I acquired a complete run of this cartoon series on standard-8mm film, as part of a swap with someone at Blackhawk Video. Lucky me? Not likely! This television series is INCREDIBLY bad, with lackadaisical animation that makes 'Clutch Cargo' look high-tech.
Having read the entire run of Chester Gould's 'Dick Tracy' strips (and some of his successors' work), I'm deeply familiar with the original 'Dick Tracy'. One of its great strengths was the cast of supporting characters: Tess, Junior, Sam, Lizz, Diet Smith, Vitamin Flintheart, Chief Brandon, Chief Patton, B.O. Plenty, Gravel Gertie, and the unfairly maligned Moon Maid. None of them are on offer here, possibly because Gould would have wanted more money. Dick Tracy himself is only barely seen at the start and finish of each episode, offering spoken set-ups and wrap-ups that don't interact with the (minimal) action.
Any positive notes? Aye, just barely. The opening credits are impressive, with a catchy crime-marches-on music theme while Tracy fires his pistol directly at the viewer, and we see captioned head shots of the various villains, so we'll know their names. (None of them move ... except Itchy, who scratches himself.) The good news is that these are all classic villains from the peak years of Tracy's strip. Even more intriguingly, we actually get TWO villains per episode, working as a team. The bad news is that the team-ups are completely arbitrary, and -- having been made by whoever set up this series -- the arbitrary team-ups remain in place for every subsequent cartoon. So, f'rinstance, Sketch Paree is ALWAYS paired with the Mole, and Stooge Viller is ALWAYS paired with Mumbles. (The single most interesting thing about this series is voice-artist Paul Frees's performance as Mumbles: he speaks his lines in a weird hyperactive quack that sounds like Donald Duck on helium.) Some of the pairings make no sense: in the original strip, Sketch Paree (a one-off villain) was a delusional psychotic artist, while the Mole (a recurring character who eventually reformed) was a dissociated murderer who lived underground: why would these two men team up on an ongoing basis? As depicted here, the Mole is a genial Buddy Hackett-like schlub who enjoys digging tunnels with his bare hands.
The biggest problem with this awful series is that Tracy doesn't do the actual detecting, and the characters who do the sleuthing -- created for these cartoons -- are awful. Each toon begins identically to all the others, with Tracy at his desk speaking into a phone: "O.K., Chief. I'll get on it right away." (We never see this chief: is it Chief Brandon? Chief Patton? Big Chief Wahoo?) Tracy then rings off the phone and uses his wrist TV to summon one of his three detectives, whom he briefs on this episode's case.
Oo-er! Those detectives! The least painful of the lot is Joe Jitsu, a Mr Moto-ish Japanese midget who signs off each of his episodes by saying 'Sayonara!' (In one episode, he tried to hypnotise a Siamese cat: the cat hypnotised him back, and then the CAT said 'Sayonara!') Jitsu has the ability to subdue much larger opponents by seizing their wrists and casually pounding their heads against the floor. Wish I could do that! The other two tecs are Go Go Gomez (a Mexican in sombrero, serape and sandals) and Hemlock Holmes. After the detective collars the villains, Dick Tracy briefly deigns to put in an appearance and offer a quick verbal wrap-up. Dick Tracy actually has more screen time in the opening credits than in any of the cartoons themselves.
Apparently the Jitsu and Gomez episodes became taboo on Yank TV because these characters are allegedly ethnic stereotypes. It makes sense to take them off TV for being crap-awful, but not for being stereotypes: Jitsu and Gomez are both intelligent, brave and resourceful. True, they speak in (very dodgy) 'ethnic' accents, but we never hear any comments about them being unsanitary, stupid, work-shy, dishonest, nor any of the other negative traits attributed to minorities.
FULL DISCLOSURE: I wanted to see these cartoons because the allegedly 'Japanese' Joe Jitsu was voiced by my friend the late Benny Rubin, a former vaudeville comic who had trouble getting on-camera acting jobs because of his extremely Jewish looks! So much for ethnicity...
Hemlock Holmes is a talking bulldog in an old-fashioned constable's helmet, but otherwise naked. Neither Dick Tracy nor anybody else finds it odd that a talking animal has entered Chester Gould's universe. There are fewer Hemlock episodes than Jitsu or Gomez episodes, but (due to the ethnic stigma) these get televised more often. Holmes, unlike his efficient colleagues Jitsu and Gomez, is a bumbling idiot. Apparently it's wrong to depict Japanese and Mexicans as brave efficient police officers, but it's O.K. to slander talking bulldogs.
A few of these episodes feature the Retouchables, a mob of stumblebum bobbies clearly based on the Keystone Cops. Mack Sennett should have sued.
A distinctive motif of Chester Gould's strip was its chillingly accurate depictions of violence. This cartoon series was intended for kiddies, so the 'violence' was all very slapsticky and bloodless.
What most horrifies me about this series is that Dick Tracy's voice is supplied by that great character actor Everett Sloane, formerly of 'Citizen Kane'. Sloane's eyesight was failing, and he committed suicide soon after making these Dick Tracy toons ... allegedly because he was going blind. I think he committed suicide out of embarrassment over these cartoons. Really, they're AWFUL!
