Командо Коди: Люди-радары с Луны

1952 film by Fred C. Brannon
The odd naming choice of the serial's main hero, "Commando Cody," was possibly an attempt by Republic to make young audiences think they were seeing another adventure of Commander Corry, the hero of the popular ABC TV and radio series Space Patrol (1950–1955). However, there is no surviving evidence that this was a consideration by anyone at Republic.

Commando Cody (George Wallace) is a civilian researcher and inventor with a number of employees. He uses a streamlined helmet and an atomic powered rocket backpack attached to a leather flying jacket. Cody also uses a rocket ship capable of reaching the Moon. When the U. S. finds itself under attack from a mysterious force that can wipe out entire military bases and industrial complexes, Cody surmises (correctly) that the Earth is coming under attack from our own Moon. He then flies his rocket ship there and confronts the Moon's "ruler", Retik (Roy Barcroft), who boldly announces his plans to both conquer Earth and then move the Moon's entire population here using spaceships and atomic weapons. Their weapons use a power superior to uranium which they call lunarium. During the next 11 serial chapters, Cody, now back on Earth, and his associates Joan (Aline Towne), Ted (William Bakewell) and Dick (Gayle Kellogg) battle an elusive lunar agent named Krog (Peter Brocco) and his gang of human henchmen led by Graber (Clayton Moore) and Daly (Bob Stevenson), who use lunarium powered ray cannons to disrupt defense forces and weaken public morale. After a second trip to the Moon, in which he captures a sample ray cannon for duplication in his lab, Cody tracks Retik's minions to their hideout where Krog is killed by one of his own devices, and Graber and Daly subsequently die in an over the cliff car chase. Retik flies to Earth to take personal charge of his collapsing operations but is blasted out of the sky by one of his own ray weapons.

Radar Men from the Moon was budgeted at $172,840, although the final negative cost was $185,702 (a $12,862, or 7.4%, overspend). It was the most expensive Republic serial of 1952 the tank like Moon "Scout Car" was not used in the earlier serial. All spaceship footage was filmed new for Radar Men from the Moon. Outer space is shown as brightly lit, and the characters are shown walking on the Moon, in normal Earth gravity and in daylight, without pressure suits. The laboratory building is actually a Republic Pictures office building with a prop "Cody Laboratories" sign added to its exterior. In 1989, the serial regained notoriety as the first shorts shown by the cult series Mystery Science Theater 3000. The first eight and a half chapters of this Commando Cody serial were lampooned before the showing of their main feature of the week (only half of the ninth installment was shown, with the in show excuse being that "the film broke").

Radar Men from the Moon has been available for decades on all manner of Home Video formats, and was re released by Grapevine Video on Blu Ray, October 13, 2017. Despite a well made pasted over main title, a feature version called Commando Cody vs. the Moon Menace, available from Alpha Video (Oldies. com), is nothing more than the television feature version of Retik the Moon Monster, with additional material edited out by sources unknown.

In his 1984 book In the Nick of Time author William C. Cline dismissed the serial as a "quickie".

Because of a failure to renew copyright, Radar Men lapsed into the public domain in 1979.