The latest volume of IDW's continuing series of comic strip reprints offiically known as The Complete Chester Gould Dick Tracy, Volume Six, is the one where it all changes. As contributing editor Max Allan Collins says in his introduction, one of the stories in this volume, "represents an explosion of imagination, surrealism, expressionism, and sadism—in short, everything for which Chester Gould is justly famous."
It's the beginning of the Golden Age of Dick Tracy, the age of weird villains and violent action, coincidentally starting as the U.S. was on the cusp of entering World War II. How else could Gould compete with the headlines?
That story Collins is referring to involves Jerome Trohs and Mama, and you'd have a hard time finding a more unlikely pair of criminals outside of the funny pages. Trohs is a midget attorney (Trohs is SHORT spelled backwards, a penchant of Gould in this time period) and Mama would more correctly be named "Big Mama;" she's a woman-mountain of a female. The two are more sadistic and violent than any other Gould villains up to this point, and when Mama gets mad, watch out, and that includes her horrific treatment of the little person she allegedly loves.
This is also the time period when Gould's art style--or that of him and his assistants--solidified into a graphic, bold look. Nothing seems wasted in these strips, not an unnecessary word, not a wrong pen line. While there is, admittedly, some weaker Gould stuff in this volume, including the rather lame marriage of Tess Trueheart to Edward Nuremoh (that's HOME RUN spelled backwards, folks...aren't you tired of this trick already?), and a strange story about Junior Tracy unwittingly getting involved with a band of bike thieves (!), it's still compulsively readable. And I'll tell you one thing: there's a number of things that would get this almost 70-year run of stories banned outright from today's papers, including the sight of Junior's battered and near-dead body laying bent-legged in the street, and this little innocent caption from 70 years ago, when the world was--indeed--a different place:
"Waiting until the officer was gone, the stranger pulled up to the curb and invited Junior into the car..."
Oh, CHESTER!
Finally, this is also the volume where the format of the series changes, the last book in the familiar Peanuts-like size and design. Next time, with volume 7, Eisner Award winner Dean Mullaney takes over the editorship and the book grows to Terry and the Pirates/Little Orphan Annie size, with more strips per volume and--hopefully--a better look and feel. Don't get me wrong, the current format is great, and the strip reproduction is--for the most part--superb. But those tiny Sunday strips bug your eyes after a while, and that's something that will be corrected. And best of all, it's the best time for Tracy fans. Coming up: The Mole. Pruneface. The Brow. Vitamin Flintheart, and the one and only Flattop.
Until, at least, Flattop Jr. comes along...
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