Dick Tracy by Mike Curtis and Charles Ettinger for October 09, 2020

How long will she get to enjoy that new car?

Good morning™, square deal dealers !

They prefer to rope you into the payments plan so they can fatten their commission. Is it the sensible car or the sporty one ?

“Paying in cash will save you quite a bit.”

“We know. Where can we back up the truck to unload?”

“Unload?”

“Yeah, we’re paying in quarters. We’ve been saving up since we were kids.”

“We can’t take all quarters!”

“Okay, the car lot across the street said that they’d be glad to because business is so lousy.”

“Geez, you couldn’t tell that I was kidding? Pull it right up here into the showroom…”

And so it goes, by gar, by gar…

Just don’t crash it, I hope at least one of them has driving experience….

And then the vampire pops up in the back seat.

The car dealer looks like he was an extra on Miami Vice back in the day.

I know at most dealerships the old shirt and tie bit has gone away, but usually toward polo shirts with the brand they sell embroidered on it. This guy looks like a stereotypical sleazy used car salesman.

I wonder if she will get matching shoes with it!!!

Never, ever heard that – I’ve only bought two cars for cash from a dealer, and both times, they wanted me to sign up for a loan instead (they get a skim off the APR; how else do they pay for those glass palaces?)

The last time I paid for a car in cash, the sales scum, uh…person tried to convince me it wouldn’t save me a thing. Managed to talk him out of it.

No more bus-stop attacks on them! Dr. Teeth will have to get creative.

Now they’ll get hit with the “document fee” and the “prep fee”, etc. They won’t save a thing unless they negotiated the price before revealing how they would pay. I get the feeling the ladies are not hard bargainers.

Looks like the salesman’s hairstyle changed between panels 2 and 3

And don’t forget – we opted for silver in color with the garlic and wolfbane package…

Hope seems like a ditzy blabbermouth. It is not the salesman’s business where they got the money. I do not trust Charity for some reason. Perhaps it is because she reminds me of Morticia Addams today, sitting there with her smug smile.

We’ll return to our show after this brief 30 second commercial!

♪♪♫ YOU BUY HERE, YOU PAY HERE, SKIP A PAYMENT, YOU DIE HERE! WE MAKE IT EASY WITH SLEAZY. SLEAZY MOTORS YEAH♪♪♫

BLONDE: So many choices! So many colors! PRACTICAL BRUNETTE: And a fair and equitable payment plan!

MGR: And you two attractive babes from Central Casting truly represent our client base. Not the paycheck-to-paycheck people we chased outta here to shoot this commercial.

PRACTICAL BRUNETTE: And the best part – you don’t have to keep running off to check with the manager…

MGR: Because I AM Mr. Sleazy! ALL: ♪♪♫ IT’S EASY WITH SLEAZY. SLEAZY MOTORS YEAH ♪♪♫

“There’s an additional fee to install fresh air in the air filter.”

“Well…I don’t know much about cars, but that sounds good. I’d hate to drive a new car with stale air in the air filter.”

“Did you want the steering wheel option with that?”

“What if I don’t?”

“You get a pair of Vicegrips attached to the steering column.”

“Ewww….yes, please.”

“What about…..”

And so it goes, by gar, by gar.

I have never known a car dealer even admit to allowing a cash purchase of the car.

Any more these days, most of their money is coming from payments with interest than the actual car itself.

Even with car prices approaching the price of houses.

Payments with interest is where it’s at in any business these days.

WTF, now we’re talking car buying, even comments are going off the rails.

When I bought my current car, an off-lease Honda CR-V, I paid cash and asked for a free hat. The salesman had to go and get his manager’s approval for a stupid $2 hat and he even gave me the wrong colour.

A lot of “moving parts” have been inserted into this storyline. Hopefully Joe and Mike will able the connect the dots.

If they’re going to be running into Stokes — and we know they are — I hope their new ride has fog lights.

Used car dealers make my flesh crawl.

I wonder….is this our “vampire”?

Hope Brown (the vivacious blonde) is doing the deal, getting the car she wanted, which I am pretty sure was a luxury model. Maybe we’ll get to see it. Charity (dark-haired, serious, seated) is pretty much just along for the ride (so to speak) and because the money is coming out of their shared inheritance.

I fear Hope is Stokes’s next victim and that she won’t be around for very much longer. Charity is somewhat enigmatic; maybe her part in this is yet to be revealed (e.g., could it turn out that she is Stokes’s girlfriend and accomplice, despite what he seems to have implied earlier?)….

I remember that when I went to buy my second car and wanted to take it out for a test drive the salesman handed me the keys and went back to eating his sammwich. I asked him if he was going to come along and he said “No, you obviously drove here in something.”

Yeah, I did, and it was a much, much crappier car than the one that I was looking at. Tempted as I was, I realized that he probably wouldn’t consider it a fair trade if I kept the one that I was test driving and left the old one.

I would of just said,’’yes’’ to the dealer’s question……none of his frigging business if she chooses to pay in cash…….Learned that from my ‘’old school’’ father.