tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-27563696494140886242024-02-19T03:48:32.498-05:00(Some of) Ryan Wynns' Assorted ThoughtsRyan Wynnshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00477919968924048814noreply@blogger.comBlogger150125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2756369649414088624.post-81504370783130740872017-10-03T10:56:00.002-04:002017-10-03T10:56:52.870-04:00So... about that new DuckTales...I've considered that there's something about, well, me being me, that I owe it to... to... the world? Myself? Unseen divine forces? Not sure... that reviewing and/or commenting on the <i>DuckTales </i>animated TV series reboot would be the perfect, most logical opportunity/excuse to revive my blog.
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The honest truth is that it wasn't at all planned or intended that tonight/last night/this morning/whatever, I would write upwards of a dozen bulky paragraphs about the new series and expedited-ly post them here or anywhere for the world to see. But I was watching the latest episode, and was incited to post a comment to The Disney Comics Fan Group on Facebook. I added a second comment. Then a third. I had explicitly stated when I started writing that I was just going to post one comment. When I thought of a couple more things I wanted to say and hadn't yet clicked "Post" and ushered forth all the finality that it brings, I spontaneously enhanced each successively added comment as it was added with an elucidatory, introdcutory, contextualizing, additional, secondary comment announcing the addition of -- and contained within a clause of -- the about-to-be-newly-added comment proper. (I should have added a comment that I was adding a comment that I was adding a comment! Why didn't I think of that?!) Finally, and equally spontaneously, I realized, "Actually, I have a whole rant I need to go on here...!", and proceeded accordingly. The self-aware commenting on each newly-added comment was generated more or less in real time, if you will, or I guess it would be better said stream-of-consciously.<br />
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Anyway, without further ado, here it is -- it's informal, not comprehensive, and focused on giving my take on the new show's taken on specific characters -- namely, the villains, but I touch on some of the principles, too... but this is it: My Big Comeback!<br />
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Modified revision of my Facebook post:<br />
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A few minutes into my first viewing of "The Beagle Birthday Massacre!" One comment: We did NOT need Joker/Pennywise Beagle Boys.<br />
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Okay, a second comment: When Ma Beagle introduced "the classic originals", wouldn't it have been nice if they were Barks'?<br />
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...oh, actually, a third comment: Did anyone else suspect -- until she said her name -- that Lena was supposed to be Daisy? I thought it added up especially because she sounded an awful lot like Kath Soucie, at least to my ears. But it's actually someone named Kimiko Green.<br />
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...annnnd, well, not done yet after all, jumping back to the subject of Beagle Boys, in what I'll call a P.S.: I meant to bring this up after "Daytrip of Doom!" -- why does this show's Burger Beagle look like the original's Bebop Beagle. The new character so far hasn't evinced any particular traits of either, yet evoking both at the outset, only to come up empty.<br />
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I don't want to be the fan coming off like he thinks rules should be imposed upon the show's creators -- and certainly keeping in mind to value the spirit of trying new things creatively -- over the years, starting with Barks (Grandpa Beagle), the allusions to the Beagles' extended clan and the occasional brushes with some of its members have always pointed to there being lots of fun to be mined from that colorful lineage. But I'm kind of disheartened by the wholesale eschewing of Beagle incarnations of the past, both those of the comics and the original <i>DuckTales</i>.<br />
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To me, an optimal way of paying homage to Barks would be a devoted attempt to bring his Beagles to animation -- meaning one character design making all of the "main gang" indistinguishable; all of same wearing prison tags formatted _ _ _ - _ _ _ that use only the numbers 1, 6, and 7; calling each other only by those numeric IDs in full or abbreviated to the latter set of three; and lastly, the biggest area of uncertainty and the one factor that never factored in Barks' comics but would be a major consideration on screen: should they all share the same voice _in addition to_ all sharing the same visage? (Maybe give just the prune-loving Beagle a slightly different voice? But NOT a "real" name, only his numeric ID, just as with the rest, of course!)<br />
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But since they didn't go the Barks route -- which would be a risky experiment, but I'd be really interested in and supportive of its attempt -- then as this IS <i>DuckTales</i>, after all, not Uncle Scrooge comics! -- I'd like to basically see the original series' Beagles. Yes, we have Bigtime, Bouncer, and a Burger who appears to not eat many burgers, but so far, their characterizations have been pretty thin. Not that the originals were mind-blowingly complex or even particularly clever, but couldn't they just play a _little_more into the nostalgia of a veritable child of the '80s like myself?<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh7HNkyD0N5khhevw1jPqutXol5xf0_7r32JVzktIswIWctWdqf2jYpuFiM1R_NdNzLWQ02sjeOPbPXVrk-J4Zf2FkcRGSwC3VR36ulUo_cTiR-HArdd1UU3yvDymyJMpQTkaRlqOEBjE8Y/s1600/1987-2017+Mike+Peraza.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="488" data-original-width="376" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh7HNkyD0N5khhevw1jPqutXol5xf0_7r32JVzktIswIWctWdqf2jYpuFiM1R_NdNzLWQ02sjeOPbPXVrk-J4Zf2FkcRGSwC3VR36ulUo_cTiR-HArdd1UU3yvDymyJMpQTkaRlqOEBjE8Y/s320/1987-2017+Mike+Peraza.jpg" width="245" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">Time warp: 1987 abruptly find themselves at an impasse, stonewalled by 2017. </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">Painting by Mike Peraza for D23 Expo 2017 limited edition print. </span></div>
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Now, I don't expect the exact replication of the designs and voices of the original. (Design-wise, that went out the window well before the new series premiered, when production art was first released!) But with the main cast -- with the exception of the COMPLETELY overhauled Webby and Mrs. Beakley -- despite the obvious aesthetic and audible differences -- and the, er, quirkier(?) characterizations -- Scrooge, Donald, the nephews, and Launchpad have been portrayed in such a way where a viewer familiar with the original is well aware these are new, distinct iterations of each, but they're consistent enough with and thus recognizable as their animation and comics antecedents alike, as well as given enough depth, where it's implicit that even though it's a reboot, these are _same_ characters, the ones we already knew, nonetheless. Think in the sense that they're myths, not modern entertainment franchises, and this is a new iteration of the myth. The new series' trio of Bigtime, Bouncer, and "Burger" have so far left me a little cold.<br />
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Ma Beagle in the role of gang leader, and moreover, the VERY CHARACTER HERSELF, were exclusively conceived in the production of -- and to date the exclusive purview of -- the original <i>DuckTales</i> (Ma Beagle coming into prominence with "Super DuckTales" after a few smaller roles/appearances over the course of the first season), So including and making her "Boss" once again (more Don than matriarch this time) is an inspired, well-considered way of signaling, "This IS <i>DuckTales</i>, after all, not Uncle Scrooge comics!" But why not go all the way and deliver the whole package: Bigtime, Burger, Baggy, Bouncer, Bankjob, Babyface, and Bebop, basically in personalty and appearance -- adjusted to the new style, but keeping the innate elements of the original designs -- the louts we know from the original? Yes, the new Bigtime and Bouncer designs basically fit that bill, and even the voices seemed based on the originals', but they're just coming off as generic cartoon thugs. (I know, I know, someone's saying, "That's all the Beagle Boys have EVER been!" :) Oh, and there's been some comedy based around Bouncer's size.... and yeah, I chuckled at his "You even buyin' this?" line to the arcade doorman.<br />
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Geez, what was supposed to be just one comments -- okay, two and one "P.S." -- turned into something else entirely, hasn't it. Didn't realize I had so much to say about this one little subject! Well, while I'm at it, I'll mention that as with the Beagle Boys, I wish they'd tried to bring to animated fruition something closer to Barks' Glomgold. Think an equivalency model: as Barks' Scrooge visually is to the new <i>DuckTales</i>' Scrooge visually, take Barks' Glomgold design and translate it to the sketchy style of the new show. Restore his background as being from and based in South Africa. Voice-wise, he might still be of Scottish descent, but PLEASE, don't go the bombastic, over-the-top route the new show took has taken with him in the recording booth. Or figure out what he should sound like if he _isn't_ in fact Scottish -- I'm not sure if Barks ever gave us anything to go on in this regard one way or the other, so as far as I know, there's no voice "type" one could say is adhering to the canon.<br />
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Or, once again, there's the "This IS <i>DuckTales,</i> after all, not Uncle Scrooge comics!" approach.They got partway with his basic, standardized clothing outfit (if I just said "outfit", would you know I was talking about what he wears?)... but why, why is he, I dunno, something like 7 feet WIDE?!!! Is it a medical condition, like a tumor or excessive swelling? Anyway, as with the new Bigtime and Bouncer, this clownish Glomgold's voice are based ostensibly on the original series'... but take this Bizzaro Flinty's aforementioned cringe-worthy larynx-generated emanations, which are a blunt aural caricature of a Scottish accent taken to all extremes, blown out of all proportion, and delivered as if on speed, compound that with the torrent of absurdity that in his two (three, depending on how you count) appearances so far (either way, the most recent appearance was a cameo, or actually, a Family Guy-style cutaway, the thrust of the gag being, "HA! He's Scottish!") has been the whole of his function. In fact, with both Gomgold and the 2017 Beagle Boy trio, it's as if they took some rudimentary elements of each characters' counterpart from the original series, but decided they were either going to be a parody (Glomgold) or stock thug (the Beagles). But we're only a few episodes in when there's more than 15 to go -- and that's just this season -- so we'll see what they'll do yet with these characters.<br />
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In the meantime, take Webby and Mrs. Beakley: I can at least understand their reasoning in thinking, "There really wasn't much to the ones from the original show, so we can do them ___a whole lot different and a whole lot better___!", and thus at least respect what they're trying to do.<br />
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More crucially -- and the end result registers in the green, I'm happy to say -- there's the classic/legacy characters. Naturally, the biggest concern in that department wis Donald. Clearly, they made it a point to get this one right/do the character justice. On the one hand, when appropriate, they run him through comedic, traditional-ish-cartoony-slapstick routines (like the stuff on the mansion-grounds-grounded houseboat in "Daytrip"). He furiously waves his arms around, stomps his feet on the ground in rapid succession, and voices his rage with unintelligible, ceasefire rants and raves. Clearly, they're paying homage to the classic-era Donald Duck theatrical shorts. But when the story beats call for it, they depict him in a more heartfelt way -- as a disgruntled, down-on-his-luck "average Joe", <i>à la</i> Barks.
But re: Glomgold and the Beagles, the show seems to be depending on sticking to convention and archetypes, cuing a lampoon, but really just referencing genre fiction's go-to type villains, ones that we all know and recognize right offhand. I'm "not really feeling(, man!)" the spirit of these characters' earlier counterparts, whether they be those in the comics or on the original show. But again, that's only as of yet, and we're not very far out.<br />
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So... Glomgold down...Beagles down... Magica still to go... *gets a little nervous* Don't get me wrong, I don't "require" that they play her exactly as Barks did, nor exactly as the original series did, but I want her to be an ACTUAL and FORMIDABLE villain, not in a tried-and-true comedic relief capacity.<br />
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Remember, in the above piece, I was zeroing in exclusively on very specific aspects of the new series. There's a lot I didn't cover a lot of which I quite like. Case in point: Another group member (who a lot of you know of, and some of you even know!) replied with a comment hinting at a hint -- that is, the biiiiiiiiiiig hint dropped on us at episode's end. (Said hint came in the form of an explicit, much-appreciated visual reference to a fondly-recalled early episode of the original series!) When I got there, I saw exactly what he meant, but I was already pretty excited just by what I'd gleamed from his comment.<br />
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Here's my reply... and, and at this point, I must issue a necessary <i><b><span style="font-size: x-large;">SPOILER WARNING</span></b></i>, applicable to what follows below:<br />
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Okay, didn't catch that, but... SOLD! I _do_love how they're building a mythology and teasing upcoming big events. ("Project Blatherskite" -- you bet THAT got my pulse pounding!) A later-to-come big, knock-you-to-the-floor reveal/unmasking like you're hinting at is something I'm ALL about. (Not that anything has actually been given away -- it's all on me and how I read between the lines! [Addendum: If you've seen "Beagle Birthday Massacre!"'s ending, as I now have, IF you know what you're looking at, there's NO ambiguity about it. Thus, not a thing has been spoiled, provided this is being read post having viewed "Beagle Birthday Massacre!" I hope that no one's eyes, unable to resist and avert themselves despite the spoiler warning above -- quite possibly their temptation level significantly raised by it, I regret must be acknowledged is a not-too-unlikely possibility -- haven't fallen here, but... Lena is Magica. The teaser-reveal-coda shows this to the viewer, provided that they recognize that the shadow is very close to Magica's evil(er) shadow doppelganger of the original series' "Magica's Shadow War". (With THAT title, it wouldn't be any other episode, now, would it?) Even many those well-familiar with Magica may not be acquainted with or may not vividly recall that episode, though... so if that's not enough, <i>née</i> Lena refers to herself in the third-person point-blank as Magica.<br />
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Reminds me of (er, more <span style="font-size: large;"><i><b>spoilers imminent</b></i></span>, just in case anyone needs them 20 years on...) when Owen abruptly started spinning rapidly in a Tasmanian Devil-type cartoony-mini-tornado blur, incongruous to the show's realism, only to have a certain Elven trickster emerge, announcing, "Herrrrrrrrrrre's PUCK!" Still one of my absolute favorite moments of any show, ever.<br />
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(Most of the rest are from <i>Gargoyles</i>, too, though!)<br />
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-- RyanRyan Wynnshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00477919968924048814noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2756369649414088624.post-9084294979174444822016-06-24T00:58:00.000-04:002016-06-26T12:09:38.506-04:00New-ish comic review: Uncle Scrooge #419 (IDW, June 2016)<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEinvSZO3gUOAGplPaAAd6AHPOjXEx1EqmOAK1awe_-zEUha6FnIjY-JZ06xU_wReDb4xdcu1cz9aXKNLn-Bg7O3DiMC8SaenCFaIWDjm2_iIHCDm7mvYd8BUhVEoVrDGa4i0WBTNGQ8lkOk/s1600/Uncle+Scrooge+%2523419+cover+A.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEinvSZO3gUOAGplPaAAd6AHPOjXEx1EqmOAK1awe_-zEUha6FnIjY-JZ06xU_wReDb4xdcu1cz9aXKNLn-Bg7O3DiMC8SaenCFaIWDjm2_iIHCDm7mvYd8BUhVEoVrDGa4i0WBTNGQ8lkOk/s320/Uncle+Scrooge+%2523419+cover+A.jpeg" width="210" /></a><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjtV-nvnKzZL-En89IoQi3xzN3-9eFJaMtKjaHH7kb4hNTFnVR9csfNXEJmQD8zFThcTticcQMqQf9UhdnX5nne4C5GwiB2YQvc9V-HAs8e_JljevRMAxXxs3fcfo2oODTv2n3CxRDacR0q/s1600/Uncle+Scrooge+%2523419+cover+B.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjtV-nvnKzZL-En89IoQi3xzN3-9eFJaMtKjaHH7kb4hNTFnVR9csfNXEJmQD8zFThcTticcQMqQf9UhdnX5nne4C5GwiB2YQvc9V-HAs8e_JljevRMAxXxs3fcfo2oODTv2n3CxRDacR0q/s320/Uncle+Scrooge+%2523419+cover+B.jpeg" width="211" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">IDW: If you keep having both the A and B cover reflect the contents inside, </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">I'll keep buying both! </span><span style="font-size: x-small;">(And glad to help sales that way!)</span></div>
