Some fans felt Gould sending Tracy to the Moon in the early 1960s was an example of this. Then again, given the sheer volume of contempt Gould had towards various 1960s Supreme Court rulings regarding due process rights all criminals have, Gould may have thought turning the book into a sci-fi strip would be better for his mental health.
Judging by the decline of the strip's artwork quality from 2006 to 2011, some fans consider Dick Locher to have suffered one of these, most likely because he experienced both the death of both his son (John Locher, who was co-artist in the mid-80s) and one of his closest friends (Mike Kilian, who was the writer between 1993 and 2006) while working on the strip. This seems likely especially when one gets a chance to read the one story Locher wrote in 1993 after Collins left and before Kilian was hired. That one 1993 story by Locher is actually pretty good, with none of the pacing, repetition, and "cowardly Tracy" problems that plagued Locher's writing from 2006-11.
The aforementioned Blackjack is a character that originally appeared in writer Mike Curtis' fan fiction. He is a huge fan of Dick Tracy and wants to join Tracy's Rogues Gallery, so he trains himself to become an expert marksman and starts robbing banks. But, he only robs banks that have engaged in unwholesome business practices. He never robs the bank patrons or shoots anybody, so he's not a BAD guy. He later shows up at a criminal bar and talk about how neat it is to be one of Tracy's foes. He eventually helps Tracy escape a death trap, and Tracy apparently lets him go free. He's clearly a character that Curtis loves and wants the readers to love, but he's so obviously not a threat to Tracy that he's impossible to take seriously.
Although he was created by Chester Gould, Max Allan Collins really likes ham-actor Vitamin Flintheart (and in the introductions to many of the Complete Chester Gould's Dick Tracy Books, he's pretty much out in the open about this). Gould created Flintheart in the mid 1940's, used him up until 1950, then never again for his entire run. Collins brought Vitamin back for his first story in 1978, then used the character in several stories up until his run ended in 1993.
Died During Production: Three times. Rick Fletcher, who replaced Chester Gould as artist, died in 1983, and writer Mike Kilian died in 2005. Probably the most tragic instance came in 1986 with the premature death of John Locher, who was in the process of taking over the strip's art duties from his father.
Executive Veto: There was such a moment when the creator, Chester Gould, put Dick in a truly inescapable death trap. Gould was so stumped for a solution that he decided to have Tracy break the fourth wall and address Gould himself, who literally extends his hand to lift the detective out. His publisher, Joseph Patterson, rightly concluded that this was an unacceptable solution and ordered Gould to redraw the section into something else.
He Also Did: Mike Curtis, the current artist since the 2000s, worked previously on the Furry Fandom, being the creator of Shanda The Panda and being the editor of Katmandu together with his wife, Carole, who was also the creator of the latter title.
Money, Dear Boy: Whenever the intros to the Dick Tracy books and articles regarding Tracy talk about Chester Gould, they tend to point out that Chet did not see himself as an artist creating a fictional narrative to entertain audiences, but rather as a businessman creating a product designed to sell newspapers.
Outlived Its Creator: While Chester Gould had already retired from actively working on the strip the better part of a decade before his death, it's continued long past that point.
Ripped from the Headlines: Gould got the idea from reading how gangsters of the time like Al Capone were making the news and was disgusted at them becoming folk heroes. So, Gould thought of the idea of creating a comic strip of a police detective who lives to take those criminals down.
Shown Their Work: When Curtis came on as writer, he made a point of sitting down and reading the entire run of the comic from start to finish. Accordingly, his time as writer has been full of Continuity Nods to the strip's long history.
While some of the extreme examples like the Space Coupe with its magnetic propulsion system are straight examples, Tracy's various wrist communicators have always felt reasonably in line with the times with occasional upgrades over the years (the latest iteration being the Wrist Wizard).
One villain who appeared in 1950 ran a protection racket targeting the television sets in bars. At the time, a TV set was a significant investment, costing up to $5000, a far cry from today when a TV costs a fraction of that and even the poorest household usually owns one.
