Bela Lugosi! An ugly robot! The power of invisibility! A military intelligence officer romancing an ambitious reporter! All of these exciting-sounding elements are undeniably contained within the runtime of The Phantom Creeps!

Originally released as 12 serial episodes - some of which were riffed on MST3K - The Phantom Creeps was later stitched together into this feature-length film. Taking a big story like that and compressing it into something much shorter would take a lot of artistry and skill. It sure would. Fortunately for us at RiffTrax, that is NOT what happened here!

Bela Lugosi plays Dr. Zorka, a mad scientist who has taken on a few too many projects at once. Robots, invisibility belts, picking up hitchhikers and then immediately driving them off cliffs, he’s a busy guy. Fortunately he has help from his beefy henchman Monk. Fans of the Batman serial we riffed will remember Gabe, another great henchman. If you liked Gabe, you’re gonna love Monk. The fact Monk and Gabe never got their own spinoff is a real shame, as all serious film scholars would definitely agree.

The Phantom Creeps is full of mysteries, chief among them, exactly what element of it is supposed to be the phantom, or the creeps, or what? Puzzle it out with Mike, Kevin, and Bill!

Written by

Mike Nelson, Conor Lastowka, Sean Thomason

Contributing Writers

Molly Hodgdon, Jason Miller, Zachary Shatzer