He played a wide variety of roles and has a minimum of 98 film and television credits including the TV show The Adventures of Kit Carson, as well as the classic motion picture Johnny Belinda and the popular movie serials The Green Archer, Captain Midnight, and King of the Rocket Men.

Author Scott MacGillivray describes James Craven as "the Wile E. Coyote of serial villains: he expects his henchmen to fail."

After Horne died in 1942, Columbia's serial unit was suspended temporarily and Craven found employment at other studios, usually playing upright military officers.

He returned to serials in 1945, now for Republic Pictures: The Purple Monster Strikes (1945), Federal Agents vs. Underworld Inc. (1948), King of the Rocket Men (1949), and Flying Disc Man from Mars (1950).

Again quoting historian Neyer: "Craven married Blanche Leining in 1963, and the couple briefly moved to California, but by 1966 they were living in Old Lyme, Connecticut, where they resided until at least the early 1970s.