrow the monarchy. When Nelson hears that the robots are remote-controlled, he knows he'll succeed. A cry goes up that "They're Coming Closer" but, when the robots approach the palace, Jock uses his own transmitter to jam the remote-control signals controlling the robots, which fall to the ground. Nelson is paid his $50K fee and is surprised to see that the king is also a robot, whose signal was unintentionally jammed and who is in the process of being repaired.

The only thing surprising about this three-page dud is that it takes place in an unnamed southern European country; it's probably Hungary, whose people revolted in the fall of 1956.

Pulp fiction writer Kip Cornell is stuck as he nears the conclusion of his new story, "Behind the Mask." Who is the masked villain? His editor, Lee Mitchell, telephones to demand the finished script and, as Kip hangs up, the story on the page begins to play out in real life. A masked man kidnaps him at gunpoint and demands the story before taking him for a ride in his car. The ride is interrupted by a police roadblock; the cops take Kip to the location of his story's climax, where the masked man is revealed to be Lee Mitchell, the editor!

It doesn't make a heck of a lot of sense but having a pulp writer suddenly find himself in the middle of the story he's writing is kind of fun, especially when illustrated by Dave Berg. Berg's art is a mix of standard, early comic art style and the style he'd later use in Mad Magazine for his Lighter Side series. All Kip Cornell lacks is a Bergian pipe.

A "Torn and Tattered" old rug lies in a waterfront shack where a man sits, alone in his misery. The carpet recalls the old days, when it was a magic carpet woven by a holy man and given to the great chieftain, Ben Youssef, who used the carpet to perform many great deeds. Over the years, the carpet traded hands many times, finally ending up in the shack, where the man wishes he could travel to South America to aid his family. Suddenly, the carpet takes flight, whisking the man to his destination. In the end, all that is left are a few tattered threads.

Paul S. Newman turns in a decent script for this issue's closer, with Manny Stallman providing workmanlike art. The Atlas comics line looks to be on its last legs as of the issues dated July 1956.-Jack

Next Week!
The Return Absolutely
No One Requested!

The Hitchcock Project-Final Arrangements by Robert Arthur [6.36]

by Jack Seabrook

Each morning, Rutherford Parnell sits and daydreams, fascinated by an idea. His shrewish wife Elsie has been confined to a wheelchair for a decade, ever since she was injured in an auto accident while Rutherford was driving. Mrs. Casey, the eighth in a series of companions that he has hired for his wife, arrives only to announce that she has found another job. Resolved to carry out his plan, Rutherford rides the bus downtown but disembarks early, telephoning the office to say that he won't be in to work today.

The unhappy husband visits a funeral home and makes arrangements, asking the funeral director to come to his house this evening but omitting the name of the deceased. Back at home, Rutherford dismisses Mrs. Casey and confronts his wife, showing her poison he bought at the drugstore and calling it "'something to help you escape your constant loneliness and bitterness.'" He pours a large glass of milk and adds a generous helping of poison. After some last bitter words are exchanged, Rutherford tells Elsie that he cashed in his life insurance policy. He asks her if she'd like to go to a rest home and, after she defers, he swallows the poisoned milk, telling her that she will soon realize that things at home were not so bad.

"Final Arrangements" was
first published here

A short story with a predictable twist ending and two-dimensional characters, "Final Arrangements" was published in the July 1961 issue of Alfred Hitchcock's Mystery Magazine. It's author, Lawrence Page, is a mystery man who has no other stories to his credit in the FictionMags Index and about whom I was unable to uncover any information. Is the name a pseudonym? The issue of the digest in which it appears also includes stories by William Link and Richard Levinson, Jack Ritchie, Henry Slesar, Bryce Walton, Donald Honig, Mann Rubin, Avram Davidson, and Helen Nielsen, all of whom either had episodes of the Hitchcock TV show based on their work or wrote teleplays for it, sometimes both. If Lawrence Page is a pseudonym for one of the authors who has another story in this issue, the most likely candidate is Henry Slesar, who wrote so many episodes of Alfred Hitchcock Presents; however, when the story was collected in anthologies, including the 1980 volume, The Best of Mystery, it was also credited to Lawrence Page, so it may well be that "Final Arrangements" was the only story he ever had published.  IMDb lists him as Lawrence A. Page, but the source of the middle initial is unknown. Read the story online here.

