Dick Tracy by Mike Curtis and Charles Ettinger for August 07, 2013

Rut Roh! now what?

Hhhmmm . . .

That’s some development.

Or is this Mysta NOT at all what she seems?

maybe there are a few flaws in clone MM/Mista after all!

Of all times for a power failure!

Well, the Energizer Bunny, she’s not!

Well, I’d certainly give her a jump.

Love the new banner on top of the page!

Wow….now THAT is an unexpected development.

By the way….doesn’t weather affect how well she does? I seem to remember her being better in extreme cold for some reason…….

Batteries not included.

So Hy Pressure gets no high voltage. Aw, rats… I wanted to see Hy change his Miami-vice-wannabe hairstyle to a Tesla-inspired afro.

Uh-oh…..a Mysta without special powers? Better clear out, now!

Has Mysta been out of the sun too long? I seem to recall that MM was solar powered.

Uh-oh, battery’s running low! She’s been away from the charging station for too long. I remember now, that the doctor was saying she wasn’t back yet, and I said to myself that she wasn’t coming back, but it looks like she might have to.

First Honeymoon loses her abilities, now Mysta losing hers? Crikey! Maybe they’ve been away from the moon too long?

Looks like a symptom possibly of degenerating cloning…. Or, it may be something else. Regardless, Clone-Moon Maid the Superhero has fizzled out. Did Hy notice her taking aim?

The new banner is the work of Shelley Pleger and Shane Fisher from Team Tracy. I think it turned out very well. I congratulate them on the nomination and I hope they win, but I think they will have an even better chance of winning next year with this Moon Maid storyline. (Maybe two years in a row? That’s really counting your chickens before they’re hatched, but the nomination is great already.)

Okay, who saw this one coming, detectives? I sure didn’t!

As soon I quit drooling over what is probably the sexiest comic strip character in history, I will congratulate TEAM TRACY on the nomination. Well deserved. I will say it again and again, you have made the comic strip enjoyable again. Staton outdoes himself each day with his drawings of Mysta Tracy.

Someone called this , yesterday! And yes, the new banner is fantastic, Gould would have loved it!

Maybe the batteries in fake MM’s costume have died…. should have used Duracells!!!

@solarrhino,“Well, I’d certainly give her a jump!”

Then you might be arrested for assault and ‘battery’!

A superhero losing their powers is one of the oldest tropes in comics.

She’s left-handed?

Didn’t see that one coming.

here’s a thought for you all that just popped into my head. when the characer in todays strip approached honeymoon it was mentioned that honeymoon didnt have her horns/antannea anymore, just bumps where they used to be.. and it seems her magnetic powers arent around anymore either… then honeymoon commented to tracy that this character’s horns were real but they looked scarred… now the power loss on her part as well.

could this be mike’s way of “de-emphasizing” the moon connection and making the characters all “human” again? maybe the horns werent scarred so much as in the process of de-generation, and this sudden power loss is the next step?

Not a shock. Clearly, any fear that there would be reliance on Mysta’s powers to solve cases was misplaced. It appears that in addition to the abandonment and destruction of Moon Valley, that Mysta now has no powers, or at least no reliable powers. This was lightly foreshadowed when Mysta saw Honeymoon. There will likely be no further trips to the moon, or use of Mysta’s powers. This should address the largest concerns and criticisms of the minority who did not care for the “Moon Era.” For those of us who loved that era—many of whom started reading DT in the ‘60s—we have the immense pleasure of seeing Mysta returned to the strip.

Once Moon Maid saved a child from freezing by radiating her warmth during a snowstorm. Her powers became depleted to the point where she had to be hospitalized. In the hospital she refused to obey the nurses or doctors and would sit all day on the hospital balcony soaking in the sun’s rays for several days in order to rejuvenate.

That may or may not be what’s happening here but her powers were never unlimited.

how come her left thumb looks like a duck?________________

Locher was well-known for hiding duck drawings in his panels.

Dick Tracy: As Mysta is about to “zap” Hy Pressure, her “powers” fail…

Into every super hero’s life some kryptonite must fall…

I will second and third the notion that this is, in fact, welcome!

It appears that many of us do want Mysta back, and as a regular character, but share the concerns of others that this was going to turn into a superhero comic strip.

Moon Valley is gone, that was told over Christmas 2012. As Pequod77 suggests, further trips to the moon certainly appear to be out.

Still, Mysta has been unfairly stripped of her earthly family; it seems even more unfair to strip her of her other family, as well.

Yes, we have seen a glimpse of Moon Governor (not a favorite character of mine – seems to embody all the worst of any in-law I have ever had). But Mike and Joe have proven to be the kings of tease – with no real commitment (or pressing need) to bring back the character.

Moon Maid needs to be a strong character – not just a sexy body on hand for comic relief.

(Which was how she was used on the Archie TV show)

The original Moon Maid needed to be in the sun for periods of time to renew her powers. One plot, way back then, by the bad guys to catch her was to lure her into an old bank vault. It didn’t work very well for the baddies. But she did need sunlight to renew her strength.

Morning Vista Bill and all.

Add my name to the growing list congratulating Team Tracy on the Harvey Award nomination and the amazing new banner!

Good morning everyone…

I never, never would have suspected this! What now?

A Playboy Bunny and the Eveready Bunny are two diff’rent animals! Maybe she needs to find a welding shop for a quick charge!

Oh no! Now that weasel will be able to capture her, and, and – I haven’t a clue what’ll happen next!And why has Mysta lost her powers? Is she solar powered? That outfit she’d been wearing in the Wheaton home certainly covered her up (and if she is solar powered, now we have a really good reason for her moon bunny outfit!)This story has more twists and turns than a San Francisco road map!

