Dick Tracy by Mike Curtis and Charles Ettinger for March 31, 2024

And we were coming up with silly stories of how the parental wishes were screwed up. We should have known.

Good morning™, everyone!

So, we finally get an explanation of how Mr. Smith could have been unaware of the contents of that envelope until now. It’s a bit of a stretch, but I suppose it’s just barely plausible.

At first glance, I couldn’t figure out how they would even know Oliver Warbucks, to leave Annie in his custody. I forgot, momentarily, that they were working for Warbucks as housekeepers in order to cover their role as FBI agents. So, I guess it was just fate that Annie ended up in the custody of “Daddy” Warbucks, anyway. At least this revelation doesn’t interfere with the status quo.

now ‘Daddy’ is by all intents, purposes and legalities, truly Annie’s Daddy…

Wishing everyone, especially my biggest fan Jim Douglas, a wonderful and meaningful Easter.

Good morning™, Kid Keepers !

Custody award … FULFILLED !

Leapin’ Lizards!

Oliver Warbucks? Did the Gray’s pick him from out of the phone book? Did their positions as FBI agents afford them a way to do a background check on Warbucks?

To all those who celebrate the holiday, Happy Easter!

I have the feeling Harold & Winifred were never found by the FBI because they really weren’t FBI agents, but wannabe FBI agent cosplayers running around waving plastic water guns & ID badges they got out of a cereal box. Their complete disappearance from the face of the Earth is really for the best, on many levels.

Are you telling me that the premise of all the adventures, trials and experiences of Lil Orphan Annie is all because of clumsiness of an incompetent lawyer who didn’t do his due diligence by not being meticulous with correspondences he receives?

MICHAEL!?!

Mmmm. I wonder what Annie would have been like if she’d grown up in the lap of luxury from a baby?

Just needed to ratify what we already knew…..

He was the garage guy?!

Love the story, but the maple syrup, to me is a stretch!

It’s an Easter…. uh… miracle? Maybe?

Please, please, please let this be the end of the utter nonsense in Dick Tracy. And, Lord, if that is too much to ask for – even on a day celebrating the triumph of your power – can it at least be the end of this inane arc so we can get utter nonsense in a new story line?

So, you can just drop your baby off at an orphanage, and specify that you want a rich tycoon to adopt her?

Having brekkers with Rip Haywire at the IHOP, perchance?

“No, Warbucks the PLUMBER! Sheesh! The kid’s so doomed with this goober. It’s back to the orphanage for YOU, kid. Just lie about your age.”

1-DT: So you’ve had this info for years and you were – what – trying to figure out how to milk some dough out of it?

2-BOB ESQUIRE: While that is the general sentiment of The Lawyer’s Pledge that’s not the case. Nah. It got stuck to another piece of mail from other clients directing me what to do with THEIR kid in the event of their death. I tossed ‘em in a box in the garage thinking there was no hurry.

3-DADDY-O: Yeah? Who was that one from? BOB ESQ: Thomas and Martha Wayne. They wanted YOU, Daddy-O, to take Bruce AND THEIR FORTUNE Probably too late to act on that now.

DADDY-O: WHY, YOU USELESS SON OF A BI…. ANNIE: Don’t be upset, Daddy-O – you got me and Sandy! DADDY-O: ARRRRRRGHHHH!!!!

Tracy barely manages to tear Daddy-O’s hands from Bob Esquire’s throat

Ah yes, the old maple syrup ploy………..

Charge that man with gross negligence.

After everybody sits blinking for a minute, Tracy gets up and says, Well – matter settled! On to Monday’s case! Bye…_

What a surprise!

We haven’t yet seen the parents’ remaining half of the broken locket (let’s call it Half #1) after leaving the other half (#2) with baby Annie.

Who has Half #1? Did the Grays keep it, or did they send it to Smith in the misplaced envelope? It seems like that’s the only way neither Warbucks or Annie knew about it.

Who has Half #2? What was the information by the Grays that was in the note left with Annie for the asylum’s matron (i.e. Ms. Asthma)? Does Asthma still have possession of #2? (I assume she’s very possibly still alive, since LOA always had Annie being brought home by Warbucks during the first months of the series, and even by the time of the real Gray’s death 44 years later that was still just a few years ago in the strip’s timeline, since Annie still looked the same.)

Miss Asthma last appeared in 1934—con artists paid her off to testify that their female accomplice was Annie’s real Mother.

When Mr .Am walked into the fourth Dimension in the middle of his 1937 lunacy trial,he also walked out of the st rip until 1948

we should have known that some ninety years ago!

Didn’t this guy have a secretary to help him go through all that correspondence? He probably was a tightwad.

My understanding is that Oliver Warbucks didn’t just adopt Annie because his wife did not approve of her. Yet in all the years I’d read the comic I’d never seen Mrs. Warbucks nor even heard of her. I got my information from an outside source.