Dick Tracy by Mike Curtis and Charles Ettinger for December 08, 2010

So…

Tracy didn’t bother to read up on the prisoner’s history before getting in the car with him?

Or just making small talk, to kind of, you know, break the ice?

I knew it. I knew Dick was going to start up some conversation. This, of course, begs the question. The man is supposed to be sedated. How exactly is Dick expecting him to communicate? And how does Mordred intend to kill him? Id assume he has a crew waiting somewhere down the road but thats impossible, no one likes him. Maybe its the ugly mask.

Dont you wish this was the one time the crook was right??

Tracy plans to drive at over fifty miles per hour, in a blizzard, at night, on the surface streets, in a car that probably lacks four wheel drive? Locher should realize that’s a bad idea. He could spin out of control and crash. He could charge blindly into the ambush set up by Dr. Mordred’s gang. The greatest threat, though, is that he’ll hit the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. They must be around, because for Locher to finish the pick-up in only two days is surely a sign of impending Doomsday. Locher is probably looking forward to that, because it will save him the trouble of skipping any explanations.

(Serial killers do not have gangs, of course, which is why Locher would give one to Mordred.)

Snerk…

Thick? The necrophile takes you for a nincompoop.

Is this what it was like for Thick when he was single? Dating someone who had to wear a paper bag? Thick could ask him if the cat’s got his tongue, but he might not like Mordred’s answer.

He’s the Blank! They both just sit and think the same thoughts.

Rightwingmoron, the refusal to speak could mean Mordred plans to lull Thick into a (deeper than usual) sense of complacency. Or it could mean that Thick makes the worst small talk Mordred has ever heard.

what kind of car? Tbird? Jag?

And a cash register. He also looks like an antique cash register. A cash register with a convenient zipper down the middle for easy access. Probably a National.

Or one of the kinetoscopes you’d see in a penny arcade. Or a conga line passing between tables, as seen from a balcony in the Copacabana. Or ants raiding a picnic. You’d think Locher would try a little harder.

Maybe we’re looking at the next Slimeglobbers. “Rowdy children can distract the driver during a long road trip. Prevent accidents by keeping them under control!”

BillThompson-When Spacy was single, I believe there was some semblance of talent and/or effort that went into the production of this strip

I want everybody to note one thing: Today is Wednesday, December 8, the sheriff has completed the handoff to Tracy, and Tracy has started the drive back home. Keep reading…

* MILD SPOILER ALERT * * MILD SPOILER ALERT * * MILD SPOILER ALERT * * MILD SPOILER ALERT * * MILD SPOILER ALERT *

In a few days, we’re going to see strips that are clearly out of sequence - next Monday, Tracy be back at the handoff point and say “I’m ready to leave, Sheriff”.

Not only have the writing and artwork of this once classic strip gone in the toilet, they can’t even submit the strips in the right order.

Sad. So sad.

Tracy doesn’t have to pretend to be disgusted with Mordred anymore now that he is out of sight from the other cops. At last he can show his fascination and express his desire for social interaction

Thick, upset that Mordred is ignoring him, opens up with, “Have you ever been in a Peugot with a Saab front end before?” Maybe he’ll let Mordred drive, just to break the monotony.

I wanna be sedated too! To quote the Ramones … http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dhh24BB84e4

-Cougar :{)

Just like the Incredible Hulk, Mordred is already starting to change. He had a half-moon mouth in last Friday’s strip and already it’s grown bigger than a rectangle. LOOK OUT, Spacy! It’s MorphMouth Mordred!

Thanks for the warning, neonleon59. Without it I would have thought this strip really did have the power to make time stand still and reverse itself.

Of course this strip is spoiled. Like Butterfly McCorpse they left it out of the freezer too long.

Hey, is the mask Dr. Mordred’s? That would explain why he can morph it into so many facial expressions. But if so, why did the police let him keep it?

Or is it the Nappingville standard prisoner transfer mask?

If they’re worried about family members assassinating him, they should have changed the mask to a Bozo the Clown mask, which would really be more fitting to this comic strip anyway.

CougarAllen, considering how long the drive will last, and the romantic tension between Mordred and his blind date, this song might work just as well here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aHs9NBxH7F8

with one change: repeat “and he rides and rides” endlessly.

He is the passenger … and he rides and rides … .

thick: Oh you don’t want to talk about it? A penny for your thoughts big fella… Come on over here you silly boy. now isn’t that more comfy? – we have time to stop at Jack in the Box. I hear you can get 99 tacos for 99 cents there…

“It’s a case of mistaken identity!” swears Dr. Richard Kimball Mordred. “You confused me with another man! Look here!”

http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_jssqp6ddl8U/SxFOuBFHQkI/AAAAAAAAAeo/L7ez9ppoyQQ/s1600/gongshow.jpg

“The real killer is the Unknown Comic! I’ll escape, and OJ will help me hunt him down!”

Maybe a stop for Dairy Queen? Tracy will need to loosen Mordred’s chains so he can eat his Dilly Bar, then ohh…..ohhh… :)

LMAO at harkherp……… thanks, harkherp; you made my day laughing! I can picture it now!

one hour in a car with tracy…everyone would be thinking the same thing.