When Moon Maid first came to Earth, the other characters were more baffled by what she could do. That was because Gould treated her abilities more as a special talent rather than as super powers. This is a subtle difference.

She was unique only in context of Earth people. She did not think of her abilities as “powers” that I can ever remember. Coming from a civilization where everyone had the same abilities, she did not think of herself as being particularly more powerful than anyone else. In fact, rather than putting on her costume to fight crime (“This looks like a job for Moon Maid”) she went on tour frying eggs in her hand and then freezing water into ice as entertainment.

Under Gould, her abilities were considered somewhat of a nuisance. She unknowingly disrupted telephone communication with the electricity constantly shooting from her horns. Even though this was inadvertent, she was considered a menace rather than some kind of super hero and was taken into government custody.

Moon Maid first appeared in 1963. At first, Tracy et. al. seemed more amused than amazed at what she could do. Tracy utilized her abilities to freeze crooks in their tracks or make them confess. However, in 1966 the Supreme Court passed the Miranda Ruling and freezing crooks without giving them their rights became illegal. (Tracy groused that it seemed the crooks now had all the rights).

When she married Junior, she promised not to use her powers on Earth. This promise was a bit hollow. Her abilities were more like a sixth sense. Could you promise never to use your innate abilities? Could you, for example, promise never to use your sense of smell again? If you went to another world, would you refer to your sense of touch as a “power?” I don’t recall Gould ever referring to Moon Maid’s abilities as “powers.”

Gould gleaned a lot of humor from her difficulty in trying NOT to use her natural talents—more like Samantha in Bewitched—using her generated heat to cook a turkey behind Junior’s back, etc.

Occasionally, Tracy would call her in to help on a case but it was usually to electronically open a safe or locked door—more like a talented safe-cracker than a super hero.

Instead, I believe Gould went to lengths to show that despite their strange abilities, Moon People were logically and emotionally pretty much like humans. They fell in love, they could be both benevolent and treacherous, they could display greed and anger, they like to watch television, they liked sports, etc.

Although Mike is the world’s greatest Superman fan and Joe comes from a Super-Hero Comic background, I was hoping that because of their experience they did not turn Mysta into some sort of super hero. Super heroes have a flamboyance as seemed to be shown in the last panel on Sunday (“Mindy can’t do it, but MOON MAID CAN!”). The original Moon Maid was not flamboyant in the least. She was more naive and shy (refusing to let people photograph her, etc.). The charm of Moon Maid was focused on these qualities rather than becoming a super crime fighter. Even when MM helped Tracy, he was the one in charge. There was no mistake that Moon Maid’s abilities, no matter how fantastic, took a back seat to Tracy’s deductive abilities.

I have a feeling it’s remorse, and physiological. Last strip showed her having thoughts about Sparkle, now she cannot spark Hy Pressure?

Not flamboyant? She embodies it!______________________

She has been portrayed in a more flamboyant manner in this incarnation.

stilldamatt, that was unecesssary and uncalled for ;) lol

Marty and Spud is not nominated, but I notice that all the nominees other than Dick Tracy are recently developed strips, the oldest being less than 20 years old.

Mutts is tied with Calvin and Hobbes for the most wins (7) in the history of the award, but Cul de Sac won last year and I think this is it’s last chance to win, since the creator, Richard Thompson, retired due to Parkinson’s. I’m assuming the current Cul de Sac strips are “re-runs.”

Dreams are good for some things but the Final 2013 ballot can be found online.

A couple of minor thoughts. If anyone has followed the cloning news stories of the last few years, when they attempted to clone a cat the resulting kittens had similar but Not identical markings to the original. They were indeed perfect DNA clones but they were not perfect duplicates of the DNA donor. It appears that at least some of our appearance is governed by what happens in the womb, not just genes.Second, clones do not inherit donor parent memories. Those are made over the course of a lifetime and quite simply can’t be passed on via DNA. If the artists/writers here are trying to throw any real science in then they have to both know this and be banking on it. If so, they’re dropping huge hints here that this is the real MM. I’d love to see it so, if only for the fun of seeing how Junior deals with bigamy. And I hate the idea that the writers are playing cruel emotional games with Honeymoon if they make her a fake.

Rista: On bigamy, I agree with tsull2121, though on slightly different grounds.

Bigamy is the act of deliberately marrying another, fully knowing that the previous spouse is yet alive. This Junior did not do. Whether Mysta actually died which, as you eloquently pointed out, has been put in serious doubt by the current story line, Junior still had no reason to know or believe it.

Since Mysta’s identity is still not completely revealed to us, the readers, and even less known to the inhabitants of Tracyland, Junior is still very much innocent of having committed bigamy, even if, as it appears to be turning out, he now has two wives.

I do not know if there is a name for the situation that Mike and Joe may have created here, which is Junior’s having married another woman, fully believing that his beloved Mysta was dead, who may have joined Mark Twain in the comment: “Reports of my demise are greatly exaggerated.”

It’s what I’m on pins and needles waiting for.

I’m also very hopeful that, in the end, there is no incredibly complicated story line involving cloning, regeneration, recreation, and especially memory implantation.

This is independent of my “prejudice,” if you will, in wanting Mysta to be the real deal.

I share the concern of those whom I have called Mysta foes in that, while Dick Tracy has always had an element of science fiction, let us not go over the top!

After all, this is Dick Tracy, not Doctor Who!

What MM/Mysta needs (quickly) is a recharge. Perhaps if she touches the posts on the car battery, she’d recharge. Or, maybe a AAA road service truck will show up and offer a jump start.

Oh bummer! Now what?

You may be losing your powers but you still look hot MM!

M&S?…….. yeah, sure Matt.