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Where's Gary? I figured he'd get on here and mention this since,
now that he's here, it would be his domain. But maybe he's busy.
Anyway, had you heard of the new Gladstone "showcase" title,
WALT DISNEY'S COMICS IN COLOR, that would feature a wide array of
different "classic" Disney comics -- the theme of issue 1 being Donald's
60th Birthday? You saw the ads?
This will give you another in the endless list of ideas of what
it's like dealing with Disney. I used to call 'em the Evil Empire -- a
better name might be the Certifiably Insane Empire. Disney told
Gladstone that they could not add a new title to their line of comics.
Part of the unique type of bullying license that Disney compels
businesses to accept is that their products must have a particular
growth rate in profit; at the same time, they forbid Gladstone from
expanding their ability to meet that goal. No explanation -- just "we
cannot allow that at this time" (which, of course, they CAN). It's
things like this that make me that much more sore, not just at Disney,
but at the air-head Disney worshipers on those Disney BBSs. Anyway, all
that Donald Duck - 60th Birthday stuff will just appear in an issue of
DONALD DUCK, I guess. Or maybe Disney will tell Gladstone to just save
it for Mickey's 70th Birthday and redraw Mickey's head onto Donald's
body -- I wouldn't put it past those geniuses.

JON:
This news report on TV. I take it the issue of DD & CO. with
that Olympics story is on the stands? Were any names of the "creators"
mentioned in the story, like Barks or me or anyone else? Or was all the
material written and drawn by Walt Disney.

FRANK DICAPUA:
Hi. Glad you liked that U$ #285. I'll try to find an issue
somewhere tomorrow. I KNEW people would be disappointed/upset that the
story does not take up the full issue as thay might assume; only 3 of
the 12 will be that long. But these stories are done for Egmont which
wants shorter stories. And, frankly, the whole series was done with the
idea that the REAL intent is for all the stories to appear, eventually,
in one album (or two or so) -- most eras of $crooge's life just didn't
call for a full 28 page story, and that would have made the series
incredibly more logistically difficult. In fact, I'm sure that would
never have been allowed if I had insisted on that when I originally
suggested the idea.
Speaking of Disney revisionism: how about that cover? Notice
that the suit of armor on the horse is not ablaze as in the story? The
original version of the cover had the blazing armor, but Disney ruled
that was "too disturbing" for young children. That's irritating, but
they did have a point that time -- if one did not know, as in the story,
that the armor was empty, it would look like a man burning to death, I
s'pose. Besides, there are bigger hurdles to get across later on with
the death scenes and Bombie the Zombie and all.
You need to read some of the old Digests in the Library some
empty weekend if you were surprised by what I was saying about Disney's
medieval policies towards freelance creators.
I did mention an art dealer in Germany who sells my art, but I
was referring to art from the 80s, back before Disney forbid Gladstone
to return the art to the owners of same. As it finally turned out, a
year ago Disney granted me the right to have my art returned, but I had
to agree to never sell it or otherwise part with it for all eternity. So
that dealer does not have any recent art, and that significant source of
legitimate income, open to all other freelance artists in America, is
another thing denied me as a freelancer of Disney comics. They get away
with it since, I regret to say, I am the only artist who was willing to
fight them over it, and I don't add up to much. I am a voice in the
wilderness.
Sure, you can send me that comic for a signature! My address is
9711 Dawson Hill Rd., Louisville, KY, 40299.

MARK MAYERSON:
As you saw above, I complain more about Disney. But don't let me
whine too much, because NOBODY is forcing me to not quit and do work for
or based on the characters belonging to a 20th century corporation. I am
locked into this sad situation by my devotion to these characters. If I
couldn't do Uncle $crooge comics, I wouldn't do some other comics, I'd
go back into the construction business.
I have no interest in doing "my own" characters since they do
not exist and I have no sentimental attachment to them. I didn't grow up
on some characters I might invent next week. $crooge and Donald have
been part of my entire life. I'm stuck with that.
I'm also stuck with the fact that the MAIN reason my stories are
somehow popular are because they feature the world's most popular
characters. I used to do my own characters in "Duck-type" stories in
fanzines as a hobby for years. In fact, I've turned these same stories
into Duck stories over the past 7 years. Nobody was interested in my
work until I started using the great Ducks; particularly so in America,
where the state of comics is such a hideous disgrace. I do "European
style" stories, but my art isn't refined enough to stand by itself in
Europe without the "crutch" of using the world's most popular comic
characters. That's why I see no chance of ever doing my own comics.
Besides, Egmont is a very large company that only publishes comics based
on licensed products of proven popularity that will sell mega-numbers.
They wouldn't be interested.
Also, I never said that my PAGE RATE was not decent. Egmont pays
everybody the same, regardless of the popularity or lack of same of
their work. But that is not a bad rate. If I continue to work
feverishly, I can make a comfortable but unextravagant living, though
there's no vacations or health insurance or pension or any of that. But
I sacrifice those things when I decide to be a freelancer. The things no
artist SHOULD have to sacrifice are ROYALTIES and our ARTWORK, which are
benefits I should be entitled to with the blessing of the parent
company, but that's not the way Disney is. Anyway, don't assume that I'm
either wealthy or destitute... I just get along.

