Doc Savage lives on in the minds of those fortunate few who cared enough to see the movie or pick up a comic book about the man Sony refers to as the “world’s first superhero.” He may not have been the most well-known pulp hero, but he was undoubtedly one of the most influential. He was first published in 1933, long before Superman and Batman. He has been dubbed the “progenitor of modern superheroes” by Stan Lee and others. This character has a wide range of abilities, skills, and powers, which he used to combat bad villains and bring them to justice.
Doc Savage possesses the mental powers of Sherlock Holmes, the strength of Tarzan, the scientific knowledge of Bruce Banner, and the morality and goodness of Captain America. Lester Dent was the major contributor to Doc Savage, which was founded at Street & Smith Publications by publisher Henry W. Ralston and editor John L. Nanovic. ‘Doc Savage: The Man of Bronze,’ directed and produced by George Pal in 1975, starred Ron Ely as the eponymous character. Later, movie legends such as Arnold Schwarzenegger, Chris Hemsworth, and Dwayne Johnson were rumored to be in talks to play Doc Savage, but the projects were shelved due to developmental and other concerns.
Marvelous Videos, on the other hand, has not forgotten to pay homage to this great comic figure who began in pulp magazines and rose to the esteem of anybody who sought to write or create anything in the realms of fantasy and adventure. Let us take a look at Doc Savage and remember the glory of pulp magazines and the treasures they produced.
Doc Savage started as a pulp magazine and then radio, film, and comic books
Street and Smith Publications were having a gala time financially because of the success of their ‘The Shadow’ magazine. To capitalize further, they started to print the ‘Doc Savage’ magazine from 1933, which went on till 1949 and had 181 issues in total, most of which were written by creator Lester Dent. However, Lester used the house name ‘Kenneth Robenson’ instead of his own. It is important to note that he was initially conceptualized by an executive of Street and Smith named Henry W. Ralston and the publication’s editor John L. Nanovic.
Despite being one of the few pulp heroes to get his own magazine, Doc Savage’s popularity went down with the tides of time until 1964, when Bantam Books reprinted the comics’ individual magazine novels, starting with ‘The Man of Bronze’. Artist James Bama did the covers and gave Doc Savage his iconic bronze hair and skin, torn khaki shirt, etc. By 1990, Bantam Books had published all of the 181 issues and unpublished novels. The story titled ‘Escape From Loki’ detailed the story of how Doc Savage met his five sidekicks during the first world war. Doc Savage was also featured in several comics, radio shows, and a 1975 film titled ‘Doc Savage: The Man of Bronze’.
To this day, he serves as an inspiration to people who wish to write about fantasy and adventure. Interestingly, there’s a possibility that Doc Savage was inspired by the American military man and writer Richard Henry Savage, who had penned down more than forty books on the themes of mystery and adventure and also lived an adventurous life as a military officer. As far as his legacy is concerned, Stan Lee himself noted that Doc Savage was the forerunner of modern superheroes like the ‘Man of Steel’ and also the one who helped create superhero teams. Without Doc Savage, the face of teams such as The Avengers and The Fantastic Four would have been very different. Doc Savage is also unique because he has appeared in comics published by both Marvel and DC.
Doc Savage Origin Explained
Doc Savage was born Clark Savage Jr. His father assembled a team of scientists who trained Doc Savage right from birth. This relentless training helped Doc carve his mental and physical abilities to the best shape humanly possible. The final result was a Doc Savage with nearly superhuman abilities. From programming a computer and designing a weapon, to playing the piano and planning an invasion, there’s nothing that Doc Savage cannot do. He was initially trained as a surgeon, but later, he mastered almost every other field of study, from ventriloquism and music to warfare and neurology. Doc Savage lived by a simple code passed down to him by his father.
