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'''The Bowery Boys''' was a [[Long Runners|long-running]] series of films starring Leo Gorcey and Huntz Hall along with a company of other actors, with a complex history spanning several different names and studios throughout the [[Golden Age of Hollywood]]. As it progressed through its incarnations, the series revolved around a group of first boys and later young men who lived in various poorer neighborhoods of New York City, finally setting on the eponymous Bowery. The films in which they appeared initially varied wildly between gritty urban dramas and light comedies, but by the time they took their final form as the Bowery Boys, they had stabilized into a series of comedies about the gang and the often madcap adventures they found themselves in. Despite the moves from studio to studio and the different names under which the films were released, the core group of actors remained more or less constant.
The Bowery Boys originated as "The Dead End Kids", the central characters of the 1935 play ''[[Dead End (play)|Dead End]]'' by Sidney Kingsley. Among the fourteen children hired to play various roles in it were Leo Gorcey, Huntz Hall, Billy Halop, Bobby Jordan, Bernard Punsly and Gabriel Dell -- the core of the future Bowery Boys. [[MGM|Samuel Goldwyn]] adapted the play into a [[Dead End (1937 film)|film in 1937]], and
Between 1938 and 1939 Warner Bros. made another six feature-length films and one short with the boys, including the classic ''[[Angels with Dirty Faces]]''. They tried to rebrand them as the "Crime School Kids", after the first of these films, but the new name never caught on, and they remained known to the public as the Dead End Kids.
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In 1938, [[Universal Pictures]] [[Follow the Leader|made their own ersatz "Dead End Kids" drama]], called ''Little Tough Guy'', hiring those members of the group whose contracts had expired (Gorcey and Jordan remained under contract to Warners), along with Gorcey's younger brother David and Hally Chester, both of whom were also in the original theatrical cast of ''Dead End''. ''Little Tough Guy'' launched a new series of films (not all of which featured the boys), imaginatively called "Little Tough Guys". When Universal finally acquired the contract of Bobby Jordan from Warners, they revised the series name to "The Dead End Kids and Little Tough Guys". Between 1938 and 1943 Universal made twelve feature films and three 12-chapter serials under both names.
Meanwhile in 1940, independent producer Sam Katzman made his own imitation "Dead End Kids" film, called ''[[East Side Kids (1940 film)|East Side Kids]]'' and
Gorcey, Huntz Hall and Bobby Jordan's agent Jan Grippo then formed a new production company, "Jan Grippo Productions", which immediately began making and releasing an updated and revised series, dubbed "The Bowery Boys". The first film in the new series, ''[[Live Wires (1946 film)|Live Wires]]'', was released in 1946, and the series produced forty-eight films over the next twelve years, making it the third longest film series in Hollywood history.<ref>Behind the [[Charles Starrett]] westerns with 131 films, and ''[[Hopalong Cassidy]]'' with sixty-six.</ref> If one counts the earlier series as simply previous installments in a larger series, it would be second with eighty-nine full-length films, one short, and three serials. Unfortunately it spent its final two years as a shambling [[Franchise Zombie]] after the 1956 departure of Leo Gorcey, who played central character Slip Mahoney, and who was basically the star of the series.
The films gained a new generation of fans when they entered television syndication -- the "East Side Kids" films first in 1950 and the "Bowery Boys" series in 1960.
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* [[Accidental Athlete]]: Happens to Sach in several of the movies, usually thanks to some [[Applied Phlebotinum]].
* [[Achievements in Ignorance]]: Sach seems so prone to these -- specifically [[Screwball Serum|liquids that do the impossible]] -- that he comes across as some kind of [[Idiot Savant]] [[Alchemy|alchemist]]
** In ''Hold That Line'' (1952), Sach mixes a bunch of random chemicals together and creates a [[Super Serum]] that makes him an unbeatable football player (while it lasts).▼
** In the same film, his attempt to reproduce the serum creates something that instead [[Incredible Shrinking Man|shrinks the person taking it]].▼
** And at the end of ''Hold That Line'', Sach creates a serum that lets him fly.▼
** Sach accidentally brews a bouillon [[Hollywood Acid|capable of melting any metal]] while on [[Peeling Potatoes|KP]] in ''Here Come the Marines'' (1952).▼
** In ''Jalopy'' (1953) Sach invents a fuel that supercharges the Boys' race car. A second batch only works with the car in reverse -- because he used ''flat seltzer water instead of fresh''.▼
** While pretending to be Prof. Maurice Gaston LeBeau, a scientist developing a rocket fuel, in ''Paris Playboys'' (1954), Sach creates his own rocket fuel formula that works at least as well as the one the real professor had been developing.▼
* [[All Just a Dream]]: The ending of 1947's ''Bowery Buckaroos''. After a whole film of [[The Wild West|Wild West]] adventures, Slip hits Sach and wakes him up.
* [[The Alleged Car]]:
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** One takes place in ''Broadway Bombshell'' (1946).
