Dick Tracy by Mike Curtis and Charles Ettinger for October 21, 2009

Leapin’ lizards!

Ah, I would have just finished reading volume 8 of the IDW Publishing Dick Tracy reprints! It’s truly vintage material from Chester Gould from the early 1940s, including Pruneface and Mrs. Pruneface. Then, I come over here and spend some time reading over today’s strip and several days before plus all of the snarky (but very funny) comments. I also recall reading it during the Max Allan Collins days two decades back, and it was still a fairly credible approximation of Gould’s work and relatively tightly plotted and written.

Dear gosh, what on earth has happened to Dick Tracy? It’s like some kind of cubist nightmare and the plot meanders around more than the mighty Mississippi. I’d call it a non sequitur but that would be an insult to non sequiturs.

Anyone have any idea how many newspapers still carry this? …And admit it?

barticle35, excellent!!

Uncle_Cassavius We have some folks here that should be able to answer your question.

Wow! Three months of excitement in three panels! Boy! Tracy’s strong! He lifts himself up with one hand and picks up Ennen with the other! Who’s at the other end of the trapeze? We’ll have to wait until tomorrow to find out… or, will Tracy still be hanging on to the trapeze bar a month from now?

Amazing how strong and masterful Tracy has suddenly become. I see that Fee Fi has let go of the tail, so if Tracy falls, it’s just too dang bad.

Don’t fall Dick there’s no safety net.

So if the giant had not held the tiger for a week and pointed out the low-hanging trapeze inside the cage, Dick would have died, huh? Yeesh. I suppose there’s no more point to pointing out how pointlessly stupid that is than there is to wondering why the clown would leave them in a cage with an exit that a man can jump to while holding a woman.

Uncle, it’s been posted here that Dick Tracy is down to 50 papers, from 350 it had when Max Collins was the writer, and the strip actually had, like, plots and logic.

Four months of bla bla bla, and this is the only action scene I have seen in this pathetic storyline.

Carlo Coratelli said, “Four months of bla bla bla, and this is the only action scene I have seen in this pathetic storyline.”

A day to remember. We can look back on it when things get back to normal.

To everybody who complains that Dick Tracy is all dialogue and no action…

This is your answer!

All kidding aside, it’s kind of difficult to understand what’s going on here.

Panel One:

It looks like Dick’s just sort of reached up and grabbed the trapeze as it inexplicably swung towards him. Either that, or he’s grabbed it and is pulling it toward himself.

Yet the motion lines imply that the trapeze is moving diagonally up and to the right. The only way I can fathom this is if it’s a very elastic trapeze, and is now responding to DT’s weight by springing back up and to the right.

Panel Two:

Now the motion lines are telling us that Tracy and Ennen are springing up and to the right with enough force that Ennen’s right shoe is flying off her foot. Said shoe has its own motion line, which shows that the shoe is flying up and to the left.

Despite the fact that Ennen is holding on to Tracy and Tracy is holding on to the trapeze while these extreme forces are at work, the previously elastic, previously swinging trapeze is now hanging straight down, and completely at rest.

If Panels One and Two were reversed, they might appear to make just a little more sense, but only superficially, and not in a way that would bear close scrutiny.

Panel Three: Let’s not even get into the subject of why the cage bars are no-longer the background for Fee-Fi’s struggle with the tiger’s tail, because if we ask that question, we are then forced to reckon with the fact that Della Contessa appears to now be in the background, completely naked, on all fours, sticking her big, fat bottom in the air.

I honestly believe that Dick Locher gives a hoot about this strip. There is no other way that you can explain the errors as pointed out by Flight Suit

So later, Mr. Pops will think the tiger ate them….clothes and all!

I didn’t realize Tracy was a lefty. He has quite the strength in his left arm (ahem).

How high can a man jump with another adult hanging on? How far off the ground will his legs be left dangling?

How high can an enraged tiger jump? Or, how high can it reach without even jumping, just by rearing up on it’s hind legs?

Nothing about this escape plan adds up for me.

What do you think? Locher does this strip for his “golfing” money together with his editorial work. He is semi-retired and doing DT the way he has been doing it is just to keep the DT strip and the memory of Gould and his son alive. Wow. Tracy in comic stip life is about 50 half his real life age of 100. A man of 50 to have such strength is amazing. Most cops retire at 50.

The KC Star dropped Dick Tracy years ago , But I found him again at the Daily Oklahoman . These comics are drawn in color every day & the last time I checked the Daily Oklahoman still ptints them IN COLOR every day. Thank God for on line comics.

I suppose today is a leap of faith, we need to believe that they are actually doing something!!!

Just when you thought it was impossible for this presentation to get worse … it actually does !

Tracy has been depicted like a flying Superman (with Lois Lane) in like - - “Up … up … and away !”