SHANU:
Isn't this classy? Somebody hiding behind a psuedonym coming on
our system to ask if we can help him steal some bootleg software! How
proud we all are.

TO ALL YOU EUROPEANS!:
In a recent Danish comic I saw an ad for an Uncle $crooge
wristwatch that looked like a pretty decent piece of goods. The only two
American $crooge watches are a cheapie made for kiddies and a $75
"limited edition" #@&%# made for "collectibles louts". And neither of
these are actually $crooge -- the first is the DuckTales counterfeit
$crooge, and the other is the MICKEY'S XMAS CAROL counterfeit $crooge.
Can anyone find me some NICE European $crooge wristwatch??? (No,
Shanu... I don't want to buy one of those hot Rolexes you have up your
sleeve.)

Well, I got a pleasant suprise this week. My brother usually brings home a
bunch of comics for me each week, giving them to me one at a time (well,
actually, he flips them to me across the room). At about the fifth toss
I was greeted with a brand new Don Rosa cover! It was Uncle Scrooge
(Gladstone) #285, the begining (Sp?) of "The Life and Times of Scrooge McDuck".
This first story: "The Last of The Clan McDuck". Don's art is great as usual,
and filled with the great detail that I always expect from him. The best
panel in the wole book may be the little sight gag in panel 2 on page three,
A worm is tapping a bird (who is pulling up a worm) on the shoulder, and is
holding a nail drive club in the other hand. The Story is a hoot, with Barks
references flying fast and furious. And, seeing Scrooge as a kid, along with
Hortense and Matilda is great.

My only complaint: Kid Scrooge looks too much like Huey, Dewey, and Louie,
with hair :-)

Hey Don, do you ever plan to do a "Life and Times of Donald Duck"? Or how
about the story of Scrooges sisters' lives?

-Darin

72260.2635 at CompuServe.COM (Don Rosa) writes:
> Anyway, had you heard of the new Gladstone "showcase" title,
>WALT DISNEY'S COMICS IN COLOR, that would feature a wide array of
>different "classic" Disney comics -- the theme of issue 1 being
>Donald's 60th Birthday? You saw the ads?
> This will give you another in the endless list of ideas of
>what it's like dealing with Disney. I used to call 'em the Evil
>Empire -- a better name might be the Certifiably Insane Empire.
>Disney told Gladstone that they could not add a new title to their
>line of comics.

Yowch! Extremely insane indeed. I was very much looking forward to
this book and for the opportunity to see stories that couldn't be
presented elsewhere. (like potential "Perils of Mickey" stuff.) Does
this mean that Gladstone couldn't publish a "Mickey Mouse" title even
if they wanted to? Or is it the fact that WDCiC is a new *title* that
Disney (tm) objects to? (But MM would be okay because it's a cancelled
title?)

======

I thought that "The Last of the Clan McDuck" was wonderful! One of
the things that I appreciated was the attention to details regarding
characterization - like the way Scroogey's hand clamps around his
first dime after he earns it.

I noticed that part way through the story, Scrooge's side-burns begin
to make an appearance. Just how much does he age from the begining to
the end of part 1?

Dear Folks,

Since I was away for some time, I've just been catching up
reading the Digests I missed. One thing I hadn't looked at in detail
was Gary's ad copy for the CBG ad of late -- the one describing WDCiC
1, the Donald 60th-anniversary issue:

"[The series] begins with an all-Donald 64-page issue that
will include--no kidding!--the very first Donald Duck adventure
produced in the comic book format! It's being reprinted in the U.S.
for the first time ever!"

