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A History of the Doc Savage Adventures in Pulps, Paperbacks, Comics, Fanzines, Radio and Film
Doc Savage is not only the prototype of the modern fictional superhero; he was also a seminal force in creating multimedia crossovers. The character exploded onto the scene in 1933, with the Great Depression and the gathering clouds of war as a cultural backdrop. The series is examined in relation to historic events and changing audience tastes, with special attention on the horror and science-fiction elements. The artwork features illustrations, covers, and original art. Appendices cover Doc Savage paperbacks, pulp magazines, comic books, and fanzines, and a biographical appendix covers all major contributors to the series.
- GenresFiction
240 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 2009
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Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews
February 28, 2024
This is a very good labor-of-love volume that's of interest only to fans of the Doc Savage books. The bulk of the book is a chronological list of each of the 181 pulp magazine issues (1933-1949) with a brief summary and/or notes about the production of the story. It's a wonderful companion volume to Philip Jose Farmer's Doc Savage: His Apocalyptic Life. There are also sections about Doc in the comics, on radio, the film, fanzines about Doc, and the modern novels that have been published after the demise of the pulps, up through 2008, when the book was printed. I would have liked a little more information about the non-Doc Savage contents of the magazine and a little less discussion of the art, and there were a few things I disagreed with completely, such as the author's choices for best stories and covers, and he maintains that the movie wasn't as bad as a lot of people thought it was... yes it was, it was worse than anyone thought it was. I thought a comprehensive list by issue of author, editor, cover artist, etc. would have been better than putting comments in the story synopses. Despite such little nitpickings, I enjoyed the book very much, and now wish I had time to re-read the series.
June 29, 2024
Frankly, I was hoping for a good deal more than just a collection of summaries of the Doc Savage series.
August 15, 2015
As a "history", this has both good points and bad points.
Let's start with the good. It's a complete catalogue, in chronological order, of all the published stories. It also covers the character of Doc Savage in other media - the one movie is given an extensive analysis, as is the script for the planned but unfilmed sequel, while radio series and comic books get more of a broad overview. There is even a chapter about fanzines related to Doc Savage, as well as an appendix devoted to the people involved in the creation of the stories.
The bulk of the book gives each of the original "novels" between half a page and nearly two pages of description. What is included here is kind of a mixed bag, based on the author's somewhat idiosyncratic interests. The publication history is almost always covered, as well as important characters in the story. Cotter is clearly fascinated by the super-science gadgets that Savage employs, and these are given loving coverage. Being an illustrator himself, he also discusses the artwork quite a lot. What is less prominent than you might expect is actual description of the stories themselves: Cotter usually brings up what he considers the most notable plot points, but there is never any complete synopsis (except, as noted above, for the movie). I found this a little surprising, to be honest.
But the really bad part is not what I missed, but what is included instead. Cotter unfortunately has a trait that is not unusual among amateur students of history and literature: the fascination with drawing connections. He spends an inordinate amount of words pointing out similarities between Doc Savage stories and later pop culture entities, and implying or outright claiming that there was an actual influence from the former to the later. In a few cases this seems reasonable, but in the majority it is completely unsupported by any evidence and in some the link is so weak that it becomes laughable. Let's all remember: correlation does not imply causation.
On the whole, this is a useful work of bibliography, but I can't give it top marks because of the space wasted on idle speculation that would have been better spent on hard facts.
Let's start with the good. It's a complete catalogue, in chronological order, of all the published stories. It also covers the character of Doc Savage in other media - the one movie is given an extensive analysis, as is the script for the planned but unfilmed sequel, while radio series and comic books get more of a broad overview. There is even a chapter about fanzines related to Doc Savage, as well as an appendix devoted to the people involved in the creation of the stories.
The bulk of the book gives each of the original "novels" between half a page and nearly two pages of description. What is included here is kind of a mixed bag, based on the author's somewhat idiosyncratic interests. The publication history is almost always covered, as well as important characters in the story. Cotter is clearly fascinated by the super-science gadgets that Savage employs, and these are given loving coverage. Being an illustrator himself, he also discusses the artwork quite a lot. What is less prominent than you might expect is actual description of the stories themselves: Cotter usually brings up what he considers the most notable plot points, but there is never any complete synopsis (except, as noted above, for the movie). I found this a little surprising, to be honest.
