Dick Tracy by Mike Curtis and Charles Ettinger for March 09, 2020

Wow~!! ✨

That’s pretty graphic for the strip these days.

Good morning™, childbirth re enactors !

I could swear Tess is going through it all again, but more like she took a slug to the solar plexis. Maybe one of the boys can give chase while the other tends to the wounded and calls for a rescue.

Pretty crappy aim by Tracy who, standing only a few feet away, had the drop on Shaky – might have cost his wife her life…

Johnny used Tess as a human shield!

Good evening™, story-turners!

Not only was Shaky shot in the shoulder, he’s going to twist an ankle going down those stairs if he isn’t careful! Anyway, it’s not over till it’s over.

I hope Tess isn’t too badly injured, but she certainly looks far from comfortable.

Exciting? Yes.Logical? Definitely not!

Dick sucks as a shooter. What is he, 3 feet away?

Plus yesterday clearly shows Tracy has his gun pointed at Shaky before he even draws his gun. No way he shouldn’t have been shot before he gets a round off. Slow reflexes I guess.

Wanted to give the plot a chance, thought perhaps the shakedown was all a ruse. Unfortunately it doesn’t appear so.

That’s it for now. Gotta go 10-100!

Hey Joe & Mike – Dick Tracy shoots to KILL!!!!!

What the heck is this shoot to wound stuff????

Wow, Tracy fired off one of those “single magic bullets” made famous by the Warren Commission!! How cool is that?

BANG!—first it travels slightly upward towards Shaky’s right collarbone but suddenly, just before impact—ZHINGG—it makes a 90-degree turn to now travel slightly downward, underneath Shaky’s chin and behind his bow tie, before finally striking a—BLOOP—glancing blow to his upper-left bicep.

Either that piece of lead is related to Barry Sanders or else Barry Allen is in the house and pranking all of us…

I’m pretty liberal about plot holes, but c’mon…..Shaky just shot Dick’s wife and now he’s still loose and free, leaving the site????

Today’s strip makes it appear that Shaky did not intend to shoot Tess.

I am surprised Shaky got away, it must be Tracy did not go after him as he was concerned about how bad Tess was injured?

At point blank range and Tracy only wounded him?

I thought Tracy lived in a ranch house. So where did all these Gosh Darn STAIRS come from…?

Dollars to doughnuts Dick Tracy has backup covering all exits of that building. Sam will catch him (I know, I know…)

With all the attention to police killing suspects, do you really expect all three of them to just fill him with lead? Realistically, he could never pull his gun before the three already pointing their weapons could fire repeatedly. But this IS a comic strip, with more drama to squeeze from the moment.

HOORAY! Shaki ran away! He’s too good as a villain to be caught so quickly.

Riffin’ Without A Script continues. Sorry. I was sure it was over…

1-DT’s GUN: BLAM. JAY BOGART’S GUN: BLAM. JAY: HA! You only winged me Tracy. DT AS HIMSELF: No I didn’t. I got you right in the heart. JAY: Then how come I’m still breathing. DTAH: You’re just in shock. JAY: Tell it to your shooting coach. DTAH: I’m the shooting coach. JAY: Yeah. Well I hear Stevie Wonder is looking for a new job. Maybe the department should consider a change.

2-ROCK: Oooh. Let’s say you caught a stray slug. Ahem. This is what happens when everyone in a society is armed. Accidental shootings become commonplace and…

BLONDIE: NO EDITORIALIZING DURING MY BIG DEATH SCENE!

3-JAY: HA! They thought they could get me out the play with that cheap stunt. NO WAY! I aim to see this turkey through to the end. Ha. Aim! Too bad Tracy can’t. Aim I mean. How ironic a cop can’t shoot straight.

♪♫IT’S LIKE RAIIIIINNN, ON YOUR WEDDING DAY, WHO WOULD A THOUGHT, IT…♪♫

SUGAR DADDY FROM OFFSTAGE: SHADDAP. THIS AIN’T NO MUSICAL!