Largely, Gary, I praise you to the ends of the earth on this
ad. Just the thing to get us drooling fans drooling even more than
usual ;-) One criticism though. In future ads you must say, "It's
being *printed* in the U. S. for the first time ever..." The way you
have it now, it suggests that the story *has* previously seen print
here. Some people will think that this is a reference to "Pirate
Gold" -- or worse, to merely the first Barks 10-pager, which *is* also
in the issue. (That was printed before in various album and CBL
publications, but this will be its first COMIC-BOOK reprinting, so
that could cause confusion.)

I have seen this kind of statement before -- for example, "We
will begin reprinting Don Rosa's "Life of Scrooge" stories" -- and for
inexperienced readers, this sounds like you're referring to things
that have been seen here already. What you might say is, "We are
printing for the first time in the U. S. [insert name of story here]".
I dunno...

If Gladstone wants to shout about Pedrocchi in the U. S., you
can look up the article about him in Maurice Horn's WORLD ENCYCLOPEDIA
OF COMICS. Frederico Pedrocchi is a seminal figure in Italan comics
-- he led the "comic renaissance" as it's called there. He gets so
much purple prose and praise in Horn's book that you can surely
recycle some of it, Gary.

More importantly --

WHAT WAS RoC'S COMMENT ABOUT WAR OF THE WENDIGO BEING ACCEPTED
BY DISNEY???? DID THIS HAVE BASIS IN FACT? I didn't see the letter
from Gary that he quoted -- did I accidentally delete a digest, or
worse -- never receive one? My system was down on Tuesday, so
maybe that indeed happened...

Yours,

David Gerstein
<David.A.Gerstein at Williams.edu>

> You were upset that I drew young $crooge to look like HD&L? How
>else should I draw a young Duck?! What choice do I have? And whatsamatta
>with him looking like HD&L, anyhow?

Well, I wasn't really upset, I was just kidding. But there must be other ways
to draw young ducks.

> There isn't much chance of a "Life and Times of Donald Duck"
>since I don't know what that could involve. I mean, he doesn't have a
>history like $crooge; Donald was just born, grew up and there he was. I
>might (for some reason I don't yet know) do a story about Donald as a
>youth, but the tale couldn't involve any important moment in his life as
>there are none. He's the "Everyman" character.

Well, he doesn't have an adventurous history like $crooge, but he does
have one. What makes Donald Duck the way he is? What events happened when he
was growing up that made him so clueless? :-) Maybe a "Life of Donald" series
could include landmark events in his life. Events such as his first run in
with cousin Gladstone, the first time he met Uncle Scrooge, and so on. I mean
any excuse to get you to draw more ducks Don. :-)

> I can also always drop back and do some other stories about
>something that happened to Hortense and Matilda. They are only shown in
>brief spots in the Lo$, and they mysteriously disappear after chapter 11
>by simply telling $crooge that they never want to see him again. After
>that, maybe they move back to Scotland, maybe they die... it doesn't
>really matter, so why deal with it? And even though I COULD tell a story
>of Hortense and Matilda (or Pa and Ma or such), if $crooge is not there
>to be part of it, there would be little reason for the tale and readers
>would not be particularly interested, I shouldn't think.

What happens to them matters to me because I can't stand to see potentially
important characters just fade into nothing. I mean here you have the two
people who should be the most important part of $crooge's life, but they
disappear? I think that if you don't do anymore "kid" Hortense and Matilda
stories, then you should do a 1 or 2 part $crooge adventure that re-unites
$crooge with his sisters.

If you ever did a Hortense and Matilda story without $crooge I think that
the interest would be there. Maybe you could show how their lives turned out
after their break with $scrooge. Maybe they made their own fortunes. Maybe
they became adventurers. Maybe they became hermits. There is any number of
ways they could have gone. Plus, this is *your* opportunity, Don, to *create*
a branch of Duck lore that is *all* your own. Unless you only want to do Barks
stuff, which is fine with me. But you should think about it. Remember that
Barks created $crooge out of nothing, and made him into one of the most
popular characters in comics history. You could use either Hortense, Matilda,
or either to do the same.

--
Bitnet : Areid at Fordmulc
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Freenet : Bz809 at Cleveland.Freenet.Edu

Dear Folks,

I talked to my friend Jerry Beck, an animation historian in
Los Angeles, and at last found out the whole story about Zeke Wolf's
Hasidic disguise in 1933's THE THREE LITTLE PIGS.

Here's the reason for our confusion -- there were *three*
versions of the film!

