Book Review: The Complete Chester Gould's Dick Tracy Volume 5: 1938-1939, by Chester Gould (2008)

The cover of The Complete Chester Gould's Dick Tracy Volume 5: 1938-1939, published by IDW Publishing in 2008.

The 5^th volume of The Complete Chester Gould’s Dick Tracy covers the adventures of the titular detective from January of 1938 to July of 1939. Unfortunately, it’s a weak volume, in my opinion the weakest in the series so far. There aren’t many memorable villains, and the storylines simply aren’t that compelling. The artwork, as always, is fantastic, as we see Chester Gould using the crisp, bold black lines that will delineate the classic Dick Tracy look of the 1940’s and 1950’s. But unfortunately, just as the strip is starting to look the way it should, the quality of the stories really falls off. 

Dick Tracy punches Rottur, a minor villain, March 13, 1938. This panel is a great example of Chester Gould's brilliance as a comic artist. There's so much going on here: Tracy's askew hair and tie flying back give you a sense of the momentum behind his powerful punch. The blood spurting out of Rottur's face is gross, but at the same time, you can't look away from it.

In my review of Volume 1 of Dick Tracy I wrote that Tracy didn’t use disguises much after 1932. Well, I was very wrong about that. There are tons of disguises in Volume 5—Pat Patton goes undercover as an Asian waiter, Tracy disguises himself as a French count, an unkempt anarchist, and a bomb maker named “Reppoc.” More on that later.

Two panels from May 8, 1938, revealing the "Cask of Amontillado"-like fate of the real mayor of Chinatown. Super creepy, with compelling artwork. "Great Caesar!" is an interjection that really needs to make a comeback.

The first story in the book deals with “Stud” Bronzen, whom we first encountered at the end of Volume 4, as the Blank was trying to exact murderous revenge upon Bronzen. “Stud” is a ship captain who deals in what we would now call human trafficking—getting Asian “aliens” into the country. The storyline is an interesting one, as it leads Tracy into his city’s Chinatown district. The storyline also fits into the politics of the era, as after the Immigration Act of 1924 was passed, immigration to the United States from Asia was banned. (The Immigration Act of 1924 was finally overturned by the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965.) Some of the story being set at sea allows Gould to work his magic and produce some superb snowstorms. 4 stars. (I’ve started ranking each storyline on a scale of 1-5, 1 being the worst, 5 being the best.)

Left to right: Noana, with her hair dyed blonde, Johnny Ramm, who always looks like he's wearing eye shadow, and the mysterious Reppoc. (Spoiler alert: Reppoc is actually Dick Tracy in disguise!) June 10, 1938.

Aboard Bronzen’s ship, Tracy finds the beautiful Noana, who was kidnapped from her South Pacific island to be brought to gangster Johnny Ramm to work as a dancer in his restaurant. Ramm kidnaps Noana and forces her to become part of his gang. Tracy then fakes a nervous breakdown, and leaves clues that lead everyone to believe that he’s committed suicide. Using makeup, he pretends to be a bomb-maker named Pete Reppoc, who seems to be Italian, given his dialect, and infiltrates Ramm’s gang. Note the last name reppoc: “copper” spelled backwards. This is an early use of the backwards spelled name, something that will become a trademark of Dick Tracy in the decades to follow. 

As Reppoc, Tracy is able to foil Ramm’s scheme of bombing local businesses by purposely making the bombs incorrectly, or otherwise ensuring they don’t explode. Tracy plays his role as Reppoc to the point of being arrested by the police, and only reveals his identity once Ramm gives him incriminating information in their jail cells. Personally, I wasn’t a fan of the ridiculous plot twist of Tracy faking his own suicide. When Tess Trueheart sees Tracy again, she hugs him and then immediately slaps him. I don’t blame her. As Tess says to Dick, “You’ll never know the agony you caused us.” Tracy replies, “I realize it was a pretty severe scheme.” And also, a dumb one to take on single-handedly. 2 stars.

Finding a severed forefinger is definitely worthy of a "Great Caesar!" As usual, Brighton Spotts baffles everyone else in the strip. July 10, 1938.

The next tale begins with the introduction of Brighton Spotts, an insufferable character who fancies himself to be a budding detective. It wasn’t clear to me how old Brighton is supposed to be at first, but eventually I figured out he’s just a little older than Junior Tracy. Brighton is meant to be insufferable, and he really succeeds at it. But he did find a severed finger, belonging to a thief who has been stealing goods from railroad cars. (Again, we see Gould’s continued fascination with amputations.) 

Train bandit Jojo Nidle, August 24, 1938.

The man with the missing finger proves to be Jojo Nidle, who is a freakish character with bulging eyes and a dark five o’clock shadow. He’s almost a classic Gould grotesque, but he’s only in the strip for about a month and a half—too short to really qualify as a major villain. But his demise is a great set-piece: Jojo has commandeered a locomotive, and Tracy is able to hop on a train on a parallel track and eventually he overtakes Jojo’s train and shoots him dead in the inevitable gun battle. The climactic train chase would make an amazing movie scene. 3 stars.

