Dick Tracy by Mike Curtis and Charles Ettinger for June 28, 2009

Snot rubber’s Doodlebook: Duh….

Grok, you were right! (Or had you read ahead?)

And how did the Big “A” cheat?

He’s… he’s HULKING OUT!!!

Good GOSH, now it’s a quarter million…

If Spacy has a ‘matrix pack’ and knows that he can turn any card into an ace, what is all the gulping and hangdog looks and ‘not much’ and ‘I need help’ about?

Is that a gun in his pocket, or is he just glad to see me?

If he can turn any card into an ace, well… that’s going to look somewhat suspicious, you think?

What if they both hold 4 aces?

Good thing Dick didn’t have the Ace of Clubs. Boy that would have been stupid…..kinda like this whole story.

Back to Quarter Million.

Next week it’s powerball time. 500 Million!!

Big Arse is the new Hulk. Nice Pink Rubber Nose in that panel.

Snotpickers Grab bag. Make sure you open your door and welcome the hoodlums selling magazines at 9:30PM on a Saturday Night.

Sheesh! Talk about cliche!

The gun…why?

Did I miss something? I thought they were using Big Ace’s deck? Once again consistency is out the window and Big Ace (aka The Big Snozzola) looks different.

So he “matrixed” his 4 of diamonds into the Ace of Spades, the death card!!! Who do you think will die???

First, thanks Sydney Phillips for answering my questions yesterday. I see no different outcome here whether Tracy wins or loses.So why play? And why cheat? The only reason I can figure for this ruse is to keep Big Ace busy while the SWAT team assembles outside. Perhaps the reason Tracy has to win is so that Big Ace will do something illegal. Entrapment, in other words. If Tracy loses, he’s just escorted out by the goons and that’s the end. If Tracy wins, Ace is not going to let him go with the money, and will do something illegal. Like kill Tracy. But now that Tracy’s pulled the gun, I’m not sure how that plan is going to be legitimate.

The last panel today tells us so much.

1) Why Big Ace is an amateur. Soft security from his bald head boys when Tracy entered the Casino. No “pat down”. No check for weapons. Amateurs ! Looking foolish as Tracy now pulls his gun

2) mr.bribery (remembering the One man SWAT team in the Magnum Force robot case) ASKED the right question yesterday. How will Tracy “signal” the new One man team ? He CAN’T (see left wrist). NO Wrist Geenee ! Yet it may enjoy the same “properties” as the Card. When you want it, it miraculously appears

3) In “Crimestoppers” – Is that Dicky’s new design for Captain Midnight ? I like the yellow eyes ! Like a cat in the night.

4) The NOSE ! Does anyone think Big Ace’s first name is Rudolph ?

5) No sign of the Rubber Duckie. Must have got a new “friend” too..

Did Brozman see “The Sting”? (No wonder Monte smells a rat!)

What if the person who arrives at your door at night is a hot lady that is wearing nothing but a smile?

Froxkrybra, that depends on where YOUR wife is!

And my card is….the OTHER Ace of Clubs….uh oh.

Honest Cop? Knew there had to be a gimick

I like how the description says that Tracy is undercover. Undercover? As himself? He looks the same and is wearing the same suit he’s worn for months and that’s gotta start smelling a bit gamy.

What do you believe the “Matrix Pack” Tracy referred to previously, to be, exactly?

Maybe Tracy slipped in a Pinochle deck to improve his odds………uh, no.

I dunno, Jeff. Perhaps Mattie can tell us since he consults with the author on a regular basis. Is it regular police paraphanalia?

Locher is using a matrix pen to draw this strip. That’s why reality keeps shifting & changing.

Matrix Pack …

I’m glad Jeff came out of retirement and asked exactly what that pack was and it’s “origins”. Most Inventions in the Strip tend to come from Diet Smith (?) This one has come at us “Cold Turkey” so to speak. It would be useful to hear more,

I’m not giving anything critical away here but strips ahead suggest the card’s face change comes from “thermal energy” and Tracy confirms (7-06) it’s generated by “BODY Heat”. Perhaps Jeff insightfully, has “headed this one off at the pass”, before it registered on the radar screen. For this thermal body stuff seems like one mighty STRETCH.

Perhaps we need a B.O. cousin in here, (say) Thermal Plenty, to hit the King’s Casinos with HIS system and share some “loot” with B.O. and Gertie. With an “ability” like that why not go the whole hog ?

Locher, clearly missed a good beat here !

Only thing is, I’m bleeep tired of Casino stories after two long ones, in three years, and having to endure “Face Cards” as substitutes for Villains. Perhaps Thermal could take up the Magician business !

DICK TRACY and MUMBLES returned briefly to “life” today, in a letter to the Editor in the Trinidad Sunday Express.

The writer one J. Peters complained bitterly about the dithering and inaction of the Government Minister responsible, whom he called “MUMBLES” for his tepid response to the largest murder rate in the country’s history.

The original Mumbles died in the papers here in 1955 and the Dick Tracy strip suffered a similar fate 5 years ago. I protested strongly, but back then, just “doing it in” by papers, seemed to have been, the “in thing” !

What it does prove is the powerful impression (name and charecteristics) that seemed to be stamped so indelibly (for a lifetime), in readers minds. Peters “remembered” it all, 55 years later.

WANT TO SEE - 200 OLD GOULDIAN VILLAINS (including Mumbles ?) ?

It’s on Mike Lynch’s Cartoon Blogspot

Do a search for: 200 Gould Characters

The bad guys go undercover as green guys in a bubble.

Okay, the nose wasn’t that bad in black and white. But with that pink coloring, it resembles nothing so much as a huge INDENTATION in Bag Ace’s face. In fact, he spends the whole Sunday strip looking increasingly like something out of Star Wars (Last panel: “E.T. Angry!”

Senseless writing is senseless.

Rumrunner’s black book: Door-to-door salesmen are glowing-eyed androids that will FREAKING KILL YOU.

“Hey Rocky - watch me pull a Ace of spades out of my sleeve!”