John T. Ryan ONCE UPON A TIME, in 1931 to be exact, newspaper cartoonist, Chester Gould of the Chicago Tribune, presented his editor with a new concept for a comic strip. Rendered in a sort of early mechanical drawing style, populated with characters having names matching their physical characteristics and laden with an ever present, underlying supply of humor;it would be about a young man's career as a Detective on the Chicago Poice Department.THE TITLE THAT the young Mr. Gould had conjured up was "PLAINCLOTHES TRACY". The editor gave the subject a little thought and suggested that Gould ought to reconsider and change the first name to "Dick"; which was the nickname, even then, already well known for a Detective. With the surname of Tracy being suggestive of tracing a wanted subject, the two would be a perfect match.SO, THE COMIC strip was launched and DICK TRACY became an almost overnight success; soon being syndicated and appearing in hundreds of newspapers. With such success, it should be no surprise that Hollywood would soon be calling. It did and within the span of 6 short years, DICK TRACY was on the silver screen; now in the format of a 15 chapter Movie Serial, Cliff Hangere type.WE HAVE VIEWED the serial several times; some years ago. In fact, we do have video copies of all four of the Republic DICK TRACY Chapterplays. Today, Turner Classic Movies began a weekly presentation of the first one with the showing of Chapters 1-3. After the programing was over, many of our impressions and opinions surfaced once again.FIRST OF ALL, the casting of Ralph Byrd in the title role was a case of near perfection. Talented, athletic and possessing a very likable screen persona; Mr. Byrd was an immediate hit with the movie going public. What's more, he even bore a sort of real world resemblance to the Tracy of the print medium.THE SERIAL DID a fine job of bringing a great amount of action (the life blood of the movie serial); while at the same time taking the story to a great variety of locales. There appears to be as much time spent outdoors, as there is in studio sound-stages; which is always a plus in giving a picture a good, polished and luxurious appearance about it.THE CREATION OF a dark, menacing and sinister world is accomplished with the highest degree of success. The characterization of so many of the denizens who inhabit the shadowy underworld is a definite plus and serves to evoke the kind of mysterious horror as did so many of those great covers from so many pulp crime-mystery magazines of the 1920's-'40's.THE ONE ELEMENT that would become a hallmark for the Republic Serial, the greatest of special effects from Howard Lydecker (later joined by his brother, Theodore Lydecker) was present here. Mysterious rays, great explosions,realistic miniatures and a futuristic aeroplane; all add up to a fantastic, though believable world.ADDED TO ALL of that is the old Republic assembly line's creative use of stock footage, scenes from other productions and real life newsreel footage. Everything is blended almost flawlessly.ON THE DOWN side of things, unlike most of their future serials, there is no original musical score, but rather liberal doses of classical selections; including excerpts from Rossini's WILLIAM TELL OVERTURE and Lizst's LES PRELUDES.ALSO ON THE negative side of the ledger is Republic's habit of taking an existing feature (The Lone Ranger, Captain Marvel, Spy Smasher and especially Captain America) and radically changing it for the screen. In DICK TRACY and its 3 sequels, they make Tracy an F.B.I. Agent, exclude regular partner Pat Patton and make no mention of female lead and love interest in the comic pages, Tess Trueheart; who is Tracy's Fiancé!IN PLACE OF a regular detective partner, we are given a couple of hereto-for unknown commodities; including a comic relief buffoon portrayed by Smiley Burnette and a mysteriously vague version of Junior.

jetan Superb serial. The only one that matches it in quality is the first Flash Gordon. The production values are exceptional and eclipse many better known B movies. Ralph Byrd is perfectly cast in the title role. The only explanation I can think of for some viewers to rate this any lower than an "A" is that they just haven't seen very many serials. One of the few efforts in this line that actually has some atmospheric touches and, as another commenter has pointed out, the special effects are genuinely good.Folks who don't really like serials are....well, they're folks who don't like serials (probably don't much like Christmas either). For those who do like serials, this is like a trip to the circus. Good action and WAY better than usual script and acting. As movies go, this probably only deserves a 7 but for a serial it deserves a perfect 10.

oscar-35 I just found this VHS double tape 30's matinée serial and thoroughly enjoyed viewing it. Great to see the pre-WW2 vintage cars, flying wing and clothes fashions of this fine show. It was well edited, shot, written and expertly acted. Great and interesting Dick Tracy casting with this beloved and loved comic-book character. Ralph Byrd surely makes the quintessential Tracy over all others. I always felt that in the later Dick Tracy serials, TV show, and Disney/Touchstone feature film could not hold a candle to this earliest '37 project. Republic Pictures is back and re-releasing their archive of films. The home studio of early John Wayne, Roy Rogers, and other matinée serials was in the present CBS Radford studio lot in Studio City, CA. The show still manages to hold-up in today's superheroes and was refreshing to see the stunt work and physical special effects and NO over used CGI.

wrbtu I've watched only 4-5 serials, so I don't have a lot to compare thisto, but so far it's easily the worst of the lot. The overlap fromchapter to chapter is too great (too much material repeated in thenew episode that was seen in the previous episode). The acting ispoor, especially Ralph Byrd (if he stood still for a moment, he'd beattacked by a woodpecker). The "comedy" of Smiley Burnett isnothing to smile about (he's even worse here than in the GeneAutry movies). The character with the most brains in this serial isactually the 12 year old kid, played by Lee Van Atta. And perhapsmost of all, has anybody seen Dick Tracy in this film? I must havemissed him, because no one in this movie even remotelyresembled the comic strip character. Low budget is not enough ofan excuse for low tech here. At least the director could have put awatch on Ralph Byrd's wrist, & pretended it was radio controlled.The two low budget jungle serials I watched with Phyllis Coates("Panther Girl of the Congo" & "Jungle Drums of Africa") were waybetter than this, & so was a low budget jungle serial with ClydeBeatty ("Lost Jungle"). Not that those were great serials, but theywere better than this one, so tells you something about Dick Tracy.If you'd like to watch a better crime serial, I recommend "The GreenArcher." That & the serial I'm in the middle of now, "CaptainMarvel," are far superior to Dick Tracy. I rate it 3/10.