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Doc Savage: Double Features #4, 5
The Polar Treasure / Pirate of the Pacific
Pulp fiction's legendary Man of Bronze returns in two of his most engrossing adventures. Why does a blind violinist have a map tattooed on his back? Investigating the mystery, Doc Savage and his Iron Crew race to the Arctic icecap in search of the secret of "The Polar Treasure". Then, while returning to New York aboard his new submarine Helldiver, the Man of Bronze is attacked by the "Pirate of the Pacific" in one of his most violent adventures. This classic pulp reprint showcases the superb pulp cover by Walter Baumhofer that was reused as the cover of the golden age Doc Savage Comics #1, all of Paul Orban's 1933 interior illustrations from the ultra-rare fourth and fifth issues of "Doc Savage Magazine", and historical commentary by pulp historian Will Murray.
- GenresPulp
128 pages, Paperback
First published April 15, 2007
About the author
Kenneth Robeson
929 books139 followersKenneth Robeson was the house name used by Street and Smith Publications as the author of their popular character Doc Savage and later The Avenger. Though most Doc Savage stories were written by the author Lester Dent, there were many others who contributed to the series, including:
William G. Bogart
Evelyn Coulson
Harold A. Davis
Lawrence Donovan
Alan Hathway
W. Ryerson Johnson
Lester Dent is usually considered to be the creator of Doc Savage. In the 1990s Philip José Farmer wrote a new Doc Savage adventure, but it was published under his own name and not by Robeson. Will Murray has since taken up the pseudonym and continued writing Doc Savage books as Robeson.
All 24 of the original stories featuring The Avenger were written by Paul Ernst, using the Robeson house name. In order to encourage sales Kenneth Robeson was credited on the cover of The Avenger magazine as "the creator of Doc Savage" even though Lester Dent had nothing to do with The Avenger series. In the 1970s, when the series was extended with 12 additional novels, Ron Goulart was hired to become Robeson.
William G. Bogart
Evelyn Coulson
Harold A. Davis
Lawrence Donovan
Alan Hathway
W. Ryerson Johnson
Lester Dent is usually considered to be the creator of Doc Savage. In the 1990s Philip José Farmer wrote a new Doc Savage adventure, but it was published under his own name and not by Robeson. Will Murray has since taken up the pseudonym and continued writing Doc Savage books as Robeson.
All 24 of the original stories featuring The Avenger were written by Paul Ernst, using the Robeson house name. In order to encourage sales Kenneth Robeson was credited on the cover of The Avenger magazine as "the creator of Doc Savage" even though Lester Dent had nothing to do with The Avenger series. In the 1970s, when the series was extended with 12 additional novels, Ron Goulart was hired to become Robeson.
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Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews
February 9, 2017
The Polar Treasure was a lot of fun, but the accompanying Pirate of the Pacific was perhaps the weakest installment in the series this far, even worse than Quest of the Spider.
The Polar Treasure starts off with the kidnapping of a blind master violinist and ends up with a submarine voyage to the arctic. The action is great, Doc's exploits are clever, and the supporting characters memorable. One twist was that instead of one nefarious criminal gang, Doc and his crew find themselves dealing with two competing gangs of crooks. This adds an extra dimension to the narrative not seen in previous installments.
While The Polar Treasure was a great deal of fun, Pirate of the Pacific was a dull slog. Taking place immediately after The Polar Treasure (Doc and his friends are journeying back from the arctic circle in their submarine), the story involves a "modern day" pirate named Tom-Too attempting to conquer the "Luzon Union" (apparently the fictionalized Philippines). I found it difficult to remain involved in the action. There's a briefly interesting passage where Doc and his pals go incognito on the same ocean liner as Tom-Too and his cronies, but Doc Savage's pals are repeatedly and monotonously kidnapped and rescued over the course of the story. Doc's escapes from danger are even more unbelievable than usual, and even the shark attack scenes are less exciting than they could have been. When Tom-Too's true identity was revealed as a fairly unobtrusive supporting character I couldn't summon up much more than a shrug.
