Who Framed Roger Rabbit: 13 Easter Eggs & References You Probably Missed

6. Roger Mimics Dick Tracy

Who Framed Roger Rabbit?
Disney

The Gary K. Wolf-penned novel from which the film is adapted, “Who Censored Roger Rabbit”, centers not around Toon characters who appear in cartoon films, but rather those who appear in comic strips and speak in floating word balloons.

Roger’s square-jawed, fedora-wearing moment as he slaps the cuffs on Eddie Valiant references longtime newspaper comic cop Dick Tracy, who makes an appearance in the book as a Toon who is given respect by the Los Angeles Police Department, despite only being a cop in the funny pages.

Roger's caricature is basically the one callback to the original source material's type of Toon.

Disney would, of course, release Warren Beatty's beautifully cartoonish but flawed live-action version of Dick Tracy two years later.

Contributor
Contributor

Maurice is one of the founders of FACT TREK (www.facttrek.com), a project dedicated to untangling 50+ years of mythology about the original Star Trek and its place in TV history. He's also a screenwriter, writer, and videogame industry vet with scars to show for it. In that latter capacity he game designer/writer on the Sega Genesis/SNES "Star Trek: Deep Space Nine — Crossroads of Time" game, as well as Dreamcast "Ecco the Dolphin, Defender of the Future" where Tom Baker performed words he wrote.