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Adventures of Captain Marvel, the 1941 John English & William Witney comic book superhero fantasy serial ("A Republic Serial in 12 Chapters"; "Based on the character in WHIZ COMICS Magazine" by C.C. Beck; about the boy who becomes a superhero when he says "Shazam" and he fights a mysterious masked villain called "The Scorpion") starring Tom Tyler (in the title role as Captain Marvel), Frank Coghlan Jr. (as Billy Batson, Captain Marvel's youthful alter ego), Louise Currie, William 'Billy' Benedict, Robert Strange, Kenne Duncan, Stanley Price, and John Davidson. Note that no one is credited as playing the lead masked villain, "The Scorpion" but IMDb notes that Gerarld Mohr voiced The Scorpion (uncredited). Note that Republic Pictures had tried to make a deal with DC Comics to make serials of Superman and Batman in 1940, but they could not agree on a deal, and in fact a lawsuit resulted. So instead they made a deal with Whiz Comics and made this serial in 1941, and the serial "Spy Smasher" in 1942 (and DC Comics signed with Columbia Pictures in 1943, and made their Batman and Superman serials there!). So this was the very first of the many "live action" movies based on the costumed super heroes, and, likely because it was released at the start of America's involvement in World War II, and there were paper drives over the next few years, original 1941 movie paper on this title is EXTREMELY rare!
NOTE: Click on linked names to see a biography.

Important Added Info: Note that Republic Pictures made two different pressbooks for this serial. Both measure 12" x 18", but one has 16 pages and the other has 12 pages. The 16-page one has two-color printing throughout, and has a great full-color "tipped-in" herald, and the 12-page one is solely black & white and does not have a herald. The most likely explanation is that the one with more color and more pages was sent to larger theaters, and the other one was sent to smaller theaters. We have seen this with other pressbooks from this time period. This auction is for the 16-page 2-color version with the tipped-in herald. We have once before auctioned the 12pg version, but we have never before auctioned this version! Also note that when studios would prepare pressbooks they would often include a sample of the herald. Most often, the herald is no longer still with the pressbook. Sometimes, the herald by itself will sell for almost as much as the rest of the entire pressbook! This pressbook contains the original "tipped-in" herald that was included with it, and it is pictured on that page that it is attached to (this is how the pressbook was created with the herald attached; the herald has printing on the back giving the cost of ordering quantities of it). Also note that we have provided an image of the front and back covers of this pressbook, and of course, the winner of this auction will receive the entire single pressbook we are auctioning (plus any supplements or heralds described above)! Also note that this pressbook is complete and uncut! Given that theater owners received pressbooks partly in order to create their newspaper advertising, and quite frequently cut them up for that purpose, it is rare to find a pressbook that IS complete and uncut!

UPDATED 03/04/2019: Note that we have updated the Important Added Info.

Note that we are auctioning 74 pressbooks in this Part II of our March Major Auction. 62 of those come from a single collector who was attempting to assemble EVERY pressbook from movie serials that were based on either comic book or comic strip characters, and he spent many decades doing so, and he came very close to getting every one there is! These include many that we have never auctioned in all our years of auctioning, and may well never auction them again! This is a very rare opportunity for collectors to acquire these ultra rare pressbooks (which are even more rare than the posters from these same serials, likely because they were sent to very few theaters, and likely most of those theaters immediately threw them out). If one started to try to assemble a similar collection without purchasing any of these pressbooks, they would likely spend many years before they could acquire even a small percentage of them. That is how rare these are!

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