Dick Tracy by Mike Curtis and Charles Ettinger for May 28, 2023

Look now to see so joyfully Sprocket way out west

Domestic bliss in state sun kissed. Changes for the best.

Adam has a new book out entitled, Clock Strikes One

Advance so sweet. Soon meet and greet. Sprocket makes work fun.

Road trip to promote the tome, to gladhand, sign, and smile

Fans in line. The weather fine, and yet all the while

Itinerary takes them east. Next stop, Tracyville

“Susan” keeps up her charade, so cool and calm and chill.

Danger is a specter now emerging from deep sleep

Sprocket acts so nonchalant, yet fear begins to creep

Into her bones, behind her eyes. Wary and alert

She knows if she’s discovered somebody shall get hurt.

On the lam. May have to scram. Left with no time to think

Should someone see behind her mask, she’ll be pushed past the brink.

And in a totally unexpected, shocking, out of the blue surprise, there’s Sprocket . . . er . . . Susan.

Good morning™, everybody!

Okay, we finally meet up with “Susan” (Sprocket) again. As her brother was saying, she does seem to be leading a happy life. I guess they are living out in the country outside Tracy’s city, since they talk about a “trip to the city.” The last time we saw them, Susan was about to accompany Adam on a business trip to California.

Oh my, what a;

touching,

moving,

emotional,

amazing,

waste of time today’s strip is!

The midnight poster changed between panels.

So sloppy! LOL!

Good morning™, aawww, mushy sweetums !

In true Tracy fashion heartbreaking violence would follow. But for now everything is coming up roses in Santa Rosa.

And still a barefoot kiddo.

Welp, time to say goodbye.

I’ll still be eagerly checking the latest Tracy strip each day at the earliest time, but I won’t be posting anymore after today or reading the Comments other than Pequod’s Sunday poems. There’re 2 reasons I’m leaving.

This forum is now dominated by hate against the current strip and its writer. It can get up to 200 posts daily, but much of it is just the same people each posting multiple complaints each day. I don’t agree with them or enjoy reading their posts. The worst of it is I can’t even post a neutral main comment that’s neither attack/defense of the current strip without risking haters seeing my post as a chance to reply to me just to further vent their hate.

But before any of you feel too guilty/gleeful at the idea you “drove me out” there’s another much bigger reason I’m leaving that’s not the fault of any of you. It’s the moderators’ fault.

In 2019, without prior warning/notice the mods banned me. When you’re banned here, you can still post, but all your posts (and your past posts) are invisible to all but you. I had to figure out by myself why no one was responding to me. Once I did, I contacted the mods and was told I was banned cuz they thought my storylists were spam. I vociferously denied it. They relented & lifted the ban. But since then, they’ve occasionally removed some of my list a few days after I posted them. Lately, they’ve gotten much worse.

On 4/7, the mods removed my storylist within hours after I posted it. They’d never been that quick before. I contacted them, but all I got was a standard, generic reply, basically saying, “We mods can remove any post for any reason. We may have removed it for 1)Reason, 2)Reason, 3)Reason, etc, or it may not have been any of these reasons. We don’t care. We’re the mods so we can do what we want.”

Tbc for one more thing (character limits) I won’t miss.

In the previous’ strip comments it is said that this strip is only about making criminals pay for their crimes. This is uncorrect. Once upon a time in the Thirties there was a mob boss, Lips Manlis whoTracy made recantvisvlife of crime and became Bob Honor. We don’t see Lips/Bob making a single day in the stir for the crimes he presumably did to become a mob boss. Then in the Forties there is Steve the Tramp who reformed after doing time and presumably getting paroled. And Pouch got totally away with the murder of popcorn guzzling Johnny Scorn

After Gould we saw the reformed Mousey, Pear Shape and even the murderous Influence. More recently Blaze Rize accomplice of of the new Mr Crime was also reformed. So it’s possible Susan/Sprocket wilk reform

Am I seeing things or does that partially obscured face on the “Midnite Mirror” poster look like … Flattop.

One package containing his books. Adam must be planning to sell them at a book signing. I wonder if the online edition and audio cd’s are available.

Is Susan still on the radar screen of the police department? Whatever it was, she makes Ma Barker and Ugly Christine look like Girl Scouts.

Trying to remember which Brit singer was always barefoot. Sandie Shaw? Oh, my memory theses day…..

In my case, it’s either Uber or Lyft.

There she is! Things appear to be going well for our couple. Part of me hopes that will continue. They deserve some happiness from life. I wonder if their trip to the city is to promote Adam’s book? It’s obvious that he adores Susan. Hopefully she can avoid trouble, but somehow trouble has a way of finding a person when they least expect it.

We got a catch up with Silver Nitrate , a bit about his childhood and now we get a catch up with Sprocket. I am woefully ignorant about SN and Sprocket so I appreciate what has come so far. I just hope Sprocket and Silver are unhinged and villainous and Sprocket . . . what shall I hope for ? A total maniacal bitczch would be nice.

1-CHAINRING: OH BOY! Atom got me a present!

2-ATOM: I hope you like it. CHAINRING: I will so long as it’s not your dam book…

3-…DAM IT! QUIT TRYING TO BOOST YOUR SALES BY BUYING YOUR OWN BOOK!

4-ATOM: You’re so cute when you’re mad.

5-CHAINRING: I forgive you, darling. I’ve got a surprise delivery for you too,,, Ball sack targeted. Fire Knee on 3, 2, 1

ATOM: OWW! mama…

Happiness is not everlasting………..

You cost Sprocket her happy home and she’ll go all Beatrix Kiddo on your backside.

she’ll go to ‘the’ city, there’s only one?

At least she’s still walking on her bare foot.

oh no, Susan will be accompanying Adam to Tracyville, I’m sure… and Tracy will want to meet up with Adam again and Adam will want to show Dick his fiancee and THAT’S when everything will go south for Susan…

and I notice Susan is back to being Shoeless Sprocket with the shades… at least she’s gotten out of the hippie-gear…

Adam and Susan seem so happy together and this accompanying thing will not go well for Susan… I have an awful feeling that their happiness is going to crash and burn when Dick enters the picture and reveals to Adam about Susan’s past…

the question is… how will Adam take to it?…

Adam Austin was the pseudonym used by Gene Colan when he started working for Marvel Comics.

I heard that a recently-posted Midnite MIrror fan fanfic, written by someone only using the initials “S.C.”, styled itself as an “untold” story of how The Chalice prevented a robbery by a gang whose masked leader got away; Chalice only much later found out it was his future arch-enemy: Boss Tracy!!!! LOL

Any other Midnite Mirror short-story descriptions out there? :)

Sprocket’s back!

Aaand here’s SPROCKET! Sprocket Nitrate, or Susan Nitrate, or maybe even Susan Austin—whatever full name she uses currently, makes her reappearance, still apparently living with Adam Austin, author. As they get a shipment of Austin’s new book, The Clocks Strike One, they are planning on a trip to “the city” next week. I take it that this would be Tracyville, and that the writing studio/home they share is in the quiet and remote countryside somewhere not too far from it. For now, all is very lovey-dovey between them; indeed, the last two panels are almost what kids used to call “mushy.”

How long can this idyllic life be sustained?…

I think she is going to kill him once he is rich and successfull !

Well,boredom doesn’t appear to be Sprocket’s problem—-she seems quite well adjusted to “domesticis”.

But she’s going back to Tracytown and the risk of being recognized. Perhaps we’ll learn towards somebody threating to “out” Sprocket, blackmail wise. And does Adam KNOW about her um…past?