It was to right the wrongs and punish evildoers. According to Lester Dent himself, Doc Savage had “Sherlock Holmes’s deductive abilities, Tarzan’s physical abilities, Craig Kennedy’s scientific education, and Abraham Lincoln’s goodness.” Savage is also a physician, scientist, detective, explorer, and researcher. Furthermore, he has a photographic memory, efficiency in martial arts, and he is a master of mimicry and disguise. Savage is also a rich man, whose office is on the 86th floor of a skyscraper.
He owns fleets of luxurious cars, trucks, aircraft, ships, etc., tucked in somewhere in a secret hangar on the Hudson River. If you thought that the list was over, then wait, he also has a retreat in the Arctics where he goes to think, and it’s called his Fortress of Solitude. If you’d remember, Superman also has one such hideout by the same name. When the first world war broke out in Europe, Doc Savage was captured and kept with other prisoners of war, at a camp. There, he met William Harper Littlejohn or Johnny, the first member of his team named the Fabulous Five. Johnny was an expert in geology and archeology. When Doc Savage and Johnny were liberated from the camp, they met the other members of the team. Lieutenant Colonel Andrew Blodgett Mayfair, or Monk, was an industrial chemist.
Brigadier General Theodore Marley Brooks or Ham was an accomplished attorney, who was considered to be the world’s most well-dressed man. Colonel John Renwick or Renny was a civil engineer; he was a giant man whose pastime activity was knocking out panels of wooden doors. Lastly, Major Thomas J Roberts or Tom was an electrical engineer and a fragile-looking character who would fight like a wild cat in a battle. Another recurring character outside the Fab Five is that of Patricia Savage or Pat, who’s Doc’s cousin.
Doc Savage has largely disappeared from the minds of people due to the rust that is called time. He may not be the most famous character today, but he was definitely the most influential in many regards and has been an inspiration for several greats of the superhero world like Superman and Batman. As mentioned earlier, both Superman and Doc Savage seek mental peace and solitude at their respective Fortresses of Solitude. Both their first names are Clark. Superman is famously known as ‘The Man of Steel’, and it was clearly influenced by Doc Savage, who is often referred to as ‘The Man of Bronze’.
Bob Kane’s and Bill Finger’s Batman is another superhero that owes a lot to Doc Savage. Both of them are uber-rich people who fight crime using high-tech weaponry and gadgets. Both of them are considered to be the world’s greatest detectives in their own respective worlds. Doc Savage is also a bit of a playboy, much like Bruce Wayne. They also share their morals, as they would do anything to ensure that no life is lost. The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles had a character by the name of Mr. Braunze, who was clearly a homage to this iconic pulp superhero.
Alternate Versions
Because Doc Savage has appeared in several comics like Dark Horse, Marvel, DC, Millenium, etc., with varying continuities, it isn’t easy to chalk out a specific and linear continuity that we can refer to. However, we are bringing to you several versions of Doc Savage, that have appeared in various comics.
Marvel’s Earth-616
Earth 616 is the Earth of the central universe from the Marvel Multiverse, which is also called the Prime Universe. In 1972, he teamed up with Ben Grimm and resided on Earth 616. However, since then, Marvel Comics lost some of the rights and has failed to publish crossover stories featuring Doc Savage and The Thing. Yet, he continues to exist as a part of the history of the Marvel Universe.
DC’s Earth One
Doc Savage lived on Earth-One, at least in Dennis O’Neil’s Doc Savage series from the 80s. It’s a different Earth from the Earth on which the mainstream DC Universe characters reside. It was here that Doc Savage was featured in a crossover with The Shadow.
As far as the Millennium and Dark Horse Comics are concerned, they don’t exactly have a shared universe, so it is difficult to figure out where they exactly live. More on this in our next entry.
