Joe Jitsu is one of the main protagonists of The Dick Tracy Show, along with Hemlock Holmes, Heap O'Calorie, and Go-Go Gomez. His method of subduing crooks is grabbing them by the wrist and violently slamming them on the ground while repeatedly apologizing to the victim. He is a parody of the fictional Japanese secret agent Mr. Moto.
Appearance[]
Joe Jitsu is a short, thin, and pale-skinned Japanese man with short hair and a mustache. He has buck teeth and wears round black horn-rimmed glasses. He usually wears a brown suit with a black tie, black pants, and black dress shoes as well as a brown bowler hat with a black ribbon trim.
Joe Jitsu sometimes carries a black umbrella.
Personality[]
Trivia[]
- Joe Jitsu appears in a total of 43 episodes.
- Joe Jitsu appears alongside Go-Go Gomez in "Tacos Tangle" and Hemlock Holmes in "Rocket n' Roll".
- Joe Jitsu has been criticized as a racist stereotype due to his appearance, accent, mastery of martial arts, and polite demeanor. He, along with Go-Go Gomez, created controversy when The Dick Tracy Show was resyndicated during the promotion of the 1990 Warren Beatty Dick Tracy film. This resulted in some stations either removing the series entirely or removing only the episodes with Joe Jitsu and Go-Go Gomez and thus leaving only the episodes with Hemlock Holmes and Heap O'Calorie.
- Despite his stereotypical traits, he is shown to be intelligent and capable at his job unlike Hemlock Holmes, The Retouchables, and Heap O'Calorie who only solve their cases out of dumb luck.
- Executive producer Henry G. Saperstein would comment that Joe Jitsu was created as a good guy to help soothe any ill feeling to the Japanese after the end of World War II.
- Joe Jitsu's name has alternatively been spelled as Jo Jitsu.
- Joe Jitsu is known as Inspector Joe Yamada (ジョー・ヤマダ警部) in the Japanese dub.
- In the episode "The Flower Plot", Joe Jitsu says he is from Sacramento, California.
- In real life, Sacramento had a Japantown which disappeared along with many other Japantowns as a result of the forced incarceration of Japanese-Americans during World War II.
- In the episode "The Boomerang Ring", Joe Jitsu says he attended Osaka University, a real-world university founded in 1931.
- In the Dick Tracy Little Golden Book, Joe Jitsu is illustrated with a red tie, has two buttons on his suit, and his umbrella is green.
- Joe Jitsu makes a brief cameo in the Drawn Together episode "Foxxy vs. the Board of Education".
Gallery[]
"Sayonara, and humbly suggest same apply to Paree!"
"Oh, simple, Mr. Tracy! Will demonstrate ancient art of mental telegraphy as used on crooks!"
"Ah so! Formula are very interesting!"
"Okay, Mr. Tracy! I get out to professor laboratory immediately!"
"Ah so! Remarkable opportunity to help Brow get new brain and help Joe Jitsu get even for dunking!"
"Ah so! Number two accomplice are none other than Mumbles!"
"Well hello kitty! Oh nice kitty! You hungry?"
"Remember criminal like boomerang. Sometime appear to get away, but always brought back to face justice! Sayonara!"
"Here are first-rate credentials!"
"Four five six seven eight!"
"HEEEEEEEEELP!"
"Cold. Very cold. Cold like stone."
"That dozen-armed monster! That Pruneface and Itchy!"
"Maybe not that fast!"
