Dick Tracy's G-Men  Dick Tracy's G-Men (1939) is a 15-Chapter Republic movie serial based on the "Dick Tracy" comic strip by Chester Gould. It was directed by William Witney and John English. This serial was the fifteenth of the sixty-six produced by Republic and the third Dick Tracy serial (there would be one more, "Dick Tracy vs. Crime, Inc.", in 1941). As with all four Dick Tracy serials, Ralph Byrd plays the lead. This time he faces Irving Pichel as the spy with a vendetta, Zarnoff. Future Academy Award winner Jennifer Jones co-stars as Gwen Andrews. "G-Man" is a contemporary slang term for an agent of the FBI. In the comic strip, Dick Tracy is actually a detective in the police force of an unnamed Midwestern city resembling Chicago. This was changed for the serial. International spy, Zarnoff, in the employ of "The Three Powers" (presumably a fictionalized reference to the Axis) is captured by Dick Tracy at the start of the serial, tried and sentenced to death. However, through the use of a rare drug embedded by his agents in the evening newspaper, he escapes from the gas chamber. His men pick up his "corpse" by ambushing the hearse and administering another counter-drug. He continues his espionage plans, while taking the opportunity of revenge on Tracy. "Dick Tracy's G-Men" was budgeted at $159,876 although the final negative cost was $163,530 (a $3,654, or 2.3%, overspend). Although the previous serial, "Daredevils of the Red Circle", came in under budget that was an exception to the rule. Most Republic serials were slightly overbudget and this one was not significantly so in comparison. It was filmed between 17 June and 27 July 1939 under the working title "Dick Tracy and his G-Men". The serial's production number was 896. This serial, like all the sequels to the 1937 original Dick Tracy serial, was permitted by an interpretation of the original contract, which allowed a "series or serial". Therefore, Chester Gould was not paid again for the right to produce this serial. "Dick Tracy's G-Men"'s official release date is 2 September 1939, although this is actually the date the seventh chapter was made available to film exchanges. The serial was re-released on 19 September 1955 following the release of Republic's final serial, "King of the Carnival".