Writing by the Seat of Your Pants: Standard writing style of Chester Gould, although he did write himself into a corner at least once (See Executive Veto above).
Actor-Inspired Element: Al Pacino actually designed Big Boy Caprice's make-up himself and completely re-imagined the character, who was originally big and fat in the comics with a little nose. Caprice's resulting film counterpart is of average height with enlarged hands, nose, and cheekbones, hence his street name.
While Tracy's age is never stated in the film, his date of birth is 1909 and the date on the deed of the Club Ritz (visible only in freeze-frame) is dated 1938, making him a 29-year-old character played by 53-year-old Warren Beatty.
According to the comic book tie-in, Breathless Mahoney is 18. Her actress Madonna was 32.
The film was directed by Warren Beatty, who also played Dick Tracy.
In the Latin American Spanish dub, Jorge Santos was the ADR Director and the voice of the titular character.
Follow the Leader: Although Beatty's development of the film had been in the works as long as Tim Burton's Batman (1989), it still retained a lot of elements that drew comparisons since Batman was released a year earlier. Peter Travers of Rolling Stone noted that they both contained: "a loner hero, a grotesque villain, a blond bombshell, a marketable pop soundtrack and a no-mercy merchandising campaign." That also didn't factor in the Art Deco-insipired set design, the original working script being worked on by Tom Mankiewicz (both films would basically discard them), and Danny Elfman as composer (and Travers noted that his Tracy score was incredibly similar to his one for Batman).
Keep Circulating the Tapes: The Novelization is easy enough to find, but its sequels, Dick Tracy Goes to War and Dick Tracy Meets His Match, while decently regarded, only had one limited printing and are rare and expensive collector's items.
Warren Beatty, a fan of the original comic strip, first had the concept for a film in 1975. At the time, the film rights were owned by Michael Laughlin, who gave up his option from Tribune Media Services after he was unsuccessful in pitching the idea to Hollywood studios. Floyd Mutrux and Art Linson purchased the film rights from the Tribune in 1977 and in 1980, United Artists became interested in financing/distributing. Tom Mankiewicz was under negotiations to write the script, based on his previous success with Superman: The Movie and Superman II. The deal fell through when Chester Gould insisted on strict financial and artistic control.
At one point, the film was going to be a musical version with Sonny Bono as Dick Tracy and Cher as Tess Trueheart. Ryan O'Neal also sought to play Tracy in the early 1980s.
Mutrux and Linson eventually took the property to Paramount Pictures, who began developing screenplays. Steven Spielberg was asked to direct, and he brought in Universal Pictures to co-finance. Universal then put John Landis forward as a candidate for director, courted Clint Eastwood for the title role, and commissioned Jim Cash and Jack Epps, Jr. to write the screenplay. Cash and Epps' simple orders from Landis were to write the script in a 1930s pulp magazine atmosphere and center it with Alphonse "Big Boy" Caprice as the primary villain. For research, Epps read every comic strip from 1930 to 1957. The writers wrote two drafts for Landis; Max Allan Collins, then-writer of the Dick Tracy comic strip, remembers reading one of them:
It was terrible. The only positive thing about it was a thirties setting and lots of great villains, but the story was paper-thin and it was uncomfortably campy.
Following the accident on Twilight Zone: The Movie, Landis left the project. Walter Hill then came on board to direct with Joel Silver as producer. Cash and Epps wrote another draft and Hill approached Warren Beatty for the title role. Pre-production had progressed as far as set building, but the film was stalled when artistic control issues arose with Beatty, a fan of the Dick Tracy comic strip. Hill wanted to make the film violent and realistic, while Beatty envisioned a stylized homage to the 1930s comic strip. The actor also reportedly wanted $5 million plus fifteen percent of the box office gross, a deal which Universal refused to accept.
