Dick Tracy by Mike Curtis and Charles Ettinger for September 18, 2008

The Incredible Shrinking Traze-R?

This strip has gotten rather silly as of late. I’d really like to see it return to a more Chester-Gould style of the 1940’s

I’m with you on that.

I still think Mumbles must be hiding inside of Traze-R. “I hav a suprize for u, Trcy” means that he’s about to shoot Dick in the head with the gun hidden in the robot’s pointing finger. Dick needs to get a king-sized can opener, so he can pry that little scalawag out of there!

What’s the deal with the crease in the side of Tracy’s face in panel 2?

The artwork has been so sloppy lately. Robo-Tracy’s hands are so crappy in panel 2 that Locher should be embarrassed.

Hey Jeff! When you and Todo do your thing with Locker later on, ask him to please get back to what made Tracy a hero cop. He ain’t doin’ DT no favors now, fan-wise!

Robo-Dick looks like he’s ready to take the wax out of Tracy’s left ear. Is that shadow in the second panel Queenie taking her dive in the smokestake?

Dorothy, please take pictures of your road trip with Toto & post them so us Magpies can share in your joy.

So far, it would seem this story-line will end quickly. Robo-Dick can apparently end a problem fast.

However, I wonder whether the crooks will figure out it’s under Tracy’s voice control. If they can copy his voice…..

DT has a sleep line on his face in panel 2. Even DT can’t be entertained for long, watching a robot open a carton of milk. He took a little nappy nap, just like I did when I read this strip. I think Lochner forgot a panel. Panel 3 should have been DT turning to traze-R and saying “Great Traze-R, but Diet is to big to go into buildings.”

The comments here are hilarious- this is as good as “Mystery Science Theater 3000”! :)

Your suggestion, morrow, first of all, assumes that I share your pain, which I don’t really. In the interest of FULL DISCLOSURE – whenever I visit with Dick I almost always share some of the commentary I read from here and over on the Yahoo! Group re: the current strip. Usually, I’m sharing details of my latest disagreements with other critics over the strip. Secondly, morrow, my sharing all of your criticisms here is basically unnecessary, because DL knows what you’re all saying here and elsewhere. He hears your feedback from 2 sources – first, his lovely wife, Mary, generally keeps up with this task for him and, secondly, Dick receives regular feedback from his Editor at TMS who is keeping abreast of your comments and opinions here and elsewhere. To TMS, naturally, its about business and how best to market the current strip to potential newspaper customers. For Dick, though, just like Gould, Fletcher, Collins & Kilian before him, its as much about maintaining the strip’s current readership as well as gaining insight on the current “pulse” for future stories to gain NEW readers.

How do I know that the TMS folks read your comments here, you ask? Well, at the 75th Anniversary reception TMS held in Tribune Tower in Oct. 2006, I had the pleasure of meeting several members of TMS marketing/licensing staff who work hard every day to sell the strip to newspapers and they told me as much.

Also, bassmanbob, I don’t (and NEVER have, to be clear) think of you or any others who may disagree with my opinions or “take” on the current strip here as “Magpies,” so please don’t lump me into this. Your “beef” is with MPH, not me. He’s my colleague and friend, and just as I respect YOUR right to your own opinion, I likewise respect MPH’s right to his, as well. We’ll see about the pic’s you mention. I’m more interested in DL’s comments, though.

In response to a newspaper reporter’s recent interview question to DL, he responded…

“My 10,000th cartoon is close,” he said, hinting at retirement. “There are other hills to climb, and it’s been a great run. I’m looking forward to the retirement cake.”

…signalling for the first time, publicly, that he may be retiring from creating his Editorial Cartoon’s (now 4/week) after 38 years for the Chicago Tribune.

Ha ha, DT does have a huge sleep line on his face!! I think that TRAZE-R is getting ready to pick his nose for him if Tracy does not wake up soon. WK UP TRACY. IM GNG TO PCK YUR NZE!!

Jeffrey, so good to hear from you. I never said you consider anyone who differs with you a Magpie. However, your admitted friendship and association with MPH(Toto for the uninformed)PLUS your trip to Mecca with him links you with him and his opinion of us. I beg to differ with you that you respect our opinions based on your past trashing of some of us, but hey that’s all water under the bridge(or a Big Mac already in Diet’s stomach). Mr. Locher(I don’t have that close, personal relationship like you do to call him DL) certainly deserves to call it quits when he thinks it’s time.(believe it or not I do mean that sincerly and respectfully). You know, you really should give a little history of who you are for the rookies here. Not everyone understands what an honor it is to share even a few moments in cyberspace with someone as esteemed as you.

