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.

Republic Pictures were clearly hitting their stride in superior (and super) serial production with this quite sensational 15 chapter crime-terrorism drama made in 1936, released in early 1937. For any faults: too long as 12 chapters would do; the tedious antics of the infantile Smiley Burnette, there is a dozen truly astonishing and eerie/creepy moments that easily compensate. The first episode is so weird, and on a huge screen in a giant old theater full of screaming kids (or even adults) has several hair raising scenes where master evildoer The Lame One has maximum effect. The first chapter ending sees The fabulous Lydecker Brothers in full big budget special effects mode on a thrill set piece aboard the Golden Gate Bridge. The opening two chapters also features an astonishing triangular flying wing plane (looks like a cross between a stealth bomber and a flying sandwich) which for its day is a genuine masterpiece of inventive and graphic/realistically clever sci fi imagination. The recent film SKY CAPTAIN AND THE WORLD OF TOMORROW owes a huge debt of imagination to this one flying apparatus alone. Republic clearly intended this serial to play to adults and it is not a G rated serial at all...given the menace, action and violence. It has three great villains one of whom is Gordon Tracy (Dick's brainwashed bro) who, after getting the treatment, sports a very fetching Bride Of Frankenstein hair stripe along with a mean scar. Another hideout menace is Moloch, a cat patting hunchback akin to a lost Uncle of Peter Lorre. Incredible action stunt sequences abound and very inventive use of miniatures and special effects..the chapter endings of 9 and 10 especially with a huge blazing Zeppelin and then a sheet of hull metal swinging from a repaired ship are very well thought out. Often the resolves cheat with Dick just getting up and running off, or rolling out of the way, but given the very high standard of the rest of all parts of this huge and complex production it was a major step forward for Republic at the time proving their willingness to make a serial for all ages that employed excellent craftsmen...especially the incredible Lydecker Brothers they inherited in their merger with Mascot Pictures. Remove them and the serial industry would have been all chases and fights. No wonder this serial was so successful it offered a big marker for two more Dick Tracy epics in 38 and 39. Excellent! Beware of dud dvds though, the one I saw was awful and bleached, in good quality this 15 chapter pre-noir horror serial must be a knockout.

"Dick Tracy" was the first of three serials based on Chester Gould's popular comic strip produced by Republic Pictures in the late 30s. The title character was played by Ralph Byrd in all three films. In this installment Tracy and his assistants Steve Lockwood (Fred Hamilton), Junior (Lee Van Atta) and Mike McGurk (Smiley Burnette) are up against a terrorist organization known as the Spider Ring. The gang is led my a mysterious shadowy figure known only as the Lame One. The gang tries among other things, to destroy the Golden Gate Bridge with a sonic sound wave machine, take over a gold mine and steal the plans for a new high speed aircraft. Tracy and his pals are kept busy trying to foil the gang's moves over 15 fast-paced chapters. Co-directors Ray Taylor and Alan James keep the action moving and provide us with plenty of excitement. There is a least one fight in every chapter. There is also the requisite "flashback" chapter which Republic used in most of their serials. The unmasking of the Lame One in Chapter 15 is almost anti-climatic. I challenge you to remember who the character was who turns out to be the Lame One. The DVD which I purchased was produced by Marengo Films. The print from which it was duplicated was apparently borrowed from a collector so IT WAS NOT duplicated from the fuzzy public domain print that has been used for several years. The picture quality is very good and the sound crisp and clear. Some interesting notes. The shooting down of a dirigible foreshadowed the real life Hindenberg disaster the following year. The high speed plane forecast the development of jet planes by some ten years. The Flying Wing used by the gang almost reminds one of the Stealth Bomber even though this was the 30s. And yes there's those great vintage 30s cars too. The running time of 290 minutes makes this I believe, the longest running serial of all time. Francis X. Bushman who plays G-Man chief, Clive Anderson had been in films since 1911 and was one of the first matinee idols. He is probably best remembered for his role as Messala in the silent "Ben-Hur" (1927). Lee Van Atta and Smiley Burnette both appeared in the serial "Undersea Kingdom" (1936). Burnette of course would go on to be one of the best known "B" western sidekicks riding with Gene Autry, Roy Rogers and Charles Starrett (The Durango Kid). Also in the cast in assorted roles, are Roy Barcroft as an air crewman on The Flying Wing, Milburn Morante as "Death Valley Johnny", I. Stanford Jolley as an intern and veteran silent heavy Walter Long in a bit. Future serial director William Witney served as a film editor on this project. Followed by "Dick Tracy Returns" (1938) and "Dick Tracy's G-Men" (1939).

This is one of the better serials I've seen...especially of the less glitzy pre-1940 productions. There are few (in fact only one I think) cliffhanger ending that doesn't ring true (the kind where we see the action...and then the resolve shows different actions happening in the next episode). That puts it up real high in my book on just that point.There isn't all that much care put to keeping the serial like the comic strip. Tracy became a g-man instead of a city police detective and gone are the maladjusted and malformed villains of his colorful rogues gallery. The Lame One, the villain of this chapterplay, doesn't compare to the grotesqueries of The Brow or Little Face.Ralph Byrd is excellent as Tracy...in fact he IS Dick Tracy. Forget Morgan Conway's forgettable appearances in Dick Tracy's Dilemma and Dick Tracy Vs. Cueball (a horrible film)...and especially forget the primary color extravaganza that Warren Beatty put out. Ralph Byrd does them both in...stolid, straight forward and eager for action.I would rate this serial right up there with other great chapterplays, like The Adventures of Captain Marvel, The Masked Marvel and the like.