Dick Tracy by Mike Curtis and Charles Ettinger for December 14, 2008

An Electronic Eulogy:

I met a detective from an antique land Who said: A vast and legless trunk of steel Stands in the city. Near it on the asphalt, Wires trailing, a shatter’d visage lies, whose frown And slotted mouth and sneer of cold command Tell that its programmer well those passions read Which yet survive, stamp’d on these lifeless things, The hand that mock’d them and the heart that fed. And on the pedestal these words appear: “My name is Magnum/Brute Force, king of robots: Look on my works, police persons, and despair!” Nothing beside remains: round the decay Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare, The lone and level streets stretch far away.

(Apologies to Percy Bysshe Shelley)

Jeff, Your post last night introducing well liked character Tiny Hunzman is a meaningless twist that fails to address the point I made. That is if DL has taken the srtistic liberty to place a collar insigna (NPD)ie Napperville Police Derartment on Lizz (sorry he calls her “Liz”), that means she is Tracy’s “boss”. And with all the niceties of ‘homage’ et al, that puts Tracy working out of Naperville. The introduction of Hunzman does not compare or change the equation ! Let’s not go into it here but it seems DL is already stuck at the very top of the Ferris Wheel in this “homage” thing, just like The Governor and Perfume Plenty, 1977, he may be on the verge of falling off! His appetite for cavalair “change’ without meaning in Dick Tracy is now becoming legendary. Perhaps that is why so many offices look alike eg see the Genesis Corporation office and compare to Dick’s police Headquarters building. It’s hard to explain away all these personal indulgences (?) and no wonder that DL hesitates to talk with his readers in open forum ! Pax Vobiscum

Yesterday LudwigVonDrake noted: “What pray tell me is wrong with Tracy’s nose in the first panel?He looks,er…rather ethnic. Just call Diet ‘Stubby’ from now on”. Nit picking? No! Not really! i looked and saw a “hawk” nose similar to the one used by Gould back in 1931. A careless flick of the wrist? As I noted in an earlier post the current Author is disposed to make cavalier artistic changes to characters, as the whim strikes him and at times with abandon. He hit the “jackpot” back in Aug. to Nov 1999 in the Slugs Magnum tale. Kilian introduced one FBI Agent Hunter, who Tracy had to deal with. What was amazing is that the character had THREE distinctly differtly appearances. First as a white hairedlittle “pipsqueek” then morphed into an aged, white haired version of Dick Tracy and as a bonus was finally switched into a round faced sliked-down black haired Agent. Can’t be disputed! Locher’s “easy” style, sadly often poorly focused, creats newmerous gaffs which has led to a sarcastic form of humor on this board. There are times when one can’t help but chuckle at the keen wit.

Where’s the rubber ducky?

Napperville, about eight miles north of Milford.

Hanki asked: “Where is the rubber ducky”? It’s usually on every Sunday page. Today (12-14-‘08), its in the last panel. The middle globe on the light stand. Some think it looks like a yellow female breast. But more distinct representations in the past look like the “rubber ducky” kids float and play with in the bathroom tub. Locher usually tries to hide or disguise it as he has done today. It’s believed to be an in-strip memorial to Locher’s son John, a young artist who was at one time his Dad’s art assistant. I believe on the odd occasion DL forgets to put it in. The largest it has ever been depicted is on the tail of a jet in the “Smirk” story. Not intending to be disrespectfull but for “kicks”, we sometimes look to see if he forgot to draw it.

“VERBOSA PARA NADA”, My clumsy Spanish for “a lot of talk for nothing”. For it’s just as I anticipated another panel (the 4th in as many days)with Diet Smith making absolutely no “verbal” progress on his cellphone with Tess One would have thought that the man who’s firm invented the Two-Way Wrist Radio would have a good handle on “communication” skills. But apparently not so ! Our Author would have us believe that he also had a “finger” in designing the Tower of Babel.That might account for the discpancy some found in panel 3 of yesterday’s (12-13-‘08)strip.Some suspect that Diet was left handed. It’s disappointing to observe that after 4 days of talking all Diet can mumble is “out of his field”. That obsolete cellphone should be !But our Author, having been rescued by a timley R.C.Harvey intervention from a forced early retirement, one which we understand he would have welcomed. But back in the saddle story progress is all in the hands of our leisurely moving Author. We must hope that unlike the biblical Balem, he won’t tie his bleeep to a tree and walk 40 miles into Jerusalem. Let’s see where he walks

Sydney, I think Grok pinpointed the rubber duckie best - right under Liz(z)’ phone. I think the light is a coincidence, but DL might be trying to catch up, as he left it out a few times. On another subject, I think the “NO” in the first panel is the collective voice and reaction of the readers to his story recap, for the hundredth time. Finally, since DL completely ignored Christmas last year, maybe he’s got Tess and Diet plotting a Christmas party. I hope so, including Pat’s retirement party.

Actually it looks there are two rubber duckies in the second to last panel. The one under Liz(z)’s phone and her earring.

How many weeks do we get to watch Braces get fried? Reminds me of Queenie’s three week float in the air until she landed gracefully in the smoke stack.

Morrow, I have said it before and will say it again: Pat Patton deserved a proper sendoff and Locher blew it. In getting rid of Pat all we got was the Useless Lt. Teevo.

Isn’t “epic” another way of saying long? If so, then this was an epic confrontation.

I also, have to admit, one of the first things I do on Sunday is look for that rubber duck (I think the one under Liz’s hand matches the ones that we usually see on Sunday)

Re Rubber Duck: The lamp in the last panel is just that, a lamp. The duck is peeking around the corner just under Liz’ hand in panel 6. Her earring is another duck, as Ludwig said. It even has an eye and a little bill.

WAS I CENSORED ??? In the second to last line of post “Verbosa Para Nada”, what I wrote “appeared” as followa “We must hope that like the biblical Balem he won’t tie his ‘BLEEEP’ to a tree and walk 40 miles into Jerusalem”.Don’t they know that a Jackass was a form of transport in those times ?

Sydney: What a difference it makes going from posting on a board where there is MANUAL monitoring vs. a site that monitors each post using programmed algorithms. What FUN!

Isn’t that a funky colored shirt Chief Liz is wearing?