Perhaps because it was silent (and the accents nonexistent), the 1920 version of THE MARK OF ZORRO with Douglas Fairbanks still plays well. When Sound entered the Picture (so to speak), the lack of accents was suddenly made noticeable- so the producers of the Zorro serials opted to shift focus to one of his descendants. ZORROR RIDES AGAIN boasted some great action, but the action was actually undercut by a fairly standard storyline (and "El Lobo's" lack of an accent didn't help matters, either). The most telling moment of all, however, comes at serial's end when Zorro's HORSE actually takes out the bad guy... ZORRO'S FIGHTING LEGION was better (one of the stunts was impressive enough to warrant its "re-enactment" in RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK, decades later), but the best would probably have to be ZORRO'S BLACK WHIP (which must have set the record for the greatest number of times a stock sequence was used during a single serial- though it should be pointed out that at least ONE chapter of almost every single serial was comprised of stock footage from an earlier chapter). While all three of these serials lack the Fairbanks flair, all three are worth a look.
Review of Zorro's Black Whip
