Dick Tracy by Mike Curtis and Charles Ettinger for October 22, 2022

and Steely’s evil plan begins now with Robert’s cooperation, whether he wants to or not…

Who’s she? ✨

Neil’s still not here with my ‘copy-paste’ "TM. Looks like self serve again.

Still puzzling whether he likes the name Steelface (which he uses himself) or dislikes it (like he says he did). I think the inconsistencies on this are to let the readers know it’s not his real name, but I find a hobgoblin. (BTW, Emerson said that after his mind was going to excuse himself when people pointed his out.)

Good morning™, everyone!

I guess that Robert’s explanation is roughly accurate, at least as much as you can do in one comic strip frame. Pinfold (who became Derby Dugan) lived under a wooden stoop alongside a backyard tenement. This is what happened to his hair:

“But then one time on his way back home, he ran into the Homicide Flats gang, older boys in checkerboard suits who were killing each other like pirates with stolen rolls of wallpaper and oilcloth. They jumped him and robbed him and set his hair on fire. When he finally showed up, drooling Hail Marys, at the stoop, Pinfold’s ear was bleeding, and his scalp had blistered and was smoking. Overnight, he had fever. It soared and burnt to ash whatever hair he still had left, the few clumps and the stubble, so by daybreak he was bald. Then the chills took him, and his teeth made such a loud clacking sound that Albert Shallow heard it down in the tenement’s coal bin, where he lived. Albert the N*gr* was a condom maker who supplied Pinfold with all his merchandise.”

I’m sure the strip will never get to the selling of condoms or several other things that I could not quote on this site, because I’d likely get banned.

Good morning™, friendly admirers !

Wotta dish !  I hope she doesn’t get caught in any crossfire. I get the feeling that for all the favors he gets from uncle ferrous face he is having to pay an uncomfortable price.

isn’t Robert’s explanation of Derby’s hair loss the same way that Lex Luthor lost HIS hair, but not thru a fever but thru some chemical mist or something similar?…

Real story for the bald-headed kids in the ghetto (see Mickey Dugan) was to rid them of lice. Fever is a more socially acceptable word.

He almost died! It was a really close shave…

Charlie Brown is also bald or at least looks so

There is no ring on her fingers so they are not married. It does not take a detective to notice that !!!

Since little Warbucks refers to his uncle as Arceneaux and not Steelface it’s most likely last Saturdays phone call was either a lapse in memory or a cheap way for team Tracy to get Sam involved and move a boring story along.

I bet he wants a favour.

FINALLY!

Robert is ripped! Yet he going to portray a little boy on stage.

why are his eyes blank? Someone may have mentioned this before -if I missed it, sorry for bringing it up again. I find it disturbing, though.

cue the ominous music

Could she be Roberts’ SO? If so, she seems nice!

“Going to get you that operation! So you’ll have pupils!”

At which point his career went on the skids.

1-DEBBY: Wait. You hired me JUST to read from this book while you do bench presses?

2-ROBERT: You said and I quote: Whatever floats your boat, baby Hang on. I gotta take this.

3-ROBERT: Now? But I just paid…huh? Ok. Yes uncle. Right away.

DEBBY: “Albert the N*gr* was a condom maker who…” I’M NOT READING THIS TRASH! YOUR SKINHEAD HAIRCUT SHOULD’VE TOLD ME ALL I NEEDED TO KNOW ABOUT YOU!

ROBERT: Awh baby – it’s not like… SLAM! Thanks a lot, Uncle…

love the silhouette in third panel

So to get in character…Robert shaved his head. Probably dry style as Telly Savalas did in a couple of Kojak episodes.

Isn’t this nice, Robert has a next door neighbor to help him go over his lines in the play. He keeps his script close at hand like Vitamin does.

Robert and his girlfriend look like nice person. Let’s hope nothing bad will happen to them.

Introductions are over and now we move to the meat of the story

Robert’s friend, with her sharp eye for detail, would be right at home on this board.

Robert is swole. Girl is pretty. Shelley is an awesome artist. Mike is building tension with the possibility that Steelface may get Robert involved in underhanded business – probably to take care of that issue we were learning about yesterday.

is that how he lost his pupils?

The fever caused his hair to fall out ??? It also knocked out his pupils!

Uh-oh. Robert Parrish was working out and chatting with his lady friend (romantic interest? just a friend? fellow exerciser at the gym? roommate? even wife?!) when a phone call from Uncle Arceneaux (sic; thus it is now being spelled, after the original version of “Arcenaux”) interrupted and demanded his presence ASAP! It’s not clear yet what Steelface (a.k.a. Uncle Arceneaux) wants, but it does look as though Bob is being sucked in to criminal activity in some way. Not good for Nephew Robert, but this should advance the plot.

Tomorrow’s Sunday strip could/should go a long way to getting the crime on screen….

That’s how Oliver Warbucks lost HIS hair.It was explained in the “Trixie Tinkle” disastrous wedding " story.