But the really bad part is not what I missed, but what is included instead. Cotter unfortunately has a trait that is not unusual among amateur students of history and literature: the fascination with drawing connections. He spends an inordinate amount of words pointing out similarities between Doc Savage stories and later pop culture entities, and implying or outright claiming that there was an actual influence from the former to the later. In a few cases this seems reasonable, but in the majority it is completely unsupported by any evidence and in some the link is so weak that it becomes laughable. Let's all remember: correlation does not imply causation.
On the whole, this is a useful work of bibliography, but I can't give it top marks because of the space wasted on idle speculation that would have been better spent on hard facts.
September 29, 2025
While interesting, this book did not live up to expectations. Reviews I read before putting this on my to-read list gave me the impression that there would be much more to this book. Specifically inspirations for the plots, characters and a historical perspective of what was happening in the world while the books were being published. While there certainly was *some* of this, I didn't really feel there was enough. Some entries were little more than a paragraph long, mentioning the proposed title if it was different that what was published, and the gadgets that Doc used in the book. I felt the repeated use of quotes from the various stories didn't add much besides the word count, and could have been removed to add more images, specifically of the cover art, when covers were mentioned.
I also noticed errors that made me question how well this book was edited. On page 118 the author mentions two characters mimicking Chip and Dale's polite bantering, but he really means the Goofy Gophers from Looney Tunes as Disney's chipmunks did not speak until they were recruited into the Rescue Rangers in the eighties.
The new technology of photocopying is mentioned as being used to hide a map in the period of a sentence, which seems unlikely. I think the author meant microfilm, as photocopies degrade images and are incapable of reproducing a map the size of a dot.
Finally, accusing Modest Stein of being an average painter was just wrong. Certainly his Doc Savage (and Shadow) covers were pretty terrible, but this seems to be a directive from the managers at Street and Smith. A quick Google image search for Stein's work will show that his painting was quite accomplished.
That's not to say the the book was all bad. There were plenty of tidbits that made reading the book worthwhile reading.
I also noticed errors that made me question how well this book was edited. On page 118 the author mentions two characters mimicking Chip and Dale's polite bantering, but he really means the Goofy Gophers from Looney Tunes as Disney's chipmunks did not speak until they were recruited into the Rescue Rangers in the eighties.
The new technology of photocopying is mentioned as being used to hide a map in the period of a sentence, which seems unlikely. I think the author meant microfilm, as photocopies degrade images and are incapable of reproducing a map the size of a dot.
Finally, accusing Modest Stein of being an average painter was just wrong. Certainly his Doc Savage (and Shadow) covers were pretty terrible, but this seems to be a directive from the managers at Street and Smith. A quick Google image search for Stein's work will show that his painting was quite accomplished.
That's not to say the the book was all bad. There were plenty of tidbits that made reading the book worthwhile reading.
November 14, 2025
A History of the Doc Savage Adventures in Pulps, Paperbacks, Comics, Fanzines, Radio and Film
By Robert Michael Cotter is mostly what it says it is. Author Robert Cotter is a fan of the Man of Bronze and a producer of Dr. Savage related media. He is not a scholar. The result is an exhaustive, and that word applies in more than one sense, that inventories and review of every Doc Savage printed story, magazine or pulp. The truth is that this is not the history of Doc Savage and as such cannot be what a ultra fan or academic is or should be reading. Listing all episode/editions in order with something in the way of a plot review and what seems to be reliable notation of who wrote which makes this a fair starting point for a more serious student. Less than starting point as a lot of space goes into the author’s best”?” guesstimates over who or what influenced who or what either before or after any given Doc Savage episode. None of this speculation is documented.
It therefore felt like a glaring failure to not have much if anything to say about the famous Superman vs Doc Savage law suit. In the early days when the field of men in tights was expanding to fill a new and dependable market of fans, exactly what made your superhero not a copy write infringement became a sizable income generator for lawyers. Recently in Michael Chabon’s loving invocation of the period, he gives us The Escape Artist. This man in tights is clearly NOT superman, because he cannot fly. Flying superheroes was a major test if the publishers of Superman noticed your competing character. In the case of Doc Savage V Superman, the Doc won on several points. A fair example being Doc had the first arctic Fortress of Solitude.