From Golden Age to Modern Age
Having been created in what can only be called the Golden Age of superheroes and comics, Doc Savage was the epitome of all the things any person would want. In 1941, Street and Smith Comics published Doc Savage Comics #5 and turned him into a proper superhero. He landed up in Tibet and had a blue hood along with a ruby on his forehead. This ruby could deflect bullets and hypnotize anyone who gazed long enough into its mysterious and mystical red light. They started calling him ‘The Invincible’, and he bore little to no resemblance to his initial appearance in the pulp magazines. Apart from featuring in his own comics, he appeared in several issues along with The Shadow, such as Shadow Comics Vol. 3, #10 of 1944.
In the Modern Age or Post-Golden Age, Marvel Comics published him in 1972 in books titled ‘The Man of Bronze’, ‘Brand of the Werewolf’, ‘Death in Silver’, and ‘The Monsters’. In 1975, Curtis Magazines, which was an imprint of Marvel, released eight black and white comics. As mentioned earlier, Doc Savage teamed up with Marvel’s ‘The Thing’ in Marvel Two-in-One #21. This was a very crucial issue because it laid the foundation of future stories such as “The Project Pegasus Saga” and “Squadron Supreme: Death of a Universe.”
DC published a four-issue miniseries and another 24 issues from 1987 to 1990. The stories pirouetted around Doc’s Mayan sweetheart Monya, other characters like Doc’s grandson Chip, and detailed the backstories of Doc’s parents. Dark Horse Comics published ‘The Shadow and Doc Savage: The Case of the Shrieking Skeletons’ and ‘Doc Savage: Curse of the Fire God’ in 1995. Dynamite Entertainment published ‘Doc Savage: The Man of Bronze’ in 2013.
Live-Action Adaptations
In 1967, it was reported that Chuck Connors would play Doc Savage in a film called ‘The Thousand Headed Man’; however, complications with rights led to the axing of the project. But Doc Savage graced the silver screen for the first time in director and producer George Pal’s 1975 film ‘Doc Savage: The Man of Bronze’, which starred Ron Ely in the titular role. While some consider it an underrated gem, it largely received mixed to negative responses from critics and audience alike and turned out to be a box office bomb. But the film’s failure is credited to the loss of funding during filming. In the film, Doc Savage leaves his Fortress of Solitude to embark on a journey to find out the reality behind his father’s death.
When the principal photography of ‘The Man of Bronze’ was going on, another film with the title ‘Doc Savage: The Arch Enemy of Evil’ was being filmed. However, the poor reception of the first film resulted in the abandonment of this new project. ‘Doc Savage: The Arch Enemy of Evil’ would have featured a German-speaking villain with a man-eating octopus for a pet. This resembled a 1937 novel titled ‘The Feathered Octopus’. Philip José Farmer wrote another screenplay based on the January 1936 pulp novel ‘Murder Mirage’.
It would have been a crossover between a retired Sherlock Holmes and Doc Savage set in the year 1936. Alas! it was never filmed. In 1999, Arnold Schwarzenegger was supposed to play this polymath’s role, but the project was shelved when Arnold became the Governor of California. However, hopes are still high as there’s news that Doc savage would return in a television show which was initially meant to be a live-action film. Despite the several canceled films, it is important to note that if and when Doc Savage returns to screens, we must as a population embrace his virtue and sincerity, and his statuesque almost-heavenly glory. At the same time, we must ensure that we don’t succumb to the complications that may arise due to the time difference between the age he was written for the first time and the present time.
Future Possibilities
In 2016, director Shane Black revealed that he was going to make a Doc Savage film starring Dwayne Johnson for Original Film and Sony Pictures. However, the project was later transformed into a TV series. According to the latest news, ‘The Man of Bronze’ would grace the small screen because Sony Pictures Television and Original Films have partnered with Condé Nast Entertainment.
The new series would chronicle Doc Savage’s adventures, and feature everything from dinosaurs to secret societies. There would be some intelligent and deadly villains, cool weapons and gadgets, fatal traps, and elaborate conspiracies to rule the Earth. Unfortunately, that’s all the information we have on the series, and we hope that the world’s first superhero, as promoted by Sony, doesn’t have to go through another developmental hell.