as Mac - AMI Agent [Chs.2-12] Reed Howes as Signalman [Ch.10] Ed Wolff as The Robot (as Edw. Wolff) Production The serial contains some similarities with the earlier serial The Vanishing Shadow, such as an invisibility belt and a remote-control robot. Stock footage was used from The Invisible Ray, including scenes of Dr. Zorka finding the meteorite in Africa. As with several Universal serials, some of the stock music came from Frankenstein. The Phantom Creeps' car chase was itself used as stock footage in later serials. Newsreel shots of the Hindenburg disaster were used as part of Dr. Zorka's final spree of destruction after his robot, which is supposed to destroy the human race, is stopped due to the sabotage by the Monk after being unleashed. Universal tried to improve their serials by eliminating the written foreword at the start of each chapter. This led to The Phantom Creeps being the first serial in which the studio used vertically scrolling text as the foreword. Influence The innovation of the scrolling text version of the synopsis at the beginning of each chapter was used for the Star Wars films as the "Star Wars opening crawl". The Rob Zombie song "Meet the Creeper" is based on this movie. Zombie has used robots and props based on the design of The Robot in several music videos and live shows. The character Murray The Robot in Zombie's animated movie The Haunted World of El Superbeasto is also based on The Robot. The Robot also appears on the album cover for the single "Dragula". A comic book adaptation was published by DC Comics in Movie Comics #6. The first three chapters of The Phantom Creeps were riffed in season two of Mystery Science Theater 3000, in the episodes Jungle Goddess, Rocket Attack U.S.A., and Ring of Terror. Chapter titles The Menacing Power Death Stalks the Highways Crashing Timbers Invisible Terror Thundering Rails The Iron Monster The Menacing Mist Trapped in the Flames Speeding Doom Phantom Footprints The Blast To Destroy the World Source: See also List of film serials by year List of film serials by studio List of films in the public domain in the United States References External links (1949 TV film edited from serial) (original twelve chapter serial) (1949 TV film edited from serial) Profile in Mike's Amazing World of DC Comics 1939 films American science fiction films American black-and-white films 1930s