While it tinges pretty much all of the Doc Savage stories given the time period, the racism in Pirate of the Pacific is particularly egregious. Tom-Too's gang is a mix of Asian ethnicities, so there are lots of references to "slanted-eyes," yellow skin, "half-castes," and so forth. The Man of Bronze spends a great deal of time undercover in yellow-face, speaking in the same cringe-worthy "Me so solly!" pidgin and fawning "O most beneficent one!" pseudo-Chinese speech as the evil Asian criminals. As a pulp fiction fan I generally don't get too worked up about racist depictions of ethnic minorities, but they were particularly prominent and ignorant in Pirate of the Pacific. The Polar Treasure had some references to foul-smelling, superstitious Eskimos, but they weren't portrayed as wicked subhumans.
The Polar Treasure was one of the better Doc Savage yarns, but I think Pirate of the Pacific can be safely skipped.
The Polar Treasure starts off with the kidnapping of a blind master violinist and ends up with a submarine voyage to the arctic. The action is great, Doc's exploits are clever, and the supporting characters memorable. One twist was that instead of one nefarious criminal gang, Doc and his crew find themselves dealing with two competing gangs of crooks. This adds an extra dimension to the narrative not seen in previous installments.
While The Polar Treasure was a great deal of fun, Pirate of the Pacific was a dull slog. Taking place immediately after The Polar Treasure (Doc and his friends are journeying back from the arctic circle in their submarine), the story involves a "modern day" pirate named Tom-Too attempting to conquer the "Luzon Union" (apparently the fictionalized Philippines). I found it difficult to remain involved in the action. There's a briefly interesting passage where Doc and his pals go incognito on the same ocean liner as Tom-Too and his cronies, but Doc Savage's pals are repeatedly and monotonously kidnapped and rescued over the course of the story. Doc's escapes from danger are even more unbelievable than usual, and even the shark attack scenes are less exciting than they could have been. When Tom-Too's true identity was revealed as a fairly unobtrusive supporting character I couldn't summon up much more than a shrug.
While it tinges pretty much all of the Doc Savage stories given the time period, the racism in Pirate of the Pacific is particularly egregious. Tom-Too's gang is a mix of Asian ethnicities, so there are lots of references to "slanted-eyes," yellow skin, "half-castes," and so forth. The Man of Bronze spends a great deal of time undercover in yellow-face, speaking in the same cringe-worthy "Me so solly!" pidgin and fawning "O most beneficent one!" pseudo-Chinese speech as the evil Asian criminals. As a pulp fiction fan I generally don't get too worked up about racist depictions of ethnic minorities, but they were particularly prominent and ignorant in Pirate of the Pacific. The Polar Treasure had some references to foul-smelling, superstitious Eskimos, but they weren't portrayed as wicked subhumans.
The Polar Treasure was one of the better Doc Savage yarns, but I think Pirate of the Pacific can be safely skipped.
May 4, 2014
The Polar Treasure:
Doc and the gang save the life of a blind musician who's the key to finding a treasure sunken in the polar icecap. I managed to get this far in the Doc Savage series before running into any particularly nasty racism. Dent must have been saving it up, because he does not like him some Eskimos. In addition to being savage and ignorant, a sentence doesn't go by without calling them greasy or smelly.
Things that Doc Savage is the best in the world of in this episode include world's best composer and world's best singing voice. Also, he can cure blindness and his skin repels water like a duck.
Pirate of the Pacific:
Coming directly off the heels of The Polar Treasure, the gang returns by submarine to New York only to be attacked by Asian pirates. The chase/capture/escape cycles go from the skyscrapers of New York to a cruise ship from San Francisco to a stand in for the Philippines. Big action in this one, as Savage gets in more fisticuffs than I've seen in the previous books combined and his five compatriots tear through crates of ammo for their machine pistols. Remmy gets the spotlight this time, and Monk and Ham get separated early on so there's less of their squabbling.
Not much in the way of plot. After the failed assassination attempt, Savage tracks down and chases the culprits, led by the elusive pirate Tom-Too, who seems more like a pan-Asian revolutionary than a bandit.
I was worried about this one because it opened with an almost surreal barrage of racial invective. Most of the time this stuff is just either outdated terms or casual bigotry, but Dent really unloads. This makes for uncomfortable reading for the modern reader, but it was also just bad writing. You really can't use "inscrutable" more than once in a paragraph. Luckily it seems that he was just getting it out of his system and he lets off a bit later in the book, though he stirr lesolts to that annoying R and L swap in the diarect. Also, Remmy is in black-face.
