Dick Tracy by Mike Curtis and Charles Ettinger for December 13, 2023

and the bi-t-ch STRIKES!…

Old saying…Never bring a sword to a gun fight.

“Enguard!”

Good morning™, everyone!

… and she suddenly lurches out from behind Tracy, her épée in one hand and her trusty case in the other. Is this the action that avenger09 has been waiting eons for?

(I guess she had the case with her, so they wouldn’t have found anything in her locker at the Club.)

I see rosary beads on a book…is it the bible? She picks the darndest time to “get religion”.

now we shall see if XL really DOES excel at epeeing…

I like the handbag in the last frame. If she looses the épée. Is it handbags at dawn?

Guess I’ll find out tomorrow if the sword is mightier than the gun.

Ms. Libris has a rather poor stance for an Olympic fencer. Granted, it’s been years, but I doubt if she would forget something so basic.

Dick Tracy has turned into an episode of Batman. We even got the tilted floor! All we needed was a written, “SWISH!” on the panel.

To answer you Neil, This isn’t action, it’s silliness!

Shelley’s so disgusted she can’t even bother to try to illustrate properly!

Gweedo’s goats are cracking up over this story!

Neil, rather than your lame attempt at sarcasm, why don’t you admit I’ve been right about this story?

It’s a boring disaster!

Good morning™, suicides by cop !

Is Tracy going to arm wrestle her to prevent getting punctured ?

The upshot on Tracy is really good and I like his intense expression. That whole view feels like looking up for real.

Shouldn’t everyone be quiet in a library?

Gun vs sword: I would put my money on Tracy… plus he is the star !

And the old dumb villain cliche. Sad. For someone as rich like her shoulda attacked through her lawyer instead but noooooo. Very disappointing story throughout.

ARGH!!!!

They did just what I hoped they wouldn’t do…..

They have Libris using a fencing sword after the killing wounds were described as those a fencing sword couldn’t inflict.

Let’s see….serial killer with her favorite weapon – a sword – against the deadliest gunman in fictional law enforcement armed with his trusty .45……

Providing Tracy isn’t slow in reacting, my money’s on him to make this a short and quick “battle”.

At least she has a cape.

Yup. She really did bring an epee to a gunfight.

I do wonder why the sensors don’t work in there, besides the needs of the story.

And XL finally let her hair down.

If she provokes a showdown, she’ll be an Ex Libris.

She won’t go down without a fight.

GREAT AUNT BESSIE"S BUTTERMILK BISCUITS!! THIS STRIP IS TERRIFIC!!

Will Tracy get the “point”? Stay tuned!!

No, as someone pointed out yesterday, they don’t know she’s there. In a fifty room mansion there are a lot of places she could be. And she was warned the police were coming – so she goes to the place they would most obviously suspect?

Well, given her willingness to scatter evidence (when she isn’t trying to remove it) and recruit witnesses/accomplices and bring a sword to a gun fight I think she’s a few quires short of a full codex.

A sword against the modern art of ching ching bang? A 9mm slug is much faster than some silly foil!

She is obviously unfamiliar with the Cairo Swordsman scene from “Raiders of the Lost Ark”

I dunno….something about the last panel makes me think, does Madonna have some “superhero background music” when she comes out of nowhere with her cape (because EVERYONE knows capes dont hinder movement in the least!) fluttering in the wind behind her?

The (sadly) ironic part about today’s offering is that the fluttering cape is the MOST movement we’ve had of this entire waste of ink

Too bad Dick doesn’t have a Tommy gun like the one Warren Beatty was always waving around in the eponymous movie. He would leave XL looking like a chunk of Havarti cheese.

Is she carrying her purse?

BLAM! Case closed.

Definitely not showing Olympic form. And those heels aren’t a normal part of the standard equipment. Hopefully she’s at least wearing a kevlar jacket under her jacket.

Tracy is thinking, “Foiled Again”

Wednesday. No Bozo but Tarzan was good today . The Born Loser was funny . I guess that’s it for today .

She’s wearing heels, a cape and a pencil skirt – she must be an Olympic-level fencer to maneuver in that!

That is one crazy chick. One shot to the knee will bring her down!. ☜⁠ ⁠(⁠↼⁠_⁠↼⁠)

Hello! My name is Xaveria Libris! You killed my plot line! Prepare to die!

I’m minded of an old DT storyline where Liz dispatched a mugger with a knife. The headline read “HOT LEAD VS. COLD STEEL!” :)

You know, it’s a shame. Just think what a cool HERO Libris could have been. She has her own library/Fortress of Solitude. She’s an important member of the fancy pants Choate Club. She has a well done “growly-face”. She’s a deadly swordsman. She’s a WOMAN. All kinds of cool things to make her a comic book hero.