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<b>"Scrooge's Last Adventure" Part 3</b><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">written by Francesco Artibani</span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">drawn by Alessandro Perina</span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">lettered by Nicole and Travis Seitler</span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">new U.S. dialogue by Jonathan H. Gray</span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">(Italy, <i>Topolino</i> #2987, February 26th, 2013)</span><br />
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When the support of Scrooe's in Part 2 pushed him out of his post-defeat slump and he vowed to fight back against the cabal that has robbed him of his financial empire and dignity, he meant it. Part 3 finds him practically marching through the Gates of <strike>Hell</strike> Pluto and into the Realm of the Council of Dark Magic. While Donald is understandably scared and Magica is walking on eggshells around her former masters, Scrooge bullishly confronts the Council like their secretaries or bureacrats standing between him and a rival CEO he's determined to confront -- and the comedic contrast between Scrooge and the more on-edge Donald and Magica is one of Part 3's hightlights. Another is the battle of wits against the Council that Scrooge wins -- a fine entry in the "Hero moves onto the next phase of his Hero's Journey by overcoming an intellectual challenge from a physically large immortal Guardian of some sort" tradition hailing all the way back to Oedipus solving the Riddle of the Sphinx. Kudos to Gray for the intelligence and complexity of this exchange, and how charmingly in-character the asides between Scrooge, Donald, and Magica were.<br />
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And said next phase consists of -- a surprise new encounter and new outing with the Terries and Firmies(!!!) Scrooge and Donald in order order help the subterranean part-bowling ball ones solve a major environmental crisis that'd beset them, the culprit turning out to be none other than... Glomgold. This reveal nicely ties Terry-Fermy episode into the wider story arc as a whole. In my review of Parts 1 and 2, I compared "Last Adventure" to the ill-realized "Rightful Owners" DuckTales four-parter. That disaster had attempted to revisit a couple of classic Barks adventures, too... but Artibani's return to the land beneath the ground is succintly and fully-realized, and packed with the requisite "mass roll" action by Perina, its place in the larger story balanced and in the proper scope, a deflty-paced and rollicking run-up to final chapter. Scrooge even has his top hat returned to him! (...wait, are you sure Don Rosa never had that happen?!) ;) Gray does a perfect job with the Terries and Firmies' country music FM radio-"learnt" speech -- it felt as though I were reading the original!<br />
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<b>"The Stick-Up"</b><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">written, drawn, and lettered by William Van Horn</span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">(New to the U.S. First appearance anywhere in Norway's <i>Donald Duck & Co.</i> #2010-09, March 1st, 2010)</span><br />
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Another Rumps McFowl-oriented Van Horn short making it U.S. debut. Rumpus, inexplicably left in charge of Scrooge's office while he and his nephews are off on yet another adventure (funny setup, that, to have an entire one of those happening <i style="font-weight: bold;">off-panel</i>), nearly blows it by making some frivolous decisions to use McDuck funds toward an attempt to win a television promotional contest -- but inadvertently foils a near-successful Beagle break-in plot, <i style="font-weight: bold;">while</i> winning the contest... which ends up benefitting Scrooge, since he owns the company hosting the contest! Genuinely kooky, clever, quickly-paced, funny stuff, replete with some wacky, calamitous syrup-based purely Van Horn visuals!<br />
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-- Ryan<br />
<span id="goog_1968172727"></span><span id="goog_1968172728"></span>Ryan Wynnshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00477919968924048814noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2756369649414088624.post-49882346413121474542016-06-08T03:13:00.000-04:002016-06-15T00:48:33.272-04:00New comic review: Darkwing Duck #2 (Joe Books, May 2016)<div>
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<b>"Orange Is the New Purple" Part 2</b><span style="font-size: x-small;"> </span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">written by Aaron Sparrow</span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">drawn by James Silvani</span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">(Well, technically, the way they're credited is jointly, as just the "storytellers".)</span><br />
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The majority of Part 2 of the new <i>Darkwing Duck</i> comic's first story arc is preoccupied with DW, flying by the seat of his (non-)pants, scrapping it up with one of his distinguished foes after another -- it appears that the idea is to have 'em just keep comin'. Elsewhere, in the cutaways to Negaduck watching DW from afar and Gosalyn trying to maker her way undetected to her dad, several additional villains show up, as the super-villain prison setting affords. (Hmm, maybe that was even the whole point...?) ;) </div>
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The succession of specially selected and spotlit showdowns that DW is subject to, averaging two pages per villain, is so busy, dense, varied, and fast-paced that it not only doesn't feel too long, but feels shorter than it is, page count-wise. Honestly, on paper (...er, wait, it <i>is</i>...well, you know what I...never mind...), if I read an outline of this installment, I'd think, "So the story is put on hold for a long string of gratuitous villain cameos, and when we finally get to the next story beat, it's cliffhanger time?" But in execution, the comic eschews any such attempt at quantifying it structurally and functionally. Each of the scenarios that DW is thrown into -- and most importantly, the solution that he finds for each -- is fully and thoroughly developed, and genuinely original, distinguished, and clever. Along the way, every single pun, gag, and moment of comedic levity reinforcing DW as flawed hero (...yeah, he'd resent <i>that</i>) hits the mark. '70's Gold Key or Charlton this ain't. Sparrow and Silvani <i>know</i> what they're doing, so if it's it's gonna be something as structurally cut-and-dry and repetitive as "DW gets in the ring with one familiar villain after another", it's 'cause they realize the potential that such an outing has to <i>rock</i>, and they're gonna go all in and all out to ensure that it does.<br />
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...and not to mention that the "villains' revolving door" sequence is comparable to the immortal <i>Looney Tunes</i> "blackout gag" structure, which DW's TV show emulated and paid homage to on countless occasions. So Sparrow and Silvani's riffing is wildly appropriate.<br />
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Thus, when two or three (or four) major plot developments pretty much simultaneously "go down" on the last couple pages, they don't feel belated but "organic", even after such rampant frivolousness. For one thing, we were having fun the whole time anyway. The build-up to Cat-Tankerous' return was concisely and lucidly broken down into very short bits interspersed throughout the story starting with the field trip/prison opening ceremony scene (and conveyed a considerable amount of understated pathos, actually), so we're good there. The reveal <strike>Suff-rage's</strike> Mistressterious is, on the other hand, totally out of the blue (unless there were hints I'm too dense to have picked up on) but intriguing, given how in "Campaign Carnage", her identity was tauntingly hinted at with the subtlety of a sledgehammer to the skull and the significance this would have to <i>Darkwing Duck</i> "'shippers", if there are in fact any fans who that designation would apply to. (Wait a minute, since I even <i>get </i>how this particular relationship of DW's can be taken as a big deal, I think I might <i>be</i> a 'shipper... <i style="font-weight: bold;">NNNOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!</i>) But then there's the fact that it appears that she's running her own hijacking of the prison independent and under the radar of Negaduck's -- definitely a wrench thrown into the works that adds a whole new angle to the story that heretofore we hadn't realized even existed, raising all kinds of questions. But in the <i>Darkwing Duck</i> pantheon, Negaduck trumps all, and thus the villainess with the confounding headgear making her big entrance is only part of the run-up to the more calculated blow that follows and that <i>really</i> leaves us dazed and staggered...</div>
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The figurative bomb that Negaduck drops on us and DW at the very last moment, that he's holding Gosalyn hostage, is no mere falling back on the damsel-in-distress trope. The fear and hurt in Darkwing's reaction is palpable, and <b>right on target</b>, hearkening all the way back to the bond paternal bond formed in "Darkly Dawns the Duck". That in one sense Negaduck actually <b><i>is</i></b> Drake (think in terms of the theory that ostensibly parallel universes are actually <i>the same </i>universe, sharing the same physical space but existing on different frequencies, of sorst), given the malevolence that rules every fiber of his being, <b>and </b>given his abusive history with <b>his</b> universe's Gosalyn, then for him to have her at his mercy -- as Negs is all too keenly aware -- hits Drake where he's absolutelymost vulnerable, and is the cruelest, most tragic -- but astoundingly apt -- irony. Sparrow and Silvani <i style="font-weight: bold;">get </i>these characters, and they drive home how visceral and potentially emotionally nuclear it is to have their deep-seated (and trans-dimensionally destined) rivalry -- and Gosalyn's inextricable part in it -- come to a head like this.<br />
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[And though she wasn't actually mentioned, Part 2's final scene certainly evoked the Negaverse Gosalyn... at least to me, if just because seeing "regular" Gosalyn in Negaduck's clutches reminded me of her parallel timeline counterpart.) And so, on a related note, I think I'll finally throw out to Aaron and James a question that's long eaten at me: How come Negaduck never thought to check out who lives in the "Prime" universe who might live at the address that belonged to him in the Negaverse?]<br />
<br />
The gel-haired, vapidity-exuding two TV news anchors with names that have a ring similar to that of "derp derp" are fast on their way to becoming a staple of the comic. They work well as a framing device, given the "public" nature of DW's career of confronting and foiling "<i>public</i> menaces", and are a vehicle for some nice world-building, fleshing out and reinforcing St. Canard almost as a character unto itself.<br />
<br />
Launchpad really shone in his one-page appearance (on the <i>first</i> page, in fact), eagerly, earnestly, and heedlessly doing what he can in hopes of coming to the aid of his "buddy". Oddly, <i>faux</i>-Launchpad in his later appearance was similarly likable... and DW accounting for how he souced out the imposter made for a particularly priceless particular line. (Not a typo -- I mean a particular line that's particularly priceless.) ;)<br />
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-- Ryan</div>
Ryan Wynnshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00477919968924048814noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2756369649414088624.post-71687687656299237402016-05-25T02:21:00.003-04:002016-05-27T01:08:43.956-04:00New comic review: Darkwing Duck #1 (Joe Books, April 2016)<span class=""> As Joe Books' </span><i><span class="">Darkwing Duck</span></i><span class=""> #2 is due out tomorrow, it's high time for this blog to honor and review #1, as it was in the truest sense, a glorious, triumphant return to comics for </span><i><span class="">Darkwing Duck</span></i><span class="">... and I can't overstate enough, a glorious, triumphant return to </span><i><span class="">Darkwing Duck </span></i><span class="">comics for the creative team of Aaron Sparrow and James Silvani. It's the latter two men, respectively, who in 2009 launched DW's </span><i><span class="">last</span></i><span class=""> comics return, but due to subsequent unfortunate, er, managerial decisions, were not kept together for the duration of that run (at least officially... <span style="font-size: xx-small;">wink, wink...!</span>) Now, however, ideal circumstances (as such they appear from this observer's distant coordinates) at a different (</span><i><span class="">*coughvastlysuperiorcoughcough*)</span></i><span class=""> publisher have enabled the reunion of Aaron, James, and Darkwing & Co. And we, the fans/readers, are reaping the benefits (though maybe not as much as the creators, who get <i>paid</i> for being obsessed with this stuff!)</span><br />
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<span class="">Given that fans have been awaiting this occasion for nearly five years (</span><i><span class="">man</span></i><span class="">,it's been already been that long? GTFO!), and moreover, given how long its creators have fought for the victory that is this comic's existence, the occasion is treated perfectly with the colorful, joyful, festive.. and inevitably calamitous </span><span class="">opening scene portraying the "St. Canard Main Street Lit-Up Electrical Parade" (That's not just a classic but a <i>class</i></span><b><i><u><span class="">y</span></u></i></b><span class=""><i> </i>Disney in-reference!) </span><br />
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<span class="">If you'll excuse my presumptuousness, I believe that the the intent behind the parade scene is </span><b style="font-style: italic;"><span class="">precisely</span></b><span class=""> as I've characterized it: to declare, "</span><i style="font-weight: bold;"><span class="">WOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!! </span></i><span class="">Darkwing's </span><i style="font-weight: bold;"><u><span class="">BACK</span></u><span class="">!!!!!!</span></i><span class="">" in a blazing torrent of zany, over-the-top, slam-bang-zoom-smash action. My evidence? The only bearing that the parade and the destruction left in its wake on the plot that's underway by issue's end is the matter of how Megavolt gets from Point A to Point B... as if we really need a backstory for his or any super-villain's latest incarceration. However, if there's ever a third instance of a <i>Darkwing Duck </i>#1 in which</span><span class=""> an identity-withheld figure of intrigue abducts Megavolt, it will have officially become a tradition. ;) </span><br />
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If you've ever been subjected to the decrees from on high as to how a screenplay (particularly, but other storytelling mediums are applicable) <i>must </i>be written, then you know that a writer shall never depict their character just hangin' 'round and chillin' like they would on any other ordinary day and move on to the next scene without a quantifiable change that advances the plot having taken place. If the "parade disaster" opener loosely makes the grade, well, as far as I can see, the "dinner at the Muddlefoots'" bit that follows eschews the so-called conventional wisdom of the gurus of pop culture formula. Nothing that transpires during it is of any trackable consequence on anything that happens afterwards -- it's just Drake reluctantly attending a cookout (and TV marathon) hosted by Herb Muddlefoot and squirming through it, as we'd expect him to. Oh, but that's what's so <i>great</i> about this scene. The characterizations and dialogue -- from Herb hilariously experiencing no cognitive whatsoever from his contention that the addition of tofu makes bacon and blue cheese<i> </i>"<i style="font-weight: bold;">healthy</i>"; to Gosalyn decidedly "cucking" Tank; to Tank slickly hustling cash out of Drake in exchange for his freedom by sabotaging by sabotaging Herb's TV satellite dish -- are not only spot-on, but delightfully original and exponentially amusing. It's like a jazz musician who will riffing comes up with a glorious melody that's completely and utterly new but yet rather than altering the song, reminds us what it sounds like.<br />