Unlikely as it sounds, a tank car of molasses leads Tracy to poison gas dealer Karpse. If a Dick Tracy movie had been made in the 1950's, I think Gregory Peck would have made an excellent Dick Tracy.

In my opinion, the next story is the best one in the book. It concerns Karpse, a poison gas manufacturer. Karpse is by far the most interesting villain in Volume 5, and his storyline becomes a classic Dick Tracy pursuit. This is the kind of story that Gould would spin variations of many, many times throughout the strip. Karpse’s story takes numerous twists and turns, and after Tracy wrecks Karpse’s poison gas manufacturing plant in the Dakotas, Karpse eventually makes his way back to the City. Once back in the City, Karpse does something not many villains in the strip do: he tries to go straight and get a regular job until the heat’s off. Turns out, Karpse was a baker back in the old country—the country itself goes unnamed, but Karpse says he “won prizes in Stuttgart,” indicating that he’s German—and guess who has a job opening for a baker? That’s right, old Mrs. Trueheart, Tess’s mother! So, there’s Karpse, working right under the very nose of Dick Tracy! The irony is as delicious as his pastries! 

Karpse and Dick Tracy meet, December 10, 1938.

Meanwhile, Tracy was blinded by poison gas, and he’s in the hospital recovering. Mrs. Trueheart sends Dick a basket of pastries from her new baker. There’s a boiler explosion at the bakery, and Karpse ends up in the hospital just down the hall from…Dick Tracy. One day, the nurse wheels Karpse into Tracy’s room so the two men can meet. Karpse doesn’t know Tracy’s a cop, and Tracy is unaware that Mrs. Trueheart’s new baker is actually the poison gas dealer who caused his blindness. It’s a brilliant scene. By giving Karpse a shred of humanity, Chester Gould makes him a much more interesting character, and thus elevates the story. 5 stars.

An example of Gould using a double panel in the Scardol story, March 28, 1939. Shown are the grotesque Scardol, Mickey, who had the odd birthmark on his face, and Pop.

Of course, Tracy gets his sight back just in time for Christmas. And he takes a vacation! But of course, while he’s resting up, he stumbles across some criminals. The story of Mickey, a minor criminal who hangs out with Wolley and then with the truly grotesque Scardol, is dull and takes up way too much time, taking us from January 1^st of 1939 to the end of April. The best part of these four months is Scardol’s character design—he has a giant pockmarked forehead, beady eyes, and an underbite—and Gould’s experimenting with the size of the comic panels. In these days, Dick Tracy was pretty much always four panels, each panel being the same size. But during the Scardol storyline, Gould repeatedly breaks this pattern, offering up double panels, or breaking the space up into three regular size panels and two smaller panels. I almost wonder if Gould was getting bored with the storyline and was keeping himself amused by playing around with the panels. Whatever the reason, it highlights Gould’s skills as an artist and storyteller. 2 stars.

The fake Bovanian princes, June 18, 1939. I love the phrase "pretentious pent house home."

Mickey’s storyline leads directly into the tale of Whip Chute, an ex-aviator who, along with another criminal, are impersonating crown princes from Bovania who are visiting the City. (The real princes are being held hostage.) It’s a dull story with a boring villain. The most memorable thing about Whip Chute is the way he dies—he’s climbing down a theater marquee when the sign breaks and he falls to his death. 2 stars. 

As I said in my introduction, I found Volume 5 of Dick Tracy unremarkable. In Volume 5, Dick Tracy does some annoying things. He fakes his suicide, goes undercover as “Reppoc” without telling anyone, and then six months later he never tells the police when he and Pop come back into town and they’re trying to take down Wolley’s gang on their own. Tracy’s really a loose cannon in this volume.

And here’s the part where I finally complain about the way the first 6 volumes of Dick Tracy were packaged. The books are small and fat, and the decision was made to put two daily strips on each page, with Sunday getting its own page. Unfortunately, the Sunday strips were shrunk to fit the size of the book. The result is that especially in the dialogue and narrative-heavy 1930’s, you’re craning your neck to read all the type on the Sunday pages. The combination of having just two daily strips on each page, and the slightly glossy paper the first 6 volumes were printed on, also means that you’re constantly adjusting the damn book to get the light right. If anyone saw me reading one of these volumes in a coffee shop, they probably thought I was a nutjob. But all that changes with Volume 7, as the books get taller and a little skinnier. From Volume 7 on, the Sunday strips are reproduced at their original size, and we get three strips on each page. The paper is also different—it’s not glossy and basically normal paper stock.

Steve Carlton: 160 baseball cards

Some of the cool stickers I got in my lot of 160 Steve Carlton baseball cards. Check out the awesome picture of Steve and Dave Parker! In the lower left you can see Steve and Jim Kaat-they pitched together with the Phillies from 1976-1979.

An assortment of Steve Carlton cards from the 1980's. Dig those fancy Glossy Fleers! Also, a rare card of Carlton with the Giants.

Earlier this week, I wrote about my recent purchase of 440 Steve Carlton cards for $50. In this post I’ll examine another recent purchase I made, this time of 160 Steve Carlton cards for $40. Not as good a bargain, I know. It’s still only 25 cents a card, so I don’t feel too bad about it. What convinced me to buy this lot of cards were the more obscure oddities it contained. 