** Another is planned in 1948's ''Trouble Makers'' (and Sach, mistaken for an old associate of the robber's, gets briefly recruited as the getaway driver).
** 1950's ''Blonde Dynamite'' revolves around a plot by gangsters to get the combination to a bank vault by blackmailing Gabe.
** A gang of bank robbers use Sach's recently-inherited farm as a hideout in 1952's ''Feudin' Fools''.
* [[Baseball]]: Trying to get permission for the local kids to use a vacant lot for their baseball games ends up with the Boys
* [[Bedlam House]]: Slip and Sach sneak into a sanatorium to rescue a woman committed by her aunts as part of a scheme to steal an inheritance in ''Hold That Baby!'' (1949).
* [[Benevolent Genie]]: The Boys find one [[Genie in a Bottle|in a magic lamp]] in ''Bowery to Bagdad'' (1955), who takes a liking to them. He's not above being a [[Literal Genie]] when it amuses him and doing so doesn't actually harm them.
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** In 1946's ''Spook Busters'', a [[Mad Scientist]] wants to transplant (part of) Sach's brain into a gorilla.
** Another wants to do the same thing only into a [[Frankenstein's Monster]]-style creature in 1949's ''Master Minds'' -- and succeeds. (It gets reversed.)
** There are two mad scientists into this in 1954's ''The Bowery Boys Meet the Monsters'' -- brothers, one of whom wants a brain for his
* [[Heel Face Turn]]: Gabe in 1947's ''News Hounds'' -- who was working for the bad guys throughout the film -- has a change of heart and saves the day.
* [[Here We Go Again]]: In ''Let's Go Navy!'' (1951) the Boys enlist in the navy to track down a pair of robbers dressed as sailors. When after finally catching them they go to the navy office to receive their commendations, they accidentally re-enlist.
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** Chuck in ''Jail Busters'' (1955). When he is injured while on an undercover investigation in the state prison, Slip, Sach and Butch take over for him.
** Danny in 1956's ''Fighting Trouble'', although he loses his job at the beginning of the film.
* [[Involuntary Charity Donation]]: The Boys give $38,
* [[Kidnapped Scientist]]: Louie, who invented a (non-functional) [[Death Ray]] in [[World War I]], gets kidnapped by spies who want to know its secrets in ''Bowery Battalion'' (1951).
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* [[Satchel Switcheroo]]: A variation is performed with horses in 1951's ''Crazy Over Horses'', as the Boys and a group of gangsters keep swapping one horse for another.
* [[Scotland Yard]]: Inspector Herbert Saunders of the Yard appears in ''In the Money'' (1958) and accuses the Boys of being jewel smugglers.
* [[Screwball Serum]]: Sach has a tendency to create these out of whatever random ingredients happen to be handy:
▲** In ''Hold That Line'' (1952), Sach mixes a bunch of random chemicals together and creates a [[Super Serum]] that makes him an unbeatable football player (while it lasts).
▲** In the same film, his attempt to reproduce the serum creates something that instead [[Incredible Shrinking Man|shrinks the person taking it]].
▲** And at the end of ''Hold That Line'', Sach creates a serum that lets him fly.
▲** Sach accidentally brews a bouillon [[Hollywood Acid|capable of melting any metal]] while on [[Peeling Potatoes|KP]] in ''Here Come the Marines'' (1952).
▲** In ''Jalopy'' (1953) Sach invents a fuel that supercharges the Boys' race car. A second batch only works with the car in reverse -- because he used ''flat seltzer water instead of fresh''.
▲** While pretending to be Prof. Maurice Gaston LeBeau, a scientist developing a rocket fuel, in ''Paris Playboys'' (1954), Sach creates his own rocket fuel formula that works at least as well as the one the real professor had been developing.
* [[Secret Path]]: A secret passage built into a fireplace ''and'' a hidden room in the basement of a manor house are key to the plot of ''Smuggler's Cove'' (1948).
* [[Seers]]: In addition to a plethora of [[Phony Psychic]]s in various films, in 1949's ''Master Minds'' Sach gets a toothache that lets him predict the future. No, really.
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* [[Super Strength]]: Sach acquires this for no apparent reason in ''No Holds Barred'' (1952), but it's specific to a body part -- it starts in his head, moves to his finger, continues traveling through his body to his butt, and ends up in place which, if Slip creates a new wrestling moniker for Sach from it, would [[Medium Awareness|get them kicked out of the film business]] according to Sach.
* [[Suspiciously Similar Substitute]]: Stanley Clements as Stanislaus "Duke" Coveleskie, cast to replace Leo Gorcey after he quit the film series in the wake of his father's death. His first film was 1956's ''Fighting Trouble''.
** Clancy's
* [[Telepathy]]: Sach
* [[Time Skip]]: ''Let's Go Navy!'' (1951) has a year-long time skip between the story set-up, which results in the Boys joining the navy, and the majority of the action and conclusion.
* [[Treasure Map]]:
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