Dick Tracy by Mike Curtis and Charles Ettinger for April 26, 2020

Confinement meant Scar could not know the fate of her old friend

Mindy died and no one cried. Sail caused her awful end.

The doctors they were flying blind, injecting DNA

From dear departed Moon Maid, who surfaced in a way

None predicted, nor foretold. Lunarian did rise

Chimera changing to this day. Can see it in her eyes.

Scarmony bitter. Wants revenge. So much she does not know

“Drop the gun!” Dick Tracy’s here. Now back to jail you go.

Mysta’s one tough cookie. Withstands all pain and harm

She writes to her abductor. Buys a pony farm.

Moral of this story, the low-down take away

Mysta pleased to be herself and celebrate each day.

The minit’s done

It’s sure been fun

I’m sorry to see it go

Although the plot

For some wasn’t hot

I throughly enjoyed the show

It was truly fun

Like a casual run

To be enjoyed as it is

No need to complain

My attention didn’t wane

2 weeks of stressless bliss

Tomorrow alas

My joy will pass

Resuming the tale of B.O.

I’ll give it a chance

Much more than a glance

But I fear it’s gonna be more P.O.

Three cheers for C-man

He proved that you can

In only 2 weeks tell a tale

That from beginning to end

Was able to send

A stimulus check in the mail

I am going to miss this Mysta, she won my heart!

Back to Mike and Joe’s Barf inducing version!

(Don’t hate on me!)LOL!

Charlie, we hardly knew ye…Don’t be a stranger to this board.

Well done Charlie, thank you!

The $64 question now is:

Will Mike take this into the “canon”?

If Mysta now remembers Mindy, how will that affect her relationship with other characters (such as Honeymoon, Sparkle, Junior – and – most of all – Lizz?)

Kidnapping and tying her to a chair was hardly conductive to an happy reunion, Scarmony

Charlie Wise my compliments for a nice and interesting story!

Oh no! Mysta bought the farm. How sad.

Good morning™, Mindy lover and haters!

Scarmony is not only getting letters from Mysta. I see that she has drawings from the two girls posted on her wall.

Good morning™, equestrian-loving inmates!

Aww shucks, Charlie, how’d ya know I’m a sucker fer happy endings?! The past two weeks have been like a parking-lot carnival ride: wild, woozy, and much too short! I got extra tickets—can we go again? Huh, huh, can we, can we…?

Good morning™, pony farmer charmers !

I like the panel two ghostly reminder of who Mysta used to be, with all the bitterness of her former self coming through. P.4, looks like Honeymoon holding the phone but who is the hair ?  P.5, shows me a contented Scarface, and I bet, a feeling she has not known for a long time.

“Scarmony and me, we’re pretty good company.”

I wasn’t at all sure about the drawing style of this MM story, but it really grew on my over the run of it. The third panel is a beaut, and we actually got some real character development in this one, rather than a purely throw-away mystery. Good job guys.

So apparently, Mysta stunned Scar to save her life, because the cops were going to shoot her. I didn’t get that yesterday.

Can we truly call this a Minit Mystery, when there was no mystery to solve?

“Colt Triplett”, incidentally, is a callback to Mike’s “Shanda the Panda”. This is a family strip, so I can’t explain why his nickname was “Tripod”. ;D

“Now let’s get everyone into quarantine. Robert Crumb’s given you all the mumps.”

Great story, many thanks to Charlie!

Great wrap-up! I was thinking that this backstory deserved a longer arc, though. Great job!!!

That was indeed a great story, well done team!

Wait… WHAT? Even Tracy admits this was a stupid mystery! Bought WHAT? A pony farm?

I am totally confused. I never fully understood the Mysta story because I came in late. Is Mysta really Mindy? What is the relationship between Mysta, Mindy and Crystal? Who’s dead and who’s not? Why is this a minute mystery? What did Mysta buy? (next to last panel)The artwork was interesting and provocative. I wouldn’t want it to replace the regular one but it was fun on the short term.

Scarmony put on a little weight since yesterday’s panel? And I thought Mysta wanted nothing to do with her former identity…

aw

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Charlie, you do a great job drawing women, but drawing Tracy himself, not so much. And, we got a different take and look on Lizz (hairstyle and hat hearkens back to Gould, always drawn in action rather than just standing there like Fletcher). I thought the take on Lizz was refreshing and I loved Sam back in his Fletcher-inspired checkered coat.

