Dick Tracy by Mike Curtis and Charles Ettinger for February 17, 2011

The granary is coming apart? Well, yes, close inspection of panel #1 shows some barely-perceptible differences between it and the nine previous appearances of this image. At this rate the granary may collapse by the end of the Cenozoic epoch.

I won’t ask why there’s ankle-deep water on the floor. Thick’s bladder-control problem is too obvious.

Mordred is from… Out There!!!

What is that wrapped around Morbid’s waist? The chains? Or did Locher skimp on the ink when drawing his usual silhouette?

Today is the 10th time that this same drawing of the granary has been used. Since the alligator in the lower right is getting so familiar, maybe we should give him a name. I’d suggest Investi. Like Spacy, he’s an Investi-gator. Sorry. :)

I feel sorry for Tracy being used on his time off just when he was about to have a date with his wife. I hope Sam, who cares for his friend, Tracy, will come to his rescue. Will there be any redemption for Mordred, or, is he just going to continue being Morbid Mordred?

There is a certain quality to this narrative that might catch my attention. Unfortunately I have been following this strip long enough to realize there might be a homeless person/circus fat lady/falling museum airplane abruptly thrust into the narrative to save the day to make any interest pointless. Pity.

jumbobrain, I think you’ve unravelled the mystery. This arc will end when Della Contessa informs Testicle Chin that the bank has foreclosed on his house. He’ll move into the granary’s first floor, but before he can do anything about the noisy Odd Couple upstairs, the Trace-R robot will make the AWACS plane crash into the building, causing a missing Stradivarius to floom away the water.

BillThompson…thanks for spoiling the end of the story for us.

I can only hope that a wormhole will open, dragging the granary and it’s occupants into an interdimensional zoo where Thick and Morbid are assumed to be a mating couple.

What a dissapointing episode for us AND the zoo keepers.

It would be great if nobody told Locher that he’s out of a job next month. Imagine three more weeks of nothing happening here, and then–“Sorry, Dipstick, you can’t spend another month wrapping up this arc with non sequiturs and inept puns. And we don’t want to see that picture of the granary another dozen times.”

I think the next three weeks should be nothing but panels of the granary with no text. It’d be an improvement.

@BillThompson: I love the story ending, but there’s one flaw in your logic… any or all of that would require Mr. Locher to actually remember any of those plot points/characters that had been introduced in the past. And we all know that ain’t happening.

Like the old radio program, I love a mystery. The mystery about this story?, is how will it end, if there is such a thing as an ending.

@BillThompson:

And don’t forget in a desperate grab for the glass doorknob, Queenie will swan dive out of the falling AWACS plane and end up wedged in a granary smokestack (which has mysteriously appeared) while Al Kinda watches from atop the Rotunda in D.C…

In panel three, we finally learn the truth about Mordred, when he tells Spacey, “but then, you’re human.” So Dr. M is actually a space alien, the “granary” is really a disguised space ship, and soon he and Spacey will be going to Uranus!

@BillThompson:

Also, you left out Agent Ennen!

And where’s the PIG ON WHEELS?!?

This has got to be one of the worst hurricanes in Chicago’s history.

Dick Tracy is only human? As opposed to Mordred being inhuman? A vampire? An undead? An alien? A God? or maybe Mordred is really just a woman dressed like a man…?

i always get weak when i look at you with my gun in my hand!

Mordred is a robot! That’s why his mask never comes off. Wonder if he’s related to Watson?

“I know I am are but what am you?”

An extra ten feet of water to cover the second floor of the granary - that’s a LOT for a lake to rise in one (or maybe two) days. Start building the Ark, you lovebirds; you fight like you’ve been married for years.

BillThompson said, about 12 hours ago

…I won’t ask why there’s ankle-deep water on the floor. Thick’s bladder-control problem is too obvious.

Yeah, so the PD has to spend so much on Depends for him that it can’t afford to send Sam to unlearn his 10-3 grip on the steering wheel.

puddleglum1066 said, about 4 hours ago …soon he and Spacey will be going to Uranus!

Please, not mine! Anyone’s but mine!

Why won’t this story end? Why?

Furthering the development of the Final Arc Segment, it wil turn out that the flooming Stradivarius was delivered by ex-East-German sleeper-guy von Kluemeister at the behest of Agent Ennen. It can also be revealed that Dr. Mordred is in fact Agent Norton, who is riding inside the reconstructed, modified and cunningly-disguised Big Bad Rock-‘em-Sock-‘em Robot. Agent Norton is there because she and the other members of the Homeless Alley Cabal played a card game overseen by One-Eyed Jack, using counterfeit thousand dollar bills instead of poker chips to keep track of the winner. She won the chance to give Thick some payback for his bungling. Thick will die of embarrassment when he realizes that for the past eternity he’s been exposing his latent homosexuality to a woman.

Or we could go for the Arclight ending, where the AWACS plane summons a stray B-52 squadron from Frostbite Falls AFB and allows Locher to go out with a bang.

And in a way the rising waters do involve Uranus, once you realize that the “a” is not a long A but a much shorter sound. Thick is doing his best to take the story to Urine-us.

I looked ahead to the work of the new team. People are going to be VERY happy with what’s coming :^ D

Just shoot the fool……………….

True,Mordred, Thick is in big trouble right now. But, old boy, so are you. Have you looked outside that window? Even an Olympic-class swimmer couldn’t hope to survive out there for long. So, I’d recommend prayer right about now. That, and maybe constructing some sort of raft for when the granary breaks up.