Having read the entire run of Chester Gould's 'Dick Tracy' strips (and some of his successors' work), I'm deeply familiar with the original 'Dick Tracy'. One of its great strengths was the cast of supporting characters: Tess, Junior, Sam, Lizz, Diet Smith, Vitamin Flintheart, Chief Brandon, Chief Patton, B.O. Plenty, Gravel Gertie, and the unfairly maligned Moon Maid. None of them are on offer here, possibly because Gould would have wanted more money. Dick Tracy himself is only barely seen at the start and finish of each episode, offering spoken set-ups and wrap-ups that don't interact with the (minimal) action.
Any positive notes? Aye, just barely. The opening credits are impressive, with a catchy crime-marches-on music theme while Tracy fires his pistol directly at the viewer, and we see captioned head shots of the various villains, so we'll know their names. (None of them move ... except Itchy, who scratches himself.) The good news is that these are all classic villains from the peak years of Tracy's strip. Even more intriguingly, we actually get TWO villains per episode, working as a team. The bad news is that the team-ups are completely arbitrary, and -- having been made by whoever set up this series -- the arbitrary team-ups remain in place for every subsequent cartoon. So, f'rinstance, Sketch Paree is ALWAYS paired with the Mole, and Stooge Viller is ALWAYS paired with Mumbles. (The single most interesting thing about this series is voice-artist Paul Frees's performance as Mumbles: he speaks his lines in a weird hyperactive quack that sounds like Donald Duck on helium.) Some of the pairings make no sense: in the original strip, Sketch Paree (a one-off villain) was a delusional psychotic artist, while the Mole (a recurring character who eventually reformed) was a dissociated murderer who lived underground: why would these two men team up on an ongoing basis? As depicted here, the Mole is a genial Buddy Hackett-like schlub who enjoys digging tunnels with his bare hands.
The biggest problem with this awful series is that Tracy doesn't do the actual detecting, and the characters who do the sleuthing -- created for these cartoons -- are awful. Each toon begins identically to all the others, with Tracy at his desk speaking into a phone: "O.K., Chief. I'll get on it right away." (We never see this chief: is it Chief Brandon? Chief Patton? Big Chief Wahoo?) Tracy then rings off the phone and uses his wrist TV to summon one of his three detectives, whom he briefs on this episode's case.
Oo-er! Those detectives! The least painful of the lot is Joe Jitsu, a Mr Moto-ish Japanese midget who signs off each of his episodes by saying 'Sayonara!' (In one episode, he tried to hypnotise a Siamese cat: the cat hypnotised him back, and then the CAT said 'Sayonara!') Jitsu has the ability to subdue much larger opponents by seizing their wrists and casually pounding their heads against the floor. Wish I could do that! The other two tecs are Go Go Gomez (a Mexican in sombrero, serape and sandals) and Hemlock Holmes. After the detective collars the villains, Dick Tracy briefly deigns to put in an appearance and offer a quick verbal wrap-up. Dick Tracy actually has more screen time in the opening credits than in any of the cartoons themselves.
Apparently the Jitsu and Gomez episodes became taboo on Yank TV because these characters are allegedly ethnic stereotypes. It makes sense to take them off TV for being crap-awful, but not for being stereotypes: Jitsu and Gomez are both intelligent, brave and resourceful. True, they speak in (very dodgy) 'ethnic' accents, but we never hear any comments about them being unsanitary, stupid, work-shy, dishonest, nor any of the other negative traits attributed to minorities.
FULL DISCLOSURE: I wanted to see these cartoons because the allegedly 'Japanese' Joe Jitsu was voiced by my friend the late Benny Rubin, a former vaudeville comic who had trouble getting on-camera acting jobs because of his extremely Jewish looks! So much for ethnicity...
Hemlock Holmes is a talking bulldog in an old-fashioned constable's helmet, but otherwise naked. Neither Dick Tracy nor anybody else finds it odd that a talking animal has entered Chester Gould's universe. There are fewer Hemlock episodes than Jitsu or Gomez episodes, but (due to the ethnic stigma) these get televised more often. Holmes, unlike his efficient colleagues Jitsu and Gomez, is a bumbling idiot. Apparently it's wrong to depict Japanese and Mexicans as brave efficient police officers, but it's O.K. to slander talking bulldogs.
A few of these episodes feature the Retouchables, a mob of stumblebum bobbies clearly based on the Keystone Cops. Mack Sennett should have sued.
A distinctive motif of Chester Gould's strip was its chillingly accurate depictions of violence. This cartoon series was intended for kiddies, so the 'violence' was all very slapsticky and bloodless.
What most horrifies me about this series is that Dick Tracy's voice is supplied by that great character actor Everett Sloane, formerly of 'Citizen Kane'. Sloane's eyesight was failing, and he committed suicide soon after making these Dick Tracy toons ... allegedly because he was going blind. I think he committed suicide out of embarrassment over these cartoons. Really, they're AWFUL!