Chow,,,, Mein.

BB

Please forgive me, but I can’t help myself:

For the historical record of DL’s career it is significant to understand that it was at the insistence of one of his instructor’s Carl Ed (pronounced “E-eed”, creator of Harold Teen), while attending the Chicago Academy of Fine Arts, that he interviewed with Chet Gould for the position of “assistant” in 1957. As you know, he was hired immediately by Gould and the two became fast friends. Gould really respected Dick’s recent USAF experiences as well as his earlier work assisting Rick Yager (another Academy instructor) on Buck Rogers.

When Gould won his first (of two) National Cartoonist Society’s REUBEN award for highest achievement in 1958, he praised DL’s valuable assistance in helping him get Tracy and Supt. Whitehall off Granite Island – he even had Dick on-hand as his guest that night (with his wife, Edna) to receive the award, despite the fact that Gould, at the time, had four OTHER assistant’s who he could have credited that night in accepting the award (Jack Ryan, Coleman Anderson, Al Valanis & his brother, Ray), but did not.

Dick left Gould’s team in early 1961 to help his family in IA who needed him. In the mid-sixties, he joined a commercial design studio where he is known to have contributed to the creation of the McDonald’s characters. He also once shared with me that for a VERY brief time in the early Sixties, he worked at United Production of America (UPA) as a staff animation artist on their MR. MAGOO animated TV series.

In 1973, when the Chicago Tribune’s legendary editorial cartoonist, Joe Parrish, announced plans to retire, it was…CHESTER GOULD…who notified Dick about the opening, encouraging him to submit his work. Plus, Gould is known to have put in a “word” for DL with his good old friend, Tribune Managing Editor, Bill Clark. His work soon replaced Parrish’s and he went on to receiving the Pulitzer in 1983. It was at the exact same time when Dick Fletcher is known to have learned from his doctor the mortal nature of his health ailments and, upon notifying his partner, Al Collins, and the TMS brass, Gould similarly received word of the sad news about his old friend and assistant from Dick’s wife, Beverly, and, once again, picked up the telephone and reached out to Dick and Bill Clark, suggesting that Locher would make for a natural replacement when Fletcher could no longer work.

The thing that DL and I share the most in our years of friendship, I feel, is our “kindred” love, respect and admiration of Chester Gould.

Thank you for the history, Jeff, but I still don’t know who ‘you’ are in relation to Dick Locher, etc.

Don’t be silly, bassmanbob! I claim no such esteem, as you say, and my words and comments are shared here without any such expectation, as such.

Anyway, today’s comments seem to indicate that Tracy’s “sleep line” in Panel 2 has everyone already pretty SLEEPY, so I certainly wouldn’t want to contribute to this any further by sharing the RIP of my old tales. Perhaps another time, bassmanbob. When it is time, I’ll likely announce when the new “virtual” Museum website will be launched. For now, though, I’m happy just to share here as an observer and historian of the strip.

Chow!….Mein!, INDEED!

Jeff, Jeff, Jeff. Your hulmility is awe-inspiring! It’s bringing tears to my eyes!(Either that or the fact that I re-read today’s strip). Don’t short change yourself Mr. J.(can I call you that)? You and Toto ARE the future of Dick Tracy land! It is because of devotion such as yours that the rides stay open, even past Labor day. Please don’t be shy. Go ahead and tell all the new members of our family who you are. I tip my bass to you.

Rock on you silly rabbit!

One quick addition/clarification to the little “history” lesson – in the most recent iteration of Gould’s assistance to DL (in 1983), IMPORTANTLY, Chet also put in a good word about Dick to then TMS CEO John Reed, as well.

Though I’m unaware of the details of DL’s retirement plans, I would expect we will hear more about it sometime after the upcoming election.

