Pulse Pounding Adventures - Pulp and Film Serial Discussion

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greycrusader
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Re: Pulse Pounding Adventures - Pulp and Film Serial Discussion

Post by greycrusader »

A couple Pulp villains I'd suggest who would serve as counterparts:

Captain Mors: Not the original, but a female descendant, who could serve as the antagonist for Black Venus and/or the Rocketeer, as a Prussian super-aviator is pretty much tailor made for the role.

The Golden Amazon: A genetically engineered "human of the future", intended by her scientist-father to be a gift to the world, but instead grew to view other people as inferiors who should be ruled, instead. A fairly obvious foe for Wonder Woman (since otherwise, its mostly Paula Von Gunther or the Golden Age Cheetah), especially as Diana would likely see her as demeaning the "amazon" name. Technically she didn't show up until 1944, but she was already a full-grown adult in her mid-twenties, so a slightly younger version would be around for your scenario. A less mature Golden Amazon would be more interested in proving her mettle against the lies of Wonder Woman, rather than using her genius to launch far-ranging criminal plans

Madame Atomos: Actually the villain in a series of French pulp-adventure novels, she's a Japanese super-scientist who is an expert on creating monsters and mutants through radiation, cybernetics, and organ transplantation; since Atomos would be about fifteen years younger during this adventure, she could take a more active role, endowing herself with powers to battle Miss Victory directly.

Gouroull, a Frankenstein-like monster from the French pulps: An amoral creature with a mouth of razor-sharp teeth (it was depicted as having certain traits akin to vampire, such as chalk-white skin and no need to breathe, though it was immune to flame), this one came to mind given you're using a couple of heroes from the Castlevania series. Also appropriate for any of the occult heroes, or Captain America, who might come to the defense of Peggy Carter, who was working with the French Resistance at the time.

All my best.
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Ares
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Re: Pulse Pounding Adventures - Pulp and Film Serial Discussion

Post by Ares »

Those are some pretty solid suggestions.

There's a slightly less well known Pulp hero known as The Avenger, who had a unique ability to mold his features and make himself the perfect master of disguise, as well as someone who carried a wide range of gadgets.

On the one hand, Doc Savage, the Shadow, the Spider and a few other heroes are all masters of disguise, and Doc, the Green Hornet and several others are also gadget using ass kickers. But at the same time, the Avenger is a pulp hero who had some notoriety, and he did have a legit superhuman ability, however minor, as well as a very unique appearance. It'd probably be criminal to have the folks I do have and not include him.
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RUSCHE
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Re: Pulse Pounding Adventures - Pulp and Film Serial Discussion

Post by RUSCHE »

Ares wrote: Sun Feb 17, 2019 5:20 pm Those are some pretty solid suggestions.

There's a slightly less well known Pulp hero known as The Avenger, who had a unique ability to mold his features and make himself the perfect master of disguise, as well as someone who carried a wide range of gadgets.

On the one hand, Doc Savage, the Shadow, the Spider and a few other heroes are all masters of disguise, and Doc, the Green Hornet and several others are also gadget using ass kickers. But at the same time, the Avenger is a pulp hero who had some notoriety, and he did have a legit superhuman ability, however minor, as well as a very unique appearance. It'd probably be criminal to have the folks I do have and not include him.
ARES there is a nice sit that sells miniatures for rpg. The company is Kniggt of Dice out of Australia I believe. They have a space port and and pulp style city called Sentry City. I thought it was cool. I may have to save up.
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Re: Pulse Pounding Adventures - Pulp and Film Serial Discussion

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So, if there was any doubt how influential the Pulps were on a lot of later writers:

I just finished a Spider story called "Satan's Murder Machines", published in December 1939. In it, the Spider fights what appear to be, at first, robots. Roughly 10-to-15 foot tall robots that can kick over cars, knock down walls, are bullet proof, have guns built into their fingers, and are air-tight and waterproofed so that they can walk along river bottoms to evade police. Even grenades do them no damage and ramming them with cement trucks do little to slow them down.

Then it turns out these aren't robots, but men piloting what are essentially pulp era mecha. And their leader is called "The Iron Man". Stan Lee apparently even stated that he got the name for Tony Stark's alter ego from this story.

This alsoy pre-dates the "Mechanical Monsters" Superman animated short, and may have, in fact, provided some inspiration for it.

So yeah. 1939 had a pulp-era crime fighter going up against a madman who had a dozen or so mini-mecha that he used to terrorize the city. He actually disables several of them through cleverness, but it really ramps up when he captures one suit himself and fights the others Rock'em Sock'em robots style. And how does he let the police know which suit he's in so that they won't immediately attack him? He brands a blood red Spider on the robot's forehead.

So frickin awesome.
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Re: Pulse Pounding Adventures - Pulp and Film Serial Discussion

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Hey Ares, have you continued work on the concept? Obviously things just take longer than planned sometimes.

All my best
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Re: Pulse Pounding Adventures - Pulp and Film Serial Discussion

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greycrusader wrote: Sun Jun 23, 2019 4:25 am Hey Ares, have you continued work on the concept? Obviously things just take longer than planned sometimes.

All my best
Unfortunately a lot has come up over the last couple of months, including moving to a new location, so I've had to prioritize things differently. I'm hopeful once things settle down I can work on both this and the Earth: Liberty setting I've wanted to work on. I'd even like to eventually give that Writing Tournament I utterly botched another shot.