Martin Balsam as Leonard Compson

The July 1961 issue of Alfred Hitchcock's Mystery Magazine most likely hit the newsstands before July and the TV version of this short story aired on Tuesday, June 20, 1961, so it appears that the producers of the TV show purchased the rights to the short story and filmed the adaptation before the magazine went on sale. Chosen to write the teleplay was Robert Arthur (1909-1969), who was born in the Philippines, where his father was stationed in the Army. He earned an M.A. in Journalism from the University of Michigan before moving to New York City in the early 1930s and becoming a prolific writer of short stories. He later was an editor at Dell and Fawcett but is best known as the ghost editor of many of the Alfred Hitchcock anthologies. He also wrote a beloved series of books about Alfred Hitchcock and The Three Investigators for young adult readers. In 1959, he moved to Hollywood to write for television and edit screenplays. Before that, he won two Edgar Awards as a writer for radio. Many of his stories were adapted for TV; five episodes of the Hitchcock TV show were based on his stories but "Final Arrangements" was the only teleplay he wrote for the series. There is a website devoted to him here.

Vivian Nathan as Elsie

Arthur makes significant changes to the characters and the story structure, though the payoff is the same. The TV version begins with a scene where Leonard Compson (as Rutherford Parnell has been renamed) visits the mortuary, seeking information; he chooses the most expensive casket before revealing to Simms, the mortician, that "'there isn't any deceased...yet.'" Adding this scene at the start of the story creates intrigue about what Leonard is up to and who is in danger of losing their life. In the second scene, Leonard is at the office, speaking to Elsie on the telephone. She is lying in bed and she voices a litany of complaints; we understand that Leonard is henpecked and the scene ends with him taking a life insurance policy out of his desk drawer, but we don't yet know who is insured.

O.Z. Whitehead as Simms

Scene three is completely new, as Leonard visits a curio shop where he is clearly an old customer. The owner, Mr. Bradshaw, shows off odds and ends including a tribal mask, a blowgun that shoots poison darts, and Persian daggers. Leonard's interest in the poison darts is tamped down by Bradshaw, who explains that he would have to remove the poison before he could sell them. Taken together, this first trio of scenes suggests that Leonard is considering killing his wife.

In scene four, Arthur makes a big change when he demonstrates that, rather than being confined to a wheelchair following an auto accident, Elsie is a malingerer who doesn't seem to have much wrong with her at all. Dr. Maxwell pays a house call and we learn that Elsie has considered herself an invalid since a trip to Haiti fifteen years before when she fell while climbing on old ruins with Leonard. The reference to a trip to Haiti ties in with Leonard's interest in curios and sets up the show's final shot. In this scene, Elsie gets out of bed and walks around, something she is unable to do in the short story; she complains of pain and the doctor recommends exercise. Leonard arrives at home and, after the doctor leaves, Elsie accuses him of wishing her dead, something he immediately denies. The viewer is becoming more and more certain that Leonard plans to do away with her, especially after he reminds her that the doctor said that she could live another thirty years.

Slim Pickens as Bradshaw

After the commercial break, Leonard pays a second visit to the mortuary, which corresponds to the single visit in the short story. He sets up the finale by paying in advance for the most expensive funeral and asking Simms to come to his home the next evening at eight p.m. to "'collect the party.'" The viewer at this point assumes that Leonard is being cagey about identifying the person who will die because he is planning to murder Elsie, but in reality, he is planning suicide. Another new scene follows, as Leonard encounters a young boy named Billy on the sidewalk near his home. Billy's bicycle nearly runs into Leonard and causes him to drop a lucky amulet, a foreign object that he must have bought at the curio shop. Leonard counsels the boy on not taking a wrong turn and ending up in a stagnant swamp, and he buys movie tickets from the boy but absentmindedly forgets to take them.

Bartlett Robinson as
Dr. Maxwell

Billy brings the movie tickets to Elsie, who is sitting on the porch. She is rude to the child, insisting that she is not well enough to go out and learning that Leonard told Billy about an impending long trip. The clock reads 7:30 p.m. in a brief scene where Leonard buys rat poison at a drugstore, requesting something painless and quick. The druggist assumes that Leonard feels sorry for the rats but, as we will see, he is protecting himself.

Susan Brown as
the secretary

Finally, the time is 7:55 p.m. and Leonard is at home, where he pours the rat poison into a glass before filling it with milk. There is a brief echo of the scene in Hitchcock's Suspicion where Cary Grant carries the glass of milk up the stairs to Joan Fontaine as Leonard brings the poisoned glass of milk into Elsie's bedroom and puts it on the table beside her. She confronts him about the upcoming trip and he replies that he quit his job and cashed in his $5000 insurance policy, most of which he has already spent. Leonard tells Elsie that they are almost broke and she is as "'strong as a horse'" before the doorbell rings.

