Title: Valley of the Living Dead
Air date: January 22, 1939
Plot summary: Lamont Cranston has taken Margo Lane to a remote valley in the desert. Margo is enjoying the scenery, but Lamont has a reason to be there: he has heard rumors of odd activity going on in the valley.
Lamont makes inquiries at a gas station at the foot of the mountain and finds that the valley is owned by an ultra-rich fellow named Ingram Maxim, who, as it happens, Lamont knew in college. The village in the valley is said to be a paradise where no one has to do any work. Lamont and Margo try to drive over the mountains on the only road, but they find that it's been booby-trapped with boulders.
So Lamont makes another pass, flying into the valley with an autogyro. It soon becomes clear that the people in the valley are in fact cared for in every respect by Ingram Maxim, who provides them with everything they need. Provided, that is, that the villagers don't ever do anything.
Tropes:
- An Aesop: Don't rely on other people to take care of you, because that will just lead to laziness and lethargy that makes you like the "living dead."
- Blood from the Mouth: Lamont comes out of his Shadow disguise and helps Maxim to close the valve that would have released the water from the dam and killed everyone in the town. After it's closed Lamont notices that Maxim has blood coming out of his mouth. Maxim has somehow mortally injured himself (from turning a valve?), and dies soon after.
- Booby Trap: Maxim has the road into the valley set up with automatic sensors that send boulders rolling down if anyone tries to drive over the mountains. Lamont has to fly in.
- Contrived Coincidence: It's a great big country, but naturally the weirdo who owns his own private valley and town is a guy Lamont knows from college.
- For the Evulz: Why does Maxim keep a village of several hundred people in a state of indolent torpor? Why does he insist that his wife has to use a wheelchair, and his young son has to wear a leg brace? Is he feeding on their Life Energy? Is he making them into zombie slaves? Is he harvesting their organs? Respectively: no, no, and not even a thing in 1939. It turns out that Maxim just wants a bunch of people to depend on him and only him for their existence. When they express any hint of self-reliance, he gets very angry.
- It's All About Me: Maxim sees his wife getting out of the wheelchair that she doesn't actually need, and sees the villagers going to the gold mine to restart operation. He doesn't take it well, and decides that if the townsfolk won't let him take care of them, he'll just kill them all.
- On the Next: Usually episodes of The Shadow ended with still some time left to fill. Sometimes they had a special guest and sometimes they just let the music play for a long time, but this one ends with a scene from next week's episode.
- Small, Secluded World: The valley is nestled in between mountains and there is only one road, which Maxim has blocked. Lamont has to fly in.
- Vacation Episode: One of many episodes where Lamont and Margo go off on vacation and encounter a mystery. Most of the time it was accidental as Lamont's vacation turned into a Busman's Holiday, but in this case Lamont specifically came to the valley because he heard that something fishy was going on.
