Day one of a new story: no talking heads. good so far.
I know that the Dethany story didn’t have talking heads the first day, either, but this looks like a new character, so another thumbs up for that. It’s very likely that if there are any crossover characters, they will not be the main character this time.
I wasn’t sure what he was doing there and at first, I thought it was shaped like a bat with ears pointing up, but I don’t think that’s what it is. Also, at first I thought it might be a soldering iron in his hand, but the zig-zag lines around the object in his hand indicate a brilliant shine I think. The tool is probably like a Dremel tool that he was using to polish what he just made.
The colouring is weird. His face is coloured, but I think those are his bare hands (as seen in the last frame) and should be the same colour as his face. Unfortunately, Team Tracy has no control over how their weekday strips get coloured.
With the Minit Mystery all wrapped up, and with today’s strip appearing to have nothing to do with that or Dethany, 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 3 cases of more than one villain with the same name (Chameleon, Mr. Crime, Shaky) 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.
That cloak is an interesting fashion choice…it could suggest that he’s either not a local or that he has a very anachronistic sense of style. He also seems to have changed his clothes between panel 1 and panel 3.
It is a very 30s vibe. Perhaps this person and Shaky get their hair cut at the same barber. It looks like this adventure has been inspired by an old Universal Horror Movie.
Mad-Eye Moody: If this tiny shard of mirror is any indication, I’ve managed to polish my teeth to a high sheen!
To the opera! The lights reflecting off my teeth into the tenor’s eyes should make for an entertaining evening! HA HAAA! That’s why they call me The Jok… no, that’s that guy from Batman. The Comedian! No, that’s that guy from The Watchmen. FUNNY BOY! That’s it!
That’s why the most successful stories in the strip revolve around one-shot villains and not around Tracy or any of the regular cast. The regular cast can’t have life-changing experience every few weeks, but a new villain can do that fairly easily.
I see what you mean, and I mostly agree. But when Gould did involve Tracy or another regular cast member personally, he knew how to do it. I am surprised to realize that some of my favorite Gould continuities are the ones with personal involvement:
Tracy and Tess’ marriage and subsequent entanglement with Wormy.
Blowtop destroying Tracy’s home and kidnapping Jr.
Junior’s romance with Model. (For that matter, years later, Junior’s fatal attraction to Thistle Dew.
Plus, Junior was constantly getting kidnapped in the early days.And, of course, the countless times a crook targeted Tracy personally, because he was in the way of their schemes or for revenge. (All those death traps.)
But when stuff like that happened in the early part of a story, we still had Tracy and crew doing detective work and going after the villain from the standpoint of being a police officer.
Maybe the “bat ear” looking object is a sharp device to make puncture wounds in a person’s neck. Prehaps this fellow is going for a vampire angle for crime.
Looks as though Colin Clive has given up on the Build-A-Monster thing and has switched to some combined variant of Mr. Hyde and Count Dracula. Very much a ‘30s-’40s Universal horror flick vibe! Love the Great Coat in panel 3 as he sets out for his nighttime romp!
Tracyville is about to experience some chilling dastardly deeds!
Terrific art work in today’s mute startup strip for this new arc….
Ah elemetary my dear Watson. The frame with the white hands are due to his wearing white cotton gloves to allow him to polish it without any dirty fingerprints or smudges.
Brian Premium Member over 3 years ago
Mysterious figure. Mysterious device. Mysterious purpose. Must be a new adventure!
AnyFace over 3 years ago
Neil Wick over 3 years ago
Good morning™, everyone and happy Labour Day!
Day one of a new story: no talking heads. good so far.
I know that the Dethany story didn’t have talking heads the first day, either, but this looks like a new character, so another thumbs up for that. It’s very likely that if there are any crossover characters, they will not be the main character this time.
I wasn’t sure what he was doing there and at first, I thought it was shaped like a bat with ears pointing up, but I don’t think that’s what it is. Also, at first I thought it might be a soldering iron in his hand, but the zig-zag lines around the object in his hand indicate a brilliant shine I think. The tool is probably like a Dremel tool that he was using to polish what he just made.
The colouring is weird. His face is coloured, but I think those are his bare hands (as seen in the last frame) and should be the same colour as his face. Unfortunately, Team Tracy has no control over how their weekday strips get coloured.
seanyj over 3 years ago
A mad scientist?
seanyj over 3 years ago
Who enjoyed that Minit Mystery?
boboscar over 3 years ago
“And now for something completely different.”
