The Thunder Child

Undersea Kingdom

"Stand By For Mars!"

Undersea Kingdom

Undersea Kingdom 12-part serial (1936) Lon Chaney Jr. as the villainous Captain Hakur is, today, the biggest name in this serial, but it stars Ray "Crash" Corrigan playing a character of the same name, Lois Wilde as a news reporter, C. Montague Shaw as Professor Norton, inventor of a rocket-powered submarine, and Lee Van Atta as Norton's young son. Under the ocean is Atlantis, with William Farnum as Sharad, the peaceful leader of refugees from the power of the evil Unga Kahn, played by Monte Blue.   Web thethunderchild.com This page is graphics intensive. Please wait for all photos to load. This serial has been released on DVD three times, but never with any extras. These screencaps are from the Cinema Classics DVD. The chapter titles show the Volkites walking towards the screen...which I tried to illustrate below. The Volkites were robots, but that name had yet to catch on in popular media. They called Volkites presumably because "Volk" means people in German. Unlike the later Buck Rogers (1939) serial, which seemed to assume that everyone could read credits scrolling upward, the explanatory information at the beginning of each chapter of Undersea Kingdom was given very briefly. At the start of each chapter, a sentence of text would appear underneath the photo of each of the main characters, explaining what they'd done in the previous chapter. The submarine, by the way, is not atomic powered but rocket powered. Crash Corrigan, born Raymond Benard in 1902, started out in Hollywood in the early 30s as a physical culture instructor...then stuntman...then gorilla impersonator! He had a suit made to his exact specifications, and after he retired as a Western actor (appearing in many serials including some with John Wayne), he continued to appear as a gorilla, in such films as Bela Lugosi Meets a Brooklyn Gorilla, and his final role in It, The Terror From Beyond Space. In Undersea Kingdom, he plays "Crash" Corrigan, recent graduate from Annapolis Naval Academy, who accompanies Professor Norton on a submarine journey in an effort to stop the earthquakes that have been systematically creating chaos. The earthquakes are caused by Unga Kahn, the evil ruler of Atlantis, who is simultaneously battling the peaceful people of that city, but also intending to take over the Upper World. Chapter One Chapter Two Chapter Three Chapter Four Chapter Five Chapter Six Chapter Seven Chapter Eight Chapter Nine Chapter Ten Chapter Eleven Chapter Twelve Warning! Warning! Warning! Danger! You might miss intriguing updates if you do not subscribe to The Thunder Child mailing list! Warning! Warning! Warning!