Dick Tracy by Mike Curtis and Charles Ettinger for April 20, 2023

ho hum… another panel of ‘talking heads’…

“You mean the orphan that 80 years later is a real teenager, living here? Sounds right!”

Good morning™, everyone!

“Tell me you’re talking about Little Orphan Annie without telling me you’re talking about Little Orphan Annie.” I suppose a printer’s proof would be more valuable than the ones they sent out to everyone who asked for one. I question the “one of a kind” claim, though. There was only one printer’s proof?

Hello, fellow crime theorists!

So the theory here is that Gameboy is after the map due to its value and the fact that it’s rare and he’s not necessarily after toys. I would be asking the same question that Tracy is, why would Gameboy be interested in it? What is the theory actually based on? Does this guy have a history of taking other rare items besides games or toys? Hopefully we’ll find out.

Good morning™, town “planners” !

Well at least Tracy has a starting point. He did ask for an expert and will now take his advice. Just hope (and know) that it catches a game fish.

Maybe Gameboy is participating in some sort of semi-criminal scavenger hunt.

Anybody figure out yet how or when “gameboy” went from serial bank robber to serial robber of collectable game related items? Think about the HAY-UGE pothole here…we get introduced to a new character that is a bank robber with dice on his mask with a penchant for changing street signs who then is mentioned as robbing ANOTHER bank, then SOMEHOW his motif turns to robbing priceless game related items…yet in this whole time, we’ve only seen him “ONCE” at that first bank robbery with nothing after that…we dont know his motive for the robberies, we known nothing about him…what his ACTUAL name is (just what tracy and his "cameo appearances team) have dubbed him…all we have to go on is pure speculation and supposition courtesy of tracy and his neverending supply of guest appearances who’s opinions he holds in higher regard than the officers of the law with DECADES more crime solving experience under their belts than the cast of pawn stars…nothing like making your team feel exceptionally inferior

So they’re not going to mention the “Time Lost” Island of Simmons Corner arc from Dick Tracy meets The Phantom?

Weren’t Tracy and Annie trapped in a live version of this program at one point?

If Gameboy stole something that valuable, and one of a kind, well known, how could he sell it afterwards?!

Tracy has to leave now and meet up with Punjab: “…bet your bottom dollar that tommmmmorrow, I’ll catch Gameboy……”

Well, I have a feeling we’re approaching the crescendo of the great “suspense” (if you can call it that) of what old Blank Eyes found so long ago in his garage.

’Faire’ suggests a medieval ambience with troubadours, jugglers and jesters, so mayhap we shall espy our olde friende the Bell Bunny anon….

Since the map could be considered merchandise from the radio show, it might fall under the toy category.

C’mon, where’s the violence?

Interesting that the “Popular radio show about an orphan who lived there” I knew Annie and Daddy Warbucks would make another cameo even if it is just as a reference for the plot line.

Steve sure likes to point at stuff. So impolite.

Oh Dude! It’s 420 Day!

A stakeout in a toy convention? Oh, please tell me Tracy isn’t going to cosplay undercover.

A lot of the comments lately (and to some degree are correct) about the slow pace of the strip may need reconsidered. Actual police work involves a LOT of leg work and investigation, following leads, etc. This is reality. Not all police work is shoot ’em up action. Usually we find out that it all fits together later in the story line. There….I feel better now….

So is Little Orphan Annie going to show up? Or maybe Little Arfing Ninny from Pogo?

1-DT off panel and his rocker: So this Simmons Corners is going to be the hottest upscale, gated and restricted housing neighborhood Tracyville has ever seen?

2-…and I can get in now – cheap – before the rest of the market catches on?

STEVE ARINO: Yes! Prices from here are only going way my friend (Steve points skyward with his nice finger as opposed to the bad middle one)

3-…Buy now before I break this to the public at the Metro Toy Faire later today. After that, it’ll be “highest bidder time” as all the rich toy fans bet their last unopened action figure on chance to buy in!

DT: LEMME GET MY CHECKBOOK! STEVE: Uh, cash transfers only. Here’s my Cayman Island account number…

Here is the actual map that is shown in panel 1:

https://i.postimg.cc/MHNWqnGp/Simmons-Corners.jpg

Caption accompanying the map:

“The radio show, Little Orphan Annie, is based upon a newspaper comic strip by the same name by Harold Gray. The show, which was set in the fictional rural American community of Simmons Corners, is praised as being the oldest American children’s radio program. It was released in 1931 and ran until 1942. While Gray’s original comic was often charged with political content, the radio show, which was sponsored by Ovaltine, was largely an advertisement for that product, the promotion of which consumed nearly half of each 15-minute episode. Nonetheless, the show became enormously popular with children across the country. Ovaltine further capitalized on the show by introducing a series of ‘premiums’ obtainable only by mail with a set number of ‘proofs of purchase.’ Among other premiums were coffee mugs, secret decoder rings, and the 1936 map of Annie’s stomping ground, Simmons Corners. The map was drawn by Keith Ward, a well-known American Illustrator and was released in 1936, when Ward was only 20, and was one of his first commercial works.”

