The measure of a manIs the type of race he ranThe way he handled painWhen his life brought heavy rainNever has a soul have to bear the tollOf what Matty soon will hearThat his life has disappearedHe wonders why he feelsSomethings missing from the dealWill he accept that he’s not realOr deny this happy meal.
Looks like Matty Squared has a bit of the Rip van Winkle syndrome. “He awakes to discover shocking changes… Van Winkle returns to his village where he recognizes no one. He discovers that his wife has died and that his close friends have fallen in a war or moved away. He gets into trouble when he proclaims himself a loyal subject of King George III, not aware that the American Revolution has taken place.” — Wikipedia
Will Matty Squared him(it)self come to the correct conclusion, that his is only a virtual existence, or will Mr. Bribery and Ygor Glitch have to break the news to “him”; in which case, how will he/it react? An angry program can wreak some interesting havoc!
The new Marty already has murder on his mind. Will Bribery clarity that the new Moon Maid is not the original? Does he intend the new Matty to kill Tracy?
Looking at panel 2 and 3, Prof. Glitch has some resemblance to Matty Squared. If you can undo the disfigurement in the professor’s face, he might look like Matty.
The only things an AI “knows” is whatever the writer of the program puts into it. So, here we have Prof.Glitch programming this “Matty Squared” to appear to be having a “Rip Van Winkle” type of experience, just so Bribery can pretend to interact with it. The character of Mr. Bribery always was quite weird, but is he actually going to start thinking he’s really talking to Matty, even though he himself commissioned Glitch to create the program?
Instead of adding to the death list an animal with a naturally shorter lifespan than humans so that even without the cigars or with the shortened timeline it’d most likely be dead by now, I’d like to take this opportunity to look at how the last story, with Specs & Spicy, didn’t add any new names to the list.The death list was first compiled a year and a month ago during the Nitrates v Mrs. Flattop story. The Specs/Spicy story is the first story since the death list came up, where no one died. That is, where no death was confirmed or even implied. By “implied”, I mean where a death may not have been fully confirmed, but where in the absence of any further evidence, it’s the conclusion you’d naturally come to, where the only reason to doubt they died is the lack of final confirmation. If there’s any reason to doubt it besides the lack of confirmation, then to my mind, it’s not an implied death.While people may have been killed in the safe explosion at the climax of the story, no deaths were mentioned. The safecracker could have been killed in the blast, but since he saw the dynamite before it went off, it’s at least as likely that he turned and ran and managed to get far enough away from the blast that it didn’t kill him. The facts that Specs was injured in the blast but was still well enough to travel soon afterwards while Spicy appears to have survived unscathed add to the possibility that the blast wasn’t as deadly as it looked and that no one was killed. This has inspired me to take a look back at all the stories Curtis & Staton have done where no one died. The first such story was in their first year on the strip in 2011, with the initial return of B-B Eyes. He tried to kill Honeymoon, but thankfully failed.The next time this happened was in 2012, their most “squeamish” year, the only one with multiple stories where no one died. In both of the first two stories introduced that year, Thunderchild and Blackjack, the villains weren’t killed and didn’t kill anybody. In between these two stories, however, was a weeklong subplot of the Second Mr. Crime, where it was implied Abner Kadaver killed Doubleup’s henchman, destroying the prosecution’s case against Doubleup and resulting in his acquittal. The next deathless story was the debut of Mrs. Flattop. She only tried to kill one person, but if she’s succeeded, the strip would be over. The year closed with the return of Broadway Bates, and while he had his moll Belle shot, the last we saw of her she was getting medical attention, making her death uncertain, and by my standard, unimplied.A few months later, in early 2013, we had the Jumbler who wasn’t killed and didn’t kill anybody. And that was the last story we had with no confirmed or implied deaths until now. Which makes the Specs/Spicy story the first story with no deaths that we’ve had in three years.
Right now Matty Squared is a virtual character, but somehow I don’t think he’s going to stay that way. Which wouldn’t disappoint me in the slightest! I like the element of the fantastic in Dick Tracy and always have.
Berke seems to alternate between reruns and new strips. He had an April Fool’s gag that was a hoot, though you’d have to read it on Facebook to actually get it on April the 1st, as GoComics runs them one week later. As for the “hacking” bit, I suspect that that was a gag as well.
cpalmeresq over 8 years ago
This should be very interesting!
Vista Bill Raley and Comet™ over 8 years ago
.Good morning fellow DT fans!.Is this 5 mb hard drive powering the computer with the big monitor in which Matty Squared is residing?.
AnyFace over 8 years ago
My advice to Warren Beatty, sung to that famous tune from *"Frozen" …
“Let it go … Let it go … Then we might get a CW Show …”
avenger09 over 8 years ago
The measure of a manIs the type of race he ranThe way he handled painWhen his life brought heavy rainNever has a soul have to bear the tollOf what Matty soon will hearThat his life has disappearedHe wonders why he feelsSomethings missing from the dealWill he accept that he’s not realOr deny this happy meal.
AnyFace over 8 years ago
Remember when computers relied on punch cards and magnetic tape?
AnyFace over 8 years ago
R.I.P, Kitty. :(
No more “Police Zoo” for you.
AnyFace over 8 years ago
Yikes!
