Calling Dick Tracy... again!

Comic Strips and Christmas Trees

Jan 02, 2026

The Return of Mr. Mirror

2026 is starting with a bang, one fired by a detective in a famous yellow trench coat. Howie Noel and I are returning to the Dick Tracy newspaper comic strip on January 4th for our second stint on America’s top cop.

For those who missed it the first time around, I wrote a two-week “Minit Mystery” in 2024 for the official Dick Tracy newspaper strip, the same comic that’s been running in newspapers daily since 1931. For that story, I was teamed with the incredible Howie Noel (dicktracyroguesgallery of instagram fame). Like me, Howie is a longtime Tracy fan and it seemed kismet when we were paired by the folks in charge of the strip. Because oddly enough, Howie and I already knew each other. A few decades ago, we worked together at a bookstore in Brooklyn during a single holiday season and have remained friendly on social media since.

Even more fortunate, Howie and I share a near-identical approach when it comes to Dick Tracy. We were both deeply influenced by Chester Gould’s original strips, the writers and artists who followed him, and the 1990 Warren Beatty movie that hit us both like a ton of bricks, locking in our fandom for good. We both think Dick Tracy works best when stylized, something we apply in both dialogue and art. Tracy should operate in a timeless world full of fedoras, old-fashioned cars, and big white gobs of snow falling from a purple sky.

As a result, our “Minit Mystery” was full of purposely placed anachronistic details. It takes place in the present, but not necessarily our present. Tracy’s city is a place where people chat on cellphones while driving 1936 coupes. Its denizens often speak in hard-boiled one-liners with a generous sprinkling of innuendo. This is a fictional world like nowhere you’ve ever been, a place that begs exploration into its seediest dark corners.

Our big little experiment introduced readers to a few new Tracy rogues, despite its short runtime. Not only did we meet the Scar Brothers, corrupt lawyers with a secret between them, but we also saw a hitman named Mr. Mirror inject himself into the action. If you’re curious, you can read our strips starting on October 6, 2024 via the gocomics.com subscription service. Or check out Howie’s portfolio page for another way to read that entire first story.

With the stage set and our main villain introduced, we’ve now been given the opportunity to tell a longer Tracy original. Not only is “The Return of Mr. Mirror” getting six weeks of daily strips and seven Sundays to tell its story, it also marks the first time a “Minit Mystery” has been folded into regular continuity. This new tale will not just reveal the criminal behind the reflective mask, but it will also debut a few other rogues. This newsletter offers a sneak peek at some of those faces, via Howie’s stellar character designs.

So mark your calendars for January 4th, 2026, and head to gocomics.com each day. You’ll be able to read the entire story for free. As with anything on the internet, sharing and liking is welcome. The more clicks our strip gets, the better chance we have of telling all the other Tracy stories we have loaded and waiting in the chamber.

NAME REDACTED - But she sure does look like Breathless Mahoney, doesn’t she?

Since you already have your calendar open…

This April, I have two new graphic novels hitting book and comic stores everywhere. John Carpenter’s Tales of Science Fiction: Pause Volume 1 collects the first six issues/chapters of my ongoing creator-owned book with artist Conor Boyle. It’s a thriller about stopped time in New York City, and you can read plenty more about it in some of my past newsletters (and in an upcoming newsletter which will spotlight the real-life locations that inspired the story). I’ve just wrapped up scripting Chapter 10, and the twists and reveals just keep on coming.

April also signals the release of my all-ages graphic novel The Spark Experiment with fantastic cartoonist and old friend Matt Loux. Containing three do-it-yourself science experiments in each chapter, this book promises a fun fantasy adventures as our not-so-serious heroes explore a micro universe, encounter weird alien life, and somehow manage to navigate middle school at the same time.

What I’m Reading and Watching

Comics:

Absolute Batman continues to be a blast, a story that reads like a combination of the 2022 The Batman film and Frank Miller’s classic comic Dark Knight Returns, but with manga influences as well. It’s a really fun book in a universe all its own with stakes that feel important.
Mark Waid continues his streak with pitch-perfect superhero comics at DC. I highly recommend Batman & Robin: Year One, co-plotted and drawn by the always incredible Chris Samnee. New History of the DC Universe is fantastic, too, especially for comic continuity buffs. It straightens out plenty of in-universe wrinkles, and features art by a great line-up, including my old friend Brad Walker.
Understandably, I’ve been in a bit of a Dick Tracy mood. I’ve just finished reading Vol. 14 of IDW/Clover Press’s The Complete Dick Tracy by Chester Gould series. I tend to jump around from one era to another with the Tracy strip, and also just finished reading the years 1983 and 2001 thanks to the newspapers.com site. Volume 14 featured a fun adventure with Crewy Lou, a favorite villain of former Tracy scribe Max Allan Collins. But I particularly enjoy the Mr. Crime/Newsuit Nan material. I’ve also taken some time out for good ol’ Nancy, reading The Nancy Show, a great collection of classic Ernie Bushmiller strips and artwork compiled by the Billy Ireland Cartoon Museum.

Books:

I’d never tried a John Carter story, so I started with the first, A Princess of Mars by Edgar Rice Burroughs from 1912. I’ve noticed over the years that most of the fiction I connect with best starts around 1920. While charming, this one didn’t break that pattern for me.
Demon Copperhead by Barbara Kingsolver won the Pulitzer, details the life of a cartoonist, and is set in Appalachia. It should’ve been a home run for me. Instead, this retelling of David Copperfield was a rough read, a laundry list of awful events in a world I wasn’t keen on revisiting . Beautifully written language, but about characters and situations that bordered on modern tropes.
I enjoyed the Game of Thrones show enough over the years, but now that I’ve started to dig into the books, I understand the hype much better. If you’re looking for a world to throw yourself into for long periods at a time, this series might be it. I listened to A Storm of Swords by George R. R. Martin on audio whenever the real world of NPR was too heavy for me. Sometimes it’s better to hear about fake murders and monsters than the real thing.

TV:

Finally caught up with Severance and learned what all the hubbub was about. This is right up my alley, like a combination of a Charlie Kaufman movie and a Kurt Vonnegut book.
Currently nearly finished watching Pluribus, and I really dig this one as well. Vince Gilligan’s storytelling is always great, and the humor in this sci-fi thriller was a welcome surprise.
Black Mirror’s latest season has stayed true to form, with several incredible episodes. My favorites were Eulogy and Common People, both gut punches that hit close to home.
With the kiddos, we’ve been watching Community, and it’s been fun seeing it through their eyes. Dorothy and I have rewatched a few sitcoms with them, but none have ever landed as well as this show. This is probably my third time watching it all the way through, and I’m still catching jokes I missed in earlier passes.

From the Batcave - Christmas Edition

While the holidays may be over, it’s always Batman season in my office. Here are a few images from this year’s Bat-Tree, featuring 132 unique Batman ornaments, two different strands of Bat-Lights, two different strands of Bat-Garland, and a Bat-Tree-Skirt for good measure.