You will notice that Annie’s portrait on the left of the bottom seal, has been turned into a silhouette in today’s strip so that we will not notice that today’s Annie could not have lived in 1936 when the map was made. All kinds of paradoxes tend to show up because Mike can’t take his eyes off of the good old days.

You can still buy scanned copies of the map for $50:

https://www.geographicus.com/P/AntiqueMap/simmonscornersannie-ward-1936

So, the convention is taking place in Paris, France? d;o)

Does anyone want to venture a guess as to what famous personage “the dealer” will be based upon?

It is great to be back after six days of having no internet access. Not much changed…Gameboy playing cat and mouse with the authorities.

Weird OT Thought Day: Wondering if I could redo my two stints Carl Kolchak. I narrated a double-bill audio book some years back, but the read was, IMHO, badly flawed, as I was under considerable stress. I lost one parent at the start and the other toward the end. Given time, I could do a significantly better read.

When something, like the Mona Lisa, Van Gogh’s Starry Night, or the {shudder} Simmons Corners map, is the only one in the world, people say it is priceless. In essence, it is worthless. How difficult would it be to fence something so rare? Whoever bought (proving it was not priceless) it could not display it or even show it to friends without risk of exposure (so it is worthless). Unless, like Brock Archive or Art Dekko’s customers, the greedy possession of it is what Gameboy is after. He is taking a huge risk for his passion. Mike must have a lot of Con friends with this attitude to write about them so often. What happened to regular crooks, like Mumbles, who are in it for the money? Oops, Mumbles is now a furry. The phrase should read: “unlike the furry, infantile crook, Mumbles”

When Tracy talks about “staking someone out,” I have visions of some poor sap ending up atop an ant mound covered in honey.

well, kiddies and fellow fruitcake inmates here at the factory, I bring you the latest update as to my physical sciatic situation…I JUST got a call from my primary as to the results of the MRI’s, which were taken yesterday at La Grange hospital… 200 pictures were taken in a matter of 20 minutes and the results were…turns out I have MULTIPLE herniated discs that was the source and reason for the intense pain that I have been experiencing gradually since late November… and that’s it, really… so I have an appointment booked for May 15th to talk to the neurologist about all this… I asked my primary whether this means surgery, which I want to avoid at all costs, but if such must happen, then so be it… and the strangest and most bizarre thing about this all is…since yesterday, AFTER I had the MRI done, the intense pain has stopped… other than SLIGHT traces of sore and ache, for the most part, that nasty pain has seemed to subside at this point… for the first day in quite awhile, I am not moaning and groaning and whining like a little girl… I am sound-free from making all that noise… LOL… and NO, this changes NOTHING about me not feeling any pain… just because I’m not feeling anything, the herniated discs are STILL in there, biding it’s time to once again fook my life up with grief… like I don’t already have enough schitt on my plate to deal with…so that’s it really, fellow class/inmates, just wanted to share with the class with a little show and tell… well, tell, if not show…so til May 15th, I’ll have to ride this out and remain pain-free for the moment and hope it lasts, because that pain I’ve been going through made my keg feel like a red-hot rod of barbed wire was shoved into my leg and being twisted back and forth… I kid you not, that’s how bad it felt, almost to the point of tears… I don’t know what’s made the pain disappear, but I ain’t arguing about it… must be my clean living and my exemplary behavior… LMAO…

Wasn’t there a story arc under the current team that focused on Dick finding himself in a little town where Annie was being held in some sort of odd narative? Tracy had either been drugged or somehow thought he was a foot patrol officer?

Or is that just yet another case f me remembering something that never happened?

Gameboy stated, some time ago, that his interest was in profit, and so if the vintage proof map has any value, sure, he’d be interested, regardless of whether it is or is not a toy, game, or anything else, —as long as it’s convertible into a bundle of cash.

Sigh! Foreshadowing (panel 1, of upcoming Annie visit), minor celebrity crossover (panel 2, that so-called celebrity guy from that TV show, whoever, whatever), and imminent immersion in a toy con (panel 3, “Metro Toy Faire” at the Locher Auditorium). Really pouring the tics and quirks on, this day!