Although they were gone long before my time, the old pulp magazines have a fond place in my heart. Heroes like “Doc Savage” — an adventurer named Clark who had a Fortress of Solitude years before Superman — and “The Avenger” — a frozen-faced revenge specialist driven by tragedy — intrigued me as a kid. The precursors to comic books had everything comics had … well, minus four-color layouts.

While “Doc Savage” might have been my favorite of the bunch, I also liked “The Shadow,” the pulp-turned-radio-series-turned-movie-series-turned-comic-book adventures of a crime-buster playboy named Lamont Cranston who, when it came time to battle bad guys, donned a black cape and roamed the city’s streets as “Batman” later would.

There were differences, of course. “The Shadow” wasn’t averse to gunning down criminals, although he seemed to prefer to drive them insane with his mocking laughter, often prompting them to inadvertently off themselves.

“The Shadow” had a complex story befitting any long-running adventurer. Introduced in 1930 as the narrator of a radio mystery, the character came to pulp novels a year later and Walter Gibson (writing as Maxwell Grant) kept the character going until 1949. Orson Welles lent his voice to the radio show for a while and several movies — including one starring Alec Baldwin in 1994 — were made.

The Alec Baldwin movie is pretty fun — I watched it just tonight — and hits all the right notes. The multiple identities (at various points over the years the writers played with the idea that no one really knew the hero’s secret identity), the shady background, the cadre of associates, the life of a vigilante outside the law are all explored.

But, like “The Phantom” and a few other modern-day adaptations of pulp heroes (we’re not even considering the campy 1970s version of “Doc Savage” here; it was off the charts goofy, probably intentionally) something just didn’t quite click.

Baldwin — and I can’t look at him now without thinking of “30 Rock” or his legendary temper tantrums — was good in the title role even though the movie, curiously, chose to slavishly recreate the character’s hook nose, necessitating Baldwin’s face morphing at a few points. It’s startling to see Ian McKellen, best known for his roles as Magneto and Gandalf just a few years later, as an absent-minded scientist in the movie.

While the theme of atonement for past sins doesn’t quite jell, the device of “The Shadow’s” network of operatives being made up of people who owe him their lives is a very neat one and pays off nicely at the end.

For years and years, there’s been talk of a new “Doc Savage” movie. A decade ago it was going to star Arnold Schwarzenegger. That improbable idea has certainly passed now — lets hope — and maybe we’ll get a serious Doc.

Who knows if we’ll ever get another outing for “The Shadow?”

I know, you’re thinking I’m going to say, “The Shadow knows.”

Cue sinister laugh.