climb aboard Mary Beth's aircraft) extends his hand to help Mary Beth back into the cockpit, she slips and falls off the wing to her death. As a result of Mary Beth's death, Waldo, Axel, and Dillhoefer are temporarily grounded by an inspector of the newly formed Air Commerce division of the federal government, Newt Potts, a man from Waldo's wartime past. Soon after, at the Muncie Fair, another tragedy occurs with the Dillhoefer Circus when Ezra (flying in place of the grounded Waldo) attempts the outside loop in the monoplane. He crashes on his third attempt, and the crowd rushes out of the stands to see the wreckage. One of the spectators carelessly flicks a cigarette into gas leaking from the aircraft, igniting it. Helpless against the flames, Waldo kills Ezra with a piece of lumber to spare him the agony of being burned alive. Because no one helped Waldo try to save him, Waldo goes on a rampage, jumps in one of Dillhoefer's aircraft and begins buzzing the crowd away from the wreckage. He ends up crashing into a carnival area, which leads to his permanent grounding. Waldo goes to Hollywood where Axel is working as a stuntman, and Waldo and Axel get jobs as stunt pilots in an upcoming film depicting the air battles of the Great War. Axel has been cleared of his grounding and reinstated as a pilot, but Waldo uses an alias so that he can dodge his grounding and fly in the film. Famous German air ace Ernst Kessler has also been hired by the producers as a consultant and to fly a Fokker Dr. I replica in the film. (The disillusioned, bitter and heavy drinking depiction of Kessler is based on the real German ace and stunt pilot Ernst Udet.) During filming of a famous wartime duel, Waldo in a Sopwith Camel and Kessler in the Fokker—although their aircraft are disarmed—begin dogfighting in deadly earnest, using their aircraft as weapons, repeatedly playing chicken and colliding with each other. Eventually, Waldo damages Kessler's aircraft so badly that it is no longer airworthy, and Kessler surrenders to Waldo. Waldo and Kessler then salute each other and fly their separate ways, Waldo unable to land without crashing due to damaged landing gear. As the sound fades, the last shot of the film is of a page in a photo album. One of the pictures is