Not only did they have the drop on him, after he’s shot he escapes?!

It seems illogical to shoot to wound someone in the left arm who’s holding a gun in his right hand and shooting at you

Before this week is over, Tess gets rushed to the hospital for emergency surgery. In the waiting room will be: Tracy, Sam, Lizz, Lee, Chief Patton, Johnny, Junior, Sparkle, Honey Moon and Diet Smith plus others. Meanwhile a doctor who still carries his black medical bag comes in to work on Shaky at his hidding place. As he recovers Shaky has to come up with another plan, so he won’t get shot in the other arm. Tracy and Johnny are going to team up to track him down.

She’ll pull threw

At least today we can see more clearly what actually happened. We couldn’t see through all the gunpowder smoke yesterday. It was pretty bold of Shaky to go for his gun yesterday with three guns pointed at him. But, his bet paid off. Tracy, who couldn’t hit the broad side of a barn, hits Shaky in the arm and Tess takes Shaky’s bullet. Shaky makes a hasty exit and no one attempts to stop him since Dick is too stunned and concerned for Tess and Johnny is too worried about getting the blood out of his cool new shirt to follow . Perhaps all a bit illogical for real life but highly dramatic in a comic strip.

If Shaky makes it to his car, we may be in for a new chapter, perhaps an old-fashioned Gouldian chase, instead of a hasty ending. So many possibilities…

Please refrain from mentioning anything Gouldian about this mess. He’s spinning enough.

Since Shaky is right-handed, shouldn’t Dick have aimed for THAT arm? And, I have to agree with someone who said that Tess is possibly wearing some sort of armor. A subdued “Ahhh!” is a bit less than I would expect from someone who was just shot. But then, I’ve never been shot, so I could be very wrong.

Shake it off, dude.

I’ve got an axe and I’m going to chop a hole in the boardwalk and hope Shaky 2 will crawl in.He is now “hotter than a firecracker”,as the old saying goes.And who says Dick Tracy ISN’T a sharpshooter in his own right?

I see Shaky’s end playing out like Sawtooth’s did where Sawtooth was fatally shot and died while leaning on a tombstone ( How ironic ! )

One thing about the collarbone being shot… There are plenty of veins as well as the carotid artery, which will pump out the blood even if “nicked” by a bullet…

And trying to escape will accelerate that probability…

Since they were expecting trouble at the meeting, because they had DT there and everyone had guns out from the begining, it is very likely vests were on all.

In real life Shaky would have so many holes in him that there would be no way to make it to the car. You pull a gun and fire at the police, they’re going to open up on your dumb arse. Thank God.

To discuss “Wayback Machine” stuff.When Sam Catchem first joined up back in 1948-49,he said he’d invented an infra-red camera that took pictures in a dark room just by being taken out of his pocket.We haven’t seen t hat camera in action yet.

C’mon Tracy, you can’t shoot any better than that? Turn in your badge.

Today we get the Big Reveal on the shootout.

Someone had said yesterday that Tracy shot Shaky in his left arm: prescient?

I am a bit surprised that Tracy didn’t pop him center-mass; maybe he made a conscious (and dangerous) choice to wound only. As we see, if so, it was not a good decision. With Tracy and Johnny holding their guns (and Tess, if she is still conscious and on her feet), it is a bit of a stretch to see Shaky making his way down the stairs without visible pursuit; I suppose we are to understand that Tracy and Johnny are tending to Tess, who is, as it would appear, in worse condition than Shaky. I hope the thug does not get away safely, but we shall see (albeit that we can see from panel 1 that he did not deliberately target Tess).

I’m glad Shakey’s not dead, was hoping to see more of Edison.

So basically, Shakey’s crappy plan fell apart at warp speed. And rather than just walk away and take the “L” (No way Dick had enough for an arrest, just on Tess’ word), he goes straight to “DIE TRACY!”

This guy is not going into the Rogues Hall Of Fame.

Wow! The moustache even looks more fake today.