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<span class="">Moreover, I'd argue that this sequence </span><i><span class="">does </span></i><span class="">serve a higher purpose. "The Duck Knight Returns" found circumstances in St. Canard having drastically, even antithetically, changed from those that we knew. The comic was never intended to be fan-fiction dwelling exclusively on intimacy between select characters, and therefore the heroes had to be the heroes and the villains had to be the villains, and so the status quo wa</span>o<span class="">s quickly restored... almost too quickly, as things remained so high-gear, several issues passed before it hit me, "W-w-w-wait, sso Drake and Gos DO still live in that same house? ...oh, you mean, Binky DIDN'T succumb to the temptations posited by some Fabio-like male model, leaving Herb, who was only saved by Quackwerks hiring him for, er, "TV viewer market research"? (Imagine Herb forcibly watching TV 24/7 <i>Clockwork Orange</i>-style but LOVING every second of it.) Ummm, hey, so we've been told that SHUSH is defunct, but have Sara Bellum's skills been co-opted by Quackwerks, or did the Crime-Bots execute her in cold blood based on algorithm determing her erratic, unpredictable, unreliable nature?" The Muddlefoots scene and certainly the subsequent satellite visit check-in with J. Gander and Gryzlikoff reaffirm that this is the </span><i><span class="">Darkwing Duck</span></i><span class=""> universe we know and love from the show, and they have a grounding, reassuring effect that admittedly was somewhat missing last time 'round.</span><br />
<br />
<span class="">Back on Earth, we find Gosalyn off to school for the day, and what at first appears to be just some daily-mundane-suburban-routine stuff within a couple panels is eclipsed by a vital piece of information that ("Finally!", I can hear Messrs. McKee and Ball harrumphing) gives way to the plot formally being continuously advanced. The insistent stream of jokes about the idiocy of hosting children as guests in an operational maximum-security prison and the steady flow of snarky asides (from Gosalyn) about this ironic scenario and Boober Fraggle-worthy fretting (from Honker) re: anticipating that "somethng</span><span class=""> BAD!!!" is about to happen reinforce that we're not merely being treated to a living museum tour of DW's rogues gallery, but that... well, that "something BAD!!!" is about to happen.</span><br />
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<span class="">That something being Negaduck (newly-and-finely-filed teeth and all) springing his latest malevolent scheme to put his reviled cross-universe doppelganger through Hell and back infinite times over. Under the </span><span style="font-size: xx-small;"><span class="">(non-)</span></span><span class="">stewardship of the 2009-2011 publisher, Silvani's art at times felt somewhat constricted, as if he was up against unreasonable deadlines... and Aaron was exceptionally vocal in relating to the public how those enforced by that publisher (the name of which shall </span><i style="font-weight: bold;"><span class="">NOT</span></i><span class=""> be uttered within this realm) indeed were. And after Aaron was let go, the comic was depleted of humor (when originally, its humor had been in stylistic keeping with the TV show and surged with real lifeblood); grasp of characterization and dialogue became tenuous at best; and whoever's influence won out in terms of plot and story, their sensibilities were higher-level-aimed but too rigid and dry in operation.</span><br />
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<span class="">And while the </span><i><span class="">Definitely Dangerous</span></i><span class=""> collected, "remastered" volume by and large rectifies the 2010-2012 run, Joe Books' April 2016 <i>Darkwing Duck</i> #1 is the first time we're seeing -- no-holds-barred, unfettered, and un-fucked-with -- the Sparrow-Silvani team blasting full-bore out the gate with an original </span><span class=""><i>Darkwing Duck </i>comic book issue </span><span class="">that is fully developed and realized, brimming and bursting with razor-sharp wit and life-loving energy on each and every imperative count: story, art, characterization, and dialogue. These guys have wholly internalized he original series and now radiate it back at the universe hematically, stylistically, and spiritually. And as my default mode is to write about the writing, I'll take this opportunity to note that whereas later in the 2010-2012, Silvani presumably out of necessity was at times working in a stiffer, more utilitarian way than he'd probably like to, at Joe Books, his every page and panel is final draft/director's cut-level. Remember that two-page splash at the beginning of 2010's #1? Here, every panel has that kind of dynamics. And while, say, there were <i>Disney Adventures</i> artists of old who could certainly draw <i>Disney Afternoon</i> characters on model, Silvani not only has on-model in spades, but he's a virtuoso with anatomy, physicality, posing, and nuances in expression and countenance. In other words, the comic looks <i style="font-weight: bold;">great</i>. And it looks just like the TV show, too boot -- just look at the background/crowd characters/extras.</span><br />
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"Okay, soooooooooo... Negaduck shows up. <i style="font-weight: bold;">And?</i>" Well, yes, technically, all that happens is, indeed, Negaduck shows up, brawls some with DW, and then gloats, in so many words, "Oh, by the way, you're trapped, and things are about to get a lot less than pleasant for you." That's a pretty vague, non-committal cliffhanger, right? Ah, but this is a case of form over content. With every unbridled smash of a giant-sized mallet; wildly indiscriminate lashing and whipping about of a (fully powered and grinding away at full force) chainsaw; every vain, flamboyant flaunting his bristling bragging of the mirth, merriment, jubilation, and joy that he takes in misanthropy, malevolence, sadism, and savagery; and every sardonic, acerbic, contemptuous (but with relish) jibe at the expense of his "Regularverse" equivalent, this isn't some over-hyped, fan-ingratiating, obligatory "Negaduck Returns, and with His Biggest Scheme Yet" affair. Rather, this <i style="font-weight: bold;">IS</i> Negaduck, period. The cliffhanger intrigues and entices despite that things are only just starting, as, frankly, not only are we still riding high on the sorely awaited reveal of Everyone's Favorite Villain that transpired a moment ago, but the stakes -- both physical and interpersonal/emotional -- have just been related so lucidly and resoundingly as to have fully substantiated themselves. In other words, we're sold.<br />
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Good thing #2 is out <strike>tomor</strike>-...today! :D ;)<br />
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P.S. I greatly appreciate the running joke incorporating Launchpad's <i>DuckTales</i>-based inclination toward "crashing", which I believe -- but I may be wrong -- was never in play or alluded to on <i>Darkwing Duck</i>.<br />
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-- RyanRyan Wynnshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00477919968924048814noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2756369649414088624.post-53682359224454266482016-05-23T16:00:00.003-04:002016-05-25T02:25:13.003-04:00New comic review: The Pink Panther Free Comic Book Day Edition #1 (American Mythology, May 7th, 2016)Alas, the comic book store (and the one other that I visited) that I regularly patronize only had the standard cover (by S.L. Gallant, depicted below) and not the <i>Ant and the Ardvark</i> variant that I was hoping to get my hands on. Hey, what matters is that I got the comic -- and following my rule of thumb with the IDW books that I buy (Disney and otherwise), the A cover is always the "real" one, and I don't want to be a hypocrite, now, do I? And as this particular A cover directly represents the lead story, it justifies my reasoning behind my personal system for choosing covers.<br />
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Also, a correction: I had reported that this Free Comic Book Day edition is also this new <i>Pink Panther</i> run's official #1. The ads inside it clarify that the formal #1 will follow sometime in May, but it <a href="http://www.previewsworld.com/Catalog/MAR161035">appears</a> to have been pushed back to June 8th.<br />
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<b>"Pan-Thor"</b><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">written and drawn by S.L. Gallant</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: small;">Gallant definitely understands the neo-silent film, visually-dependent nature of the DePatie-Freleng shorts and faithfully translates them to the medium of comics... or, if you will, sequential art. (I would think that Scott McCloud would approve.) I was confused by a couple of the gags. I'm prone to think it may well have been me, with one exception: what's up with Inspector Clouseau's cameo at the end? Is he Thor's Earthly counterpart, or was this a case of magical long-distance place-trading? Anyway, in the spirit of Free Comic Book Day, this parody of Marvel's <i>Thor</i> works nicely as tribute to the medium as a whole.</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: small;"><b>"Clean Sweep"</b></span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">written and drawn by Adrian Ropp</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-size: small;">The punchline of this one-page <i>Ant and the Ardvark</i> gag is an old standby. While no new layers or twists are added to it, it's still <i>told well</i>, with quick, sharp timing, and the characterization is true to the shorts. Compared to the light, flitting style of "Pan-Thor", this has an earthier style, grounded (pun kind of intended) by a more weighted sense of anatomy. In both cases, the respective style is an appropriate interpretation of the animation on which the comic is based, although neither is a slavish mimicry of the original by any means.</span></span></span><br />
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-size: small;"><b>"Pink Volcano"</b></span></span></span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">written and drawn by Warren Tufts</span></span></span></span><br />
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-size: small;">Though this story is attributed to 1994 issue of <i>Pink Panther</i> (published by Harvey, we can deduce), the fact that it was also a reprint<i> then</i> is neglected. The four-tiers-per-page format in conjunction with the <i>Pink Panther</i> title logo in the opening half-page splash are a dead giveaway that this of Gold Key/Whitman origin. In true Western Publishing fashion, just like with, for example, <i>Tom and Jerry</i> and <i>The Road Runner</i> the Pink Panther does something that </span></span></span></span> his screen counterpart does not: talk. A lot. </span><br />
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<span style="font-size: small;">This is an extremely silly story about an island trying to sacrifice "Pink" (that's his name, apparently) to their volcano god. The natives are represented by an oblivious, buffoonish "king" with an absurdly long, jibberish-y name that he can never pronounce right himself (this running joke nearly dominates the story) and his royal "assistant", who's the "power behind the throne" -- you know, the type who's actually far more astute and competent than their "lord", and is actually the one keeping things running, but never complains, happily, loyally and quietly doing his job. Their comedic interplay is actually pretty entertaining. The same goes for Pink playing out the old routine of relishing in the mistaken belief that the natives genuinely mean to treat him hospitably and as an honored guest, and then, at the moment the truth hits home (markedly later than common sense would dictate -- and that's where the humor lies, of course), doing, "Wuh-wuh-WUHHHHH?!!! They want to EAT ME??!!! I'm OUTTA HERE!!!"-type double-take. Fun stuff. Like cotton candy! (And not just 'cause it's pink!)</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: small;">-- Ryan</span>Ryan Wynnshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00477919968924048814noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2756369649414088624.post-33491394058706890832016-05-21T05:12:00.001-04:002016-05-21T05:15:21.912-04:00New comic(s -- in total, 2) review: Walt Disney's Comics and Stories #730-731 (IDW, April-May 2016)<br />
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">Right: Cover for #730, drawn by Henrieke Goorhuis, colored by Ronda Pattison. Original.</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">Left: Cover for #731, drawn by Massimo Fecchi, colored by Mario Perrotta.</span></div>
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<b>"The Search for the Zodiac Stone"</b> (#730-731)<br />
Chapter 10: "Blondbeard's Pirate Plunder"<br />
Chapter 11: "The Partners of the Pendant"<br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">written by Bruno Sarda</span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">drawn by Franco Valussi</span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">lettered by Nicole and Travis Seitler</span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">U.S. dialogue by Jonathan H. Gray</span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">(Italy. <i>Topolino </i>#<a href="https://coa.inducks.org/issue.php?c=it/TL+1789#c">1789</a>-<a href="https://coa.inducks.org/issue.php?c=it/TL+1790#b">1790</a>, March 11th and March 18th, 1990)</span><br />
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Eleven issues ago (...how time has flown!), I wrote about the advent of the U.S. premier of "The Search for the Zodiac Stone" in terms of expecting some sort of cosmic-in-scope, "ultimate"duck-mouse universe-set "epic". I had no idea what I was talking about, as many a European reader would've been able to recognize 25+ years ago. To a <i>Topolino</i> reader in 1990, this storyline we might imagine was a novelty: for 12 consecutive issues (exactly three months' worth), one story (out of several) per issue, each roughly 30 pages in length, was presented under the over-arcing "Zodiac Stone" umbrella. What otherwise may have read as the latest <i>Uncle Scrooge</i>, <i>Donald Duck</i>, <i>Mickey Mouse</i>, or even <i>Huey, Dewey, and Louie</i> adventure had tacked onto it some jive about the immediate proceedings having something to do with the recovery of 1 of 12 "pedants" (as they've been called int he American version).<br />
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The loosely serialized nature of the continuity is driven home by its unassuming, <i>casual</i>, not merely self-contained but self-<i>concerned </i>second-to-last and penultimate installments. Chapter 10 is made of the stuff that accounted for a <i>Huey, Dewey and Louie Back to School</i> or <i>Donald Duck Family</i> edition of <i>Dell Giant</i>: the nephews, staying on Grandma Duck's farm, are bored, so Grandma decides to liven things up for them by faking a pirate's treasure map set right on her farm. On the other hand, even given her temporarily getting the upper hand on Scrooge, Chapter 11 may be Magica's most undignified, humiliating effort to acquire Scrooge's first dime: despite the basis of the magic she uses here in Greek mythology, in effect, it comes off as little more than her commandeering a coin-operated grocery store kiddie ride rocking horse.<br />
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Make no mistake, I enjoyed the comedic seasoned adventurer nephews' expressions of boredom with the plain doldrums of a "hayseed's" existence; Grandma's stick-to-it-iv-ness in not just verbally defending her way of life but going out of her way to orchestrate an elaborate ruse to prove her point; the comic relief found in Gus reluctantly aiding Grandma in aid efforts and in their course becoming far more easily tired than she is; Scrooge's faulty memory ("Back to the Klondike", anyone?) leading both Donald and Mickey around the globe on several false trails; and a despondent Scrooge supplicating a gloating Magica, who is quick to find herself fouled up by the surprise arrival of the Donald-Mickey team. And make no mistake, each and all of these characterizations and interactions were as richly rewarding as they are in the IDW due to Jonathan Gray's exacting scribesmanship.<br />
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Whereas in Chapter 10, the "Taurus" theme is incorporated only in passing as part of the opening scene, and later revisited, <i>sort of </i>"tying everything together" at the Whitman-level "dramatic" climax, and has absolutely nothing to do with the respective pendant's backstory, Chapter 11's " " is jutting right into our face, in a glaring, big, honkin' way... yet the ultimate locating of the pendant turns out to have NOTHING to do with the preceding search for it, in an way that's almost clever for being anti-clever.<br />
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So, in all, yes, "The Search for the Zodiac Stone" has ended up being sillier an outing than I'd originally hoped it might be. But it HAS -- thanks to the lively, charming art, dialogue, and characterizations -- been a hell of a lot of fun, delightfully both silly and satirical.<br />
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And the final panel of Chapter 11 teases and promises that the next and final installment will see the Phantom Blot teamed with Peg Leg Pete. Let it not be said that "they", in their various permutations over the decades and across the continents, don't know what we want!<br />