I agree with you, bassmanbob, he has more than earned the right to begin retirement (at age 79!) on his own terms. I know, though, that even in retirement, not a single day will go by without Dick creating at least one (if not a half-dozen or more!) editorial cartoons. You see, he’s in a 38 year routine that will endure the rest of his life, published or unpublished. It is interesting to note ALSO that Paul Conrad (still the ONLY 3-time Pulitzer Prize winner for Editorial Cartooning) retired from the L.A. Times in 1997, yet he still produces near similar output as DL has over the past year or more (~4/week) for his syndicate IN retirement. We’ll see!

I appreciate the kind tipping of your bass, bassmanbob! I’ve unfortunately found myself ONCE AGAIN here continuing to procrastinate listing a ton of newspaper comics on eBay. The next panel of our session here will have to wait for another day, pal. In the meantime, margueritem, you can check out my Facebook page…if its at all helpful, I don’t know…and I’ll just say briefly that when I was 15 years old, I helped the family of Chester Gould and a group of interested adults open and maintain the Chester Gould-Dick Tracy Museum in my hometown where I grew up and where Gould lived the last 50 years of his life a generous neighbor – Woodstock, Illinois.

What Jeff is trying to say, boys and girls, is that he and an unforgettable fellow named Matthew P. Hansel are (were) Board Members of the Dick Tracy Museum - which closed this summer (?). Matthew (Mattie, MPH, BNM, or Toto, as he was affectionately called) was noted for being quick to light up with most people who were critical of Dick Locher. Matter-of-fact, his rantings actually attracted people to the discussion site (Comicspage.com) He was as entertaining - no, MORE entertaining - than the stories. Someone once asked him what he’d do to get a job with Locher and I would be embarassed to venture a guess. But both of them (Mattie and Jeff) are very knowledgeable on the subject. Jeff has quite a bit more gentleman to him, which shows. Mattie would correct your grammar or choice of words in a heartbeat; Jeff is more mature about it. Personally, I like to meet Jeff and buy him a drink - maybe even supper. MPH, well….., that’s a different story. Ludwig could fill you in better than I can.

“Personally, I like to meet Jeff and buy him a drink”

Morrow, shouldn’t that be ‘I’d’?

Ye Gads, the spirit of Mattie has taken over. Quick, someone Traze-R me!

“Sigh”, those were the days. I feel bad for everyone who missed them. Matthew was da ma(n).

Matthew, if your lurking(we all know you are) PLEASE check in. It’s so boring without you. You have a whole new group of people to hate and despise!

Peace

BB

Jeff, I know the museum and Woodstock IL quite well. We lived in Crytal Lake for 30 years. My husband would see Chester Gould on the Northwestern every week taking his strips down to the Tribune. I’m sorry to read that the museum closed. I’m not a member of Facebook, and don’t plan to be, otherwise I would check your page.

That said, I feel that the strip had gotten quite silly, and I just stopped reading it. I started paying attention to it again when GoComics underwent it’s latest overhaul.

BB, my apology on the grammar. I was typing on a laptop whilst sitting in my car and trying to balance the laptop on my knees and the remote aircard sitting precariously on the dashboard. I did mean “I’d”. Likewise, if Toto was grading these “epistles”, he’d jump you for using the word “your” when you meant to use the contraction “you’re”. BUT I WOULDN’T, because my buddies can use whatever punctuation they want and the message is still the same. And you, BB, are my buddy! We’ve both taken the same lashings because we aren’t important!

I’m not around for the day and look at all the love I come back to!!!

Morrow, I think you summed the situation up nicely in one of your posts. MPH is a blowhard who doesn’t respect anyone’s opinion if it doesn’t align with his. I am very grateful when he’s not around because he turns the tenor of things very negative.

I don’t blame Tracy for his sleep line because this story is dragging on and on and on…ZZZZzzzzzzz.

Hey Morrow, how are things at your house after Ike?? Are things improving any?

Ludwig, thanks for asking. Pull up The Houston Chronicle and it is full of stories and pics. The dark part is that literally thousands of people are MIA. They can only estimate how many stayed (1 big city and 2 small towns) and they can’t be found anywhere. Thousands of them disappeared into thin air. The USCG (Coast Guard) thinks the tidal wave came in as a wall of water, exploded the houses, and when it ebbed a few minutes later, pulled them out to sea. Normally, a body would bloat and float back to shore. But the mixer was so violent, they could have been pulled to pieces. But as of tonight, there are thousands reported missing by their families. We (my wife and myself) are the luckiest people alive! And, we are 1 mile to the water!