1950's science fiction

Google, via the Youtube algorithm, decided to get me looking at 1950's science fiction again, and so the other night I watched most of This Island Earth, of which I think I had only previously seen bits and pieces.

It is pretty deliciously silly, but it was in bright Technicolor and features an actor with the name "Rex Reason".   I fell asleep in the last third, but saw the "climax" (it's a film with a remarkable lack of dramatic arc) which features the crash of the good alien's spaceship into the ocean, and - cut to credits.   Lots of old science fiction had the really abrupt ending, I seem to recall.  Perhaps because they often ran with another feature, so it's not as if it's the only thing the audience came to see.

So today, Youtube decided I would like to watch Commando Cody - Sky Marshal of the Universe - not a movie but a serial of 12 episodes given I think both theatrical then TV release.  This guy:

 

He was the original rocketman character, and I have an early memory of getting a thrill from the flying suit sequences.   And you know, I still kind of like the way they did them - I think it must be a dummy flying along a wire line, or something, but you can't tell exactly how it was done.   (Have a look here, at the 3.50min mark to see the bits I am talking about.)  The print quality of this on Youtube is high, but as for story - the space villain is ridiculously Flash Gordon in design.     

Still, it's worth a laugh.  Just as in This Island Earth, there's a lot of nuclear science being done in tiny laboratories.  I guess the movie makers in the 1950s had much idea about the size of the Manhattan Projection.