By the end, what I most enjoyed was that it was the end. Yes, I do have an itch or indulge in some of the old and new Doc Savage. I notice it is hard to get a copy, of the fist story, but not the second. There is something very interesting to have names like Philip Jose Farmer and if only sorta James Patterson keeping the Doc among us. Brandt "Doc" Savage vs Doc Clark Savage, you tell me.
By Robert Michael Cotter is mostly what it says it is. Author Robert Cotter is a fan of the Man of Bronze and a producer of Dr. Savage related media. He is not a scholar. The result is an exhaustive, and that word applies in more than one sense, that inventories and review of every Doc Savage printed story, magazine or pulp. The truth is that this is not the history of Doc Savage and as such cannot be what a ultra fan or academic is or should be reading. Listing all episode/editions in order with something in the way of a plot review and what seems to be reliable notation of who wrote which makes this a fair starting point for a more serious student. Less than starting point as a lot of space goes into the author’s best”?” guesstimates over who or what influenced who or what either before or after any given Doc Savage episode. None of this speculation is documented.
It therefore felt like a glaring failure to not have much if anything to say about the famous Superman vs Doc Savage law suit. In the early days when the field of men in tights was expanding to fill a new and dependable market of fans, exactly what made your superhero not a copy write infringement became a sizable income generator for lawyers. Recently in Michael Chabon’s loving invocation of the period, he gives us The Escape Artist. This man in tights is clearly NOT superman, because he cannot fly. Flying superheroes was a major test if the publishers of Superman noticed your competing character. In the case of Doc Savage V Superman, the Doc won on several points. A fair example being Doc had the first arctic Fortress of Solitude.
By the end, what I most enjoyed was that it was the end. Yes, I do have an itch or indulge in some of the old and new Doc Savage. I notice it is hard to get a copy, of the fist story, but not the second. There is something very interesting to have names like Philip Jose Farmer and if only sorta James Patterson keeping the Doc among us. Brandt "Doc" Savage vs Doc Clark Savage, you tell me.
October 1, 2023
What a sorry excuse for a book. 147 pages are synopsis of every Doc Savage novel and novella from the pulps. That is 70% of the non-back matter in this book. These synopses are of very occasional interest, such as telling readers when somebody besides Lester Dent wrote a story, but that information is duplicated in the book's back matter, so it really isn't needed here. A better writer would have summarized the trends (impersonation stories, lost civilization stories, etc.) and presented a far more useful overview in a dozen pages. The author even gets one of the synopses wrong. THE GREEN EAGLE has a character named Ben Duck, not Donald Duck. Ben is mockingly called Donald in the story, but Cotter claims that the character's name is Donald. This is the only Savage novel I have read in decades so I cannot check the others for mistakes. I suspect there are more.
There is one other instance of authorial malpractice: the chapter on Doc Savage comic books comes before the chapter on the radio series and film yet refers to these. Readers really need to read about the radio series and film first to make perfect sense of the comic book chapter.
Oh, why go on? I hope somebody will write a good book about Doc Savage someday, but this isn't it.
There is one other instance of authorial malpractice: the chapter on Doc Savage comic books comes before the chapter on the radio series and film yet refers to these. Readers really need to read about the radio series and film first to make perfect sense of the comic book chapter.
Oh, why go on? I hope somebody will write a good book about Doc Savage someday, but this isn't it.
June 29, 2024
A fun / interesting / provocative history of the various Doc Savage incarnations. There is something for almost every Doc fan. Of course as with any effort such as this there will be disagreements with some of Mr. Cotter's opinions. But if you have enjoyed Doc Savage put aside any disagreements you may find and just enjoy immersing yourself in the "Savage" world.
August 25, 2024
Great resource.
September 7, 2013
The merits of this book obviously depend on whether you're interested in pulp hero Doc Savage, but I certainly am. While I'm very familiar with the pulps, Cotter does a good job of bringing fresh information about them, and he's exemplary in covering Doc's moves to other media--I'd never heard of his radio show before, for instance. Agood job.
Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews