Life of Uncle $crooge

August DeBlieck ADEBLIEC at drew.edu
Wed Feb 8 17:17:08 CET 1995



                                        Date:     08-Feb-1995 11:14am EST
                                        From:     DeBlieck, August
                                                  ADEBLIEC
                                        Dept:     STUDENT
                                        Tel No:   

TO:  Remote INTERNET Address              ( _IN%DISNEY-COMICS at MINSK.DOCS.UU.SE )


Subject: Life of Uncle $crooge



DAVID:  Will have to reread those stories over the weekend and get back to 
you on Monday about them.  Although, to tell you the truth, a lot of what 
you wrote makes sense.  :)

JORGEN AND DON:  Here we go, at long last:

For those of you who need a refresher:  Jorgen asked me close to
two months ago what I, as a relative newcomer to $crooge lore,
thought of Don's The Life and Times of Uncle $crooge.  Don echoed
his question, and I promised an answer as soon as school began. 
School has begun, I'm back on e-mail every day, and one of my New
Year's Resolutions is to post more on the e-mailing lists I'm on. 
(Now if only Donald had stuck to this one instead of that silly
"I will not get angry" one.  ;) 

I spent the last weekend rereading the series to refresh my
memory.  Trust me, there are worse things to do than read these
issues again.  :)

How do I look upon it?  I enjoy it as stories which stand alone
on their own, and not merely as a compilation of facts culled
from Carl Barks' work.  That is, even when I don't know where the
references are - or even if they exist - I still enjoy the
stories.  I am proud of the fact that I did catch a couple
references.  (The Square Egg story comes immediately to mind. 
Oddly, this is one I've heard a lot about, but have yet to read.) 
A lot of references I picked up on from their admittedly
bastardized version from DuckTales.  (Uncle Seafoam's gold teeth,
for example, was the basis of one DuckTales episode.  Even, to a
more limited degree, the tale of Scrooge's first dime - to the
extent that I know he got it shining shoes and being 'smarter
than the smarties', although DT may have gotten that in the wrong
order.)

I'm learning a heck of a lot as I go along.  I didn't know much
of Scrooge's family before, for example.  Thanks to chapter 1
alone, I can remember all of them - almost.  (What's his mother's
first name?)  I understand why HDL and Donald and U$ are all
uncle's and nephew's.  It's been a big help.  And it's part of
the reason chapter 1 is probably my favorite.  That last page is
a masterpiece.

I am saddened to admit that I didn't catch the Afrikaner Glomgold
references soon enough, though.  :(

Don's annotations are invaluable references for newbies like
myself.  A few of the stories to which he has alluded I have
reprints of.  It's fun to go back and reread them, to see how
much more impressive Don's work is.  He's taken off-the-cuff
remarks flipped out of U$'s mouth in the middle of an action
scene, and turned them into a believable and workable story.

Part of why I enjoy Lo$ so much, methinks, is that I'm a
superhero comic junkie, as well.  Don's Lo$ is quite like a
superhero tale in that it tells our favorite character's origin
and early days in a believable chronology.  I was talking to my
comic book dealer who sells the Gladstone comics about this and
he just shook his head and said, "Tsk, I think you're bringing
superhero continuity into this."  And he's partially right. 
These are merely fun little stories, told terrifically by Carl
Barks.  They really shouldn't be taken so seriously.  But I do. 
And so do most of the people on this list.  (Even though you guys
have been doing this longer than I.)  It's just as relevant an
approach, and even more fun, than just dismissing it as a simple
set of fun stories.

I'm not quite sure what else to say.  If you have any other
questions, feel free to ask - I'd be more than happy to answer
them for you.  But the simple answer to your question is that I
enjoy the stories as stories unto themselves, and then I am
impressed by the research that went into them.  I don't get all
the references, though it's always a personal accomplishment when
I do. :)

My only potential let down of the series is that when it's done,
we in America probably won't have Todd Klein lettering Don's work
anymore.  :(  Don, any chance of keeping Todd on to letter all
your stories?

Also, while I'm here, I am excited every month by the new
Gladstone comics.  I must admit to being slightly amazed at a
large number of people on this list.  Due to my inexperience,
almost every Barks reprint is new to me.  (The exception being
some of the one-pagers.)  I can't imagine what it will be like
when every reprint is one I've already read.  It's a day that
will bring not only a sense of accomplishment, but also one of
sadness.  But I'll have to wait to cross that bridge until I come
to it.  I imagine it will be nice to reread them for the first
time in years, I guess, since I will have last seen them, and in
whatever new format we have for comics in the future.  (Duck
stories on the glossy paper, like the superhero books?  I hope
not.)

I've gone on way too long.  I now return you to the regular list.

-Augie De Blieck Jr.
"This was once a noble house, lad!  McDucks sailed forth in fear
o' no man born o' woman... except maybe the tax collector!"
          -Sir Quackly McDuck



More information about the DCML mailing list