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<b>"Music for Melons"</b> (#730)<br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">written and drawn by Ben Verhagen</span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">lettered by Nicole and Travis Seiter</span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">U.S. dialogue by David Gerstein</span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">(Netherlands. <i>Donald Duck</i> <a href="https://coa.inducks.org/issue.php?c=nl/DD1987-09#b">#9-1987</a>, February 27th, 1987)</span><br />
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Perhaps it's because of "Blondbeard"'s low-key nature that "Petrified Perfection" was given the cover and lead spot over "Zodiac"'s tenth chapter. Whatever the reason, the rare appearance of Ben Verhagen story is a special event in its own right, and being a 10-pager, it being a <i>WDC&S</i> headliner is both appropriate and deserved. Donald pressured to succeed in a new, key position delegated to him by the ruthlessly judgmental Scrooge is a time-tested formula. I wouldn't as Donald only succeeds at the last minute, after a string of desperate, failed attempts. If the intended-to-be-silly efforts to accelerate and compound the growth of a single melon are visually not as silly as they could be, Gerstein's dialogue makes up for it, with numerous pun and turns-of-phrase ingenious in their direct contextual relevance, as well as several <i>very</i> eccentric references (a couple of which I couldn't even figure out). </div>
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Something about the narrative execution felt off to me -- I've pinned it to the fact that Scrooge charges Donald with the entire crop, yet the ensuing efforts are centered on the one melon. Though we're shown what inspired this obsession, it was hard to escape the feeling of established but immediately neglected expectations. Living (and measuring) up to the legend is a still hard sell, as it's not made explicit that the melon icon painted on the fence is supposed to represent the actual size of the historic precedent Don's striving to emulate. </div>
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Ultimately, though, the [series of comedic failed attempts --> fleeting moment of triumph undone by over-the-top disaster --> things turn out okay with a "twist" solution] structure holds things together perfectly fine. The wide-angle, grand, stately depiction of Scrooge's newly-opened giant-melon-refurbished-as-hotel in the closing half-page splash evokes the fantastical whimsy of Verhagen's adventure stories. I don't know if Scrooge in the introductory scene citing the zoning restrictions subjected upon him or the cryptic hint in the legend about "the secret being found in song" were originally part of the story or were worked in by Gerstein, but either way, both lay the ground for a setup-payoff sub-thread -- two integral layers built into the story, giving it more complexity.<br />
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<b>"Petrified Perfection"</b> (#731)<br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">written by George Stallings</span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">drawn by Riley Thomson</span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">(U.S. <i>Br'er Rabbit</i> weekly Sunday newspaper comic strip, <a href="https://coa.inducks.org/story.php?c=ZB+53-05-17">May 17th, 1953</a>)</span><span style="font-size: xx-small;"> </span><span style="font-size: x-small;">[newly titled]</span><br />
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Vintage Disney's Br'er Rabbit, a vintage Sunday newspaper comic strip -- how can one go wrong?!</div>
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<b>"Why Robot"</b> (#731)</div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">written by Stefan Petrucha</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">drawn by Fabrizio Petrossi</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">lettered by Nicole and Travis Seitler</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">(France. <i>Le Journal de Mickey</i> <a href="https://coa.inducks.org/issue.php?c=fr/JM%202999">#2999</a>, December 9th, 2009)</span></div>
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This story's appearance in the U.S. marks a throwback to the Gemstone days, which was heavy with 4-tiers-per-page modern Danish <i>Mickey </i>(and friends/family) stories. Petrucha was one of the writers whose stories were regularly used, and though Petrossi wasn't seen as frequently as Ferioli, he did make a showing, and I would say aesthetically was of that same school -- slick, smooth, and more (pupil-eyed) "Disney traditional" than their stylized Italian counterparts.<br />
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Not only is "buddy film"-esque scenario spotlighting Goofy and Horace as a comedic duo sans Mickey or any other regulars a novelty, but so is Horace receiving top billing, shared not. It's practically screamed in the reader's face that if their hosts aren't robots or haven't been body-snatched by aliens, then it's <i>got </i>to be <i>some </i>other equally familiar trope. But it's not supposed to be an impenetrable mystery for the reader -- it's a farce, the crux of this outing being how, each for his own reasons that are innate but completely different from the others, this pair of sidekicks astray from their "alpha" are both oblivious to and hyper-suspicious of (in a justified but completely misguided way) of their surroundings.<br />
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Because they're both played as fools, we expect all along that whatever accounts for their mysterious glimpses, fleeting window-facilitated of what they take as a "robot's shadow" is most likely innocuous. It shouldn't be a letdown when we're proven right, for all of the dark-and-stormy-night theatrics are meant as a joke -- a spoof -- reflecting each protagonist's childlike, misread perception of the situation and their wild, unfounded hypotheses.<br />
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The quintessential moment of this exercises in contrast is the simple-minded though humble nature expressed in Goofy's thought balloon and the overblown ego and self-deluded vanity rampant in Horace's.<br />
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-- Ryan</div>
Ryan Wynnshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00477919968924048814noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2756369649414088624.post-21941284867767849242016-05-07T03:02:00.000-04:002016-05-12T02:58:46.518-04:00New comic(s, two of 'em!) review: Uncle Scrooge #417-418 (IDW, April-May 2016)<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiLYaXrEvQaqUNkYyqnxUvhDSKMVX8201QSZUaXFImpezGF64fGsMYhDbA4RMolRHbfqa1f-ZwmEh8GDlzaYNT8ndZb7OgIo3f7QAuMpSSo0Z3l8vEoaqUkxSXI3DJvN4XXigiU0QIY6FdQ/s1600/Uncle+Scrooge+417+cover.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiLYaXrEvQaqUNkYyqnxUvhDSKMVX8201QSZUaXFImpezGF64fGsMYhDbA4RMolRHbfqa1f-ZwmEh8GDlzaYNT8ndZb7OgIo3f7QAuMpSSo0Z3l8vEoaqUkxSXI3DJvN4XXigiU0QIY6FdQ/s320/Uncle+Scrooge+417+cover.jpeg" width="211" /></a><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgIlpbKr-COUJ3O-N3dnLyel0ys30NrPB7fBnEHOCxCHraOflGvZl2Usuw31gfup6rGPO8TVvDhkspmbUIxxEVffX7n_jlHyaRwhCdcvgVf1aiwzL4UVDAkpyUDlrYi3lw6rLFzPmsUOc2a/s1600/Uncle+Scrooge+418+cover.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgIlpbKr-COUJ3O-N3dnLyel0ys30NrPB7fBnEHOCxCHraOflGvZl2Usuw31gfup6rGPO8TVvDhkspmbUIxxEVffX7n_jlHyaRwhCdcvgVf1aiwzL4UVDAkpyUDlrYi3lw6rLFzPmsUOc2a/s320/Uncle+Scrooge+418+cover.jpg" width="210" /></a><span style="font-size: x-small;"> </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">Left: Cover for #417 by Alessandro Perina, from <i>Topolino</i> #2985.</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">Right: Cover for #418 by Ulrich Schroeder and Daan Jippes. Original.</span></div>
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<b>"Scrooge's Last Adventure" Parts 1 and 2</b> (#417-418)<br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">written by Francesco Artibani</span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">drawn by Alessandro Perina</span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">lettered by Nicole and Travis Seitler</span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">new U.S. dialogue by Jonathan H. Gray</span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">(Italy, <i>Topolino</i> #2985-2986, February 12th and 18th, 2013)</span><br />
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<i><b>This </b></i>is what the ill-paced, under-developed "Rightful Owners" four-parter of 2011's short-lived U.S. <i>DuckTales</i> comic should have been... and I think was trying to be. (Not to mention that Rockerduck unquestionably <i>belongs</i> in an <i>Uncle Scrooge</i> story, whether properly cast -- as he is here -- as one of Scrooge's arch-nemeses, whereas his comparable (unprecedented) involvement in "Owners" was... puzzling.) One of if not the most recent Italian duck stories that IDW has printed, it reveals that Italy's most popular comic is keeping pace with its American counterparts, in terms of "big", blockbuster-level stories that bask in the mythologies of the respective headlining stars and their universe, playing to a cumulative archetypal conception of them given a new spin, the figurative "money shot" being our hero faced with a harrowing day of self-reckoning and/or devastating crisis and defeat that speaks directly to and underlines their "core essence". Strictly in terms of <i>Batman</i>, a definitive example of this kind of thing would be "Night of the Owls"; or its slightly-less-modern (and now virtually legendary) progenitor, "Knightfall".<br />
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Getting back to the <i>DuckTales</i> comparison, I find it apt as even though the TV is now considerably more dated than I ever imagined it'd become, in conceit it was always a more Hollywood incarnation of the duck comics... and with "Scrooge's Last Adventure" (<b>ahem</b>, this 2013 Italian four-part serial, <b><i>not</i> </b>the promising but sloppily executed 1990 <i>DuckTales</i> episode), that objective and approach has been reinvigorated and brought up to speed with competing popular fiction narrative-based entertainment.<br />
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Make no mistake, a part of me (a <b>considerable<i> </i></b>part) is almost militant in my ideological inclination toward a Barksian-Rosian purism (the "-ian" part is quite deliberate -- far from rejecting anything not by the Duck Man and his celebrated #1 fan and successor, I embrace the European stories crafted by Jippes, Milton, Verhagen, Branca, Vicar, the Heymanses, etc. because of their familiarity to and with Barks' universe.<br />
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Nonetheless, how can I <b><i>not</i></b> enthrall to seeing my favorite characters in such a rollicking, <i>accelerated</i>, hyper-ized form so drastic and heightened in scope? Seeing the secretive reaching-out-and-assembling, hand-playing, give-and-take compromising that nets the super group allying of Scrooge's four unqualified hallmark arch-nemeses; the execution of their strategically coordinated, multi-front assault on Scrooge and his bin hinging on their game-changing role-switching; its paradigm-shifting success; the defeated, depressed Scrooge casting a pall over his shaken but (touchingly) supportive nephews, soon to feel the ramifications of the villains' triumph themselves; the concurring intricate clashes of wills, agendas, and statuses (the Beagles and Magica each in their own right tossed aside as tapped-out patsies "rewarded" with pointedly misfitting new trappings), exacerbated by their innate mutual distrust, forcing the web of inter-group conflict to thicken; and <i><b>both</b></i> fantastical, big-stage Magica-centered show-stoppers (in Part 1, a would-be-but-dud-fated Battle for the Ages over the dime in the bowels of Mt. Vesuvius; Part 2, a Tolkien-cum-Lovecraftian face-off with an apparently sugar-averse monster posted guard at the gates to the underworld of the sorceress trio comprised by Magica's superiors.<br />
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The answer? (Wuh...? ...ohhhhh, <i>yeah!</i> I was asking a question! Huh! Who could remember <i>that?!</i>) I have no choice but to -- there is no conceivable reality in which I cannot -- <b><i>eat this shit up!</i></b> I even -- <u><b>for the first time, EVER</b></u> -- not only accepted and was sold on Duck Avenger being a part of Donald's existence and Duckburg's schema... I found myself actually <u><i>liking</i></u> the whole deal! Hell, I was cheering him on!<br />
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Despite my excess use of flowery language, I'm absolutely not dressing up and agrgrandizing any of the scenes, concepts, characterization, or "ultimate character mythology moments" I've alluded to. I'm but recounting <i>what's in the comics</i> -- what Artibani and Perina are doing here, and doing in spades. The complexities of Artibani's ambitious overarching plot and its several inextricable subplots are the stuff of grand vision complemented by acute clarity and finely-honed execution. Perina's art is unmistakeably "duck comic Italian" in its late '90's/early '00's Cartoon Newtork-ness, but deceptive in its simplicity, for his action is fluid and precise, bolstered by his exacting, exceptional, original, rich-in-depth "camera angles". The latter, however, are so purely servile to the narrative, one doesn't notice them -- "cinematic" framing and composition is the post-<i>Watchmen</i> comics norm, but to employ this approach in a duck comic and trick you into thinking you're reading a more-or-less <i>traditional</i> shows the hand of an artist who in this respect is <i>truly</i> good.<br />
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Also and in kind, it's important to note how the state-of-the CG coloring done at Digikore Studios is as (pardon the expression) cartoonishly bright and "solid color"-predominant as we've come to expect of modern Disney comics, but the faux-shading is more sophisticated and nuanced than were these comics' four-color ancestors (even very recent one), but is subtly layered to the point where one is thinking, as he or she would in the Disney Comics era, "Hey, they're trying to be modern but its beyond their means." It blends in. It works. (E.g., the shadow that's fallen over Donald's house in the left foreground in just the opening panel of Part 2.) And it adds to that vivid, "rich", "cinematic" "depth" (quoting myself) in Perina's panels, working together for the comic, not against it.<br />
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(And those Seitler letterers, they're all on top of and "rocking it" in doing their job, too!)<br />
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A couple other "quintessential" bits/scenes that must be noted:<br />
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1. All of the duck family and a few familiar friends and acquaintances rallying around the resigned Scrooge at his and his nephews' place of refuge, Grandma Duck's farm can easily be transposed in my mind to being enacted by the "duck cast" variant that is <i>DuckTales</i>' cast.<br />
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2. In fact, much like the nephews, Launchpad, Mrs. Beakley, Webby, and Duckworth's visit to Scrooge's jail cell in <i>DuckTales: The Movie</i> reinvigorates him, quickly and decidedly resolving to double down, strike back, and WIN... in "Last Adventure" Part 2, the genuine, profuse concern and encouragement from the extended Italian comic book duck-family-and-friends lineup finally resonates with Scrooge, and he suddenly is restored to the tough-as-nails, ablaze-with-drive-and-determination Scrooge we know and love. I won't mince words: as an integral turning point crowned with an uinhibited, all-in McDuck rallying cry, it's absolutely, positively, wayyyyyyyyyyyy beyond kickass.<br />
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...oh, and before his rebound, said scene finds Scrooge pacing afret on a circular rug. Yes, there's a Barks precedent (unquestionably), but I couldn't help but let it evoke for me <i>DuckTales</i>' "worry room"... (I know, I know, I can't help myself...)<br />
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When I expressed to one of my grad school professors fondness for the '90's <i>JLA</i> arc "Rock of Ages", citing two specific intentional "quintessential, archetypes" (1. Part Two's cliffhanger ending, in which Batman -- cowl folded back, fully exposing the face of and giving way to the person of Bruce Wayne -- declares that he's going to revert Lex Luthor's thwarting of the League with something that "Bruce Wayne knows best -- corporate takeover" (sic). 2. The reveal, on a dystopian future Earth, that the elusive, anonymous mastermind running the rebel resistance from a computer terminal is a battered, hardened, aged Batman/Bruce Wayne), she remarked that the story as a whole was contrived, strung together by "those big moments", while the themes and seemingly key plot points said moments are meant to crystallize are inconsistently actualized throughout the rest of the serial. I had to admit that I could see her point, so I <b><i>do</i></b> at times worry that I'm letting myself be manipulated by the gimmicks that are in actuality what these"sweeps week"-type "event books" are built on. Maybe so. But in my assessment, if the plot can be looked at as a thin string of fan bait, at least with the IDW version, not one of the ultimate product's bones is lacking, thanks to the abundance of meat that is Jonathan Gray's dialogue, the numerous strengths and immense versatility of which has been praised here several times past.<br />