Ah well. Dick probably can’t take the competition anyway.

Sam, Lizz and (from off-panel) Lee are all thinking: “Libris must be going down the middle, since it always turns out that Tracy chooses correctly…I’ll just stay behind and watch.” :LOL

So much for coming out quietly…

(face palm)

And whadya knows. In the end she just jumps into a plot hole.

These are fun but I kinda wish they’d also run a “Classic Dick Tracy” strip like they do with other legacy strips in concert with the current run…

Is Tracy an imbecile now? He goes into a room where he expects to find XL, a person he knows has been killing people with an epee, AND GETS TAKEN BY SURPRISE WHEN THE PERSON IS THERE WITH AN EPEE?!? He wasn’t even holding his gun as though he expected to find someone. Do us a favor XL and have done with him!

What y’all are missing is the actual situation!

Tracy, anticipating such daring lunge and, swiftly tears pages from a dozen rare manuscripts, fabricates a life-sized papier mache marionette of himself. This is what is drawing her fie…er…stabbiness.

Once she’s out in the open, fussing over a broken heel (Thank Gould they ‘stilettos) and tragic run in her Boss Woman’s Finest hose, he’ll swoop down on her in the best Errol Flynn manner and cuff her.

Unless she’s knocked into the nearby volcano.

OT: I see GARFIELD has a goat gag today. Nonononono. Poorly phrased. It ISN’T kinky, I swear!!

If her golden tresses aren’t parted with hot lead in the finest Gouldesque tradition, XL can appropriately mutter Snidely Whiplash’s classic line: “Curses, FOILED again!!”

1-DT: Stay outta the kitchen, Sam. I’ll go alone into the room where she’s most likely holed up and ready to attack…

2-doh dee doh…

3-DT: WHAT THE HELL! YOU’RE IN HERE?!?! XAVI-RHEA: TRACY!!! LOOK!!! I FOUND THE KILLER’S SWORD AND I HAVE EVIDENCE THAT PROVES IT’S FRONTROOM GU…

OFF PANEL: BLAM BLAM BLAM BLAM BLAM! Whewf! That was a close call. I wonder what she was jabbering about? Oh well. CASE CLOSED!

She’d better toss that swizzle stick and get a gun.

Never take an epee to a gun fight.

She brought a knife to a gun fight.

Xaverai is no samurai, but she’s got her thrusters on. I’m going to guess that Tracy prepared for this possibility.

MOVIE QUOTE

“He’s half Cheyenne. Hates white men. Doesn’t mind white women”.

Burl Ives—DAY OF THE OUTLAW—1959

Tracy has the advantage.He’s not wearing high heels

HOLD….EVERYTHING!!

Sam needs time to legally change his name to Porthos.

The brazil nut has cracked wide open.Never mind “thinking straight” and “strategy”—-the woman has lost it.

And she thinks she can beat Dick Tracy one-handed.

Tracy just said to come out quietly. He didn’t say anything about not having a weapon.

Bringing an epee to a gunfight… not smart.

OT: I’ve been sick to my stomach for days and I’m going to the ER. I feel like death warmed over. For my fellow A.D.D. Detectives who can tolerate me, please wish me luck. :(

She is a regular female Errol Flynn….en grade!

X. Libris: Have at thee, knave!

D. Tracy: [bang bang bang]

Oh, looking ahead, in my mind, to tomorrow. Police ballistics panels/amour would stop the sword (should she go for the heart).

Ok, it’s confirmed. The perp is bat-shit crazy and thinks she can slice a bullet in half. We knew she wouldn’t go down quietly…

That gun will be knocked out of his hand in seconds if she is good with that épée.

Épée – Wikipedia

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She’s out of her mind!

She brought a knife to a gunfight. Whatta you think?

Xaviera Libris has snapped. Rather than wait out Tracy and his team and sneak off through some hidden access, she does the Worst Possible Thing. Springing from the shadows at Tracy brandishing her sword (which in panel 3 IMO more resembles a foil, with flexible thin blade, rather than the épée, with triangular-sectioned heavier blade, that we know it is), In her uptight (literally) Ice Queen uniform business suit, XL challenges Tracy directly—surely a suicidal move. Even if Tracy is momentarily startled, he is enough a veteran professional that he will shoot her first, before she can do him any significant harm with her blade. She is not Zorro, unless maybe in her fevered fantasies. Tap 2 + 1. Two nine millimeter slugs to Center Mass, plus one for good measure to the head. Tracy racks up yet another kill. Too bad we are unlikely to learn anything more about her motivations (psychotic? Who knows, or ever will?).

Nice mood-matching art work today, expressing the sheer madness of the moment….