Dick Tracy by Mike Curtis and Charles Ettinger for January 04, 2013

Holy Batman shadow!

Those do look like Batman ears to me, too.

It’s a nice in-joke.

……still doesn’t explain why he wanted to kill Belle…witness removal perhaps?

Thanks DT for clearing that up. GM VB hope u r well. Is BB dead? did Belle survive? What is Cinn and horse face going to do next?

…….so who’s going to be brought back next? Pruneface?Flattop? 88 Keyes? Go Go Gomez? Hemlock Holmes? Lol….

one cannot help but to wonder; what’s up with the thing on the wall? It’ll probably play into the story somehow.

Who’s casting THAT shadow?

Helloooo everybody. Perhaps it’s again time to see what Honeymoon is up to, ’eh? And it would be very cool to see Cinn become a cop. Maybe a detective in a few years?

Since there really isn’t much beyond that shadow, to comment on, instead I’m just gonna post another of my original designs for a Tracy “Grotesque” , let me know what you think (Keep in mind that I draw them in the Gouldian style, or as close as I can get to it)

First of all, thatk you GGC for the colour come back.

Secondly: did you see that Sunday strip is here plus all weeek (to date) in colours ?

Good morning everyone…

The referencing or similarities that came in Bob Kane’s Batman strip, (the jaw line, the Penguin look-alike and all that) - becomes more pronounced, And had anyone missed it, there - now more pointedly, that convenient shadow.

Sort of takes me back to an earlier realization, the similarity between Two Face and Gould’s Haf and Haf (1967). Two Face came first, the shoe might well have been on the other foot on this one.

Subconscious or otherwise ! (?)

I did enjoy that the hoods had on bowlers, masks, and numbers, like proper bat villans.

DrSid1 … THAT is exactly what I thought when I saw the panel!!!

I wonder if Tracy has ever met one of the costumed crime fighters from the other city.

Well now the shooting of Belle makes even less sense-once she was identified, the shadow of suspiction would fall on Bates, something he would want to avoid since he already knows Tracy was keeping on eye on him.It makes Tracy’s job much easier with all these villains having low I.Q.’s.

While I’m still not sure if I like the idea of super heros or “masked crimefighters” actually existing in Dick Tracy’s world. I gotta say that today’s strip is a joy to behold!!

Something tells me Belle might become a reformed rogue. And a Dick Tracy – Batman crossover? I think that would be so full of yes! And Good Morning to you, VB!

Awesome. Confusing storyline, but awesome all the same.

I just finished re-reading the original “Broadway Bates” story, and there’s a couple of interesting differences between the original BB & Belle, and their modern counterparts:

Broadway Bates’ wasn’t originally from Tracy’s city; he was actually from Seatle, and unlike his modern counterpart, he had an entire gang, of which Belle is just one more member, BB&B acted more like quarreling sibblings, than lovers! XD(At one point, Broadway is enraged at Belle and gives her a hard slap to the face< The actual slap is “off camera” but, you do see Bates raise his hand, then you see Belle holding the left side of her face while several “pain stars” shoot out from her jawline)Now, something interesting about Belle, in her original incarnation, she isn’t a redhead, but, rather, she’s referred to as “The bob-headed blonde”<< Not surprising since her look was based on early pictures of Bonnie Parker, who herself was a blond. For those who forgot, or who missed it, I am reposting the Bonnie Parker (before she met Clyde)/Belle pics below:

Bonnie when she was paired with Clyde below

More on Bonnie Parker (1910-34): the early pics show her as rather cute teenager, Bonnie had everything going , she was a cute popular straight-A student (Parker was one of the best students in her high school, winning top prizes in spelling, writing and public speaking As an adult, her fondness for writing found expression in poems such as "The Story of Suicide Sal and “The Trail’s End” (known since as "The Story of Bonnie and Clyde).) and was a good girl, but, unfortunately, she had a taste for “bad boys”, in 1926, at the age of 15, she eloped with one of them, a small-time crook named Roy Thornton, against her parent’s wishes; ironically, the marriage was short-lived as Thornton soon found himself in prison and Bonnie returned home and took up the life of a good girl once more, taking a job as a waitress in the diner where her Mother worked. Unfortunately, one of the joints regular customers introduced her to a certain Clyde barrow in 1930; and just four years later, she and Clyde would be gunned down in a Police ambush, Bonnie was only 24 when she died in 1934, but, as you can see from the third (1933) picture, she had aged rapidly, no doubt in part from the lifestyle her second “Bad boy” forced her into!

Meanwhile, back at the Bat-Cave…..

