Dick Tracy by Mike Curtis and Charles Ettinger for February 17, 2013

Boy Tracy works fast! Sweatbox seems strong but I’m betting Mole is stronger.

Good ol’ Mr. Mole. I wouldn’t bet against him in this fight!

It all depends if it’s a fair fight, or whether Slimey … oops Sweaty is armed! my guess is Mole will be shot, but will recover and Sweaty will hide in the marsh while Toad gets away to safety

On the other hand, a well-placed girl-bite might get Sweaty to release his grip on Mole! ;)

It doesn’t get any more exciting than this!

The Mole is tougher than he looks, just ask Tracy.

Sweatbox thinks that because he works out he’s a tough guy, heh? He doesn’t know the incredible power in the hands of an angry Mole! This could be a truly epic hand-to-hand battle! Go, Mole!And—run, Toad, run!

I wonder what the trib ran today, instead?

Good morning all…

My money is on Mole.

Sweatbox, you are SO busted. If Mole does or doesn’t get him, Tracy and Lee will put him away for a LONG time.

He thinks he can break the Mole in two? Hhahahahhehehehheeeeeehahahahahoho!Get’im, Mole! and Run, Toad!

It’s great that Mole will get a shot at Sweaty, but police using a civilian to spring a trap? Did Mole use special skills (stealth? burrowing?) to get into position, in a way one of Tracy’s finest could not? I’d have liked to see this plot point played out over a longer timeframe — more suspense, less surprise.

Sweatbox was a fool. Kidnapping Toad all but confirms his guilt in the murders, no other testimony needed.

I am hoping Sweatbox doesn’t die..We need to get a Full Explanation of events at Camp Freedom. And just who IS that second skeleton?

It looks like Mole stopped to untie Toad after he grabbed her from the back seat of the car. He would have beeen better advised to just run with her, to get them both out of harm’s way. Now, Sweatbox was able to slide across the front seat and wrestle with Mole.

If I remember from the original Gould strips of long ago, Mole has extremely strong hands and arms from digging tunnels under Chicago in his bad old days. I think he killed a few bad guys with his bare hands. Lets hope sweaty doesn’t know that.

Who’s gonna break who in two? I wouldn’t want to be SB right now.

Yesterday, Bill Thompson asked :" . . . .. Was Sweatbox modelled on John Wayne Gacy ? "

I’m told on the appearance side, the model might be American Film Director - Quintin Tarentino ! ?

. See post # 16418 on the Dick Tracy Yahoo board for a picture of the gentleman. And as you look, think ‘exagerated’ facial features of that likeness, to arrive at Sweatbox, and note too Tarentino’s thining hair over patches of scalp.

I’ll wait until this plays out before I comment fully. But right now plot logic seems off-the-rails to me. A big part of which has to do w/ why Sweatbox kidnapped Toad in the 1st place…unless all those bones in the crypt are children’s bones? (Sweatbox is crazy child killer & his betraying actions are compulsive?)

The irony of my avatar & last “insight” doesn’t escape me. Ha!

Ah, I see. The police’s plan was to have George Tawara record a fake confession, then broadcast it only to Sweatbox’s phone. That would give them the time to triangulate his position and close in.

My guess is that Mole will almost but not quite kill Sweatbox, realizing at the last moment that Toad is watching.

Thanks for that insight, Sydney. That’s definitely part of the issue— maybe Sweatbox’s “screen-time” has been reduced? For the past few weeks, he’s been a fairly peripheral character so it’s been hard to gauge his motivations. It’s only been in the past couple days that he’s even been revealed as the Big Bad. I’ll hold by tongue (text) for now & see what happens this next few. There are a couple other story elements that I’ve found confusing as well but perhaps proper denouement is around the corner!

This has got to be one of the all-time best thrillers in DT history – including Gould, Killian, et al! Team Tracy knows how to spin a tale, and it shows! Thanks, guys! And thank the Sleep Fairy for not waking up the troll! Let him slumber with his cat!

Having taken a quick look at the Times edition of the Sunday Tracy, it looks to me as if they ran the exact same page as we are seeing here.

