Dick Tracy by Mike Curtis and Charles Ettinger for July 16, 2021

Good morning™, all!

So, I guess now he’s putting up social media posts on their behalf — or is that a press release?

That guy is totally deluded. Someone will suspect those media releases are faked, and specifically Tracy. And Mysta may communicate via her antennae with Honeymoon or her father. And what could he want with Vera and Mysta anyway?

This is preposterous! Pick up a chair and bash him in the head!

Scratch his eyes out!

Kick him in the his Quail eggs!

This train is heading to the usual destination.

Only in Tracyville!

Good morning™, tough talkin’ chickees !

In three panels she goes from gritty to befuzzled. If she were facing him straight on, a spastic knee jerk would wrap him into a neat bow.

Mysta is confident Diet will come looking for her. I am, too, no matter what Archival has up his sleeve with the media post. On the other hand, why hasn’t Mysta signaled Honeymoon telepathically? Did the ring sap her of that ability?

We still haven’t told how exactly did Archival got hold of the ring. Did the mayor sold it in an auction to raise funds for the city or something?

Since you’re holding them hostage have you fed them and allowed them to bathe and take bathroom breaks?

What’s to stop Vera from including a hidden message in a strip? Something that, even if Archival read it before he sent it to Vera’s distributor, he wouldn’t realize what it is, but someone who knows Vera well enough, like his assistant or his ex-wife (Sparkle) would pick up on.

Claw his eyes/grab the ring. Or a well-placed knee will do the trick.

Heavy object. Head. Back turned. Don’t tell me the ring saps Vera’s desire to remain free.

Doesn’t Mysta have a connection of some sort to Honeymoon? Can she use that to signal for help?

In the end we know no one outsmarts Dick Tracy…….right!

I certainly do not like the idea of Mysta waiting for Diet Smith to find her. I have never quite thought of her as a “damsel in distress.” I would expect her to behave in a more proactive manner—particularly after what we saw in her fight with Scar. This “I’ll wait here and play the helpless victim” attitude seems a bit out of character. And I know Vera is a weasel but he is not dead. Even trapped rats fight back when cornered.

When I was in the military, we were told that if we were captured our main duty was to escape by any means necessary. Just because Archival has a ring does that mean that the two can’t gang up on him with regular human abilities?

Konk him in the head when his back is turned. When he goes in the other room, blast the walls and drop the ceiling on him. Yeah, he may have guards but if something like half the house collapses, they can escape in the confusion. They had better come to the conclusion that they can either live as kidnapped victims or they can attempt human methods of escape that do not depend on Moon powers.

I am not a fan of making Mysta or even that bonehead Vera helpless victims. Come on, don’t they both have creative brains? Start planning your escape folks.

1-HORNY: Your mustache needs trimming.

2-STAN LEE: Maybe I like it bushy. Besides, it’s not a mustache…

3-…It’s a womb broom. And this contract to which I’ve forged your names stipulates that you must always refer to it as such.

VERA: THAT’S AWFUL! What else did we agree to???

STAN LEE: You don’t wanna know so soon after you’ve eaten.

Archival can’t spend 24/7 standing watch over Mysta. Once alone, she can blast her way through walls and start wrecking his collection. That will change his behavior.

I hope like everyone involved that Mystra does remember how to alert Honeymoon telepathically!!

The look on Mysta and Vera’s faces…..they are thinking it at the same time….the word “Shazaam”.

“It all be taken care of with this next media post. See for yourselves”. Hmm…did Archival go on Facebook? Posted something like due to the recent book tour with Vera, she is going on a leave of absence.

Kerry Drake in the 40s..Deadpan captured cartoonist, cartoonist put message H-E-L-P in dailies. Vera ain’t that smart, and our “storytellers” ain’t that creative. For excitement..check out Candorville

This strip is getting boring

MUST…NOT…KILL! Wait, what the heck, go ahead and kill this pseudo-Sauron!

A lot of excellent facial expressions in Joe’s work today—Mysta outraged and then baffled, cowardly creepy Vera, and smug-as-can-be Brock Archival! (Never trust a man who wears ’70s-style turtlenecks in the 2020s—and , yes, that applies to both Brock and Vile!)

Simply in the practical comic strip sense, I think that this can’t go on much longer without some sort of action by the prisoners, successful or not….

That ring is some kind of Lunarian energy dampening field.