A) 1930s version. The Wolf's Hasidic disguise included
hunched-over posture and hooked schnoz, as well as Yiddish dialect:
"I'm the Fuller Brush Man. I givin' g'way free semple."

B) 1940s version. The Wolf was reanimated so that he didn't
hunch over or have a hooked nose while giving his speech. The new
animation was made by Jack Hannah. But the AUDIO remained the same.

C) Current version, made in 1950s. Version B was given a new
audio track so that the wolf now said, "I'm the Fuller Brush man. I
work me way through college." The Wolf's lip movements still say
"...I givin' g'way free semple."

This is *not* common knowledge. It is unknown if version B
was ever released to theatres, but it was made available as a home
movie print for a while, which is how Mr. Beck once saw it. The only
version ever released to TV and video is version C.

Version A is one of the rarest cartoons of all time. Mr. Beck
doesn't even know if the Disney Archives has a copy. He has seen a
French version at the Museum of Modern Art.

As someone noted, Zeke isn't obviously very devout, because
he's spent years of his life attempting to catch three pigs. Of
course, as non-kosher Jews such as myself know, the lure of the hog is
great sometimes... ;-)

Your friend,

David Gerstein

"SO! Will Petrolio de Balonio de Donald Ducko *pay* for his
Christmas dinner, or will he wash dishes in *my* kitchen?"
<David.A.Gerstein at Williams.edu>

> Version A is one of the rarest cartoons of all time. Mr. Beck
> doesn't even know if the Disney Archives has a copy. He has seen a
> French version at the Museum of Modern Art.

In that case, it's possible to restore it! The french version with the
type "B" soundtrack!

Steamboat Willie

----------------------------------------------

... Does The Little Mermaid wear an algebra?

----------------------------------------------

Internet: hellman at proxxi.uf.se, DuckNet: hellman at 313:100/13.0

Hi, Folks!

Mark Semich said: "As far as I know, *none* of Barks' ducks
ever had any sort of colored hair. It seems extremely bizarre on a
duck, and now, by extension, it implies that Donald, Daisy, and HD&L
are bald! Was this your idea, or Gladstone's?"

How about Gladstone *Gander's?* Am I wrong, or has Gladstone
Gander's hair been frequently colored brown during the last forty-five
years? It hasn't always been colored brown (hell, in his first
appearance, for one page only it's colored *green!*), but it quite
frequently has.

As for other ducks with colored hair, I think of Don Rosa's
own favorite, Ludwig von Drake, who has brown hair (what's left of
it). As for Barks ducks in particular, I have never seen an edition
of "The Horseradish Story" that didn't color Seafoam McDuck's hair
some color. It's even shaded as though it's meant to be colored, not
white. And Glittering Goldie's got gold hair, doesn't she? And
Magica de Spell has black hair! (I forgot all about her.)

BTW, as for whether all little-kid ducks resemble HDL, I know
they don't. In any event, they certainly don't all grow up to be
Scrooge's size... think of the football-player ducks in some stories,
among others. In Don Rosa's own "On Stolen Time," as the Beagle
Boys run over the frozen crowd, we see a duck who flouts two
conventions. Apparently a rabbi (given his outfit), he not only has
eyes like HDL, separate from his beak, but is as tall as the dogface
characters in the crowd. Maybe it's just that Jewish ducks look
different somehow. ;-)

* * * * *

Back to the cancellation of WDCiC. Did Gladstone just go
ahead and put this series on the schedule and in the ads without
telling Disney about it? I was under the impression that Gladstone's
current contract with Disney was for six titles only... that's what
someone told me when Gladstone's new books were starting up. If
Disney was not told until the new series was announced, I can see why
they would have been confused, although I DON'T say that this should
let them cancel the series.

Perhaps a renegotiation of some contract or other is in order.
Then again, maybe something in me just doesn't want to believe that
Disney is as nuts as it seems right now. Why shouldn't they want
another title out there? More exposure for the characters, more
royalties for them. What's the danged PROBLEM? (And who made the
decision?)

If, after continued discussion with Disney, Gladstone cannot
get them to agree to adding this series in the near future (if not
immediately), I suggest that they use the extra resources they
apparently have now -- they must have them, if they planned to
publish six additional books a year! -- and begin publishing their
ongoing six titles eight times annually?

Disney's latest ultimatum... WHY? WHAT DOES IT GET FOR
DISNEY? A POWER TRIP? WHAT????!

David Gerstein
<David.A.Gerstein at Williams.edu>