There was a lot to like in both your drawing and your writing for this story (actually more of a short, self-contained episode with a beginning, middle, and end). I liked how all of the MCU worked on the case (except Lee Ebony, who was probably on vacation again).

I liked opening up the action to the lunch counter instead of just talking heads in the squad room. Mike should take a tip and find more ways to open the action to other locations. I’d like to see the interrogation room or the conference room of the police station. I would like to see the squad on the streets flatfooting it more often. Sanitary squad rooms with talking heads lose the grit of the city. Your skid row deserted warehouse presented a location that brought back some of the grittiness that has gradually been lost from the strip.

I agree with Neil that nothing in the story was out of character for Mysta yet, I also agree with Avenger09 that your take on the character was much more human and likeable rather than simply beautiful. Perhaps your Mysta wasn’t the perfect Barbi doll Mysta who is breathtakingly beautiful but you made an approachable Mysta in a t-shirt with ruffled hair. No perfect Mysta here, we see that she has both compassion and a temper. I must admit that I like this imperfect Mysta better.

In the 2nd panel of the middle row – is the bald headed girl what Mysta looked like back when she was Min? Yikes. That version would’ve never tempted Mr. Roboto.

When Honeymoon said “She bought it” I didn’t see at first that she meant the pony farm.

I thought, briefly, that somehow the whole thing was a plot between the girls to get Mysta to recover her memories. Crazy, I know.

Co-dependence,

Toxic co-dependence!

Co-dependence,

The game we love to play!

What was the mystery?

Lousy artwork. All the women looked alike.

Thank goodness this is over

Nothing in this last two weeks make any sense whatsoever. Why is Mysta saying Mysta bought it? Please, no more of these awful minit mysteries. There wasn’t even a question in this one much less a mystery.

I didn’t get the entire thing.

???

After a few nay sayers, I thought I’d jump back in and say that this has been one of the best stories in Dick Tracy, let alone Minute Mysteries.

I’m with StillDaMan on this one: Mindy ought to be allowed her previous memories. This total amnesia of who she was previously may have worked in one of those “I don’t know who I am” kind of mysteries, but has just never seemed to work for me, no matter what you guys want to say about Moon DNA.

To me, Moon DNA was just a plot device to have “a” Moon Maid in the stable, further starving those of us who would have loved to have had the return of the real Moon Maid – all the while, and at the same time – enraging those who wished they had never been a Moon Maid – even in the 1960s – in the first place!

As introduced, Mindy-as-Mysta, or Franken-Mindy (I believe I coined that name – but I meant it affectionately) – was a lose-lose for Team Tracy. Franken-Mindy managed to offend both Mysta fans and foes alike.

And maybe that’s why we don’t see that much of her anymore.

But the story Charlie just gave us also gave us some delicious possibilities.

But will Mike and Joe “nibble”?

And the final question: Just what would Team Tracy – and their characters – do if Mindy’s memories did return?

These should be re-named, " 2 Week Mysteries," because they’re boring, and last 2 wks. Get back to the regular Tracy strip.

No one who thought this two week “minit thingee” was “great” has ever been a fan of the real Dick Tracy. Katy Keene, Archie, Harold Teen maybe but not Dick Tracy. Please start collecting the IDW reprints and see what you are missing. Most are on sale and there are only 2 remaining in the series.

At least this story was able to stick the landing.

I’m going to only say this once, so listen closely, Charlie, if I ever ended up getting the gig writing Tracy, I’d beg, implore, grovel, and flat out DEMAND the powers that be to assign you as my artist.

your take on the characters is refreshing and offbeat, and I believe with a bit more exposure and time on the strip working with them, youd settle into an AMAZING groove and make these characters your own.

This is BY FAR the most entertaining, well planned, well presented, well paced minit mystery…AND Tracy story in a long loooong time!

KUDOS…. and hopefully you’ll stick around the boards for a while.

That Metropolis gig at the Patterson Playhouse musta paid her big time bucks to afford buying a farm.

Gotta wonder tho… is it the farm that Ghote and Sail met their end at?

A beautifully melancholy ending for a charming tale, with invigorating artwork! Well done, Charlie. One of the best Minit Mysteries, maybe the best. It was great fun!