It’s pathetic and painfully depressing to those that came in with Dick Tracy at it’s peak ! How could an Author with the advantage of years of “exposure” and discussion on winning practises and style, just flippantly shrug them all off and throw his reputation in the Garbage Bin ?

With a lighter view, one has to acknowledge that Locher’s Tracy is a “STAND UP” man, as further ahead Locher (Nov 16 to 21), has him doing exactly that AGAIN. It was a repeat bout of EXPLANATATIONS, on what happened, who was guilty of what, pontificating without evidence. Sequences which readers should more appropriately have SEEN appearing as ACTION in the strip – but didn’t !

Horribly flawed examples to guide (homage driven), aspiring young comic strip artists like Mattie. Read Gould carefully MPH - - and see the great difference !

We’re gather again without fail to read this anew this tawdry tale Tracys escape is in the making Unless of course Lochers faking A horizontal leap of thirty feet Tigers make to catch their meat His rate of ascent must be great Else the kitty will have some steak Like Superman he has the Damsel Say, whatever happened to Judy Hansel With his left hand he grabs the bar This is the most action yet by far Can Tracy escape the beast And deny it a grisly feast Or will his upward mobility Become a near impossibility We don’t know if tomorrow Tracy will be dead Well, except for Sydney, he reads ahead.

Chubsy suggested a “Limerick” … here’s one !

There once was a writer named Locher Ringo’s whip for the hip of this loafer Buggy speed for the race Contradictions, no pace ‘Twas “tradition” disgraced, a writer misplaced, sign and resign you incomprehensible Joker !

wndrwrthg,

You are sharper than a tack today ! How impressive, that responsive speed.

Then, I particulatly liked that touch of Judy Hansel. Hope she returns.

If I was going to draw a man being lifted from a tiger’s cage, and wanted to gussy up the background a bit, I’m not sure a string of triangle pennants and some bubbles would have been my first choice.

Locher will reveal another “Deus ex machina” when there is another ally working the power winch on the trapeze, which will pull DT & NN to safety. Please note that she threw a shoe, which will magically reappear on her foot.

Remember the tiger last year that jumped a 12 foot fence to get at a couple of teens who were tormenting him? Do we really think this tiger is going to be stopped by a trapeze that leaves his dinner’s legs dangling about 4 feet (if that) off the floor? Unless, of course, there’s someone on the outside raising and lowering that trapeze. Hey Rube!

Yesterday someone pointed out the previous tiger escape a few years back, so I went back to read it. Boy did I get hooked! I ended up reading Kilian/Locher’s Tracy for a couple of hours. Makes me really sad to have to come back to this garbage.

Can we calculate how high the trapeze is? Figure Tracy’s feet are dangling over 8 feet below the trapeze, so Tracy can jump at least 8 feet higher than a tiger can, while carrying a woman who’s not much smaller than he is. If we can find out how high a tiger can jump we can just add 8 feet to that.

Hmm … or, another approach: How high can YOU jump while carrying a woman not much smaller than you? I’m going to go find a woman and experiment. Back later….

-Cougar :{)

Still pulling for the tiger.

No dialog….now that’s an improvement!

I am beginning to see that we are fans of DT because we want to see how bad it can get. A tiger can jump twice as high as a really talented high jumper. If this were a reality show, DT would already be tiger breakfast.

Here’s an experiment for you. Bend your knees, crouch down and jump up as high as you can. How far did you jump? Now pick up 100 lbs. (being generous to Ennen here) and do it again. How high did you jump this time? Was it higher than that 12 foot fence the zoo tiger jumped last year? If so, maybe you’re safe from DT’s tiger. If not, oh well……

physically , unless Tracy is superman, that leap with all that weight is a bit on the impossible side…..

–oops, clearly I’m not the first to see this discrepancy …..so…..

never mind!

Wow!! Dude has hops. He’s what the NBA needs, a white guy leaper. Not bad considering he’s what?? about 75. and while we’re rhyming: There once was a copper named Dick Whose tales were exciting and thick. As the years passed him by, it makes one want to cry, that Dick’s stories are not worth a lick’

I’m not sure if I fully understand the rules of haiku, but here’s my attempt:

Snoopers leap to swinging safety cat pounces

CougarAllen, how’d that experiment go?

Macy has suddenly turned into Burt Lancaster!

Now Ol’ Dick is in a position to make Ms. Ennen a “deal she can’t refuse”.

I asked earlier if DL even liked cops. Seeing what he’s done to Dick Tracy, I reckon I have my answer.

DT can’t detect a crime that was done right in front of him. May have trouble detecting that his wife made a sandwich for him even when sandwich is on the table in front of him.

Police who should be protecting the crime scene are nowhere to be found, have to be called back to save DT or arrest Ringo for his murder, take your pick.

Police in general seem to be as useful as a swimming pool patch to fix a leaking ocean. Incompetence is almost too kind a word.