Serial

Serial is a term, originating in literature, for a format by which a story is told in contiguous installments in sequential issues of a single periodical publication. By extension, it also came to apply to a film issued in the same installment manner over a period of sequential weeks at a single movie house.

Film

A serial, or cliffhanger, was a popular form of movie entertainment that dated back to Edison's What Happened to Mary? of 1912. Usually filmed with low budgets, serials were action-packed stories that usually involved a hero (or heroes) battling an evil villain and rescuing a damsel in distress. The villain would continually place the hero into inescapable deathtraps and situations, or the heroine would be placed into a deathtrap and the hero would bravely come to her rescue, usually pulling her away from certain death only instants before she met her doom. The hero and heroine would face one trap after another, battling countless thugs and lackeys, before finally defeating the villain "once and for all"...even though the villain would almost always get away at the end, to return at a future date.

Related Topics:
Hero - Villain - Damsel in distress

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Many famous cliches of action-adventure movies had their origins in the serials. The popular term cliffhanger was developed as a plot device in film serials (though its origins have been traced by some historians to the Sherlock Holmes stories of Arthur Conan Doyle), and it comes from the many times that the hero or heroine would end up hanging over a cliff, usually as the villain gloated above and waited for them to plummet thousands of feet to their deaths. Other popular cliches included the heroine being tied to a railroad track; being lashed to a log in a sawmill, lying on a conveyor belt and approaching a gigantic whirling sawblade; or being trapped in an abandoned mine shaft, watching as the burning fuse of a nearby bundle of dynamite sparked and sputtered its way towards the deadly explosive. The popular Indiana Jones movies are a well-known, romantic pastiche of the serials' clichéd plot elements and devices.

Related Topics:
Cliffhanger - Plot device - Sherlock Holmes - Arthur Conan Doyle - Indiana Jones

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The serials were filmed in separate parts, and each chapter (a typical serial usually had fifteen of them) would be screened at the same theater for one week. The serial would end with a cliffhanger, as the hero and heroine would find themselves in the latest perilous situation from which there could be no escape. The audience would have to return the next week (and pay admission) to find out how the hero and heroine would escape and battle the villain once again. Serials were especially popular with children, and for many youths in the first half of the 20th century, a typical Saturday at the movies included a chapter of at least one serial, along with cartoons, newsreels, and two feature films.

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Silent era

Famous American serials of the silent era include The Perils of Pauline and The Exploits of Elaine made by Pathé Frères and starring Pearl White. Another popular serial emerged that year, the 119 episode The Hazards of Helen made by Kalem Studios and starring Helen Holmes for the first forty-eight episodes then Helen Gibson for the remainder. Other major studios of the silent era produced them, such as Vitagraph and Essanay, as did Warner Brothers, Fox, and Universal. Several independent companies (for example, Mascot Pictures) made Western serials. A serial version of Tarzan was also made by a minor studio. Europe had its own serials, notably the French Judex and the German Homonculus.

Related Topics:
The Perils of Pauline - The Exploits of Elaine - Pathé Frères - Pearl White - The Hazards of Helen - Kalem Studios - Helen Holmes - Helen Gibson - Vitagraph - Essanay - Warner Brothers - Fox - Universal - Mascot Pictures - Western - Tarzan - Judex - Homonculus

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Sound era

The arrival of sound technology made it costlier to produce serials, so that they were no longer as profitable on a flat rental basis. Further, the Great Depression made it impossible for many of the smaller companies which had turned out serials to upgrade to sound, and they therefore went out of business. Only one serial specialty company, Mascot Pictures was in fact able to make the transition from silent to sound filmmaking: Universal Pictures also kept its serial unit alive through the transition.

Related Topics:
Great Depression - Mascot Pictures - Universal Pictures

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In the early 1930s a handful of independent companies tried their hand at making serials, but managed only two or three, including the once-prolific Weiss Brothers. The Weisses bought a little time when Columbia Pictures decided to take a try at serials, and contracted with them (as Adventure Serials Inc.) to make three chapterplays. They were successful enough that Columbia then established its own serial unit and the Weisses essentially disappeared from the serial scene. This was in 1937, and Columbia was probably inspired by the previous year's serial blockbuster success at Universal, Flash Gordon, the first serial ever to play at a major theater on Broadway; and by the success of that same year of the newly-created Republic Pictures, which dedicated itself to a program of serials and westerns, eschewing major productions in their favor. The creation of Republic involved the absorption of Mascot Pictures, so that by 1937, serial production was now in the hands of three companies only - Universal, Columbia and Republic, with Republic quickly becoming the acknowledged leader in quality serial product. Each company turned out four to five serials per year, of 12 to 15 episodes each, a pace which they all kept up until the end of World War II when, in 1946, Universal dropped its serial unit along with its b-picture unit and renamed its production department Universal-International Pictures. Republic and Columbia continued unchallenged, with about 4 serials per year each, Republic fixing theirs at 12 chapters each while Columbia fixed at fifteen.

Related Topics:
1930s - Columbia Pictures - Adventure Serials Inc. - 1937 - Flash Gordon - Republic Pictures - Universal-International Pictures

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By the mid-50s, however, episode television series and the sale of older serials to TV syndicators by all the current and past major sound serial producers, together with the loss of audience attendance at Saturday matinees in general, made serial-making a losing proposition.

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