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By the way, here's a notably dark (for a duck comic)cover by Perina that was used on <a href="https://coa.inducks.org/issue.php?c=fi/AATK419">a 2014 Finnish book</a><b> </b>in which the whole serial was collected:<br />
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Pretty great, eh? Hopefully, IDW will appropriate it for either Part 3 or 4... or use it for the trade (which not only is an eventuality, but<b> should </b>happen, since a multi-part epic like this one presented in its entirety is originally what a "TPB" was for... and still the only purpose for which one makes sense.)<br />
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<b>"Nothing Like It"</b> (#417)<br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">written, drawn, and lettered by William Van Horn</span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">(New to the U.S. First appeared in 2009 -- the April 27th issue of Norway's <i>Donald Duck & Co.</i>, Sweden's corresponding April 28th issue of <i>Kalle Anka & Co.</i>, and the Danish <i>Anders And & Co.</i> equivalent, dated April 1st but designated by Inducks as the story's "first" appearance. Must have been determined alphabetically ('cause, you know, <b><i>A</i></b><i>nders</i>).</span><br />
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Given how "Last Adventure" Part 1 ends a<a href="https://www.blogger.com/null">Location</a>nd how the immediately-following backup story, "Nothing Like It", begins, a new reader might think the latter to be some sort of "Last Adventure" sub-chapter taking place somewhere in the near-immediate wake of Part 1. (I'm quite sure this not literal but thematic unity was not overlooked by our editors.) New (to the States) Van Horn has become rarer and rarer, so this one's appearance here is certainly a happy occasion. Though relatively simple, modest, and low-key, "Nothing Like It" is simultaneously whimsical, absurd/surreal, eccentric-ly and uniquely funny, and genuinely original and unpredictable. Yes, all odds were that Scrooge could only be experiencing a dream, hallucination, transport to an alternate universe, or<i><b> </b></i><b>anything else but</b> a genuine, real McCoy new day in his and Duckburg's reality (such as it), I couldn't for the life of me deduce what was actually going on or how Scrooge's dilemma would work out -- I was stumped! With the "lima bean and tapioca yogurt" callback and the self-in-joke wordplay to Scrooge's "wise adage" final line, the ending hits just the right spot.</div>
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<b> "For Whom the Belle Toils"</b> (#418)</div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">written by Dick Kinney</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">drawn by Al Hubbard</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">lettered by Nicole and Travis Seitler</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">(Disney Studio program, new to the U.S. Per Inducks, first printing anywhere was in Brazil, 1970, but my alphabetical theory holds up (O before T), because said Brazilian printing was in what Inducks cites as the October 2nd, 1970 issue of that South American nation's <i>O Pato Donald</i>... yet the site likewise notes that its first Italian -- and, I decree, <i>actual</i> first-ever -- printing was in that same year's January 18th issue of <i>Topolino</i>. Unless I'm misinformed, January is the first month and October the tenth month of a given calendar year.) (Trivia gleaned from Inducks: Until now, Italy, Brazil, and Greece were the only countries to use the story, in 1976.)</span></div>
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Belle Duck is back, I found her more endearing than last time, the comedic twist on the last page and the "new anchor" callback closing gag actually amused me and didn't feel forced, and for the most part, Hubbard's ducks aren't looking more appealing and less weird to me. Pluses, all! (I know, sort of backhanded of me, though... I think I'm just restless in wanting to finally be done with this review...)<br />
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If a Belle-versus-Brigitta-for-Scrooge's-hand story has never been done, I guess I'll go on the record as saying that it wouldn't be a hopeless endeavor. By the way, re: Belle, think Kathy Bates' Jo Bennett of <i>The Office</i> but with a markedly higher sum measurement of the ingredient of sweetness.<br />
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-- Ryan</div>
Ryan Wynnshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00477919968924048814noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2756369649414088624.post-20974184745864359762016-05-05T06:10:00.001-04:002016-05-05T06:15:12.107-04:00American Mythology's Pink Panther #1 Free Comic Book Day 2016 (I just found out!)Was just playing catch-up (what else is new?), and was surveying the <a href="http://www.freecomicbookday.com/Home/1/1/27/206?articleID=172440">2016 Free Comic Book Day master list</a> (it's this Saturday, May 7th), just about to conclude that there was nothing to my interest or worth my while this year, when "<strong style="background-color: white; font-family: Geneva, Tahoma, 'Nimbus Sans L', sans-serif; font-size: 11px; line-height: 14.85px;">AMERICAN MYTHOLOGY</strong><span style="background-color: white; font-family: "geneva" , "tahoma" , "nimbus sans l" , sans-serif; font-size: 11px; line-height: 14.85px;">| THE PINK PANTHER FCBD 2016 EDITION</span>" caught my eye. Looked it up, and lo and behold, it's <i style="font-weight: bold;">not</i> a new itinerant of the live-action feature film-based franchise, but the honest-to-goodness, <u>animated</u> Pink Panther! Per <a href="http://www.bleedingcool.com/2016/02/24/pink-panther-ongoing-comic-to-start-in-june/">this Bleeding Cool article</a>, with this Free Comic Book Day issuing of issue #1, American Mythology Press is launching an ongoing <i>Pink Panther</i>!<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhiAtmsXOidkQApsLKNlnwiSNk3Rh_JdPTiOBjLDU2npspoEbdOC7KqS4Omcwx98uhWKuMS9S1-qeHYG10-VI6FRPs4EAmPqUeW9x5-nlK2_Jig7DQRCkEqYtZhQXVfehpyln8nSrLsdhjA/s1600/Pink+Panther+cover.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhiAtmsXOidkQApsLKNlnwiSNk3Rh_JdPTiOBjLDU2npspoEbdOC7KqS4Omcwx98uhWKuMS9S1-qeHYG10-VI6FRPs4EAmPqUeW9x5-nlK2_Jig7DQRCkEqYtZhQXVfehpyln8nSrLsdhjA/s320/Pink+Panther+cover.jpg" width="208" /></a></div>
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I'm partial to this very DePatie-Freleng-esque <i>Ant and the Aardvark</i> cover:<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg-yrhDRuS0Y14qwamHkOU9H-SCCM-oe9xGBZfU52fewU6BVvr9RjOGMvKTwzL_yDGOtplYGmNsLoOiyNmFi-RjijZkIxKwL4yk_UCeNSET6waS4kO7tr_ftIIjuK8A52kXyysWPi6YNPXB/s1600/another+Pink+Panther+cover.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg-yrhDRuS0Y14qwamHkOU9H-SCCM-oe9xGBZfU52fewU6BVvr9RjOGMvKTwzL_yDGOtplYGmNsLoOiyNmFi-RjijZkIxKwL4yk_UCeNSET6waS4kO7tr_ftIIjuK8A52kXyysWPi6YNPXB/s320/another+Pink+Panther+cover.jpg" width="208" /></a></div>
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Hopefully, come this Saturday, I'll luck out, and my dealer will have that last one. If not, I'll take what they have, and get my preferred one somewhere online afterward!<br />
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Some new, timely Disney comic reviews are coming -- well, there's some I really want to do, anyway!</div>
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-- Ryan</div>
Ryan Wynnshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00477919968924048814noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2756369649414088624.post-3066578425961282132016-02-23T18:15:00.002-05:002016-02-23T21:19:19.513-05:00(Some) Assorted Thoughts on: The X-Files, season 10, episodes 5 and 6: "Babylon" and "My Struggle II" (2/15/16 and 2/22/16)Had I gotten around to writing about "Babylon" before the latter edition of "My Struggle" had aired, I would be subjecting you to a far more negative blog post. Indulging in bloated production orchestrations and a sense of humor that's not just gimmicky and shallow, but just plain <i>puzzling</i>, "Babylon" found Chris Carter embracing his worst tendencies, all too painfully evoking memories of the insufferable inanity of, say, "The Post-Modern Prometheus", "Triangle", and "Improbable". Most will probably point to the insipid, totally unfunny "Mulder goes line-dancing while on mushrooms" abomination as the episode's worst sin. However, I was absolutely <i><b>SHOCKED</b></i><b> <i>AND APPALLED </i></b>that Carter shamelessly pulled a tired old trick (one that the show has done five or so times in its history) out of his that: that of introducing obvious, cutesy doppelgangers to Mulder and Scully, apparently intended to illicit irony and humor.<br />
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...actually, I'm leaning toward the episode's <b><i>TRULY</i> </b>biggest, most unforgivable sin being the bill of goods Carter sold us with his promise at last year's San Diego Comic Con that "the Lone Gunmen will be back". Memo to Carter: Having their distorted, costumed visages appear for a couple seconds in Mulder's drug tri<i><b> DOESN'T COUNT</b></i>.<br />
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(...oh. All of my negativity toward "Babylon" came pouring out after all, didn't it?) As was always the case when contrasting Carter's bloated-budget "family entertainment" episodes with his cornerstone Mytharc episodes, "My Struggle II" is an all together different case. Having eagerly awaited it with baited breath these past four weeks, it <i><b>exceeded</b></i> my expectations, not just following through and delivering on what was set up in the first part, but -- as foreshadowed by the numerous stills from the show's early years that complemented Scully's voiceover intro-- actually bringing the Mytharc full circle, explicitly honing in on story threads harkening all the way back to the second season.</div>
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The most exciting development was the significant screen time given to Cancer Man (who we were teased with at the very end of Part I... and whose appearances here -- as he deserves -- were given the show-stopping, shamelessly histrionic gravity of a veritable arch-villain for the ages, as he deserves) and a certain other returning cast member whose made-over role might in fact be considered controversial and seen as cheap by some. As likable as the character of Monica Reyes as played by Annabeth Gish may have been, she never really got to come into her own the way that Robert Patrick's John Doggett did.<br />
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Patrick fully assumed the position of male lead for nearly the entire duration of season 8 and 9; even when he did "have" to share the spotlight with Mulder, in the writing and the performing, it was a totally convincing meeting of wills. Reyes, on the other hand, was "brought in the backdoor" late in season 8 as a recurring guest character, forcibly presented in a one-note way as the quirky "New Age" agent with weird interests. When she was officially made lead for season 9, she was re-characterized as completely bland, presumably to fit some conception of mass appeal. And not only did she have to share space with Scully, her sensitivity and earnestness made her seem of junior status compared to Doggett, ostensibly her partner. And even Doggett got a shoehorned "personal" Mytharc, while Reyes had no backstory and, really, no character arc -- she was a purely functional investigative agent assigned to the X-Files. So while she may have had potential, fast-forward to 2016, and she's obviously going to be given a secondary role as long as Mulder and Scully are restored as the leads. Thus, her surprise return and the twist revealed with it gives this exhilarating tsunami an <b><i>additional</i></b> point of intrigue and "edginess"...and believe me, it already has <i><b>A LOT </b></i>going for it. </div>
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Things escalated so rapidly, Scully was rushing to literally <b><i>save the entire world</i></b>, in a state of panic from an abrupt mass viral outbreak, before I'd even registered what was happening. The Mytharc has endured loads of criticism throughout the years for eternally setting the stage for an impending threat to all of humanity but never delivering. Honest to God, they actually did it, and even though it was contained in one mere episode (well, so far... read a bit further), they actually hit the "epic apocalyptic feature film" level that a "Mulder and Scully save the world" barnburner calls for! </div>
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And it <i>should</i> have seemed all too much contain in 42 minutes, for in fact, we were left on an out-of-field (but very appropriate, given the series' iconography in the popular consciousness) cliffhanger that would be <i><b>AGONY</b></i> if it were never followed up on... but I'm happy with what preceded it, and all signs are that both Carter and Fox are more than ready and eager to continue, I'm not too worried. </div>
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Oh, and two important points:</div>
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1. The Mulder and Scully "young doppelganger" characters returned, and they actually worked pretty well in a serious drama. Still, it's hard to get over how obvious it is not just that they've been brought on as bench-warmers in case Fox is willing to go ahead with Duchovny and/or Anderson, but that we've been through this before, stringing us along with Spender and Fowley in seasons five and six, and later Doggett and Reyes stepping up as full-fledged, official replacements. (Though both, even the under-realized Reyes are characters unto themselves and by no means clones of Mulder and Scully, nor their inversions as were Spender and Fowley, earning their own respectable places on the <i>X-Files</i> tapestry, ultimately, they were the product of a backup plan.) </div>
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2. Remember last post, when I was speculating as to if they would ever be brave enough to take on the landmark story that would be William's return? Part of the cliffhanger was Scully realizing that the world depends on his being found... yup, they're going <b><i>all in</i></b> and giving him a singular spot in the Mytharc as the "Golden Child" immaculately conceived by Scully -- who it's implied is destined to be Central Player in the Grand Scheme of Things herself -- who is to the world's savior messiah. That's right, <b><i>all in!</i></b> :D</div>
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-- Ryan</div>
Ryan Wynnshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00477919968924048814noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2756369649414088624.post-48137536028839567492016-02-16T00:51:00.000-05:002016-02-16T00:51:19.484-05:00(Some) Assorted Thoughts on: The X-Files, season 10, episode 4: "Home Again" (2/8/16)As I write this, only about 20 minutes have passed since this mini-season's fifth episode, "Babylon", premiered. As I don't have cable (and even if I did, I would have gotten home from work halfway through it... as if such specs about my life matter to you...), I'll be watching it online shortly. But first, I'll get in my comments on last week's episode...<br />
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My litmus test for whether or not someone "gets" not just <i>The X-Files</i> but Ten Thirteen Productions' output as a whole is if they recognize how vital the creative team of Glen Morgan and James Wong -- if either was credited as writer, director, and/<b>or</b> producer, then nine times out of ten, the other was co-credited as same right there with him -- were to making <i>The X-Files </i>into <i>The X-Files, </i>in terms of its defining its main characters, jump-starting and expanding the Mytharc, and self-consciously playing with and pushing of the series genre-oriented stylistic narrative parameters. When the second season of <i>Millennium</i> was put entirely in their hands while Carter and other key Ten Thirteen personnel were working on the first <i>X-Files</i> feature film, the result was the single best season of any one Ten Thirteen show. </div>
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But in the wake of said season, whatever the reason, Morgan and Wong together went their own separate way from Ten Thirteen. If in fact there was bad blood that had boiled over, I'm glad that matters have been reconciled so as to precipitate their participation in the <i>X-Files</i> revival of 2016. As said participation is major -- each has an entire episode to all to himself, single-handedly writing and direction -- it's nice to see that Carter indeed recognizes that the optimal way to do <i>The X-Files </i>is to do it with Morgan and Wong. </div>
