The Falcon (fictional detective)

Arlen's Falcon is characterized as a freelance adventurer and troubleshooter – a man who makes his living "keeping his mouth shut and engaging in dangerous enterprises."

The 1941 film The Gay Falcon redefined the character as a suave English gentleman detective with a weakness for beautiful women.

The Gay Falcon was intended to establish a replacement character for Leslie Charteris's The Saint (Simon Templar), who had appeared in a popular RKO film series.

The new Falcon films followed the "Saint" pattern so closely that author Charteris sued RKO, charging unfair competition.

Charteris told author David Zinman in 1971, "RKO switched to The Falcon, a flagrant carbon copy of their version of The Saint, in my opinion with the single mercenary motive of saving the payments they had to make to me for the film rights.

Producer Maurice Geraghty later revealed that RKO executives had recruited Conway simply as a way to induce Sanders to make one more Falcon picture, after which the series would end.

The Falcon was revived for three more films, all made in 1948, but these featured the earlier "Michael Waring" character as created by Drexel Drake.