Dick Tracy by Mike Curtis and Charles Ettinger for November 10, 2019

Déjà vu

Well, well, the Howells are going to take a dip in the drink. They better have water wings available! ;-)

Howells think Frisk dead. She lives instead. Wendy Wichel recites news

To the safe house run. Flight is no fun. Wings both of them could use.

In great haste the Howells now race. Foul criminals shall flee

At setting sun from justice run. Put out an APB.

Ms. Lily jailed. Frisk she assailed. She is now locked up tight

167, far from heaven, finds the Howells in flight.

A T-Bone hit! The tire split! Clair and Frank in trouble

Gould did say, “Crime does not pay.” For these two that goes double.

Off the icy road a heavy load is airborne, then the splash

Water so cold. A fate foretold. From the Howells life does now dash.

Shouldn’t that be YE GADS

Survivable? ✨

Good morning™, drivers!

You have to watch out for those blowouts! They plummeted down at a pretty steep angle.

Good morning™, cliff drivers !

Why should Tracy care so much about these slimers when he could look at the bright side of saving the city and state the expense of a trial and incarceration ?

Alright! This is the old Dick Tracy carnage we’re used to!

Ah, predictability

There’s comfort in the known

Why fret over a mystery

Let’s see what’s already been shown

Truthfully now

Has anyone been surprised

With all that has occurred

Leading to this fateful ride

Everyone guessed

Some of that, some of this

A little bit of splat

Like a recap using ’Tis

Oh well I suppose

Worst things could be

Instead of Mike and Joe

We could have a Matthew P.

“Don’t shoot me, I’m only the piano player”.

Couldn’t happen to a nicer couple…

Well, Howell ‘bout that?! Poetic justice that the traffickers bought it in a traffic accident! I “Frank”-ly think they should have “adopted” a better escape plan. Then again, there’s “snow” use in predicting the weather. Are you about to “blow” because my “tire”-d puns are falling “flat”? I “shore” am…

Looks like that couple did their last bad deed!

Poor old Thurston and Lovey…

Ye gods! The old convenient way to get rid of villains trick.

Yep, here we go again. How many called it?

I like the Howell’s expressions in panel 4, when they knew it was over and they were going for maybe their last ride!

Let’s not forget that Frisk gave Tracy an envelope with information leading to “higher ups” in the City, involving this baby trafficking ring. He said he would follow up on his end, and ever since then, we’ve been following the “perils of Friskie”. I hope we can now see what detective work Tracy has been doing, rather than just dropping this and moving on to another story.

Actually, that’s not what kills them. When the M.E. examines the bodies, the cause of death will be determined to be suffocation from cigar smoke…

I’m just trying to see how a blowout sent the Howells over the cliff alone when just seconds before, their car was attempting to push Tracy’s car over the same cliff after T-boning it? Their station wagon was talking the sedan, then boom, the tire goes, and so do the Howells. Did the tire’s explosion somehow catapult the car over Tracy’s and into the drink? Someone help me here!

With their weight and smoking so much, I doubt they can swim or hold their breathe underwater!!!

“I don’t like to say ‘I told you so’, but I told you so” – 4th Doctor

I guess they quit smoking at the same time…

1-ROSIE: That was close! DAN: I been in closer.

2-TIRE: ARGGGH! I’ve been shot! Goodbye cruel world!

3-DAN: Is this the end of Little Caesar? ROSIE: Yeah, see, yeah…

4-DT: Wow. Even when I just shoot out a tire, people end up dead! Unless…

*5-…Hey Primm. Can you swim?

PRIMM: Awh, those untaxed cigarettes would be all soggy by the time I got ‘em to shore.

DT: Not what I meant.

Second-to-last panel: Howells are going straight to hell

Maybe Mr. Howell has an early bad-guy two-way wrist genie in his pocket and he can call for help?

The old water escape.

Finally

Who didn’t see that coming since the last strip?

Just stuck my nose in here for my once-a-week check up and, to my surprise, the Howells are still here!

And with a Sweatbox-Nitrates-style ending, to boot!

(But we all know how much Mike likes to recycle bad guys)

Another dumb criminal team bites the dust.

They died doing what they loved. Smoking!

If this were a movie, the car would burst into flames when it hit the water.

“Ye Gods!” – Oh never change DT.

Great Caesar’s Ghost !

They’d have died from lung cancer anyway, no smoking or vaping kids.

Ah, an old-fashioned “villains die horribly” Dick Tracy strip… how I’ve missed those!

A Sad end for a Ford Ranch Wagon

A very low survival rate if they can’t get to them fast enough.

As one or two other commentators have mentioned, this automotive crashing climax is similar to other endings in recent years, such as the Sprockets. Too similar. Not a good sign when storytellers keep recycling their own material.

Panel #4 says it all… Frank and Clair know their fate…

Oh, they fly through the air with the greatest of ease….

…Of dis-ease….

The flying Howells is a one-time only act. You are lucky to have seen it here!

Unhappy landings, punks!

Remember, kids, don’t smoke!