This lot had quite a few of the stickers from the early 1980’s, which you don’t come across that often. Just check out the picture of Carlton and Dave Parker, probably taken at an All-Star Game. It’s a very cool sticker. I’m also a sucker for oddball cards like the 1986 mini Fleers, one of which was included here. The lot also included Steve’s 1986 and 1987 Sportflics cards, a short-lived brand that used lenticular printing—if you moved the card, you saw a different image. Pretty cool, huh? This was cutting edge technology back in the mid-1980’s, folks! 

There were a good amount of Carlton’s 1980’s base cards from Topps, Fleer, and Donruss, but not too much duplication. What I was really excited about in this lot were some of the lesser-known Fleer cards from the 1980’s. Included were 8 of Carlton’s 1985 Fleer Limited Edition card, one of those cards that I never knew about when I was a kid, and only learned about when I started trying to complete my Steve Carlton collection as an adult. Apparently, the Limited Edition sets of 44 cards were only distributed at McCrory’s variety stores. The lot also had 7 of Steve’s 1987 Fleer Exciting Stars card, which shows him in a Chicago White Sox uniform. The 44 card Exciting Stars set was an exclusive to Cumberland Farms convenience stores. I’ve never even heard of McCrory’s or Cumberland Farms, so I guess that explains why these cards are pretty obscure to me. I would assume that the sets eventually found their way into the hands of sports card dealers. The Exciting Stars set mainly consisted of younger players, although there were a handful of veterans like Carlton, Gene Garber, and Steve Garvey included. (I think Steve Garvey was probably included in EVERY card set from the 1980’s!) And leading off the Exciting Stars set was…Orioles relief pitcher Don Aase? Really? Well, he was coming off his only All-Star selection in 1986, so there’s that. I’m not sure how exciting kids would have found Steve Carlton in 1987—sure, he had gotten his 4,000^th strikeout in 1986, but that was about the only highlight of a season that saw him pitch for three teams, and finish with a won-loss record of 9-14 with an ERA of 5.10. 

Speaking of 1986, there were 9 copies of Carlton’s 1986 Donruss Highlights card, which is one of the few cards showing him as a member of the San Francisco Giants. The copywriter for Donruss had a rather dismal view of Carlton’s 1986 season: “There seemed no reason or need for Steve Carlton to sign on with the San Francisco Giants July 3.” Wow, that seems pretty judgmental for the back of a baseball card. The card then notes that Carlton struck out Eric Davis on August 5^th for his 4,000^th strikeout, “in the third inning of a game he would last only one-third of an inning more.” Ouch. “Carlton struck out only three batters in that August 5^th game and the Reds went on to win 11-6.” So harsh! Just two days after getting his 4,000^th strikeout, Carlton announced his retirement, which was really a way for the Giants to gracefully release him. 

Contrast the pessimistic text on the back of the Donruss Highlights card with the optimistic spin that Fleer put on Carlton’s 1986 season on his 1987 SuperStar Specials card, which has a picture of him in a White Sox uniform: “For Carlton, the {strikeout} mark was a great measure of satisfaction, after he had to sit out a good part of the 1985 season with arm problems. But he came back and brought a different assortment of pitches…Carlton mixes everything to great advantage.” The Fleer card says nothing about Steve retiring/being released by the Giants, instead closing with: “A week later, he joined the White Sox where he had a 4-3 record and a chance in 1987 to build on his strikeout mark.” To sum up—the Donruss card essentially says, “He’s a washed-up veteran, he’s done!” while the Fleer card says, “He’s got a great future in the American League!” 

Part of the difference between the tone might simply be the fact that Carlton is pictured with different teams on the two cards. Carlton’s stint with the Giants was not very successful: 6 starts, a 1-3 record, and a 5.10 ERA. For whatever reason, he was better with the White Sox: 10 starts, a 4-3 record, and a 3.69 ERA. Carlton obviously wanted to keep pitching, and his success with the White Sox likely gave him hope for the 1987 season. Carlton was a non-roster invitee to 1987 spring training with the Phillies, who had released him in June of 1986. After a few spring training starts, the Phillies let Carlton know they wouldn’t add him to their roster. But he caught on with Cleveland Indians and was traded to the Minnesota Twins at the trading deadline. 

Back to the cards: there were several “glossy” copies of Carlton’s 1987 Fleer cards. Fleer Glossy was basically a way for Fleer to try and compete with Topps’ “Tiffany” sets, which were produced on higher-quality paper with a glossy finish on the cards. I don’t have many of the Fleer Glossy cards, so this was a cool find. There were also 24 cards from the 1990’s and 2000’s. I have a lot of Carlton’s post-playing cards, but honestly, there are so many produced that I’m not trying to collect ALL of them. Basically, only the ones that look cool. There were some interesting ones, including a 2005 Donruss Champions card that shows Carlton as a San Francisco Giant, walking off the mound after his 4,000^th strikeout. 

All in all, I was satisfied with this lot of cards. As I wrote in the above paragraphs, I was happy with the odd 1980’s cards and stickers that were included in this lot.