Red Barry (1938)

"Red Barry" was the 40th sound-era serial produced by Universal Pictures (followed "Flaming Frontiers" and preceded "Scouts To the Rescue"), and was based in the Will Gould comic strip distributed to newspapers by King Features Syndicated, Inc. It was the third of five serials from Universal starring Buster Crabbe, and while the plot only revolves around two million dollars in bonds and soon evolves into a game of "Bonds, Bonds, Who Has the Bonds?", it has so many groups, and their armies of henchmen, acquiring and re-acquiring the bonds that, in a chapter or two, the people who have the bonds don't appear to know they are the current holders. Wing Fu, brings the bonds to the USA to buy war planes for an unnamed county, and quickly loses them to Quong Lee, a Eurasian underworld chief, but they are re-taken in chapter two by Red Barry. Ballet dancer Natacha, representing a ruthless group of Russians, acquires them in chapter three, but Barry gets them back in chapter four. Hong Kong Cholly, an agent for Wing Fu, goes after Barry to get the bonds, but isn't successful, and is killed in chapter nine. Valentine Vane, aka Harry Dicer, a criminal investigator, takes the bonds from Barry in chapter six, but Quong Lee re-acquires them again in chapter seven. Lyceum Theatre (where Natacha dances) manager C. E. Mannix pops up with them in chapter eight, and the question of the day is how did he get them from Quong Lee? The answer is , though portrayed by two different people, William Ruhl and Frank Lackteen, Mannix and Quong Lee, for the "storyline" are one and the same as the Oriental makeup is only a disguise. The next question is why would anyone want to look like Frank Lackteen ? Two Russians, Petrov and Igor grab the bonds in chapter nine, but Barry just as quickly grabs them back. But (keep up the best you can) Wing Fu has them in chapter ten, Mannix gets them again in chapter eleven, hides them in Natacha's trunk in chapter twelve, only to have Vane steal them, and Mannix promptly shoots Vane in chapter thirteen and gets them again. But, since chapter thirteen is the concluding chapter, his ownership doesn't last long.