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Taken together, Wong's "Founder's Mutation" (covered in my previous post) and Morgan's "Home Again" are clear counterparts, and very complementary ones, at that, employing a similar narrative structure and embracing the very same theme and subject matter. Both function as a standalone Monster-of-the-Week, but woven into the proceedings are subplots (and I hesitate to call them that, as they arguably eclipse the doings of the ol' Monster-of-the-Week rigmarole... or at least I suspect they do for many longtime, die-hard fan) of the lasting -- and evidently worsening -- self-doubt and pained sense of absence and a certain incompleteness re: Scully having "given up" hers and Mulder's son, William, some 14 years ago so as to protect him from Super Soldiers by way of anonymity. In contrast to the dream-like, "What if...?"/"In another life..." sequences in Wong's episode, Morgan depicts her agonizing over the fear that not only was she forever rendered a horrible mother by her decision to put William up for adoption in and of itself, but all the worse, the possibility that knowing that he was rejected by his own mother has had a permanent, detrimental impact on William. The romanticized fantasies in "Founder's Mutation" of Scully walking William to his first day of school and Mulder showing William <i>2001</i> for the first time and joining him in launching a model were touching in a warm-and-fuzzy, pseudo-nostalgic way. But Scully's thoughts and emotions regarding her absentee son in "Home Again" hit us with -- and leave unresolved -- an unresolved existential bleakness.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi5DpdjCjHX_9fhTOdl7kOCxOWJh4xtd3f01aV1WduzfcLoS7IE1cUOKhsJbufnrbH0Hov42U-mXbiV4vYPxpb4sjJrlJ4vQ3OKxHOxQbFddexgHfNbm08ZSQ_sL6WpWLhvg5K6dDLIjIng/s1600/Band-Aid+Nose+Man+2.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="221" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi5DpdjCjHX_9fhTOdl7kOCxOWJh4xtd3f01aV1WduzfcLoS7IE1cUOKhsJbufnrbH0Hov42U-mXbiV4vYPxpb4sjJrlJ4vQ3OKxHOxQbFddexgHfNbm08ZSQ_sL6WpWLhvg5K6dDLIjIng/s400/Band-Aid+Nose+Man+2.png" width="400" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">"The Band-Aid Nose Man"</span></div>
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Lest I overlook the Monster-of-the-Week stuff, the case of "the Band-Aid Face Man" is of a nature polar opposite to "Founder's Mutation" scientific orientation (albeit a loose one at certain points -- though every idea incorporated into that episode had a basis in actual theory, research, and/or experiments, the flash-whiz-bang tricks performed by the unified psychic power of the Chimera siblings at "Founder's" climax was more Hollywood than anything). But based on when we saw him in action, by all appearances, the Band-Aid Nose Man seemed what could only be a supernatural entity, and when all was accounted for -- or at least, to the extent that anything was accounted for -- the scrappy artist living "the fringe" who appears to have manifested Bandy did so through a process of pure magic.</div>
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Even taking into the fact that we're dealing with a series whose history has included a man who can stretch and contort himself like Plastic Man (or Ralph Dibny, ha!) or Gumby and one of its leads spending an episode trapped in an "uprooted" building suspended at the heart of a maelstrom/tornado-like void of an alternate dimension, nothing here should in theory be testing our suspense of disbelief... perhaps it's the contrast with the grounded, wholly realistic scenes in which Scully sits at her dying mother's side and those in which she contends with the very mundane legal nitty-gritty of late changes to her mother's will that Scully was unaware of. </div>
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Still, Morgan plays the Band-Aid Nose Man story just right: using a lot of close-angle shots and quick cuts -- the recurring motif that is the rear, up-angle perspective of a silhouetted Bandy's uncannily tall figure ripping apart his victims with sharp, outward right-angle thrusts of his arms are instantly iconic (even though the gore is in silhouette, because of said gore, I've chosen not to use screen shots of these particular visuals, are distinguishing as they are) -- sees to it that the murders, though played out in full before our eyes, such as they are, remain vague and elusive, and that we are in fact left not with not a full accounting but a <i>suggested</i>, yet ultimately un-nail-downable, explanation/fill-in-the-blanks backstory gleaned and inferred from what the "artist" disclosed is in fact a classic <i>X-Files </i>motif.<br />
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">Mulder stands at Scully's side during her mother's final moments... </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">in which painfully lingering doubts and potentially </span><span style="font-size: x-small;">unanswerable questions </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">re: their son are brought to the fore.</span></div>
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The pathos of Scully being faced with her mother's death evokes early episode in which she also weathered personal and familial crises of mortality, such as the first season's "Beyond the Sea" or the second's "One Breath" (which capped a multi-episode arc based around Scully's "abduction", alien or otherwise). NOT coincidentally, "Beyond the Sea" and "One Breath" were both Morgan-Wong episodes... and given the great extent to which this episode captures the spirit, characterizations, and themes of those episodes (in fact making overt references to the "One Breath" era, even jarringly using clips of both a bright-eyed and bushy-tailed Duchovny and Anderson!), at certain points, it was as surreal to watch this episode as it was to find one's self being sensorily-impressioned by the series original theme song/title sequence the first time watching "My Struggle". Until now, the 2016 <i>X-Files</i>' connection to the franchise's past had seemed loose, but here, Morgan not only brought things near-full-circle, but came as close as probably anyone ever can or will come to not merely rehashing or imitating those early days, but realizing a living, breathing, organic, speculative pseudo-real-time jumping-to-the-present continuation of that work. (Not an update, so much as a bringing-up-to-date.)<br />
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I would think that Mulder and Scully <i>actually</i> being reunited with William has to be in the cards... my instincts tell me not in the remaining two episodes of this current "season" (well, as much of the world has now seen "Babylon", which has now been sitting on my laptop waiting for me for over two hours, in truth, only <i>one</i> episode remains), but in the event that Fox orders more episodes -- which by all indications, all concerned parties<i> </i>very much <i>want </i>to happen; it's just a matter of making negotiations with the principles -- they could hardly put it off for long. They've handled the matter delicately and admirably in these recent episodes, so much so that one can't help but think that it might be best if they never take the plunge and attempt <i>Star Wars</i>-esque Epochal <b>Event</b> that the prospect seems to self-demand...</div>
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And so, "Babylon" and on. I burn with anticipation for "My Struggle II" next week, but I'm very curious to see what else Carter has offered with his return to the writer's-and-director's chair for tonight's episode... I'll get back to you on it soon!</div>
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-- Ryan</div>
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Ryan Wynnshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00477919968924048814noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2756369649414088624.post-4435104178769133682016-02-06T20:03:00.001-05:002016-02-07T07:37:15.959-05:00New(!!!) X-Files episodes: (some) assorted thoughtsThough I haven't posted since New Year's Eve, I'm almost (note the "almost") okay with that fact, for something shifted in my brain during the course of this past month: between my full-time job and my "recovery" hours between shifts and on the weekend, to expect myself to write exhaustive reviews all of the time is unreasonable, running contrary to my "natural" (as if) day-to-day living rhythm.<br />
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Honestly, at this point, I'm not sure what the future of this blog is going to look like. Nonetheless, especially as we're already halfway through the <i>X-Files</i> revival's six-episode run, I can't let it go without posting about it.<br />
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">It's been a while, so they're not wielding</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">those badges with confidence again yet...</span></div>
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Here, I now offer my take on the three new episodes that have aired to date:<br />
<br />
<b>"My Struggle" </b>(1/24/16)<br />
<br />
Like every season past, the series' tenth (it seems that's what these six episodes are officially considered) opens with a sweeping, tumultuous, big-in-scale-and-scope Mytharc episode... except virtually none of the Mytharc threads left hanging at the end the (I guess former) series finale, "The Truth", are addressed. Obviously written with casual and new viewers in mind, all you really have to know is that since the late '40's, UFO sightings have persisted throughout the U.S., almost as though the show is using the actual history of ufology as its backstory and starting anew from there.<br />
<br />
Honestly, as much of a continuity freak as I am, I didn't mind the unexplained absence of Super Soldiers or the question of why Skinner still has his job after having aided in Mulder's escape from death row in "The Truth". (Though these fumblings aren't actually new; in the 2008 film <i>I Want to Believe</i>, Mulder's fugitive status was casually, inextricably written off, and at the film's climax, Skinner's surprise appearance found him without explanation still FBI Assistant Director)<br />
<br />
Rather, I was <i><b>riveted</b></i>...<br />
<ul>
<li><i> ...</i>right<i> </i>from Mulder's clarion call-like voiceover intro -- which was accompanied by a montage of striking images of UFO sightings, a number of which appeared to have integrated CGI UFOs into of proper live-action footage of actual landscapes and cityscape, making the prevalence of such events far more realistic and imminent-seeming than the original series ever had...</li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li>...to the strained, angst-ridden reunion of Mulder and Scully...</li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li>...by the intrigue introduced with Internet conspiracy talk show host Tad O'Malley seeking out Mulder as an ally...</li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li>...and then how, having led Mulder and Scully (and us) along by a dangling carrot for two-thirds of the episodes, O'Malley lays down all his cards and outlines the global elite's bleak, dystopian, Hell-on-Earth plans that he professes to have uncove<span style="font-size: small;">red</span><span style="font-size: x-small;">(*)<span style="font-size: small;">...</span></span><span style="font-size: x-small;"> </span></li>
</ul>
<ul style="margin-left: 40px;">
<li><span style="font-size: x-small;">(*) Citing 9/11 used as an excuse for endless war abroad and attacks on civil liberties like the Patriot Act and the NDAA; Big Pharma; transnational food corporations like Monsanto that have a stranglehold on a major fraction of the market but questionable regard for public health; and infinitesimal inflation and Too-Big-To-Fail bailouts, this wasn't sci-fi so much as a regurgitation of the news.</span></li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li>...clear through to the ground-pulled-out-from-under-us, brick-to-the-head last-minute turn of events bringing about an abrupt cliffhanger: Mulder and Scully discovering the likely-ordered-from-on-high shutdown of O'Malley's website; jackbooted storm troopers raiding and destroying the hangar housing a secret project utilizing alien technology, unflinchingly mowing down with their machine guns every last one of the the earnest, noble, world-class scientists working there whom we'd met earlier; and the stark dramatization of the cold-blooded apparent murder (via a beam of light directed at her from a UFO, ensuring as over-the-top bombastic cliffhanger as possible) of O'Malley's prospective key witness, a completely sweet, endearing, innocent young woman named Sveta, milking every last drop of the audience's sympathy for her so as to leave them distressed and clamoring for follow-up and resolution.</li>
</ul>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgv9sKEuFPlIQtCqY-Clm3ZABwHr2zohbIgGcygTg94bWm_TEYzjGyjcy4XDDMb3jOHo_kII-6JKb9Msl2W1eq30vHRmiGILKMRHlurHmuENKlSE5NgXneEys50-hcJ4S09_G0vViSCwV6o/s1600/the+real+Tad+O%2527Malley.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgv9sKEuFPlIQtCqY-Clm3ZABwHr2zohbIgGcygTg94bWm_TEYzjGyjcy4XDDMb3jOHo_kII-6JKb9Msl2W1eq30vHRmiGILKMRHlurHmuENKlSE5NgXneEys50-hcJ4S09_G0vViSCwV6o/s320/the+real+Tad+O%2527Malley.png" width="320" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;">Gee, I have <b>NO</b> idea who Tad O'Malley </span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;">could be based on... do you? </span></div>
<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj55GIdRND34GU0FmRWOIxFzIXRkeyLxYUJYFmoahanNNmLFW9AwPweLBNSyYQDTNe8aPX8LP96BqCyrLZq0bOquTyJRU0bAxGyAkRE8sGy56zoh8OrIDyGpip-8FC6cAASKp3YFBohdiQh/s1600/group+hash-out+session+2.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="234" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj55GIdRND34GU0FmRWOIxFzIXRkeyLxYUJYFmoahanNNmLFW9AwPweLBNSyYQDTNe8aPX8LP96BqCyrLZq0bOquTyJRU0bAxGyAkRE8sGy56zoh8OrIDyGpip-8FC6cAASKp3YFBohdiQh/s320/group+hash-out+session+2.png" width="320" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;">Mulder and a reluctant Scully</span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;">convene with O'Malley and Sveta.</span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br />
_________________</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<b>"Founder's Mutation" </b>(1/25/16)</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh5X7Ns3WBPrMgEpxhZwvCve3n_XQ6F9ZX7DBGdQRbW9gZ5067GhuFxnJDXCFwnMANtWDyFw6p4_9z-Dignyk_Rm8pYW9L2PxJy2BHCZZZ1AwNqHpy4ETILPLS-fNvX3Thb9EtabuE0Zn5N/s1600/earache+3.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="296" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh5X7Ns3WBPrMgEpxhZwvCve3n_XQ6F9ZX7DBGdQRbW9gZ5067GhuFxnJDXCFwnMANtWDyFw6p4_9z-Dignyk_Rm8pYW9L2PxJy2BHCZZZ1AwNqHpy4ETILPLS-fNvX3Thb9EtabuE0Zn5N/s320/earache+3.png" width="320" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;">We begin with a guy suffering a splitting headache...</span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;"><br /></span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjgr5ktSD6Vtukmu_672nFpb1Iki5JYGUY5iqznKfqAZlUNZIf2O_63g2BPXKyykscWt6QB2ETLHcj5z7Oy4qSrlATigBOjOzegsJOzFeJU-_swJy12rHvybhnqWcR-sWc2vOw5hEW64UuB/s1600/chimera+siblings.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="284" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjgr5ktSD6Vtukmu_672nFpb1Iki5JYGUY5iqznKfqAZlUNZIf2O_63g2BPXKyykscWt6QB2ETLHcj5z7Oy4qSrlATigBOjOzegsJOzFeJU-_swJy12rHvybhnqWcR-sWc2vOw5hEW64UuB/s320/chimera+siblings.png" width="320" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;">...and somehow end with bio-engineered siblings </span><span style="font-size: x-small;">sharing </span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;">some sort of psychic link meeting for the first time.</span></div>
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
It was frustrating to know that the second episode wouldn't be following up on the first... but then, that's exactly how it <i>always </i>was, right? An exemplary Monster-of-the-Week entry, from the nature of the case (it starts off grisly, but it winds up somewhere more wondrous), the federal agent procedural angle, and the scientific basis. It was charming to see Mulder and Scully present their FBI badges to interviewees for the fist time in over 15 years, wrangle with uncooperative witnesses, and create a bureaucratic tiff with another federal agency, the Department of Defense.<br />
<br />
Skinner's wry "Welcome back, agents" as he hands the newly reinstated Mulder and Scully their badges just after an unfriendly visit from a terse DoD representative (who doesn't get off without being subjected to some Mulder-brand sarcasm, of course) was one of the most priceless parts of the episode.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEggkK1GFxfnfp2nhkuoEM7dFcZ0q1qJh7BU5mt35noWILm9Agr7pDFqHAu-_4DQk3LrevBmIqsYbsCMCArz_XGI4toRGAnCKUVqR-b1xiYlgZKsulb0ZAi4k03vXKdTBHs5b949e8T9jdQz/s1600/bureaucracy+1.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEggkK1GFxfnfp2nhkuoEM7dFcZ0q1qJh7BU5mt35noWILm9Agr7pDFqHAu-_4DQk3LrevBmIqsYbsCMCArz_XGI4toRGAnCKUVqR-b1xiYlgZKsulb0ZAi4k03vXKdTBHs5b949e8T9jdQz/s1600/bureaucracy+1.png" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;">"If we don't make eye contact wit him, maybe he'll start to think he's not real."</span></div>
<br />
And James Wong, one-half of the James Wong-Glen Morgan duo who wrote some of the original series' best episodes, should certainly get his due for this episode's solid, tight writing and directing. The dream/alternate reality sequences showing Mulder and Scully's son, William, growing up with them in a happy domestic household were not just beautifully shot, but very touching.<br />
<br />
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">In another life....</span></div>
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<br /></div>
</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
