THE ORIGINAL DICK TRACY Fights the Mumbles Quartette

by Chester Gould

THE ORIGINAL DICK TRACY Fights the Mumbles Quartette

Paperback

First published January 1, 1990

About the author

Chester Gould was a U.S. cartoonist and the creator of the Dick Tracy comic strip, which he wrote and drew from 1931 to 1977. Gould was known for his use of colorful, often monstrous, villains.

Reviews

[Brian Rogers · Rating 3 out of 5]

Found this (and the second volume, the origin of the two way wrist radio) at a used book store and was happy to have done so. Gladstone comics did some great reprint runs of comics before others were doing so, and these two volumes are good examples of their work. My only complaint is that the didn't start at the beginning but picked later story arcs to present in total.

Still, a minor complaint. Gould's artwork is distinctive, his pacing is solid, and the inherently off kilter but hard boiled universe he presents is certainly attention-catching. I used to love the Dick Tracy Sundays when they were running when I was a kid in the 70's and 80's, and it's nice to see some of the originals without paying an arm and a leg for them,

[StrictlySequential · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of Chet's best!!!

The Gladstone presentation beats any other because it's enlarged to a point where you miss none of his splendid detail and the color is well tuned. I love Blackthorne's but this beats it senseless.

(Anything and everything is better in album format and France/Belgium has known that for generations. Gladstone knows that intimately- they aren't cheap with presentation like almost all publishers over here. Fascist capitalism knows no bounds- it runs this country and make it distasteful to the rest of the world.)

[C. John Kerry · Rating 3 out of 5]

According to the inside cover the material in this book ran from October 17th to December 10th, 1947. However I am not sure that all the strips from that time period are contained in the book. The story somehow seems rushed at times. It is still a pretty decent story. The character of Mumbles, though he doesn't stand out physically the way some Tracy villains do, is still an interesting villain, in that his dialogue is jumbled and has to be translated by one of his gang members. Posing as a musical group as a cover for committing robberies was one that I do not recall being used frequently (if at all). All in all this is not bad Dick Tracy, and is an okay introduction to the strip. There are better sources out there but they will also be more expensive. For what it is not a bad book really.