Dick Tracy by Mike Curtis and Charles Ettinger for July 25, 2013

Now you’re talking.

Good morning everyone…

Go get ’em, boys!

Good morning, VB!

MORNING TO YOU V.B. and all. I love the way this group pulls together. Didn’t take much for Sam to get Chief Patton out from behind that desk and ready to rock-n-roll.

Yesterday I stumbled onto an interesting continuity tidbit.Up until now, most of us have been assuming (due to her youthful appearance) that Honeymoon was four or five years old when Moon Maid died in the 1978 car explosion. Since Honeymoon is now confirmed to be eleven years old, this would mean about six or seven years have passed in Tracy time since the explosion.Yet in these panels from 1972, Honeymoon confirmed that she was already seven years old. (I like her cheeky reply to Groovy, “Check!”):Even assuming she did not age another day between the 1972 date and the car explosion, this means that in Tracy time, only four years at most have past since the car blast and the present day. If Honeymoon aged as little as two years between ’72 and ’78, the explosion happened just two years ago!Another implication is that Junior and Sparkle have been married only 2-3 years at most.

But Jewel Tracy has got to be older than that!

Now I’m wondering what these two are planning.Add that to wondering what’s next (if anything) with Fritz Ann. And the doings on the Wheaton farm. And Hy Pressure’s plan. And Drs. Sail and Ghote. And…

What kind of help does the Chief have in mind?

Sam Catchem and Pat Patton! What better back-up could a Tracy (Dick or Junior) want?! Now, how to unravel this tangled web Team Tracy has woven?

Pat was Tracy’s partner for just a year? That distortion bothers me more than Honeymoon’s age.

So lets get this right. We are suppose to adjust everything to try to make Honeymoon 7 years old before MM died because that age is mentioned in one strip. But we ignore that her birthday was in 1965 as specifically stated in the same strip?

How about we just enjoy the ride that Mike and Joe are giving us, and not worry so much about dates and ages? It’s a comic strip.

(Although the idea that Tracy and Pat were partners for only one year…???? That one seems a stretch. Too bad Mike had to put a “hard number” on it. When will that come back to haunt a future creator on the series?)

Not crazy about the “for a year” part either. Maybe it’s just a typo and was supposed to be “for years”.

Literary license. In the Oz series, no one grows or dies (unless destroyed or eaten by some creature,) yet Dorothy ages from around 6 to approximately 12 and Ozma from perhaps 8 to 16 or 17.

Pat’s got so many stars on his collar he ought to be called General instead of chief.

Pat and Dick were partners for more than a year. Someone made a mistake.

From Wikipedia:

Pat Patton was Tracy’s long-time partner and later was appointed Brandon’s successor as Chief of Police. Formerly a steel worker. He served as Tracy’s sidekick until he was eventually replaced by Sam Catchem in 1949.

I guess if “Peanutbutter” makes a future appearance, we’ll be discussing the timelines, again (guessing he’s about to enter adulthood)…

If you want to wonder about age in the comics, you would be in big trouble:

He was already a hardboiled detective in 1931, when he first appeared in print. Assuming he walked a beat first, he should be over 30, which would make him about 113 years old.

He is pretty tough for someone who has been a senior citizen for over 50 years

From yesterday: tsull2121 said @Sweet Betty

betty, WAS the truck at the station? cause i remember sparkle left the station early to go to an interview.. i had assumed it was at a different building.*********************From what I recall, Sparkle was shown telling Gertie about the meeting and that she wouldn’t be long and then shown encountering MM outside of a building. Granted, she could have gotten into a vehicle and driven to some other location but the implication I got was that this took place right outside the radio station, can’t be sure though.

My take on all this “timeline” discussion: I agree with you all that time needs to be flexible in a comic strip, and we shouldn’t try to nail down too many specifics. After all, look how many actual years Junior stayed a kid, until he suddenly took an interest in girls in the Model story of the mid 50s. It’s the nature of a long running comic strip – in fact, it’s a nice problem to have, because it means our favorite strip has been around for a long time.

Having said that, I do wish Pat had said “for years” instead of “for a year”. Not for the time issues involved, but because of what it means to his relationship with Tracy. They went through so much together – molded into hot wax tubes, baked inside a flaming tank, rescuing each other from countless traps, etc. “For years”, without specifying how many years, would have been a perfect solution.

Thank you, Tarry Plaguer, for the instructions on how to make type bold or italic.