My money is on Mole, but Sweatbox isn’t going to make it easy

Woo hoo! Mole to the rescue!But how will this affect Tracy’s trap?And maybe Sweaty is as strong as he claims…This tale is one of Team Tracy’s best yet! (Love the way Mole has become a major supporting character – and hero!)

When Tracy finally gets there, it will be reminiscent of Montgomery marching into Palermo, only to find Patton.

Great move! I will not be surprised, if they find out that Mole actually burrowed to the car underground. My money too is on Mole to take care of Sweatbaux and I hope for good.

Heh heh! Dig! Dig! Dig!…Wrong Mole? But they look so much alike!

If you think about it much, does this story make any sense?

Chicago Tribune has several different panels today which change the story completely. Instead of Toad bound and gagged, the Tribune shows a drawing of the Baux tomb. Fifth panel is from the point of view inside the car and shows Mole reaching in to grab Sweatbox with no dialogue. Last panel shows Mole and Sweatbox nose to nose with Mole saying: “Where is Toad?”

In the final panel of the Tribune version, we see Tracy and Lee in their car reflected in Sweatbox’s rear view mirror.

The Tribune’s version stinks, glad we have the original story, but, it is very interesting to compare them

If the Chi Tribune is running a different strip, it makes you wonder why Tribune Media Service is sending a different strip to every other paper in the country.

No such thing as a “fair fight.” You fight you win, lose or draw. But Sweatbox will probably kill if given the chance.^^Well, by fair fight, I mean whether SB will fight Mole hand-to-hand (fair) or shoot the unarmed Mole (unfair)

Amazing how frightened “The Tribune” is here. Ridiculously so. They are fearful of losing their more hyper sensitive readers.^^Yes, really, there’s nothing in the original story that Gould wouldn’t have done….well, maybe Gould wouldn’t have had a longtime serial killer but, I think they should have run it “As is”

@Ken in Ohio ^^Yeah really, as I said yesterday, if the Chicago Tribune can’t support it’s own flagship comic, who can?

I wonder if perhaps the Tribune offered two versions to the various newspapers that take “Dick Tracy”, one the version that we’re seeing and one “sanitized” version which they themselves have been running. It’s been done before.

Too bad a crime strip can’t portray certain crimes according to the Tribune’s censors. I wonder if the two versions will have different resolutions to the story.

A poster yesterday compared this to Looney Toons and it seems that is what the Chicago Tribune is making it.A crime strip by nature should be gritty in tone. But the Tribune (to which I subscribe since I live in Chicago) wants to “soften” Dick Tracy by not acknowledging that pedophilia or kidnapping exist. Perhaps this attitude is why Chicago is the crime capital of the country. No one wants to admit that these types of crimes really exist.

If they ever compile these strips in reprint form, I wonder which version they will use—The Tribune version or the version everybody else in the USA saw?

I don’t know what happens to the original art on these strips, but I would assume that having both versions printed would make the “alternate” artwork worth more $$$. Some comic collectors will purchase two or three of the same book or magazine just to have the alternate cover. The Tribs running the different version also certainly has drummed up a lot of interest and conversation, like we have here. Someone said any publicity is good publicity.

Re: My comment earlier today. I was mistaken; Toad was in the front passenger seat, not the back seat. I looked at the art yesterday more closely. I still don’t understand why Mole didn’t run with Toad, and untie her after they were safely away. But, maybe he just wasn’t thinking clearly.

You know, Sweatbox only gave Mr. Tawara one hour to go on the tv with his “confession” – that was some mighty fast work by everybody, to get that phony video prepared and sent to Sweatbox’ mobile phone.

Ken, in the GoComics version (last panel) today, it seems she is taking off the last strand of rope ? That implies Mole started the job for her ? She’s free to run now - - as he suggests..

When accessing today’s Dick Tracy on the Tribune’s web site the Comics Kingdom version comes up (same as the GoComics version). So only the paper version of the Tribune’s Dick Tracy is censored.

By coincidence, volume 14 of The Complete Dick Tracy (1951-1953) shows an example of a censored strip from January 6, 1952. Spinner ReCord is striking Margie, who is tied to a chair. The censored version replaces the drawing of Spinner striking Margie with text. Further, in a subsequent a panel showing a fleeing Spinner struck in the shoulder by a bullet, the “Bang” and the path of the bullet are removed.

The decision to censor the strip is unfortunate, especially as it dilutes the sense of danger to Toad. Her absence in the censored version lessens the chance for a lesson about speaking to strangers to be taught to young readers.

The stupid bowdlerizing by the Chicago Tribune editorial Timid Timmies is part and parcel of its decline (it is now the second largest daily in town). It has become editorially a part of the Rahm Machine. That’s a big part of why I no longer read the print edition though I am a Chicagolander and cut my reading teeth on the Tribune during WW II, when I was not yet of grammar school age….

Sadly Disappointed With The New Storyline, By Gulliver. The Censorship Has Made This Story Very Confusing. Both Today And A Few Days Ago! Could It Be That The Censorship Is A Decision By The TMS Editors?

Disappointed And Confused. The Recent Third Panel Replacement Affair Is Confusing. The February 11th Newspaper Strips Apparently Choose To Run A Different, You Could Say Safer Third Or Last Panel. This Leaves The Reader To Speculate: Was The Drawing In That Last Panel That Terrible That They Needed To Remove It Entirely And A Better Drawn Panel From Later In The Week Put In As A Last Minute Replacement? Or Did That Last Panel Upset An Editor So Much That It Had To Be Supplanted With A Kinder, Softer Or Less Controversial Drawing?Did The Cartoon Figures Say The Wrong Things To Each Other? Or Were The Cartoon Figures Put In A Seemingly Bad Situation? The Panel that Ran Online, (Not In Print), Appears To Show A Young Child In the Passenger Seat Of A Car, Seated Next To A Sweaty Old Man, No Less. Could This Be What The Editors Saw As Being Over The Top? It Remains To Be Seen. Inappropriate Conversation? It Remains To Be Seen.

This Story Remains Dull And Boring. Hope It Turns Around Soon, Even If It Means Replacing More Frames On A Daily Basis. Seems More Panels Might Need To Be Removed To Make A Better Story.Do Something Even If It’s Wrong! This Whole Mess Reminds You Of This Week’s Carnival Cruise Line Passenger Ship Horrible World Tragedy. A Limited Tragedy Of Personal Discomfort, That Ship Was A Floating Petri Dish. And The Only Thing That All The Passengers Had To Eat All Week Was Warm Water And Onion Sandwiches! Just What Are The Owners Of That Passengers Ship Trying To Hide? ( Seen With Today’s News Stories … ) And Similarly Here On The Daily Tracy Strip; --Just How Many Onion Sandwiches Must The Readers Here Endure? *.Some Examples Of More Exciting Entertainment… -Rewatching Banana Joe Win The Westminster Dog Show, The First Affenpinscher, Ever! (Looks Just Like A Little Werewolf!) – Reading The Transcripts Of The 2013 State of the Union Address. – and (sadly) …. Sleeping…..(sigh)

Children who watch TV are exposed to much more dangerous situations than this strip has shown. What, exactly, points Sweatbox being a pedaphile?

George must have gone to Tracy right away and they set up the fake confession. They do work fast!

Dick Tracy sure has some strange looking characters!

why did they call her little Toad?!!!!!….she looks like a big young woman geez!!!!!!!!!!!

I’m just surprised the Chicago Tribune has the editorial energy to spend on this (newspaper staffs being very thin these days).

Thanks to all for clarification on Tracy’s ignorance of Mole’s actions. I maintain that this turn of events would’ve been easier to follow if it had been spread out across a few more strips. Also, while the bowdlerized Tribune version is confusing and frustratingly “watered down,” I LOVE those last two Sunday panels, of Mole lunging at Sweatbox and demanding Toad’s whereabouts. Kindly old Mole is a force to be reckoned with!