Guess the “Death List” needs to be updated again, huh?
Neil Wick over 8 years ago
Looks like Matty Squared has a bit of the Rip van Winkle syndrome. “He awakes to discover shocking changes… Van Winkle returns to his village where he recognizes no one. He discovers that his wife has died and that his close friends have fallen in a war or moved away. He gets into trouble when he proclaims himself a loyal subject of King George III, not aware that the American Revolution has taken place.” — Wikipedia
jonahhex1 over 8 years ago
WOW…..how can this computer version of him remember all that when he got boiled alive years ago? Or is this one of those moments we suspend disbelief?
Steven Wright over 8 years ago
The picture fine-tunedMatty 2 becomes clearerHow do others feel.Happy to see him? Some yesOthers no its for the best
abdullahbaba999 over 8 years ago
It all makes sense now..
Sisyphos over 8 years ago
Will Matty Squared him(it)self come to the correct conclusion, that his is only a virtual existence, or will Mr. Bribery and Ygor Glitch have to break the news to “him”; in which case, how will he/it react? An angry program can wreak some interesting havoc!
60sFan over 8 years ago
The new Marty already has murder on his mind. Will Bribery clarity that the new Moon Maid is not the original? Does he intend the new Matty to kill Tracy?
WaitingMan over 8 years ago
“Wait. Just a moment.” HAL9000, “2001; A Space Odyssey”
TracyFan 65 over 8 years ago
Kitty! “Big litter box in the sky”?Say it ain’t so!
(OK. How about a descendant who smokes pipes?)
22ph over 8 years ago
Looking at panel 2 and 3, Prof. Glitch has some resemblance to Matty Squared. If you can undo the disfigurement in the professor’s face, he might look like Matty.
Ray Toler over 8 years ago
They could make him a virtual smoking cat.
fhoffman01 over 8 years ago
I always enjoy catching up with Bribery, and this Matty Squared character looks like a hit.
Ken in Ohio over 8 years ago
The only things an AI “knows” is whatever the writer of the program puts into it. So, here we have Prof.Glitch programming this “Matty Squared” to appear to be having a “Rip Van Winkle” type of experience, just so Bribery can pretend to interact with it. The character of Mr. Bribery always was quite weird, but is he actually going to start thinking he’s really talking to Matty, even though he himself commissioned Glitch to create the program?
sjsczurek over 8 years ago
All right. I’m starting to lose faith in this strip. Too many resurrected bad guys.
boboscar over 8 years ago
Instead of adding to the death list an animal with a naturally shorter lifespan than humans so that even without the cigars or with the shortened timeline it’d most likely be dead by now, I’d like to take this opportunity to look at how the last story, with Specs & Spicy, didn’t add any new names to the list.The death list was first compiled a year and a month ago during the Nitrates v Mrs. Flattop story. The Specs/Spicy story is the first story since the death list came up, where no one died. That is, where no death was confirmed or even implied. By “implied”, I mean where a death may not have been fully confirmed, but where in the absence of any further evidence, it’s the conclusion you’d naturally come to, where the only reason to doubt they died is the lack of final confirmation. If there’s any reason to doubt it besides the lack of confirmation, then to my mind, it’s not an implied death.While people may have been killed in the safe explosion at the climax of the story, no deaths were mentioned. The safecracker could have been killed in the blast, but since he saw the dynamite before it went off, it’s at least as likely that he turned and ran and managed to get far enough away from the blast that it didn’t kill him. The facts that Specs was injured in the blast but was still well enough to travel soon afterwards while Spicy appears to have survived unscathed add to the possibility that the blast wasn’t as deadly as it looked and that no one was killed. This has inspired me to take a look back at all the stories Curtis & Staton have done where no one died. The first such story was in their first year on the strip in 2011, with the initial return of B-B Eyes. He tried to kill Honeymoon, but thankfully failed.The next time this happened was in 2012, their most “squeamish” year, the only one with multiple stories where no one died. In both of the first two stories introduced that year, Thunderchild and Blackjack, the villains weren’t killed and didn’t kill anybody. In between these two stories, however, was a weeklong subplot of the Second Mr. Crime, where it was implied Abner Kadaver killed Doubleup’s henchman, destroying the prosecution’s case against Doubleup and resulting in his acquittal. The next deathless story was the debut of Mrs. Flattop. She only tried to kill one person, but if she’s succeeded, the strip would be over. The year closed with the return of Broadway Bates, and while he had his moll Belle shot, the last we saw of her she was getting medical attention, making her death uncertain, and by my standard, unimplied.A few months later, in early 2013, we had the Jumbler who wasn’t killed and didn’t kill anybody. And that was the last story we had with no confirmed or implied deaths until now. Which makes the Specs/Spicy story the first story with no deaths that we’ve had in three years.
Chief Patton over 8 years ago
Right now Matty Squared is a virtual character, but somehow I don’t think he’s going to stay that way. Which wouldn’t disappoint me in the slightest! I like the element of the fantastic in Dick Tracy and always have.
Yngvar Følling over 8 years ago
Berke seems to alternate between reruns and new strips. He had an April Fool’s gag that was a hoot, though you’d have to read it on Facebook to actually get it on April the 1st, as GoComics runs them one week later. As for the “hacking” bit, I suspect that that was a gag as well.