The Dick Tracy Show

The Dick Tracy Show is an American animated TV series based on Chester Gould's comic strip crime fighter. The series was produced by UPA for Syndication in the 1961-62 season. The series consisted of 30 five-minute episodes, and each station used its own on-camera presenter, usually dressed in a police uniform.

Instead of pursuing the criminals himself, Tracy assigned the cases to various second-stringers:
 * Joe Jitsu, an Asian kung-fu master/detective
 * Go-Go Gomez, a lazy Mexican master of disguise who solved crimes from his hammock
 * Heap O'Calory, a stereotype Irish-American policeman
 * Hemlock Holmes, a British-accented bulldog who was accompanied by the Retouchables, a group similar to the Keystone Kops

Despite the show's title, Dick Tracy usually appeared at the beginning of the cartoon to assign the case, then only twice more in each animated segment. Once would be in the middle of the action, when the good guy would shout, "Hold everything!" At that point all the action would freeze, and the hero would call Tracy on his two-way wrist radio to fill Tracy in on how things were progressing. The action would resume when Tracy radioed back, "...Over and out!" The last time Tracy would be seen was at the end, to praise his men for their good work. On rare occasions Tracy showed up on screen during the story to get involved.

The series was revamped and re-syndicated in 1990 to take advantage of the publicity surrounding Warran Beatty's big screen version of the character. The Joe Jitsu and Go-Go Gomaz cartoons were initialy rebroadcast as part of the package, although they were soon pulled and only Heap O'Calory and Hemlock Holmes cartoons remained.

Tropes That Appear in The Dick Tracy Show

 * Ethnic Scrappy: Joe Jitsu and Go-Go Gomez were drawn just about as stereotypically as you might imagine. Gomez could move very fast, although he did so with lots of "Arriba! Arriba! Yeeha! Yeeha!" yells that turned him into a human Speedy Gonzales.
 * Hey, It's That Voice!: Everett Sloane was the voice of Dick Tracy. Mel Blanc and June Foray did many of the other character voices.
 * No Celebrities Were Harmed: Heap O'Calory was a caricature of actor Andy Devine. Hemlock Holmes' voice was a cheap imitation of Cary Grant.