Dick Tracy by Mike Curtis and Charles Ettinger for January 25, 2022

Good morning™, everybody!

Lizz successfully found the Queen of Spades when she did her “job interview” and maybe some others were also there, but we never saw the Ace or Doubleup there. Maybe they were in another office?

Sure Shot Sam did catch her

Well, “It’s a wrap!” Just ignore all the loose ends, although it does seem like getting shot 3 times at point blank range has caused Dick to shrink a few inches so at least there’s that!

Oh, and Lizz should get less Botox in her lips, not a good look for her.

Yeah, Sam, I don’t think Queenie’s uncle is gonna be too happy about you busting his favorite niece. He’s liable to put a big fat loogie in your next pizza pie!

Good morning™, you no eata my place no More !!!

They still could eat there provided Niece Queenie is a pain in the patoot that he is glad to have some distance with, in that case the boys might get one on the house.

Where is Patty that interviewed Lizz for the office manager job ?  I bet Another Take knows what “detour” she is taking on her way to the “get out of jail free” card. ;-p

And I thought Patty Cure is in the escort service business. Turns out her primary business is in the pharmaceutical industry :)

With the fate of Blackjack left undetermined for now, and with Tracy & Co continuing to move in on the Apparatus, it appears we’ve reached the start of a new story. When I’ve decided a new story’s started, I do a list of every Tracy story on GoComics. Unfortunately, soon after I started doing this GC imposed a stupid, asinine character limit of only 2000 characters which includes every letter, space, punctuation, & html, which means I have to do this over several posts. I’ll do my initial introduction in this post and start the list in the next one, because otherwise, I can’t even get past the second year.

My notes are fairly simple. Just my name for the story (usually the name of the main villain or villains, unless they just aren’t the emphasis) followed by the dates the story began and ended. If someone was the main villain for more than one story, I add a “II” and so on to emphasize this. If more than one villain from a past story are in the same story committing major crimes, I include them altogether. Finally, for the 4 cases of more than one villain with the same name (Chameleon, Mr. Crime, Shaky, the Ace of Spades) I add, “The Second” in front of their names.

Minit Mysteries Note: at the request of people who wanted to see these listed here, I’ve decided to make a separate post for them to keep the listing of Mike Curtis stories in as few posts as possible.

At the start of the GoComics archive, the writer was the late Mike Kilian. Personally, I like his work on Tracy and think he’s very underrated. At the very least, he knew how to tell a story in the daily strip format where every day, something happens that moves the story along, a quality his successor sorely lacked. I recommend anyone here who hasn’t read these stories to check them out.

TBC cuz GC decided to suck now

How did they know it was her? She wasn’t wearing a coat…..

Well, there’s always Marmel’s Deli! Now with 99% fewer criminals!

the Apparatus ran a deli and a pizza place. I’d suggest checking out all the local lo-cost food places

Two pretty ladies in the first panel and I just love the way the sweater fits …mmmmm . And her yes also . Isn’t the Queen of spades Black on the card ?

I’m pretty sure the Queen of Spades should be wearing a spade icon. In all playing cards in the USA, spades are colored black. I wonder what country our colorist works in. Indonesia springs to mind, only because my own company uses some outsourced services from that nation.

So, we’re back to the Apparatus story as if the whole Blackjack/Mr Bones interlude never happened. I mean, this scene looks like it took place only minutes after the arrest of the Queen. Wassupwidat?

Hmmm, the first panel seems off. The last panel has the same look? Oh well, it’s just a cartoon?

“Hmm. Seems like we’re forgetting someone…” “Naah!”

Shucks, I was hoping to see Mr. Catchem in action at the raid in the new ’hornet’s nest’ in this strip!!

Seems like they could have held off the minute mystery till this one wrapped up, since it was so close.

I suppose Ace of Spades fades away from the story line for an opportunity to cause mischief another day. One thing for sure…he is going to need some personnel. His current crew keeps getting perp walked.

Even the Apparatus must be thinking, we need to revaluate our association with Ace of Spades. He has such a high turner with his staff. Maybe we should send him a “Dear John” letter saying that we reached a fork in the road.

Queen of Spades uncle might say to Sam and Tracy, they are not welcomed into his business. Plus they can kiss those “discounts” goodbye. Uncle now has to hire a lawyer for his niece. As someone posted this episode is a wrap. Next story!

I really like Shelley’s artwork but I am not a fan of Tracy’s new shorter haircut.

Whatever comes up next, can Madam Mayor of Tracy land curb her enthusiasm? Chief Patton, how about not being so willing to open the department to wanna bee journalists looking to do interviews. Just a suggestion and Diet Smith, put the time drone thing on the shelf permanently. Right alongside the magnetic space coupe.

“Sam! I’m amazed you could do that all by yourself. Guess someone ELSE will be fetching my morning coffee from now on, eh?” SAM: ONE-MAN ARMY. Coming to theaters near you soon!

The “mad colorist” strikes again—-that’s a spade but it’s colored RED!!!

1-DT: The Queen of Spades has an odd hairline – like a slowly balding man. Do you think maybe…

SAM: Huh? She has hair? I didn’t notice. Excuse me. I better be nearby – like in the room – for her delousing and cavity search.

DT: Ugh! Better you than me, pal.

2-DT: Hi Doll. That crazy Sam volunteered to help with the Queen’s cavity search and delousing!

DOLL: Uhh, you better get down there fast.

3-DT: I’m shocked at you, Sam!

SAM: HOMINA HOMINA HOMINA!!! Sputter, spit, slobber

DT: You tackled her even though she wasn’t causing any problems. What got into you, Sam???

SAM: Want…transfer…Jail Matron… Sputter, spit, slobber

DT: Let’s get you home, buddy. You’ve been working too hard…

Today is the 75th anniversary of the death of Al Capone.He is missed by absolutely no one.

ANd Cut Famon was much more “Capone-ey” than Big Boy ever was.

MOVIE QUOTE—-

“Excuse me,sir.I thought you might like to know that some of the wine is actually getting in your mouth”

Henry Brandon to uncouth bandit chief Burt LancasterVERA CRUZ—1954

Good advice! Maybe some spinal decompression can give him back his missing inches?

On to Lou Mitchell’s.Where else is there to eat great food at affordable prices?

And tomorrow,a nearsighted zoo attendant locks Pouch in the giraffe enclosure.

As entertaining as the recent Apparatus storyline (lines?) have been, I’m ready to move on from anything having to do with the Apparatus for the foreseeable future. Diet Smith, too. I hope Shelley & Mike have a fresh story coming up, with some fresh villains & characters.

I hope we see more of the girl with the mysterious frown. Se must be a mathematician. She has developed two well formed formulas.

Sam, maybe you are betraying your East Coast origins, but no one native to Chicagoland/Tracyville speaks of pizzas as “pies”! That’s all NYC talk!

Anyway, at least part of the Apparatus’s operation has been disrupted, and Queenie looks definitely unhappy both at being apprehended and at not being rescued by Ace or any of his cohort.

Truth is, though, other than tying up a loose end or two, today’s strip is pretty much just filler, with nothing of consequence happening….

That Lizz has the sharp eyed look of a cougar.