More reviews at Trash Menace.
Doc and the gang save the life of a blind musician who's the key to finding a treasure sunken in the polar icecap. I managed to get this far in the Doc Savage series before running into any particularly nasty racism. Dent must have been saving it up, because he does not like him some Eskimos. In addition to being savage and ignorant, a sentence doesn't go by without calling them greasy or smelly.
Things that Doc Savage is the best in the world of in this episode include world's best composer and world's best singing voice. Also, he can cure blindness and his skin repels water like a duck.
Pirate of the Pacific:
Coming directly off the heels of The Polar Treasure, the gang returns by submarine to New York only to be attacked by Asian pirates. The chase/capture/escape cycles go from the skyscrapers of New York to a cruise ship from San Francisco to a stand in for the Philippines. Big action in this one, as Savage gets in more fisticuffs than I've seen in the previous books combined and his five compatriots tear through crates of ammo for their machine pistols. Remmy gets the spotlight this time, and Monk and Ham get separated early on so there's less of their squabbling.
Not much in the way of plot. After the failed assassination attempt, Savage tracks down and chases the culprits, led by the elusive pirate Tom-Too, who seems more like a pan-Asian revolutionary than a bandit.
I was worried about this one because it opened with an almost surreal barrage of racial invective. Most of the time this stuff is just either outdated terms or casual bigotry, but Dent really unloads. This makes for uncomfortable reading for the modern reader, but it was also just bad writing. You really can't use "inscrutable" more than once in a paragraph. Luckily it seems that he was just getting it out of his system and he lets off a bit later in the book, though he stirr lesolts to that annoying R and L swap in the diarect. Also, Remmy is in black-face.
More reviews at Trash Menace.
December 5, 2017
This book brings us two Doc Savage novels from June and July 1933
First up is, "The Polar Treasure" where Doc sets out to find a blind violinist and offer him sight-restoring surgery, but before he can do that, the man is kidnapped by pirates, and Doc and his men find themselves caught between two gangs of pirates battling over a fantastic treasure. The Polar Treasure is a Doc Savage novel at its best: There's plenty of action and daring do. There's some great plot twists, and two sets of villains. It's a lot of fun and very fast paced.
Next is, "Pirate of the Pacific," where Doc Savage takes on an "oriental gang" bent on overthrowing a nation that's supposed to be the Philippines. This book loads up on racial stereotypes and "yellow peril," storytelling, which is not only offensive to modern readers, but also makes for weaker writing. The villain's not interesting, the plot is confusing. Doc Savage is fighting a pirate who has created an elaborate infrastructure to make himself ruler of the island nation. That's not to deny that there are some good action scenes and some superb cunning, but it's weighed by the weak spots of the story.
Overall, I think the "Polar Treasure" is a five-star story and Pirate of the Pacific is a two-star story with a lot of baggage for modern day readers.
First up is, "The Polar Treasure" where Doc sets out to find a blind violinist and offer him sight-restoring surgery, but before he can do that, the man is kidnapped by pirates, and Doc and his men find themselves caught between two gangs of pirates battling over a fantastic treasure. The Polar Treasure is a Doc Savage novel at its best: There's plenty of action and daring do. There's some great plot twists, and two sets of villains. It's a lot of fun and very fast paced.
Next is, "Pirate of the Pacific," where Doc Savage takes on an "oriental gang" bent on overthrowing a nation that's supposed to be the Philippines. This book loads up on racial stereotypes and "yellow peril," storytelling, which is not only offensive to modern readers, but also makes for weaker writing. The villain's not interesting, the plot is confusing. Doc Savage is fighting a pirate who has created an elaborate infrastructure to make himself ruler of the island nation. That's not to deny that there are some good action scenes and some superb cunning, but it's weighed by the weak spots of the story.
Overall, I think the "Polar Treasure" is a five-star story and Pirate of the Pacific is a two-star story with a lot of baggage for modern day readers.
December 21, 2023
Had all the paperbacks until a basement flood turned them to mush. Found this used magazine style version at a comic show. Turns out there are a few illustrations but the two stories are presented as originally formatted in the old pulp. Sixty years ago these were thrilling tales to a kid. Today they are just a fun nostalgic read.
Read
July 28, 2011pretty silly
Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews