Dick Tracy by Mike Curtis and Charles Ettinger for February 16, 2016

.Good morning fellow DT fans!

Tracy smirked and giggled withinAnd rued the year he skipped Spanish for gymHow handy it’d be if he took 101Instead he and Putin could only twiddle thier thumbsHe never enjoyed giving others the leadHe always perferred the position top steedHe reluctantly choose to remain perfectly stillA skill he once learned from his friend VistaBillHe knew before long Wunderbra would explainWhy he and DolverJine lip synched Singing in The Rain

At least Hats make sense in Cuba.

Gweedo remarked to avenger09,Think you can keep it going ’til Bill arrives on the scene at San Juan Hill ?-———————————————————————-.I hope I don’t let youse guys down!

Gweedo cautioned,Make sure to take your guns to town, Bill !-————————————————————-.Gotcha, Gweedo!

Fantastic job conveying the atmosphere today. I’d rather not see it in color, it could only spoil it.

Wonder if the background characters are based on anyone in particular today.

I rather like the balanced detectives of panels 1 and 2, as Tracy and Ivanov lean toward one another across the frames. I also like the seedy characters of 222B passing in review behind them. Panel 3 makes a fine coda. Today’a art work is indeed very musical in its rhythm….

1. So I guess DJ is the Havana equivalent to the Ace of Spades in Tracy’s city (“the local crime boss”).

2. Based on Panel 3, I really think his “look” is more devil horns than “Wolverine.”

3. We have confirmation that neither Tracy nor Ivanov is fluent in Spanish, so they have little idea of what’s going on until Wunbrow explains it to them.

I hate to be nitpicky, but I really think that “Wunbrows” (Panel 2) could benefit from an apostrophe.

It wouldn’t surprise me if, in fact, both Tracy and Ivanov do speak Spanish and are pretending otherwise….

Today’s strip is the definition of the “B” word!Let’s see. . .“Brilliant”? “Beautiful”? “Bountiful”? “Best”?

DJ is really starting to look like Wolverine in the last panel. Or maybe a werewolf.

No sign of Spicy yet.

No, neither Ivanov or Tracy speak Spanish. It’s been established before they speak each other’s languages and that’s all. Here in the Curtis household, my wife Carole is fluent in Spanish. I can follow along and speak a little Japanese, but that’s all for us.

I guess people who frequent that place have a very short “shelf life” what with all the second hand smoke in the air.

Suddenly we’re back in the ‘50s on this strip? Where’d the color go?

This place is 222B – across the street from 221B, home of Sherlock Holmes.

Dick should have no problem taking this DJ character on..

Well, black and white are colors…!

.Thank you my good man for correcting a major blunder (another B word!) on my part! Of course you are absolutely right!

Wunbrow doesn’t look amused by DJ…..

I think that will have to happen off-panel, as it would be repetitive.

Maybe so and maybe not. There are ways to recap things without being repetitive. For example, he could recap bits of the conversation that we didn’t see the first time. Anyway, he’ll likely have to explain what’s going on, whether it be on-panel or off-panel.

Than girl in panel 2 reminds me a lot of “Tongolele”, a famous exotic dancer that emmigrated to Mexico and appeared in many old movies. She has a white hair strike in the forehead too.I always believed she was Cuban, but Wikipedia says she was born in Spokane, Washington.

Interesting place, the Café Humo de Segunda Mano…

From behind, Wunbrow has “Double-Up hair”…..

Thanks JPuz. I don’t often reload the page during the day, just leave it open in a tab, but I reloaded when I saw your comment.

Update from Max Allan Collins. It seems that his constantly delayed heart surgery will finally happen tomorrow: “It appears, at long last, that I will be going in for the open-heart surgery – scheduled for Wednesday, Feb. 17, a day after this update is posted. I suppose anything could happen, but right now this seems carved in stone.”

I was right about the black and white. Tracy’s hat is way too distracting and ruins the atmosphere. B+W served today better.

It appears to be a straw hat. I don’t think I’d have made it quite such a bright colour of yellow.

Too true. Tracy without a yellow hat is like a hot dog without mustard :) (or ketchup if you prefer)