With the Minit Mystery all wrapped up, and with today’s strip appearing to have nothing to do with that or Dethany, 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 3 cases of more than one villain with the same name (Chameleon, Mr. Crime, Shaky) 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
GoComicsGo! over 3 years ago
DC or Marvel?
jonahhex1 over 3 years ago
That guy has the look of a NAZI…..always a good way to start a crime story is with someone truly evil.
Nimblejack over 3 years ago
That cloak is an interesting fashion choice…it could suggest that he’s either not a local or that he has a very anachronistic sense of style. He also seems to have changed his clothes between panel 1 and panel 3.
WGillete over 3 years ago
Great art! Reminds me of something from the 40s.
jz27wk Premium Member over 3 years ago
These mini mysteries with their guest artist alwasy make me appreciate Joe’s artwork more and more.
johnbrown1859 over 3 years ago
A lab! A cape! It’s gotta be good!
Don Bagert Premium Member over 3 years ago
That coat looks like Mastermind’s https://marvel.fandom.com/wiki/Mastermind
Mastermind is the man who drove Jean Grey over the edge into Dark Phoenix mode in the X-Men’s most famous storyline.
tcayer over 3 years ago
Is that the same guy hurrying out in panel three? Becuse he changed his outfit!
Ray Toler over 3 years ago
It is a very 30s vibe. Perhaps this person and Shaky get their hair cut at the same barber. It looks like this adventure has been inspired by an old Universal Horror Movie.
Pen_alias over 3 years ago
What, no ice cream?
Another Take over 3 years ago
♪♪♫ Just me and my shaaaa-dow ♪♪♫
Mad-Eye Moody: If this tiny shard of mirror is any indication, I’ve managed to polish my teeth to a high sheen!
To the opera! The lights reflecting off my teeth into the tenor’s eyes should make for an entertaining evening! HA HAAA! That’s why they call me The Jok… no, that’s that guy from Batman. The Comedian! No, that’s that guy from The Watchmen. FUNNY BOY! That’s it!
Ken in Ohio over 3 years ago
@ Neil Wick: From late yesterday:
That’s why the most successful stories in the strip revolve around one-shot villains and not around Tracy or any of the regular cast. The regular cast can’t have life-changing experience every few weeks, but a new villain can do that fairly easily.
I see what you mean, and I mostly agree. But when Gould did involve Tracy or another regular cast member personally, he knew how to do it. I am surprised to realize that some of my favorite Gould continuities are the ones with personal involvement:
Tracy and Tess’ marriage and subsequent entanglement with Wormy.
Blowtop destroying Tracy’s home and kidnapping Jr.
Junior’s romance with Model. (For that matter, years later, Junior’s fatal attraction to Thistle Dew.
Plus, Junior was constantly getting kidnapped in the early days.And, of course, the countless times a crook targeted Tracy personally, because he was in the way of their schemes or for revenge. (All those death traps.)
But when stuff like that happened in the early part of a story, we still had Tracy and crew doing detective work and going after the villain from the standpoint of being a police officer.
NeededPeacefulBreaks over 3 years ago
Maybe the “bat ear” looking object is a sharp device to make puncture wounds in a person’s neck. Prehaps this fellow is going for a vampire angle for crime.
coratelli over 3 years ago
Great strip today.
SFpagan over 3 years ago
judging by points on item in his hands almost matching weird teeth and he’s grabbing a cape ….. a vampire type villain?
Sisyphos over 3 years ago
Looks as though Colin Clive has given up on the Build-A-Monster thing and has switched to some combined variant of Mr. Hyde and Count Dracula. Very much a ‘30s-’40s Universal horror flick vibe! Love the Great Coat in panel 3 as he sets out for his nighttime romp!
Tracyville is about to experience some chilling dastardly deeds!
Terrific art work in today’s mute startup strip for this new arc….
BreathlessMahoney77 over 3 years ago
Congratulations, Professor! You’ve invented the phone booth!
AB9SS over 3 years ago
Ah elemetary my dear Watson. The frame with the white hands are due to his wearing white cotton gloves to allow him to polish it without any dirty fingerprints or smudges.
Wichita1.0 over 3 years ago
Burbank’s evil cousin? Send for The Shadow.