Happy Valentine’s Day! If you’re feeling a little tingle running through your skin, it could be love. Or it could be ants. This week we are happy to welcome Joshua’s wife, Adrienne English Scrimshaw, as our special guest. She’s brought us an episode of Escape entitled “Leiningen Versus the Ants,” based on the short story by Carl Stephenson. Can the power of William Conrad’s voice withstand an unstoppable army of ants? Can the women and oxen contain their excitement? Would this be better if it were a comic book featuring a character named Von Mohl?
I enjoyed this episode. “Escape” is generally pretty good. And William Conrad is one of my favorite radio voices (along with Brace Beemer and Frank Lovejoy), though I knew him as the cartoon Lone Ranger before I heard him on OTR.
The Tarzan/Lone Ranger Adventure Hour! You’ve just filled me with a compulsive need to wake up early on a Saturday and eat a bunch of sugared cereal! Glad you like the episode, I expect we’ll be returning to Escape and “Mr. Darnoc” again.
Oh, excellent choice, Adrienne! I really love this. To be fair, you had me at “ants.” Ants will inherit the earth. (Cockroaches would, but they are not that organized.) The least realistic aspect of this episode, to me, was just how fortified Leiningen’s plantation was. I mean, jeez, it’s been a long day, but did I hear that wrong? Does he have a wall-of-flame defense system set up? Irrigation systems I kind of get, although it’s a rainforest, so maybe it’s actually drainage or… You know, maybe that doesn’t make sense, either. Huh. Aside from the sheer size of the… Read more »
The Tarzan/Lone Ranger(/Zorro) Adventure Hour was my favorite Saturday morning cartoon. At the time I never even realized the Lone Ranger also narrated Rocky & Bullwinkle, which I also enjoyed.
Leningen is something that has grown on me. Sadly the first time kept me from Escape for a couple years, but it has really grown on me over time. I love the two forces (nature vs will) being juxtaposed with the smaller sounding narrator. I actually saw the movie with Charlton Heston and Bill Conrad, and the visual actually helped me appreciate the ants as well as his relationship with his workers better.