Gasoline Alley/Superman crossover

By Mike Curtis
Posted on: Jul 27th 2008 at 10:30 AM

Replies: 3

I've mentioned Video Steve Russo on here before, and a while back, he came up with a gem for me.

CORKY OF GASOLINE ALLEY is the second and last of this B movie series, from Columbia and in 1950. Presumably the first film is lost. The actors are okay in their portrayal of the characters.

Anyway, the plot revolves around an uncle of Hope (Corky's wife) who can fix anything and goes down to Skeezix's repair shop to help fix TV's. He manages to do so, and the trio watch 5 minutes from the 1948 SUPERMAN serial with Kirk Alyn.

Wonder if DC knew about it?

Mike

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Comments:

Posted by: Don Markstein

Posted on: 2008-07-28 at 08:15:22 AM

Not so shocking. They were both done by Columbia, which probably thought of the inclusion as some kind of minor promotion. I don't know if they bothered to tell DC, but if not, DC probably noticed fairly soon and didn't see any cause for action.

I have 1951 as the release date. I haven't heard about the first Gasoline Alley film (released earlier the same year) being lost.

Quack, Don

Posted by: Mike Curtis

Posted on: 2008-07-28 at 11:36:28 AM

Ah, but there may have been action on DC's part.

1951 being the release date, also the year of SUPERMAN AND THE MOLEMEN. Columbia had wanted to do a third serial, but DC declined. I wonder....
Not knowing the release date of CORKY, did DC see it, get mad and decline a third serial, deciding to do their own filming, or...
did Columbia put it in CORKY after DC declined?

DC was notorious on usage and depiction of their characters, it's one reason the 1940-41 Republic deal fell through.

And hey, send me an email, Don! Got something to send you!

Mike

Posted by: Don Markstein

Posted on: 2008-07-29 at 05:34:30 AM

A whole serial falling through seems a rather drastic response to a few minutes on the screen, which isn't likely to hurt them financially anyway. I'm not buying it.

DC was known to protect its property by suing a couple of other comics publishers for particularly blatant Superman imitations. But they didn't do kamikaze attacks -- they let most '40s superheroes slide. Disney is the notorious one, as in the famous incident where they threatened a nursery school for painting a Snow White scene on an outside wall. (Hanna-Barbera scored a PR coup by sending a couple of their own artists over to paint Yogi Bear over it.)

The IMDB gives Sept. 17, 1951 as the release date for Corky. But I don't see that as an act of revenge on their part, either. If so, it's kind of a wimpy one. I doubt the incidents were connected at all. (But you never know -- big corporations have been known to be petty before.)

You've got my address, but I'll send you an e-mail to follow home later today anyway, soon as I turn on the machine I keep the Toonopedia e-mail on.

Quack, Don