Hill and Beatty left the film, prompting Paramount to re-envision it as a lower-budget project with Richard Benjamin directing. Cash and Epps continued to rewrite the script, but Universal was unsatisfied. The film rights eventually reverted back to Tribune Media Services in 1985. However, Beatty decided to option the rights himself for $3 million, along with the Cash/Epps script. When Jeffrey Katzenberg and Michael Eisner moved from Paramount to Disney, Dick Tracy resurfaced with Beatty as director, producer and leading man. Katzenberg considered hiring Martin Scorsese to direct, changed his mind. Disney officially greenlit the film in 1988 under the condition that Beatty keep the production budget within $25 million. Principal photography began in February 1989 and ended in May of that year.
Spoiled by the Merchandise: In 1990, Playmates Toys released an action figure line to coincide with the movie. "The Blank" was a Canada-exclusive figure and if you pulled off the blank-mask, you revealed Madonna's face underneath. The novelization, by contrast, conceals the Blank's true identity.
Stillborn Franchise: Disney/Touchstone had hoped that Tracy would become the Indiana Jones of the '90s. However, while the movie did well at the box office (contrary to popular belief), there were legal issues between Warren Beatty and Tribune Co. over who had the rights over the franchise that ensued for two decades, plus then-studio chief Jeffrey Katzenberg was dissatisfied with the final results.
Also, James Caan as Spud Spaldoni, considering his history with Al Pacino in The Godfather. An added joke is that they're minor antagonists to each other in this film, after previously playing brothers.
Throw It In!: The main reason that so many comic strip characters are featured in the film, and sometimes in alternate roles, (Flattop and Itchy being Big Boy's co-dragons, as an example, rather than independent villains like in the comic strip) was because Warren Beatty was a big fan of the comic and wanted to include as many faces as he could should the film not receive a sequel.
Jack Nicholson was originally offered the lead role, and he seriously considered it, being a lifelong fan of the comic strip. However, he turned it down, being already committed to his role in Batman (1989). Robert De Niro refused the role for fear of being typecast as a grim, hardened tough guy similar to his Travis Bickle character in Taxi Driver. Bruce Campbell, an avid fan of the comics, lobbied hard for the title role. However, Warren Beatty thought Campbell was "too TV like" and was turned down. Couple years later, Campbell tried to adapt the comic book character to TV, but Beatty (who owned the rights to the character) declined unless he'd play the role. Other candidates included James Caan, Harrison Ford, Richard Gere, Mel Gibson, Paul Newman, Robert Redford, George C. Scott and Tom Selleck.
Macaulay Culkin was considered for The Kid, but turned it down as he preferred to do Home Alone over this film.
Gene Hackman was offered the role of Lips Manlis, but he turned it down, because he couldn't bear being directed by Warren Beatty again after his experience on Reds.
According to his autobiography, comedian Gilbert Gottfried was nearly cast as Mumbles based on his distinctive voice. He was perplexed that he and Dustin Hoffman would even be considered for the same role, joking that "the only way our names would appear together in the same Hollywood conversation would be in the sentence, 'I've seen Gilbert Gottfried's acting, and he's no Dustin Hoffman'."
The producers lobbied for Former President Ronald Reagan to play Pruneface but this was nixed by Beatty.
Danny Elfman originally proposed a darker, more Gershwin-inspired score that was very different from the one heard in the movie proper. He later released it on Volume 1 of his compilation album, Music for a Darkened Theater.
Sean Young was originally cast as Tess Trueheart but was replaced when Warren Beatty felt she was not right for the role. She later accused him of firing her for not having an affair with him (Beatty had a reputation for being quite The Casanova after all).
Beatty originally wanted Bob Fosse to direct, but Fosse turned him down. Martin Scorsese was also a fan of the comic strip and considered directing at one point, but he lost interest and chose to make Goodfellas. Tim Burton was offered the job at one point but had to turn it down to focus on Edward Scissorhands.
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