Dick Tracy by Mike Curtis and Charles Ettinger for June 02, 2009

Hey, it’s a clown car in panel 1! You thought have thought about that a lot sooner, Tracy.

I think you should hope the jury in your upcoming trial will be as forgiving.

There’s comics and comics, Mr. Trail.

It’s a good thing for Tracy that this is only a comic. If this were for real, he’s broken so many laws and procedures that he would be headed to prison for a long time.

I guess we could lighten up a bit at that. Last time I checked, Superman isn’t real either which is a good thing considering the way he and his enemies tear up the town when they fight. Real crooks and cops tear up the town bad enough as it is.

I agree with “Marktrail” it is just a comic. You are not evaluating someone’s “Thesis” Enjoy the story or find something else to read. I have been reading Dick Tracy for 70 years. I think the problem is with today’s readers is that there is nothing left to the imagination. All the gizzmos that Diet Smith invented are no longer comic fantasy. Just as Sean Connery playing 007. The weapons he used in the 60’s have been invented and improved upon. The same with the Hardy Boys series. They were excellent books but dull by todays standards. Maybe the solution here is to change the time period of Dick Tracy. Make the comic strip so the stories are set in mid 1940’s to 1955. I enjoy on PBS the Agatha Christie mysteries and the stories have not been updated, but happen back in the old days when mysteries and cime were solved without the aid of modern gadgets.

Tracy always has, and always will be, the ultimate, “Good Guy”. The gadgets were introduced a long time ago to help ensure that the side of good had the tools to win. Somewhere in the 60’s and 70’s, it got way out of hand, with Moon Valley and Moon People, and Junior marrying ET.

The problem that this creates is that it requires better criminals to make the strip work. Instead of creating new and better criminals, the strip of late instead settles for mediocrity, and has to stretch what they can to get a story line. That is why the strip moves at this glacial pace, with all the repetition.

Why is Tracy squinting in the last panel?

This story arc did start out very promising. I know it received praise from this group. But at some point, it lost something. I don’t think it has to be believable, but it does need to be consistent in its own world.

‘stein, say what?

Looks like the city gave Tracy a Toyota Prius to be politically correct. Excellent chase car!

Actually marg, not a clown-car–it resembles precisely a 1957 Morris Oxford (of which clones are still being produced, in India–and despite of much higher sales of other models, the Oxford-clone aka Ambassador or Amby is considered quintessential Indian car).

(edit: in panel 2, the differences become apparent–Amby’s have instruments in middle, not behind steering)

I agree with marktrail. It’s only a comic strip, not real lifr. Sit back and enjoy it for what it is. If you can’t do that, stop reading the strip. How old are you twits anyway?

re: Mark Trail: it’s only a comic… Right, but the critical comments are better

“Nobody owns the pleasure of tones that belongs to the guy with no ear.” - Frank Black

I went to see Star Trek with a bunch of friends last week. There was something subtly wrong with the sound, and it drove half of my friends crazy, so they left and saw a later showing. The rest of us? It didn’t bug us that much. But I wouldn’t tell the ones who left that it was ‘just a movie’ and that they should stop acting like children.

Just because you have a high tolerance doesn’t mean that there’s no such thing as ‘good’ or ‘bad’ comics. A lot of us are here because we recognize that Chester Gould did very good comics, in contrast to what is served up now.

margueritem says: “Hey, It’s a clown car in panel 1 !”

No ! It’s a test model Govenment electrical car (formerly GM). available for sale in the Fall.

Why does Tracy think that B.O. is at Sunny Dell acres ? Remenber, he raced into the Casino without “thinking”, without a call for “back up” once the “Wire” stopped transmitting.

He doesn’t know Mr. Plenty was dropped off in Iowa. Did he check all the back rooms at the Casino ?

Now heading for Sunny Dell he has failed to call for “back up” for the THIRD time, when regulations require he “do so” ! It has become a “laughable” Casino sequence. ! A presentation riddled with buffoonery style errors !

Locher may be writing for a kiddie audience, an invisible one perhaps, for there is NO evidence to suggest one is even there, other than his “off target”, ham-handed, simplistic approach.

But why must he be so startlingly INEPT in doing these presentations properly ?

Seems he learnt nothing at the feet of the great Gould, who effortlessly did it every day !

I am impressed that DT has a flying car. Or maybe he just came off of some sort of stunt ramp in panel 1?

@ Grok: “Sheeple” - nice term. I love it! Describes WAY too many people I have to interact with on a daily basis.

Thanks for adding a new word to my vocabulary!

You’re in good form today Grokstein ! You’ve rebuffed the Apologists. I’ll have to applaud you the way Mattie likes to extoll Locher. But in sincere fashion, not the Downwind Jackson (look the other way - see no flaws) style !

I agree with neonleon, the term “sheepie” describes that hectored outlook perfectly.

You’d think they never read Gould, who’s presentations were at a vastly higher standard. Interesting, gripping ! Not the flawed kindergarten stuff floated out today.

We’ve tasted “better”, we remember “better”, we want “better”, not tasteless, crass mediocraty forced down our throats.

Why should we, like newbie Mattie (not growing up with “better”), now enjoy “PARC” ?

Tracy ran into the casino to rescue B.O. in the first place. Maybe he searched the casino in between yesterday’s strip and today’s and established that B.O. is no longer in the casino – but what makes him think B.O. is at Dell Acres? No one in the casino could have told him that because no one in the casino knows that.

UNLESS … the biker gang / antique motorcycle buffs who brought B.O. home are part of the criminal conspiracy and taking him to Iowa and then bringing him back is all part of the plan.

While I’m imagining Locher might know what he’s doing … no doctor has examined One-Eye Jack and pronounced him dead. Maybe the King shot him with a blank so Tracy would leave him for dead instead of arresting him and that’s all part of the plan too. Mwahahahaha! Fat chance.

-Cougar :{)

Prasrinivara, you were right, in Panel 1 it was a 1957 Morris Oxford or clone. By Panel 2 it had morphed into some other car, and the next time we see it, it will have morphed again into yet another car. Gentlemen, place your bets …

I am betting it won’t be a late-model Crown Vic (because police actually use those….)

-Cougar :{)

H’mmm…ambulence is most likely there for the bad guys that got caught in the bear traps. Still it’s good Tracy’s going to Sunny Dell…in a week or so we’ll be into a new storyline.

Regarding the “Nothing is new” rationale for the mediocrity of this strip, it has nothing to do with time period or gizmoes, or anything of the sort. It’s a lack of creativity in plots and imaginative villains which were always Gould’s stock-in-trade. Check almost any story line/villain from 38 to 55 and he NEVER missed. Made mistakes, sure (See Sydney’s Odd Spots) but the stuff was so good you overlooked it. I defy anyone to cite a good villain coupled with a good story over the last 5-6 years. Why read it?/ Quite frankly habit , and hoping that a good story may transpire.

Dick Tracy statue to stand guard over Naperville Riverwalk

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/chi-dick-tracy-w-zone-03-jun03,0,7425318.story

That’s what I thought as well Judy