Buck Rogers (serial) - Production Notes

Production Notes

This 12-part Buck Rogers movie serial was launched in 1939. It starred Buster Crabbe, who had previously played the role of Flash Gordon in two movie serials prior to Buck Rogers. Constance Moore played Lieutenant Wilma Deering, the only woman in the film, and Jackie Moran was Buddy Wade, a character who did not appear in other versions of the Buck Rogers franchise, but who was clearly modeled on the Sunday strip character Buddy Deering. Anthony Warde played "Killer Kane", Buck Rogers' enemy; this was the only time that Warde, who usually portrayed evil underlings in serials, played a lead villain. Korean-American actor Philson Ahn, younger brother of noted actor Philip Ahn, played Prince Tallen, a Saturnian native who befriends Buck Rogers.

The noted actor and "crown prince of stuntmen" David Sharpe, who appeared in over 4,500 films over the course of a seven-decade career, also appeared in the Buck Rogers serial in several roles: as one of Kane's pilots, a Hidden City sentry, and a Saturnian lieutenant.

The serial had a small budget and saved money on special effects by re-using material from other stories: background shots from the futuristic musical Just Imagine (1930), as the city of the future, the garishly stenciled walls from the Azura palace set in Flash Gordon's Trip to Mars, and even the studded leather belt that Crabbe wore in Flash Gordon's Trip to Mars, turned up as part of Buck's uniform.

In 1953, the 1939 movie serial was edited into a feature film entitled Planet Outlaws. Then it was edited again to feature length and titled Destination Saturn for syndication to television, in 1965. Finally, the serial was edited once again into a feature film format in the late 1970s, this version simply entitled Buck Rogers with the theatrical poster advertising, "Star Wars owes it all to Buck Rogers", and later was sold on videotape in the early 1990s by VCI Entertainment under the catalogue title of Planet Outlaws (which title, to make it appear legitimate, was also superimposed onto the first shot of film following the main titles). VCI released all twelve installments on DVD in September 2000. In November 2009, VCI released a special 70th anniversary edition on DVD, with extras including "The History of Buck Rogers" by Clifford Weimer, a photo gallery and the 1935 Buck Rogers short feature originally shown at the 1933-34 Worlds Fair.