Strange scene in Cibola story? (US 7)

[Daniel van Eijmeren]

CAREY FURLONG to FRANCESCO SPREAFICO and me, 21-06-2001:

> [panel 9.6] Perhaps, and in agreement with Daniel and Sprea's 
> conjectures, Barks may have drawn Donald out and inserted Scrooge 
> to make the scene better support the action in the following panels.

I've tried to compile the information and suggestions about this 
subject:

- - - - - - -

 Panel 9.6: a vase falls apart from a nephew's hands. It's filled with
 jewels, but Scrooge doesn't seem impressed. Instead, he only answers 
 the nephews' observing that the vase fell apart, saying its "No wonder!"

 Panel 9.7: all the ducks gather around the vase's contents and Donald
 states they're "beads and JEWELS and ornaments of heavy GOLD!"

 Panel 9.8: Scrooge suddenly jumps over the jewels greedily, saying "Let
 me have a look at that stuff! I'm an EXPERT on GOLD!

 Panel 10.1: Scrooge holds the contents of the broken vase in his hands
 and says "It's REAL, boys! And the design shows it's at least a THOUSAND
 years old!" 

The timing of Donald being the first to identify the vase's contents,
followed up by Scrooge's sudden excitement, might seem a bit strange 
and hint at a possible change made by Barks after having inked the story 
(or at least this scene). If so, then there are several possibilities of 
what might have happened.

Possibility 1: Perhaps Barks looked over the story and decided to make
this theoretical scene a bit more visual by inserting the excited Scrooge
into it. 

Possibility 2: Perhaps Scrooge has been redrawn over a previous Scrooge,
that maybe, was already excited by the sight of the jewels. Maybe Barks,
re-reading it, decided to add panel 9.7, and had to change Scrooge in panel
9.6 to be consistent with the following panels. 

Possibility 3: Perhaps Barks originally had Donald in panel 9.6 instead of
Scrooge. If that were the case, it could have been Donald in panel 9.6
saying, "No Wonder!" and then in panel 9.7 Donald continues to speak,
saying "It was filled with beads and jewels and ornaments of heavy gold,"
thus completing the earlier statement. This has better continuity, at least
as far as the dialog is concerned. Perhaps, Barks may have drawn Donald out
and inserted Scrooge to make the scene better support the action in the
following panels. 

- - - - - - -

Additional notes/guesses: 

The action of the excited Scrooge in panel 9.8 looks like panel 5.8. 
Maybe Barks found that Scrooge would become too impulsive/
over-enthusiastic in case of possibility 2? 

In other words, maybe Barks found that *two* of such impulsive Scrooge 
scenes (page 5 and 9) would make Scrooge's interaction in the story too 
one-dimensional? With panel 9.7 in between panels 9.6 and 9.8, Scrooge's 
enthusiasm is "explained better" than without 9.7.

(Perhaps another, additional reason could be that Barks wanted to pad the 
scene, with for example a half page worth of material, because otherwise 
the visit to the professor would follow too soon?)

In case of possibility 3, the story was changed without nescessarily 
having an effect on the length of the scene (or the story).
If the only change would have been replacing Donald by Scrooge, then 
I think that Scrooge in panel 9.8 might have looked too much as if he 
jumps out of nowhere. Now, with Scrooge on the foreground in panel 9.6 
(instead of Donald), Scrooge's jump in panel 9.8 looks visually more 
"balanced" to me.

I hope I've managed to write this down in a clear way, but you'll have 
to see the scene in front of you to get what I mean.

In order to find out what possibly happened, it's nescessary to
look at the *original* issue Uncle Scrooge 7. Reprints may have 
been retouched too much to give a clue. (I don't have this comic, 
so I can't check it myself.)

BTW. Possibility 1 was by me. 
I find it very unlikely after having read possibilities 2 and 3.

-- Daniel


"THIRTY DOLLARS! That's more money than there is in the world!
GANGWAY! I'M goin' to be an artist, TOO!"

(Which Barks story? Hint: look for bears, not for ducks.)