With all the costumed crimefighters at the Halloween party, they should have included Don Quick Oatie.

Now, that you folks have me thinking animation, here’s a bit of TV trivia — in the Filmation/Archie’s TV Funnies run of Dick Tracy, DT was voiced by John Erwin, who was also voicing 9Lives spokescat, Morris, during the early 70’s…

Love today’s strip, explaining all.And I hadn’t realized how much Tracy’s mouth/jawline was like Bruce Wayne’s! (And love the Bat-shadow!) It all reminds me of the Golden Age stories DC used to reprint in their “80 Page Giants” (for 25 cents!) back in the 60’s.Gotta give Bob Kane credit; he knew what to steal – uh, borrow – to make a good strip!

@ NightShade09 I loved the 80 Page Giants.

love the Batman shadow

Just out of idle interest, what happened to the moon sequence?

Gotta love that bat shadow! Maybe someday the Tribune and Warners will agree to have a team-up. Hey, Superman met Tarzan, and Spider-Man. You never know……

YW, it is pretty fascinating to see just how much of Kane’s Batman comics were cribbed from elsewhere; on the other hand, even if he wasn’t completely original, Batman melded all these “borrowed” elements very nicely, when all is said and done.

You’re replying to Night-Gaunt49’s comment:

I got to see the pictures of the bodies stripped of clothes and cleaned up showing all the different places bullets entered and exited.^^Huh? I must have missed that part 0.o

Shouldn’t the “Krakker” have oversized radar dish ears for listening for tumbler clicks with ? He looks like a good candidate for the Tracy canon. If The Team were to use your guy would it be given freely or will something have to be worked out ? It could get into big money quick if The Team has to start paying for reader ideas-submissions. Not trying to put up roadblocks, just being realistic.^^Well, I suppose they would have to contact me, and it would go from there. As far as Krakker goes, I imagined him as simply head-butting safes into submission (Very Gouldian MO, don’t you think?), which explains his somewhat caved-in head

Lonnie Cavenee said, about 6 hours ago

@Mikeyj

If you’re gonna steal then steal from the best.^^Makes more sense than stealing from the worst ;)

You’re replying to Gweedo Murray’s comment:

Now that you’ve shown us the real Bob Kane I aint in no hurry to read “his” material. The 60s live Batman and the 90s animated series had some fine people carrying on the legacy. Having read practically all of that page, I have to hand it to Bob for some creative copying. why couldn’t he have given credit where it was due ? As a copyist and curator of a crack team, he had a pretty good assembly. I am sure he pre wrote the comic page tomb plaque as it is very flattering toward him. I’m glad he wasn’t my dad.^^Well, I suppose a good plagiarist prefers not to make where he cribs his stuff from known; makes you wonder though, just how many lawsuits DC comics may have had to fight, over Batman, over the years

Gweedo Murray said, about 9 hours ago

@Mikeyj

I am reluctant to think that she was “forced” as she seemed to have a preference for the bad guy to begin with.^(^Well, I meant that she probably never bargained on just what a horror her life would become, once she “Shacked up” (Legally, she was still married to Thornton) with Clyde: Rarely able to stay in one place, eating on the road, when they could find food, most of the Barrow gang were nursing gun-shot wounds, they sometimes went days without sleep as they would drive 100s of miles a day; Bonnie & Clyde’s lifestyle was nowhere near as glamourous as Hollywood would have you believe.

@Mikeyj – DC Comics (Detective,inc/National) never had a single lawsuit filed against them for any elements in BATMAN that might have been “Plagerized” from other sources.

That includes Conde-Nast who would have had grounds to sue over the story in Detective #27 with was a rip-off of a SHADOW story, right down to key elements.

A run down on the “borrowing” from other sources for BATMAN can be found in these great “Dial B For Blog” entries:

http://dialbforblog.com/archives/389/http://dialbforblog.com/archives/390/http://dialbforblog.com/archives/391/

As for any “Nods”/“Tip of the hat”/Eluding to BATMAN that Mike and Joe have used in this storyline, it’s “Fair Use”. (Heck, one might say it directly falls under parody,even if Bates predates Oswald. ) Remember, we never actually see any direct references. Wouldn’t be the first time a strip,or comic has made such references in the 115+ years of the American Comic Artform.

I’m sure this was run past Trib’s legal department before Mike and Joe got the ok. to run it.

Oh… you mean the autopsy photos of Bonnie and Clyde, for some reason, I thought you meant that was on the Bob Kane is a plagiarist webpage, D’OH

love Batman’s shadow