Dick Tracy by Mike Curtis and Charles Ettinger for November 08, 2021

It’s a “Set Up” all right!!

Good morning™, everyone!

Above a delicatessen? Didn’t Tess and her parent live above a delicatessen in the first story? I like the way the smoke crosses over from the last panel to the middle one. (I guess that Briar Rose won’t have to think about escaping, after all.)

I guess panel 3 proves that Ace believes in two fisted cigar action! Does he ever stop smoking?

More like an “unsafe” house, lol

Good morning™, over optimistic safe house protected !

I hope, underneath the goofy happy look, she has a strong streak of suspicion that they might try “something” and will continue to give the gullible look while plotting a way and place to make a break.

be afraid, be very afraid! She looks clueless!

Isn’t that Double Up lurking backstage in panel 1? I bet he has a housewarming gift for our Rosie.

ace is wearing a full face mask that only shows his eyes. how is he smoking?

“And by ‘leave’, I mean LEAVE! OH, just sign this facsimile will I’ve made up to train other employees. Nothing to actually do with you, of course.”

It’s a setup.

Above a delicatessen.

And now for the road show version of “Sweeney Todd”.

Turn up those spidey senses Rose… she has to get the feeling something’s afoot…

1-RATFACE: A letter arrived for you today. I took the liberty of reading it. Oh. And I have a request: STOP GIVING OUT OUR ADDRESS!

2-SUKI: How sweet! Mom says Sis is getting married to her baby daddy – the third one – and she’s sure it will work out because now she won’t be able to testify against him!

3-RATFACE: Hmmm. That would be one way of solving the problem of you…

SUKI: What’d you say?

RATFACE: Oh nothing. Thinking out loud. We’ll stick to the original plan though which is – are you ready for this? YOU’RE MOVING TO DISNEY WORLD! Or someplace with lots of mice anyway. Heh heh heh

So long Briar…so long!

Doesn’t sound to good looks like you’re going to get it

cue the dark ambient music with discordant overtones which, although broadly tonal, is inflected with chromatic and polytonal passages

Uh oh. She’s become a loose end.

Clearly Doubleup knows this plan, as shown in P 1, so will he be the bad guy and do Ace’s nefarious bidding, or will he come to her rescue, as someone posited before?

Double-Up sure looks mean, looks mean!……..

I would like it to be the old “Trueheart Family” deli.We haven’t seen it since 1938.

That’s when Ma Trueheart made the mistake of hiringPoison Gas King Karpse as a baker.Heard he mad a great Prune Danish,though.

I am somewhat reminded of the scene in Person of Interest in which young Elias, who will grow up to be a super-gangster, is “taken for a ride” by hoods employed by his father, who has found him superfluous to requirements. https://youtu.be/N_fiUybx1GU?t=49

I’ll vote with the crowd saying Doubleup will try to saveBriar Rose from the meat grinder.I Consider it goodnews that he’s eavesdropping in Panel One.

But making an anonymous phone call would be impossible in his case.

MOVIE QUOTE—-

“What are you smoking?”

Alan Ladd to Edward G.Robinson in HELL ON FRISCO BAY—1956.(Ladd has turned down a dishonest proposition)

how is he smoking with a mask on?

Ace: “You’ll be able to identify the apartment by your name & the big red arrow pointing to your window painted on the. outer wall.”

Again, someone has wondered about Tracy’s age. If Tracy’s pushing 115, then Diet Smith must be about 130, and Warbucks – who was an old, bald man when he first appeared in the ‘30s – must be around 150. He was born in the 19th century. The real answer is that they’re as old as Mike says they are. In the most recent James Bond movie, he’s retired from active duty. But when the next Bond movie is made, they’ll probably start all over again, just as they did with Roger Craig’s first one. Team Tracy could do that whenever Mike retires from the strip in the distant future.

When do I leave? This very afternoon.

Uh-huh. Bye bye, babe. I think you’ll never make it to the deli, if in fact it even exists. You’ve become a liability to the Apparatus and Ace of Spades, and that is something up with which Ace will not put. You’re going for a ride, the last ride!

On the other hand, Briar is not just some “dumb dame,” and if she smells a rat (who has cigar breath) she may make haste with precautions against The Last Ride. Who knows?

My guess is that Briar Rose is too useful a property in this story to whack so soon; it’s not that she’s a Good Girl, worth saving in the end [I am a bit surprised at how many of our commentators seem to think of this murderer as “our gal” or the like!], but she is still a valuable tool in the writer’s kit for the time being….

Does her crew know how to be discreet, so they will not give the location away? Well I guess I’ll find out.

Nice job Apparatus…place Briar Rose in a safe house….then reveal it with an anonymous call to the police. Of course the other option is to have a contract killer on speed dial.