Phantom Detective 108 - Streamlined Murder

Phantom Detective 108
Streamlined Murder
by Laurence Donovan

There's a method of writing in which the author starts with an inexplicable scene or plot device and then works out a way to explain it later.  The Doctor Who revival did this with diminishing returns as the seasons went on.

In Streamlined Murder, we have a murdered silk tycoon holding a box with a severed hand.  There's going to be a will reading at his mansion, which happens to have as permanent house guests:

• An Arab who trains apes to use machine guns
• A legless carnival acrobat
• A reclusive chemist

I kept waiting for the Ritz Brothers to show up,



but instead we've got the Phantom Detective and gang, along with a mad gasser and Japanese criminals.  Any one of these elements should be awesome, but here he's just throwing the whole Old Dark House kitchen sink at us.  I'm especially upset by the apes.  If you're going to have an army of machine gun wielding apes, use them a lot.  A whole lot.  Hell, start a spin-off series.

At the end Donovan ties everything in a little bow with a bunch of stuff the Phantom found out about off page, as per usual.

Phantom Detectve 107 - Murder Moon Over Miami

Murder Moon Over Miami
by Laurence Donovan
Phantom Detective 107 - January 1942

Murderous bandits roam the waters of Florida's bays and swamps, killing immigrants that they smuggle in and blackmailing a judge to find hidden stolen goods.  But mostly, the Phantom and company dog paddle around boats in various states of being blown up.

Phantom Detective - Death Over Puget Sound

Death Over Puget Sound
by Laurence Donovan (Robert Wallace)
Phantom Detective 103
Phantom Detective September 1941

The Phantom heads out to the Pacific Northwest to investigate a series of high altitude murders against mountain climbers and lumberjacks by the ruthless Black Wolf gang led by the mysterious Echo Voice.  There's an unusual cast of characters, including a pro-wrestler, an amazonesque mountainlady, and a deranged prophet.  And bankers, lots of bankers.

Another unfair mystery from this series, with most of the revelations coming from a peek at bank records the reader isn't privy to until the end.  A lot of convolutions with further convolutions to explain them.  Luckily this piece has plenty of action, including a white water rapids rescue from a dynamite loaded barge and a downhill chase with a runaway streetcar.

I'm still having issues visualizing the Phantom in the story.  He spends much of the time in disguise, but much of the time he just goes around in the open as the Phantom.  He doesn't seem to wear the mask as shown on the cover - I guess either the character or the writer just aren't bothering to keep his secret identity that secret.

Phantom Detective 102 - The Thousand Islands Murders

The Thousand Islands Murders
by Robert Wallace (Laurence Donovan)
Phantom Detective #102 8/1941

The Phantom inflitrates a mystery island where all the residents have the last name of Smith, looking for a missing person and the secret of the Devil's Fire, a fireball that completely incinerates its victims.

According to the introduction by Will Murray, this was one of the stories that moved the Phantom towards a more Doc Savage style of pulp hero, but there's still more detection than action here.  The first two thirds or so have the standard sneaking around in disguise, being captured, escaping, being rescued, etc, from the more action oriented pulps.

I wasn't in the right frame of mind to deal with the last part, which was some kind of long, drawn out reveal of a not-very-fair play mystery.  It's like we get the reveal, then the clues, and then we're told what the mystery was in the first place.