A good part for veteran character actor Eduardo Cianelli who specialized in playing villains, this lengthy serial is lots of fun, but not much different than other tales of wacky mad scientists trying to take over the world. He tries to kill Robert Wilcox in the opening with a poisoned needle blown into his chest, but fortunately a hat stops that.
The mechanical robot, looking like a bunch of metal trash cans fastened together, isn't as silly looking as Lugosi's contraption in "The Phantom Creeps", but obviously young boys giggled in delight at it. Lots of other traps are set, and obviously the heroes are going to get out of harm's way somehow. Saved by the fact that Cianelli doesn't ham it up and plays it completely serious without obvious madness which makes him all the more sinister.
The mechanical robot, looking like a bunch of metal trash cans fastened together, isn't as silly looking as Lugosi's contraption in "The Phantom Creeps", but obviously young boys giggled in delight at it. Lots of other traps are set, and obviously the heroes are going to get out of harm's way somehow. Saved by the fact that Cianelli doesn't ham it up and plays it completely serious without obvious madness which makes him all the more sinister.