Why is the rear of Tracy’s car a 1946 Hudson Hornet?

John Russco said, about 10 hours ago

what kind of car? Tbird? Jag?

I think it’s an Avanti with some body work done by Cosmo Fishhawk’s mechanic.

Take an egomaniac and a psychopath, neither of whom have any communication skills, jam them into a small car, let them drive over a rough, bumpy road in the dark–and at the end of the hour Locher and Brozman have produced at least a week’s worth of the strip.

DrMidnight-what do you have against Bozo the Clown?

Is Mordred a Charlie Manson type of serial killer with his group of apostles?

If there were a good writer behind this strip, I’d take the apparent contradiction (that Macy’s starting a conversation with a guy who’s supposed to be sedated) as a clever attempt to have both the reader and the detective realize the Bad Doctor is, in fact, fully awake and that there’s clearly somebody on the inside (maybe the sheriff’s office) helping him. With the Locher Mess Monster in charge, though, it’s more likely the Doctor’s next words will be, “I bet you say that to all the boys…”

BillT, my interpretation of the spoiler alert is that we are going to see this weeks sequence - repeated all over again - next week !

Why would Dick have to make the journey twice ?.

Perhaps we have our answer now, on the “motivation” for the contribution to this - particular charity (?)

http://www.gocomics.com/dicktracy/2007/01/21/

http://www.gocomics.com/dicktracy/2007/01/22/

NVash, On the aging of characters in the comics we have to give a little slack. As you know, Comic strip years do not equate to human passage of time.

In some strips the characters never seem to age. Annie, was one example she remained a young teen for 85 years. In Popeye, Swee ‘Pea entered the strip creeping in 1933, she/he is stil creeping today.

TMS fired Max Collins. He didn’t like it and went to Court ! Not sure if he was satisfied but the Court ruled that he had a ’financial’ interest in the characters created while he was the writer of Dick Tracy. And that, if they were used in future strips, he would be entitled to some form of compensation.

Result : New writers avoided using them - or, for convenience, they simply changed the name. I guess that’s when Dick Tracy’s SON (previously Joe), became known as “Cool Dude” ;-)

Cool Dude appeared in 3 Mike Kilian stories and was the errant young offender in the Smokes (1995) story. He would last appear at Christmas (Max Gorge) 1999.

Sydney Phillips, I’m curious as to what will happen with the repetition. Will it be corrected? Does anyone at TMS care? Given Locher’s habit of repeating himself, will they even notice?

VanDork, I think things were better even with the Moon Maid goofiness. I don’t like it, but it was coherent and the artwork showed some energy.

Saucy1211, you may have called it with a Manson-style gang. It’s the sort of idiocy Locher would pull out of thin air.

So far there has been nothing to make anyone expect a gang. Horn Hair rambled about death threats from the relatives of Mordred’s victims, and Mordred has been described as a serial killer. Serial killers almost always work alone; cases like Bianchi-Buono and Muhammad-Malvo are rare. (Manson wasn’t a serial killer; he didn’t do his own killings, and his motive appears to have been revenge).

Of course there’s a first time for everything, and if Mordred had a gang, or led a cult, they might try to rescue him. Obviously this decoy scheme is the worst way to transport him; you’d want him surrounded by guards at all times. If nothing else, a concentration of forces would let you kill or capture his gang if they attacked.

Perhaps Thick is being set up as bait for a gang attack. It would actually make sense to not tell him, assuming Locher realized Thick is an idiot. But it’s just as likely that Mordred will either escape on his own, requiring Thick to catch him. Or the CIA might want to recruit him as an assassin (stupid idea, really) so they’ve engineered a way to make him appear to vanish.

Question: How much Jack Daniels would you have to drink to make driving a serial killer to prison by yourself, with no-not-any support seem like a good idea??? I’m guessing quite a bit. Oh, man, if I wasn’t reading it here I’d call a plot like this unimaginable. No sane police force would do this in this way. For that matter, very few crazy police forces would do this.

Even assuming the used an unmarked car for prisoner transfer, they never would use only one detective with no other officers in the car. There’d be at least a couple of officers to convince the bad guy that now would be a stupid time to try anything. Nope, send DT in alone– so the offender gets the idea that escape is relatively easy and maybe he can kill Tracy in the bargain.

Tracy should not be driving a car.

The perfect vehicle would be a Ford “Escape”

Now Mordred is supposed to be “Sedated”

But if Tracy talks to him long enough, he will be sedated or Mordred will wish he was dead.

I remeber when I was about 8 or 9 I got for Xmas a thing called “Mr. Brain.” It came with cards with questions that you would insert in its mouth and one of its eyes would light green for the correct answer and red for an incorrect one. Today in panel 3, Doc Mordored reminds me of that long forgotten toy.

http://tinyurl.com/24ujeeo i just don’t give a duck on wheels

If this murderous fiend is sedated, how can he have coherent thoughts?

And that last person that had such murderous thoughts about Tracy wound up under an old World War II fighter aircraft.

Just wondering what’s ahead…..

I don’t know why I don’t seem to have heard of Siouxsie and the Banshees before – they’re pretty good.

-Cougar :{)

Bill Thompson, what makes you think Mordred is an egomaniac?