When I do, I'll probably want to make that pulp story idea it's own thread and leave this as a more general pulp discussion thread.
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Re: Pulse Pounding Adventures - Pulp and Film Serial Discussion

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So how's the Pulp coming along Ares?
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Re: Pulse Pounding Adventures - Pulp and Film Serial Discussion

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MacynSnow wrote: Wed Feb 24, 2021 5:40 pm So how's the Pulp coming along Ares?
It's coming. I've had to put it on the backburner to focus on other things lately, but it's never far from my thoughts. I've got the general outline, working on some particulars, and once that's done I'll hopefully be able to work on it, if there's interest in reading what would probably be a novel length story.

In the mean time, I've updated the roster once again.

Here's the Earth-based "Pulp Era" heroes:

Image

Full size: Link



And here's every major hero I plan to have a prominent role at some point in the story:

Image

Full size: Link
"My heart is as light as a child's, a feeling I'd nearly forgotten. And by helping those in need, I will be able to keep that feeling alive."
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Re: Pulse Pounding Adventures - Pulp and Film Serial Discussion

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And if anyone's interested in a Who's Who of that heroic line up, just let me know! :)
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Re: Pulse Pounding Adventures - Pulp and Film Serial Discussion

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Ares, have you seen the Doc Savage Fantasy Covers gallery? Because... Well... I mean...

Image

Image

Image
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Re: Pulse Pounding Adventures - Pulp and Film Serial Discussion

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Batgirl III wrote: Wed Feb 24, 2021 7:17 pm Ares, have you seen the Doc Savage Fantasy Covers gallery? Because... Well... I mean...

Image

Image

Image
I had not. And only now, having seen them, do I see what I was missing from my life. :) That is so cool, thank you!
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Re: Pulse Pounding Adventures - Pulp and Film Serial Discussion

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Ares wrote: Wed Feb 24, 2021 6:22 pm And if anyone's interested in a Who's Who of that heroic line up, just let me know! :)
Me, me, me! :D :D
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Re: Pulse Pounding Adventures - Pulp and Film Serial Discussion

Post by Ares »

MacynSnow wrote: Wed Feb 24, 2021 10:23 pm
Ares wrote: Wed Feb 24, 2021 6:22 pm And if anyone's interested in a Who's Who of that heroic line up, just let me know! :)
Me, me, me! :D :D
Cool deal. We'll just use the master picture since that has everyone.
Ares wrote: Wed Feb 24, 2021 5:59 pm
Image

Full size: Link
So, from Left to Right, Front Row:

Dr. Atomic Robo Tesla - Atomic Robo
Conan of Cimmeria - Conan the Barbarian
Red Sonja - Conan the Barbarian, Red Sonja
Jonathan Morris - Castlevania: Portrait of Ruin
Charlotte Aulin - Castlevania: Portrait of Ruin
Black Venus - Contact Comics, FemForce
Jack Walters - Call of Cthulhu: Dark Corners of the Earth
Tonto - The Lone Ranger
The Lone Ranger - The Lone Ranger
Miss Fury - Miss Fury
The Shadow - The Shadow
Wonder Woman - Wonder Woman
Dr. Evelyn "Evy" O'Connell - The Mummy (1999)
Rick O'Connell - The Mummy (1999)
Joseph Joestar - JoJo's Bizarre Adventure: Battle Tendency
King T'Chaka, the Black Panther - The Black Panther
Doc Savage - Doc Savage
Captain America - Captain America
The Phantom - The Phantom
The Avenger - The Avenger
Flash Gordon - Flash Gordon
The Spider - The Spider
Tarzan - Tarzan of the Apes
Zorro - The Curse of Capistrano, The Mark of Zorro
Dr. Henry "Indiana" Jones, Jr. - Raider of the Lost Ark
Mandrake - Mandrake the Magician
Lothar - Mandrake the Magician
Prince Valiant - Prince Valiant
The Green Hornet - The Green Hornet
Kato - The Green Hornet
The Domino Lady - Saucy Romantic Adventures, The Domino Lady
John Carter, Warlord of Mars - A Princess of Mars
Sheena - Sheena, Queen of the Jungle

And Left to Right, Back Row:

Captain Marvel - Whiz Comics, The Adventures of Captain Marvel
The Rocketeer - The Rocketeer
Miss Victory - Captain Fearless, FemForce

While there will be cameos and other side characters, I plan to have these characters all involved in the story at some point in a major way, including one Endgame-esque scene where they all fight together as a single unit.
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- Captain Marvel SHAZAM! : Power of Hope (2000)

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Re: Pulse Pounding Adventures - Pulp and Film Serial Discussion

Post by MacynSnow »

That's a BIG roster you got there Hoss, think you'll be able to do 'em all justice?
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Re: Pulse Pounding Adventures - Pulp and Film Serial Discussion

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I think so. A lot of the initial action will be establishing the smaller but still sizable team, and then once they're established slowly expand from there with introducing new characters. And a lot of the characterization will come from breaking down the team to have individual missions comprised of 4 to 6 members in places that play to their strengths, so we get a feel for how they interact with each other and the like. And then mix them up to see how those interactions differ with different heroes.

It's a lot, but I'd expect this to be a long labor of love. And if I'm going to do a story that is meant to sort of bridge the moment when things went from Pulp to Superhero, I want to go all in, have a blast and play with as many toys as possible.

I mean, one chapter is going to be Indiana Jones, Rick and Evy O'Connell, Ardeth Beth and Captain Marvel fighting Imhotep, Ra's Al Ghul, the League of Assassins and a lot of mummies in a vast underground necropolis while the bad guys try to bring back Black Adam. And another one will have Wonder Woman, Black Venus, Miss Victory and the Rocketeer fighting Sky Pirates on a World War II version of a Helicarrier. It's going to be that kind of story.
"My heart is as light as a child's, a feeling I'd nearly forgotten. And by helping those in need, I will be able to keep that feeling alive."
- Captain Marvel SHAZAM! : Power of Hope (2000)

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