Feats N' Faults: Zorro's Black Whip (1944)
A Wild West Super Hero
Welcome back to Feats N’ Faults, where we use our Tiered Point System to rank and record our favorite characters based on their achievements and deeds. For a more in depth look on how points are awarded, please check the About page. Below is our Tier System for quick reference.
We have a first for this week's feed: a Western! It is the first time we have ever covered a character from this genre, and I stumbled upon it by accident. There we were, walking through Goodwill, when this DVD caught my eye amongst the glassware. Zorro’s Black Whip from 1944. I had never heard of it before but love collecting physical media. I knew I was leaving with it when I read that the entire run was on it! Not knowing what to expect, my fiance and I popped it in, and it became our obsession for the week. Fast passed with moments that kept cracking us up. But that is enough of the preamble. Let me introduce you to the three characters we will be featuring. The western superheroine The Black Whip, her sidekick Vic Gordon, and the evil mastermind behind keeping Idaho from becoming a state, Dan Hammond. Go ahead and rank these guys from least to greatest, and let me know in the comments how you did!
Let's Get Started!
3rd Place, Dan Hammond: 13 FN’F Score (1944) 12 ep.
I wasn’t sure how these characters would score. I had never done a western or anything close to something this old. The beginning of my journey with Doctor Who was even 20 years newer than this. In the end, these guys did pretty well. The first thing that sticks out to me is Dan's lack of faults. A perfect record with a decent feats score. This guy had a weird obsession with staying out of the Union, but boy, did he fight to suppress some votes. Strangely applicable to today’s climate, Dan was determined to keep swindling this territory by keeping the Union at arm’s length. It would bring law and railroads to town, destroying his stage couch business. He was willing to rob banks, kill immigrants, suppress and counterfeit votes, and rustle up some horses. In the end, the Black Whip defeated him. That is to say, he was trampled to death by her horse. Yeah, you heard me right. He finally cornered The Whip and was about to shoot her when her horse went crazy. It was spectacular! He never saw that one coming. A 13 isn’t a bad score, either. He is tied with a fellow villain, The Red Skull, from the MCU. I'm unsure if this score is good enough for him to appear on any Top Tier or Top Team feeds, but we’ll soon see. The end of the year is coming up faster than you think.
2nd Place, Vic Gordon: 15 FN’F Score (1944) 12 ep.
Vic plays the part of the damsel in distress for the show. I found this fascinating and wondered how groundbreaking it must have been for the 40s. You could see the writers struggling to make him look tough and brave but also constantly losing. My fiancé and I had a running gag that his weakness was a stool. This guy only ever lost when he got punched or hit in the back of the head. Every fight ended this way. In the beginning, it was with a stool. From that, he was conked with a stool leg, a fist, a shovel, you name it. The back of this guy’s head must have been buggerd. It was terrific to yell at the TV whenever someone picked up a stool. Vic felt like he was always in danger which made watching it that much more entertaining.
Vic would have tied up with our hero if he had stopped letting himself get captured. Yet he was just that incompetent. For example, He had a guy locked up in jail. He then proceeded to throw a gun with blanks into the cell to try and frame the guy. Yet when he walked in, he let the prisoner hold him up with a weapon that he had just given him and knew had no bullets in it. Not only did he put his hands up, but he also gave the other guy HIS GUN! What in the world was he thinking? Vic, Vic, Vic, you’re better than that.
1st Place, The Black Whip: 17 FN’F Score (1944) 12 ep.
The Black Whip is basically Zorro but a woman. She rides around solving crimes and taking out bad guys with her whip, eschewing any prying eyes by disappearing in her hideout under a waterfall. When she is not behind the mask, she is a newspaper reporter—not just a reporter; she is the head of the entire paper. She uses this to her advantage on multiple occasions to trick the guys or throw them off her trail. She is deadly with a whip or a pistol. I never saw her miss a single shot. Plus, she is accurate enough to extinguish the flame on a fuse of TNT with her whip! In the end, the Black Whip did better than I was expecting. I wasn’t sure how much action would happen in the 12 episodes she was in. I also did not know how much they would let a woman solve the problem in an action show from the 40s. Luckily, I was surprised on both fronts! The true hero of her own story with a score to prove it!
Review:
Zorro’s Black Whip (1944): 7/10
I used to watch a lot of Westerns growing up because my dad really enjoyed them, so I had an idea of what I was getting into. However, it blew those expectations out of the water. The action was fun and clever, the hits felt real, and the cliffhangers were amazing! It is the perfect show to sit down with someone and have a blast screaming at the TV. “Watch out for the stool Vic!” “Whip them!” “Oh no, how are you going to get out of this one!”
Do you know how they used to speed up the footage during fight scenes in these old shows? There is a scene where the footage is sped up, but a guy picks up a vase and throws it. My god, that vase went flying at a man's head quicker than any bullet. Moments like that have you laughing and gasping in shock. Plus the cliffhangers, oh, the cliffhangers. A bloody building will just explode with your heroes inside to end an episode. Every episode has you saying, “Now, how in the world are they surviving that?” For the next episode to show you that the building was connected to a cave, and they scuttled their way into it before the explosion. It was bizarre and fantastic. Especially since I am used to the Doctor Who cliffhangers, these just blew all of those away. That is saying something.
Recommendation: Yes,
It is not peak cinema, but it is a hell of a ride. If you are already in a good mood and have a friend coming over, pop it in and have a blast. Yell at the characters, gasp at the action, and laugh a lot. I bet you’ll have a great time.
Thanks again for tuning in this week. Feats N’ Faults will return with more character scores and reviews next Thursday. I hope you enjoy this week’s feed! Do not forget to subscribe and tell a friend. Plus, let me know in the comments what series or IP you would want to see covered in a future Feats N’ Faults. I hope you have a fabulous week!
Until Next Time!