Posted by Mike on the Yahoo group:

“it got past all of us.

Instead of A YEAR it should read YEARS. Patton and Tracy were partners forYEARS.

Sorry about that.

Mike"

Trying to determine a specific time within the context of a comic strip is a fool’s errand.

Look at it this way: Suppose you were reading a novel where all of the action takes place within a single day but you decide to only read one paragraph a day. It may take you a year or more to complete the novel. Yet, within the context of the story you have just read, the action still only takes place in one day.

A comic strip is analagous to the situation I have just described. We are reading a comic strip one paragraph a day.

Sparkle was zapped by Moon Maid on May 28th but in the context of the story that was only a few days ago.

Moon Maid hots wired a car and at Diet Smith Industries on June 27th but was not seen driving away until three days later on June 30th. She made her escape and stopped for the night at the Dairyland exit on July 3rd three days later. Bear in mind, all of these events happened within a few hours.

Yesterday was July 27th (24 days after MM stopped for the night) and in the context of the story it is the next morning.

Simultaneous to Moon Maid’s escape, Tracy and Bardoll have had their fight. In the context of the strip, this action happened yesterday or at most the day before yesterday. Consequently nearly a month of “real time” have passed while only a couple of days have passed in the context of the strip.

Sure Sparkle was zapped on May 28th in “real time” but to the characters in the strip, this happened only a few days ago. Therefore, Sparkle’s amnesia has only been short-term in the context of the story (perhaps only 3 or 4 days).

Does this give a formula for time in the Tracyverse? The answer is no. Time in Tracy land is based on how long it takes to tell the story and how many panels that involves. There can be no definite formula because the ability to visually and verbally tell the story changes from tale to tale.

This is an interesting discussion. I’m glad Mike Curtis and Ray have cleared up the “one year” controversy.As for Honeymoon being at least seven when the car exploded, that blows my mind a little since I have been one of the people who assumed all along she was only four. She looked so young, but then again she looked even younger in the 1972 strip that Willy linked, where she was seven. I guess she was just small for her size.Based on the discussion, it seems like the 1972 dating could be made to work, except for the big monkey wrench of Jewel’s age. I recall Mike Curtis saying she’s around six, which would blow up the 1972 continuity since that means Junior and Sparkle have been married at least seven years, which would make Honeymoon 14 or 15.I suppose these things are bound to happen in a daily strip that’s over 80 years old and has gone through several changes of management.

Will a certain few of you relaxxxxx?THIS IS A COMIC STRIP!!! Jeez, almost EVERY strip’s characters don’t age at the same rate as real life…..Tracy didn’t exactly age under Chester G. before either……give Mike & Joe a break!

that said, to those of you upset we’re still waiting to see who or what Dr. Sail’s really about; that’s understandable because it does seem we were yanked away rather abruptly from that part of the story…..but I’m thinking perhaps it would give away part of the Moon Maid end if we learned everything now…..

When I was checking out the scene Ray posted, I ran across these panels. Just to verify that Mysta dresses like a typical moon girl:

It ain’t the first time Mike and Joe have had a blunder. Anyone recall when the old Ghote made his first appearance and was named “Doctor Zygote”?

That said, how many blunders have we had (one) in Mike and Joe’s tenure and (two) under previous management?

Now, for my take on today’s action: There wasn’t any. It would seem that Pat and Sam were already in the thick of things since Bardoll. That the “one year” comment has made such a stink indicates, I think, that there was little else of interest in today’s strip…

Oops!Well another note for something to fix when the e-book comes out.

Willy, in the topmost authentic and autographed glossy photo of MM, she needed a shoehorn to get into that outfit, and even at that, some didn’t get quite in!

Late in the day, and probably no one will notice.

Perhaps the biggest fly in the ointment of the time theories is that we may end up with there having been insufficient time to have declared Mysta “legally dead.” All we would have is the presumption that no one could have survived that blast.

And the gist of the current story arc is that, in all likelihood, someone did – namely, Mysta!

Here is a technical question for those of you who have knowledge about these things. . .

We’ve been speaking about a “typo” today. In the old days, comics were hand lettered. Are they actually using a keyboarded font these days, or are they still hand lettered? Does anyone know? As a retired printer, I’m just curious.

Dick Tracy is lettered using a font.

The 7 Most Disastrous Typos Of All Time

Very apropos, Tarry!