Leonard orders Elsie to answer the door, taking control of their relationship for the first time, and she complies. The episode's big surprise then occurs in a shot filmed from Leonard's point of view as he drinks the glass of poisoned milk and Elsie is seen through the bottom of the glass as she leaves the room. Simms enters through the front door, having arrived to pick up the corpse, and the final shot shows Leonard lying dead, a smile on his face, holding his lucky amulet, which the viewer assumes he hopes will guide him in the afterlife.

Despite Robert Arthur's extensive revisions to the short story, "Final Arrangements" plays flat, mainly due to the decision to portray Elsie as an utter shrew with no sympathetic aspect. In the short story, her behavior is understandable if not excusable; she was crippled in a car accident and blames her husband for taking away her health and her freedom. In the TV version, Elsie is a malingerer and it seems like Leonard should have put her in her place much sooner than the final scene.

George Kane as
the pharmacist

This is the only episode of the ten-year Hitchcock TV series to be directed by Gordon Hessler (1925-2014), who was born in Berlin, raised in England, and came to the U.S., where he served as a story reader for Alfred Hitchcock Presents before being promoted to story editor, a job he held from 1960 to 1962. He went on to be an associate producer and later producer on The Alfred Hitchcock Hour from 1962 to 1965. He directed for TV and film from 1965 to 1995, including an episode of The Night Stalker and the film, The Golden Voyage of Sinbad (1973).

Bryan Russell as Billy

Martin Balsam (1919-1996) plays Leonard. Born in the Bronx, Balsam's early stage career was interrupted by a stint in the Air Force during WWII. He then joined the Actors Studio in 1948 and began appearing on TV in 1949. His big break came when he played Juror #1 in the film Twelve Angry Men (1957); this led Hitchcock to cast him as Arbogast in Psycho (1960), where he makes the memorable backward fall down the stairs of the Bates house before he is murdered by Norman in drag. "Final Arrangements" is one of his two appearances on Alfred Hitchcock Presents, the other was "The Equalizer." He also appeared on The Twilight Zone and many other TV shows. By the early 1970s, he was appearing mostly in movies. He later was a regular on Archie Bunker's Place, the sequel to All in the Family, and he continued to make regular appearances on TV and in the movies until his death. He won an Oscar as Best Supporting Actor for A Thousand Clowns (1966).

Vivian Nathan (1916-2015) plays Elsie; she was a founding member of the Actors Studio in 1947 and appeared on Broadway starting in 1949. She was born Vivian Firko in New York City and made a handful of appearances on screen from 1953 to 1989. This was one of her two appearances on Alfred Hitchcock Presents; the other was "Fatal Figures."

Oh, for a time machine!

In smaller roles:

• O.Z. Whitehead (1911-1988) as Simms, the mortician; Whitehead was a member of John Ford's stock company who appeared in such films as The Grapes of Wrath (1940) and The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance (1962). He appeared in one other episode of Alfred Hitchcock Presents, "Not the Running Type."
• Slim Pickens (1919-1983) in an odd bit of casting as Bradshaw, who runs the curio shop; his face and voice are instantly recognizable from countless westerns but he will always be remembered riding the atomic bomb and waving his cowboy hat at the end of Dr. Strangelove (1964). Pickens was on film and TV from 1946 to 1983 and was also in "The Jar" on The Alfred Hitchcock Hour.
• Bartlett Robinson (1912-1986) as Dr. Maxwell; he was on screen from 1949 to 1982 and he was seen in no less than 11 episodes of the Hitchcock show, including "Thanatos Palace Hotel."
• Susan Brown (1932-2018) as the secretary in the office where Leonard works; she was on screen from 1955 to 2004, appearing on soap operas such as General Hospital. Brown was also seen in "Cop for a Day" on Alfred Hitchcock Presents.
• George Kane (1926-2006) as the pharmacist; he was on TV from 1951 to 1964 and he appeared in one film, the adaptation of David Goodis's The Burglar (1957). He was on Thriller twice and he was in two other episodes of Alfred Hitchcock Presents, including "Cop for a Day."
• Bryan Russell (1952-2016) as Billy; his brief screen career lasted from 1959 to 1967.

Watch "Final Arrangements" online here or buy the DVD here.

Sources:

"Final Arrangements." Alfred Hitchcock Presents, season 6, episode 36, NBC, 20 June 1961.

Grams, Martin, and Patrik Wikstrom. The Alfred Hitchcock Presents Companion. OTR Pub., 2001.

IMDb, www.imdb.com.

Page, Lawrence. "Final Arrangements." Alfred Hitchcock: The Best of Mystery. NY: Galahad Books, 1980. 589-592.

Wikipedia, www.wikipedia.org.

Listen to Al Sjoerdsma discuss "A Man Greatly Beloved" here!

In two weeks: "Don't Look Behind You," starring Jeffrey Hunter and Vera Miles!