_________________</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<b>"Mulder and Scully Meet the Were-Monster"</b> (2/1/16)</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiigZm38_MsdXS__6T3ujjNQIr5q73BT5rtkkFKq5Dr89NZKf9mDIYw3eJSWQ-LoWNaoiQSdEx_Sm3w7EVCeC2KuVjGb5t-esxkialYgqJIPf50kvCKkvLgsrH6W-7AawpOp8M9zMkDb20D/s1600/Guy+Mann.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="285" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiigZm38_MsdXS__6T3ujjNQIr5q73BT5rtkkFKq5Dr89NZKf9mDIYw3eJSWQ-LoWNaoiQSdEx_Sm3w7EVCeC2KuVjGb5t-esxkialYgqJIPf50kvCKkvLgsrH6W-7AawpOp8M9zMkDb20D/s320/Guy+Mann.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;">If you know what the phrase "a Darin Morgan episode" portends </span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;">and are told that this image is, in fact, from a Darin Morgan episode... </span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;">it makes perfect sense.</span></div>
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
Darin Morgan, the writer of classics like "Jose Chung's <i>From Outer Space</i>" (and certain lesser known but arguably even more brilliant second-season <i>Millennium</i> episodes), triumphantly returns with his trademark mix of self-parody, silliness, and introverted, existential reflective observations about how perplexing so many aspects of everyday life are, and how that goes largely unnoticed and taken for granted. If you've ever felt like you're playing someone other than yourself in your own life, you'll surely appreciate the way Morgan turns the show's whole Monster-of-the-Week concept of what a "monster" is on its head.</div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
-- Ryan</div>
Ryan Wynnshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00477919968924048814noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2756369649414088624.post-44782987003415459982016-01-01T00:13:00.002-05:002016-01-01T00:13:58.959-05:00(Assorted) New Year's Greetings!Posting this at just past midnight. Well, I wanted A) to get one one more post in for 2015, and B) this was supposed to have been it, but I've spent the past hour trying to figure out what I'm going to use to spruce it up aesthetically... and am still trying! Will add something soon... er, eventually... I hope!<br />
<br />
I haven't reviewed any IDW Disney comics since the August issues (yeah, I know, that's <i>sad</i>). I'm going to start doing one (abridged) for each month's releases, and still plan to catch up. (So as to be seasonal, I'd wanted to jump ahead to the December Christmas-themed issues (similar to what Joe Torcivia has done), and then go back and pick up with September and go forward from there. But a post on all those Christmas stories (already!) won't seem very "seasonal", so not sure what I'm going to do... I guess just review them like I would any other comic, and forget trying to be culturally and calendar-ly minded?<br />
<br />
And believe it or not, continuing the <i>Aladdin</i> reviews is still in the pipeline, at least in intent!<br />
<br />
Well, here's to 2016, folks. Hope you stick around, and I'll try to interact with you guys more this year, honest.<br />
<br />
...now, I have three days left of a four-day weekend! I'm gonna enjoy it, but I'd be remiss if I didn't get some fresh blogging in!<br />
<br />
-- RyanRyan Wynnshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00477919968924048814noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2756369649414088624.post-59361877787140974702015-12-10T15:47:00.002-05:002016-05-12T02:59:52.438-04:00Recent comic review: Walt Disney's Comics and Stories #722 (IDW, August 2015)<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg8g-WwAsA4n8uEdeuJcJbb2PAhHWFQ6d7-7JQwaSNjjuU1Nu6aphXoQcTTfRfLlWE3UhPPGSwiJaOeC_ZwoLDBi29z8_GtgeREf7WV1mXZitfjG2Auj3JF069eEryaJaLaW4eCpsTWl0uJ/s1600/Walt+Disney%2527s+Comics+and+Stories+722+cover.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg8g-WwAsA4n8uEdeuJcJbb2PAhHWFQ6d7-7JQwaSNjjuU1Nu6aphXoQcTTfRfLlWE3UhPPGSwiJaOeC_ZwoLDBi29z8_GtgeREf7WV1mXZitfjG2Auj3JF069eEryaJaLaW4eCpsTWl0uJ/s320/Walt+Disney%2527s+Comics+and+Stories+722+cover.jpeg" width="211" /></a></div>
<br />
Part 2 of "The Search for the Zodiac Stones" finds Mickey and and Goofy exactly where at the end of Part 1 they announced they were going next: Brazil. Goofy admiring a street vendor's display of local pottery and various other "souvenirs" while Mickey stands by, urging him, "Hey, we've got to get goin'!" may sound too casual for a splash panel opener, but Massimo De Vita's art is rife with so much activity, using arresting, dynamic perspectives and original, specific poses and expressions, it works fantastically.<br />
<br />
Over the course of the next several pages, Mickey and Goofy meet Tex "Eagle-Eye" Tuckaree, a scatter-brained pilot they're chartering to fly them to the Stickaree village. The ensuing flight, culminating in a head-on crash smack-dab into the jungle, is as tumultuous as our heroes had feared, but to the reader, the sequence is entertainingly rife with first-rate quirky, comedic action. If "Eagle-Eye" (perhaps the best part of that name is not its intentional irony, but how Jonathan Grey's narration toys with said irony) reminds one of Launchpad McQuack, he <i><b>should</b></i> -- and indeed, Grey makes the allusion. (It would have almost been a crime <i>not to</i>.) In the flashback relating how Tex lost his eye-sight -- and, it would seem, his mind -- which thus ended his stunt pilot career, it's impossible not to think of Launchpad's backstory as having been one of the Flying McQuacks before he went solo.<br />
<br />
The flashback ends with perhaps Grey's most priceless line of the issue (and there's a lot of good ones to choose from): "See how <i style="font-weight: bold;">sad</i> that story wasn't? Don't you feel <i style="font-weight: bold;">awful</i> for laughing?" In fact, put that way, I'm not sure how I <b><i>can</i></b> reconcile how charming, amusing, and fun I found the Tex Tuckaree sequence! However, I do feel vindicated in my having noted that it looks like there's going to be wacky, <i>Rocky and Bullwinkle</i>-esque aspects to this serial<br />
<br />
Grey, a proven ace with references (one to a certain <i>kaiju</i>, and at least two<i> </i>in-jokes related to Mickey himself), wordplay ("blights, terrors, and terrored blights!"), and just plain <i>colorful</i> language ("Sweet babies!"; "<b>THUNDERDUNK!</b>"). But he exercises discretion and holds a delicate balance, playing it straight when called for -- notably at moments when plot logistics are established, such as the information the Stickarees share with Mickey and Goofy that allows them to pick up the trail they're following anew, or the news given to them by Cal and Cab about the sale of the Scorpio piece. But playing it straight doesn't necessarily mean playing it dry; as no-frills a line as Mickey's "They left with a canoe, so their trails can't be that cold!" might be, it certainly sounds like the scrappy Mickey we know. (Imagine if he'd said, "It appears that they have taken a canoe, which means that at this point, they cannot be very far ahead of us." Yuck!")<br />
<br />
Visually and conceptually, the fantastical, even "trippy" Scorpion Valley sequence -- with its abundance of fumaroles ("baby volcanoes", per Goofy) spewing a gas that induces alarming ocular distortions character by scale wonkery -- is originally and intelligently conceived, especially considering the scientific explanation for -- and solution to -- how the illusions are chemically manifested. Mickey and Goofy going through the process of suffering the effects of the fumes and then figuring their way out of and overcoming this hallucinogenic trap follows a tight narrative arc that's near-perfect in its build-up and unraveling.<br />
<br />
And finally -- what, you thought I actually wouldn't cover this -- there's the delightful surprise that comes right after Mickey and Goofy leave the Calloways' camp: their running into Scrooge, Donald, and the nephews, in the middle of one of <i>their</i> adventures, but one that's been going on without the reader being privy to it -- until the moment at which Mickey and Goofy join in! I knew that the ducks were going to be in this multi-part epic, but I wasn't expecting them in this installment. Thus, their reveal genuinely threw me for a loop, but in a very, very good way! Grey made it all the more sweet with his dialogue for the (highly <b>personalized</b>, <b><i>descriptive</i></b>) greetings exchanged between first Mickey and Donald, and in the next panel, Mickey and Scrooge.<br />
<br />
Leading up to this chance meeting of major players, the reader was teased with the Stickarees' and Calloways' accounts of the "band of five" whose trail Mickey and Goofy are following. Due to a loss in translation, Mickey suspects Pete and some of his known accomplices and sidekicks, whom Grey has Mickey name (or rather, has Mickey think, <i>think</i>, via thought balloon) as treat for the fans... that is, presuming these references are original to this version. I wonder how in the original version Mickey's elusive was described by the respective witnesses and what were Mickey's thought balloon speculations as to the identity of the group he's tailing.<br />
<br />
This all-star team-up nearly eclipses the cliffhanger ending that follows. But let us not overlook yet another example of De Vita's talent -- using a heavily stylized, jagged style that imparts a throbbing jerkiness, the chaotic, violent energy of this geological upheaval almost rages out of the panel borders and off of the page.<br />
<br />
One quibble: in Part 1, the Aquarius piece is referred to as Cab's. Here, it's Cal's, the Scorpio piece being cab's. A mistake that will be corrected in the trade, I presume?<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
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At a short but busy, expediently-but-evenly-paced four pages, Evan Geradts and Freddy Milton's "Open Door Policy" follows the Beagle Boys as they steal one of Gyro's latest (considerably more magical-seeming than usual!) inventions in order to use it to -- what else? -- rob the money bin. Being able to effortlessly make their own instant-entrance to the bin is virtually a Beagle's dream come true. There wouldn't be very much conflict if at first they didn't make off with some of the cash, but after some initial freaking out, Scrooge ultimately manages to thwart, in a wildly ironic, perfectly fitting way. This resolution -- like the rest of the story -- plays out with "wham, bang, done" pacing that conveys the Beagles' fated comeuppance in a particularly lucid, stinging way. Maura McManus' dialogue is modest but witty (and in-character), suiting the story quite nicely. E.g., the descriptive, silly names for several of Gyro's silly invention; or the last line of the story, Scrooge, gloating to the Beagles over his foiling them, making a "door pun" that's grin-inducing in a "Oh, you just HAD to, didn't you?" way.<br />
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Two gag pieces -- one duck, one mouse -- fill out the issue. In Al Taliaferro's "Demolition Donkey", a sportswear salesman is left baffled by Donald without explanation returning one sport's uniform amd exchanging it for that of a completely, drastically different sport.<br />
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Though Mickey behaves uncharacteristically childish in Merrill De Maris and Manuel Gonzalez's 1939 Sunday "Minnie Can't See", it definitely makes sense that the robust, active, outgoing Mickey of the strips -- as established by Gottfredson -- would be too restless to spend a day at the beach just loafing, as Minnie expects him of him. Here, she's prissy and preoccupied with social acceptance (a characterization more often used for Daisy, but not without precedent for Minnie). After seeing her act snippy and condescending toward Mickey, one's spite is rewarded (Mickey clearly enjoys it, too! by her obliviousness in the last couple panels that she herself is the object of the crowd's mocking laughter.<br />
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-- RyanRyan Wynnshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00477919968924048814noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2756369649414088624.post-21728842652623291132015-12-02T16:47:00.000-05:002015-12-02T16:47:00.503-05:00(Recent) comics review: Ghostbusters: Get Real #1-4 (complete mini-series, IDW, June-September 2015) <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
Although IDW's <i>Ghostbusters</i> comics of the past few years have overall been quite good, at times I couldn't help but wonder, "Well, if they're going to be drawn in a cartoony way... in fact, if they're going to be drawn, period, why not just do <i><b>The Real</b> Ghostbusters</i>?" While that may not appeal to some fans, who would prefer the movie GBs -- which is what IDW has been doing, kind of -- by and large, my nostalgia for the franchise lies in growing up on DiC's animated series. I have no shame in sharing that when reading the IDW comics, the voices I hear in my head aren't those of Murray, Ackroyd, Ramis, and Hudson, but of Coulier, Welker, LaMarche, and Hall.</div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">(The cover used for the first issue's 2nd printing, </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">appropriating the splash panel that closes </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">the first installment, sans word balloon.)</span></div>
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Though <i>Get Real</i> can be viewed as a novelty project (and possibly the most redundant [non!]-crossover of all time, especially when you consider that the IDW Ghostbusters can never<i> really</i> [no pun intended] be the movie ones!), it sure has been nice to see "<i>The Real</i>" guys again, especially given how Dan Schoening's renderings and Luis Antonio Delgado's coloring makes them look <i>so</i> much like their animated selves of 25-30 years ago... but with the color palette being much richer, honestly. Same goes for the backgrounds, in particular, the animated universe's firehouse.<br />
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As well-done as writer Erik Burnham's appropriation of Greek gods Proteus (the main villain) and Ananke (in a smaller, more heraldic role, in Hero's Journey terms) is, they serve in an ancillary capacity, providing a plot vehicle for what everyone's <i>really</i> (cough) reading for: the IDW/psuedo-movie Ghostbusters meeting and interacting with their animated counterparts. Burnham, of course, knows these characters inside and out, and so he <i>nails</i> setting them up as foils for themselves: the Rays sharing in their enthusiasm and sense of wonder, the Egons working together on the scientific and technical matters of their universe-crossing dilemma, the Winstons sharing in their everyman skepticism, and most bitingly, the Peters finding each other to be insufferable jerks.<br />
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As someone who even as a child thought that the interior of the animated Containment Unit was some sort of physics-defying vast, dreary realm functioning as some sort of ghost purgatory -- and not simply compounded, locked-down spectral energy -- was a stupid idea, the mini-series' most priceless moment, far and away, is as follows: the animated Peter asking the IDW/movie Egon if he's ever taken any "trips into the containment unit". The reply? An absolutely dry, flat, "It doesn't work that way." Oh, sweet, sweet vindication!<br />
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I'm hoping this is prelude/precedent/way-paving for a new, ongoing <i>Real Ghostbusters</i> comic. Please, IDW, make that<i><b> </b></i>a <b><i>real</i></b>ality!<br />
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-- RyanRyan Wynnshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00477919968924048814noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2756369649414088624.post-53171397465371636852015-12-01T16:14:00.003-05:002015-12-02T08:31:30.116-05:00(A semi-recent) comic review: The X-Files Annual 2015 (IDW, July 2015)Released between the final issue of <i>Season 10</i> and the first of <i>Season 11</i>, <i>Annual 2015</i>'s "Most Likely to..." is a standalone, complete exception to the ongoing storyline(s) in the regular comics, I suspect designed to give the regular team a break after <i>Season 10</i>'s big finale and a chance to get their bearings so as to begin the current "season".<br />
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As established by the opening panel's caption, the story takes place in summer 1999, which would set it sometime during season seven (but definitely before its final episode). Despite my and others' negative connotations, the story tonally and thematically evokes seasons six and seven. In the real world, at the time the story occurs, the seventh's first run would have just finished up in May. Thus, "Most Likely"'s place on the timeline is fitting both internally and externally (if you're able to follow what I mean by that...)<br />
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For better or for worse, like many of the "MotWs" of those two seasons, "Most Likely" indulges in some cutesy toying around and teasing in regards to the (at that point only and heavily fan-fantasized) prospect of Mulder and Scully being in a relationship. Also like those (to me, justly) maligned two seasons, it "whimsically" and kitsch-ily embraces a particular element of pop culture -- here, though an anachronism, cable reality shows such as <i>Ghost Hunters</i> and <i>Ghost Adventures</i> that would become popular late in the following decade -- and has a more upbeat, Hollywood-ish tone. Though it by no means has a happy ending, it does have a clean, polished -- family-friendly even -- quality in the "neatly tying it all together" ending, with Mulder delivering a "solemn", "reflective" overview of his conclusions re: the case, expressing an allegory that suggests a karma-based fate/resolution for its subjects.<br />
