Various things (again!)

[Larry Gerstein]

        Dear Folks,

        Let's see here...


        Inheritance stories
        ===================

        Knut recalled stories in which Scrooge tested Donald and Gladstone
with regards to inheriting his fortune.  He noted the rainbow story (now
known as "Some Heir Over the Rainbow") and the mattress factory story
("Searching for a Successor").  Then he said:

        "I'm quite sure there is another one, too, starting with $ going
out with Gladstone and DD to show how one dollar can be the start of a new
fortune. After making some good deals he gives each of them half and tells
them to try on their own. I think DD tries some horse gambling or
something, but I can't remember the rest of the story."

        This sounds like a remembrance of two stories.  One of them being
"Nobody's Business," by Don Rosa;  and the other being Vicar's "Road to
Riches" (published in the American UNCLE SCROOGE around 1991, I think),
which is the one with the horse gambling.


        Rosa's Ducks and the human psyche
        =================================

        Bjorn summarized same by saying that "I think most people in the
panel felt that while no one really can be compared to Barks, Don's work is
in fact a LOT better than any other modern Duck artists. Even if he lacks
Barks depth and 
understanding of the human person and how to make the right flow of a
story, he is very good at slapstick gags and keeping true to Barksian
details and intention."

        My own response is, that aside from a very few exceptions such as
"Lost in the Andes" and that particularly grim Donald-vs.-Gladstone story
of WDC&S 131 ("Gladstone's Luck"), Don Rosa's Ducks are MORE emotional, and
realistically so, than those of Barks.  Not that Barks doesn't make the
ducks human -- he does, of course.  I think that Rosa in fact picks more
emotional moments to show, and he himself has mentioned that he'd more
often end stories with an emotional moment were it not tradition to end
them with gags.

        I think that it's the emotional portrayal that Rosa presents us
with, that leaves me less comfortable with seeing the same characters go
through painful slapstick (as in "Incident at McDuck Tower" and "Super
Snooper Strikes Again").  I don't mind it at all when the characters
deserve it for being blowhards (as in "Fit to be Pied"), but I think that
Rosa portrays the ducks with such real emotions, that it becomes trickier
business to put them through slapstick!


        Peter Pig returns
        =================

        Harry, can you give me the H-code for the 1-page gag with Peter
Pig?  Sounds like just the thing John Clark would like to use!  Also, I'd
be glad to trade you something for the Dutch DD birthday issue, which
sounds sufficiently different from the American and Danish ones for me to
want it.  (If you wanted, I could in fact trade you the American DD
birthday issue... unless you have easy access to it yourself.  Not that
I've gotten it yet, that is -- it comes next week.)
        Is the one-pager set in the future?  Somehow, I don't see the
normal DD being a movie star.  FG's MM worked at a studio, the strip made
clear, but it was also clear that no one regarded him as a celebrity for
some reason...  you get the idea that he only made films once in a while.


        Disney ADVENTURES and Donald's B-Day?
        =====================================

        In February, Marv Wolfman told me that Disney ADVENTURES was going
to have a special story for the birthday, which had been produced in
Denmark with Bob Foster's assistance (but specifically for Disney
ADVENTURES).  While last month's issue of that included a Gottfredson
"Mickey Mouse Movie" from the 1930s Sundays, I have seen nothing ducklike
in the magazine.  Might Heidi MacDonald fill us in on this?
        Every month Disney ADVENTURES includes a page of "comic news"
mostly discussing Marvel and DC comics.  I hope they announce the DD 60th
Birthday issue -- or announce DD's 60th in SOME way.


        Disney seems to have felt it could not do any kind of promotional
push over Donald's birthday without diverting personell from the huge LION
KING campaign.  What about Warner Bros., which spent 1990 promoting both
Bugs Bunny's 50th and TINY TOON ADVENTURES?  It's not like one campaign
diverted the public from the other.  I'm really surprised that after Disney
actually went to the trouble of celebrating Mickey's 65th last year, they
didn't bother with Donald's 60th.  I'm a little confused...

        David Gerstein
        <gerstein at math.ucsb.edu>
        "Close by the Pig lives Donald Duck/No trouble ever bothers
HIM/because he never bothers IT!/He'd rather far to dance or swim!"