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Though the theme of a high school outsider vs. the popular kids has -- it's safe to say -- been done to death, and despite the questionable aspects of the "geek" being the football star's "sidekick", writer Mike Raicht's variation of this old tune is original enough. Mulder and Scully's encounters with the concerned individuals' parents -- depicted in a state of enduring sadness and brokenness in the wake of the backstory's central events -- evoke the drearier take on domestic suburban America of earlier seasons. And the mild twist of the "truth" -- the specifics as to what happened to the kids, which entail the requisite "unexplained phenomena" -- that's revealed at the story's end admirably strikes me as just like something the show would have done. And Kevin VanHook's art, which is more showy and bulbous and much less minimalist and diminutive than that of the regular comics, it's more, er, extroverted nature fits the seasons-six-and-seven orientation of the story.<br />
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-- RyanRyan Wynnshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00477919968924048814noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2756369649414088624.post-67199322103105934392015-11-17T02:51:00.000-05:002015-11-17T02:51:01.766-05:00New comic review: Back to the Future #1 (of 4) (IDW, October 2015)Given the tight lock that long seems to have been kept on allowing official new iterations of the <i>Back to the Future </i>franchise, I was surprised to hear the announcement this past summer that IDW had a <i>BttF</i> comic book mini-series in the works. If it were any one of many other publishers, I'd have been wary, especially in the context of the recent wave of 2015-themed <i>BttF </i>media hype nostalgia, which has struck me as cheap and tacky (if inevitable). Though I couldn't be sure as to what would be the actual extent of Bob Gale's reported authorship of the comic, I could only take his involvement as a good sign, since not only did he write the damn movies, but by all appearances, he has over the past couple decades more so than anyone advocated for and strived to preserve the legacy of the franchise. (He really won me over when I heard him during a DVD commentary spiritedly insisting that he would never re-release any of the films with digital special effect revisions, disapprovingly alluding to the contentious behavior of one George Lucas.)<br />
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Given how tightly, integrally, and consummately the films were written and executed, each individually and all three taken as a whole, one would not be wrong-headed in considering any attempted sequel or spin-off ill-advised and expecting it to be extraneous and corrupting. Rest assured, going by his afterword to the first issue (which is what's being reviewed here), Gale has taken into this consideration and arrived at what I would concur is the best approach to this undertaking, boiling it down to a veritable mission statement: "No updates, no reboots, no 're-imaginging' of the characters. These were going to be <i style="font-weight: bold;">THE</i> characters." Gale makes it explicit that -- in a decision that might turn some off -- the focus is not going to be time travel, but "the characters and their stories".<br />
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Case in point, the self-explanatorily titled "When Marty Met Emmett", #1's 14-page lead story. I distinctly recall DVD commentary in which Gale explained how in the earliest phases of work on the original's screenplay, he and Zemeckis had a clear sense of Doc and Marty's relationship, mentioning that Marty had begun hanging around Doc because he liked being able to "use his amp". It's almost surprising that the movie didn't begin with its teenage protagonist's first encounter with this strange, mysterious figure as a way to establish intrigue. Instead, they took a "show, don't tell" approach -- only the most inept of viewers has ever failed to understand from the first scene that the amp is Marty's reason for hanging out with Doc.<br />
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Nonetheless, I'm sure I wasn't the only fan whose appetite was whet by that bit of DVD commentary for the full details on Doc and Marty first being acquainted... and here, Gale and co-scripter John Barber deliver on the those off-the-cuff verbal teases. Yes, it's a straightforward, simple story, but it's no less nor more than what it should be, and most importantly, it hits all the right notes: Marty's antagonism from the obnoxious "Needles", along with Marty's trademark intolerance of being referred to as "chicken" are recalled/foreshadowed, as is his his electric-guitar-playing hobby. The latter, for story purposes, facilitates the specifics of a demand and deadline threateningly imposed by Needles, sending Marty on a quest for amplifier tubes that leads to Doc's garage, getting into which entails a Goldbergian obstacle course certainly worthy of Doc's nature. The build-up to the reveal of Doc plays off of both his being an elusive, dangerous figure of both urban legend and gossipy, judgmental scandal and rumor, <i style="font-weight: bold;">and</i> the fans' anticipating the appearance of a character they hold in high esteem. (Well, speaking for myself...)<br />
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Mindful of the tight-knit continuity of all three movies and the parameters they defined for Doc's story, "When Marty Met Emmett" is bookended by, er, a flashback-slash-flashforward that appears to be set in the early 1890's, with Doc preparing for the appearance he and his family make at the end of <i>Part III </i>and filling in some background info on the Brown family lineage and a bit about the history of Doc's house in the movies' 1955 scenes and how he wound up in his 1985 living situation, as further illuminated at the story's center. In his narrating, Doc incidentally skips over how he spent the 1940's, but rest assured, his mysterious, fantastical background alluded to in "When Met" is plunged into head-on with "Looking for a Few Good Scientists", the first part of a serial that looks as though it intends to bare all regarding Doc's involvement in the Manhattan Project, <b><i>another</i> </b>enticing backstory tidbit brought up during DVD commentary.<br />
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Whereas Brent Schoonover's more matter-of-fact, stark-yet-pronounced, stiff-yet-animated art -- bringing to mind "indie"/"underground" cartoonists like those who have worked on <i>American Splendor</i> or perhaps Joe Sacco -- complements the domestic, sitcom-esque trappings of the lead story, Dan Schoening's sleek, dramaticized, cinematic art brings out the conspiracy-heavy, arcane, heightened-reality fantasticism of "Few Good Scientists". Harmoniously, the script, working off of Gale's treatment, is by Schoening's <i>Ghostbusters</i> collaborator, writer Erik Burnham, laying down the environment of academic esotericism and the paranoia-facilitating tiptoeing around elitist power-players and their soul-piercing stone-faced mind games that Schoening brings to life with such theatrical flare.<br />
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IDW's <i>Back to the Future</i> mini-series is decidedly on the right track, all indications being that the remaining issues shall be a good time, indeed.<br />
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-- RyanRyan Wynnshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00477919968924048814noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2756369649414088624.post-42937865104995500522015-10-23T04:38:00.006-04:002015-10-23T22:44:20.858-04:00Comics review: Millennium #1-5 (complete mini-series, IDW, cover dates January-May 2015)<span style="font-family: inherit;">It's unfortunate but not unexpected that IDW's <i>Millennium</i> mini-series came and went receiving little recognition (and weak distribution, if the trouble I had getting #5 is any indication). By contrast, much like the original TV series did not enjoy as much popularity and longevity as its Ten Thirteen Productions sibling, <i>The X-Files</i>, IDW's <i>The X-Files: Season 10 </i>concluded earlier this year, immediately succeeded by the still-ongoing <i>Season 11</i>.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">The greater tragic irony is that the </span><i style="font-family: inherit;">Millennium</i><span style="font-family: inherit;"> and </span><i style="font-family: inherit;">X-Files</i><span style="font-family: inherit;"> comics share the exact same writer: Joe Harris. Just as all things Mulder, Scully, and Cancer Man are concerned, Harris' knowledge and understanding of </span><i style="font-family: inherit;">Millennium</i><span style="font-family: inherit;">'s mythology, continuity, characters, and themes, as well as its general episode format and its script and production conventions is impeccable, showing that his appreciation of </span><i style="font-family: inherit;">The X-Files</i><span style="font-family: inherit;"> runs so deep that it extends to its creators' other productions. And as he's done with Ten Thirteen's flagship franchise, in </span><i style="font-family: inherit;">Millennium</i><span style="font-family: inherit;">'s five issues, Harris uses his familiarity of the source material and his skill as a writer to present a completely logical scenario for the series' character and the world surrounding them to have arrived at 15 years on, resuming the narrative threads of the show's mytharc to tell a story that's new but feels an awfully lot like the original show -- in a very, very good way.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Given the show's more fantastical elements, another writer might be inclined to "go big" and do the apocalyptic epic that some fans feel the show was building to but never got to do, and wind up with a disappointment, if not an utter mess. Harris knows that a manageable less-is-more approach works better. The mini-series open with Frank pursuing a case involving a psychopathic criminal, a series of devastating child deaths, and a tinge of the supernatural -- not unlike the average episode, or, if you will, <i>Millennium</i>'s equivalent of <i>X-Files</i>' many Monster-of-the-Week entries. But said supernatural element, by teasing Frank with some portents that hit the right buttons and setting him on a new course, turns out to be a plot device to take things to the next level by bringing on the mytharc stuff. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">The 15 years that have elapsed since the series ended work to Harris' advantage, picking up with a Frank who -- with complete plausibility -- has grown not just elderly but nomadic and even more isolated than he already had been. This allows Harris to tease at and build to all the things the fans are waiting for: Frank's return to Seattle and the iconic yellow house of seasons one and two, his first confrontation with the Millennium Group presumably since the finale episode, his poignant reunion with Jordan, and finally, the Big One: a showdown with his arch-nemesis, Lucy Butler. ("She's always a big hit with your circle, Frank.") Harris has all of the bases covered, and (switching metaphors) he not only plays all of the right notes, he plays them with the touch of a maestro. As a fan, I truly feel that though the mini-series seemed to end far too soon, I couldn't have been more satisfied with it.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Seeing an ashen Frank living in solitude in a shoddy hotel was bad enough, but the revelation that Jordan as an adult not only harbors deep resentment of her father, but that in cold defiance of him, she has joined and become loyal to the Millennium Group, is absolutely devastating. As heartbreaking as it is, it's wildly appropriate, given the show's hints that Jordan had inherited Frank's gifts, and an ingenious new iteration of a theme introduced on day one, in the pilot: Frank's involvement with the Group encroaching on his family and tearing them apart.</span><br />
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I can't resist listing some of the iconic, self-referencing, fan-baiting moments (trust me, they worked!): 1. Frank logging into his Millennium Group desktop software, uttering the "Soylent Green is people" passphrase for the first time since season two. 2. Our first sight of the (formerly) yellow house since season two, now in symbolic disrepair. 3. Issue #4 ending with the ultimate tease, the cloaked old woman mockingly telling Mulder, "Tell [Frank] Lucy says hi." 4. Frank stating, "I'll need a vehicle" as he sets out to rescue Mulder, and then, in the very next panel, remarking with much understatement, "This'll do" as he approaches a red Jeep Cherokee exactly like the one drove throughout the series.<br />
<i><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
From the miscellane</i>ous "former law enforcement" freelancers of season one to the hooded-and-cloaked occult ritual participants seen in season two, the exact makeup of the Millennium Group's membership body and hierarchy was always decidedly vague. The men-in-black-type operatives, the claustrophobic, dimly-lit roundtable meeting, the ornate yet archaic furnishings of Quentin McKittrick's office (which I think is within a high-rise, which means that he's really going for something with the blood-red cushioning of his austere wooden chair and the two rapiers cross-mounted on the wall above a fireplace with an active fire) might be cliché and Dan Brown-esque, but, hey, they work.<br />
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Millennium's viability as a franchise is questionable, to say the least (which is why we should be grateful that these comics happened at all), and given how on the first issue cover, Frank stands side-by-side with <i>The X-Files</i>' Mulder, there were some decision-makers who felt the same way. Frankly (no pun intended), I can't blame them, nor would I had they opted to slap the <i>X-Files</i> title logo somewhere on the cover, but to their credit, they avoided being that tacky. However, rather than being an intrusion, Mulder's presence in the story delivers <i>yet another</i> fans'-dream-made-true: a <i>proper</i> Fox Mulder-Frank Black team-up that actually does justice to both characters, unlike the crossover that occurred during <i>X-Files</i> seventh season. (If you look at an episode list, you can probably deduce that it's the one called "Millennium".)<br />
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Whereas there, Frank spent most of the episode sitting around on his ass in the mental ward he'd checked himself into (huh?), here, we see them in action together, following a lead and then chasing what they think is a fleeing killer. (Oh, and later, Frank took out a bunch of zombies with a shotgun, which was weird, because he rarely ever used a gun on his own show.) Whereas the crossover episode didn't even acknowledge their mutual background as criminal profilers, Harris fleshes out their shared universe with some new backstory work, connecting them both to the Monte Propps case, which in fact is a clever expansion of a detail mentioned in passing in an <i>X-Files</i> episode. (I hadn't even realized this until the Internet pointed it out to me -- Harris truly leaves no stone unturned!) And making up for their minimal interaction in the TV crossover, Frank and Mulder interplays finds both of them in top, quintessential form -- communication between the two is prickly and stilted, the no-nonsense Frank repeatedly being short in reaction to Mulder's wry sarcasm, and Mulder bewildered when Frank proceeds to act without telling Mulder what he's thinking, so focused on finding Jordan and keeping her away from the Group.</div>
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Re: Lucy seducing Mulder -- given his pornography vice, it makes sense that unlike Frank, he would quickly give into Lucy's wiles!</div>
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Though Frank is innately brooding and solitary (hence why I identify with him!), all indications are that if his sister hadn't been abducted, Mulder would be a "well-adjusted", baseball-loving, skirt-chasing everyday guy. Yet despite their stylistic differences, both chose singular, all-consuming career paths -- so much so that they wall each other off, Frank with his stone-faced disposition, Mulder with his all of his flippant remarks. But I'd like to think that there's an unspoken respect and understanding between them. In fact, Frank's concern upon learning that Mulder's in Lucy's clutches, describing him to Jordan as "a friend", is a quietly heartwarming moment.</div>
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The Lone Gunmen making a cameo to help Mulder crack the Millennium Group's encryption, Langly remarking that he's heard rumors in the hacking community that the Group's members use movie quotes as passphrases, held special meaning to me, as the nerdy tech guru Roedecker, who'd set Frank up with his "Soylent Green is people" login in the first place, always struck me as <i>Millennium</i>'s equivalent of the Gunmen. In fact, I'd always thought that if there were a full-fledged crossover, they should share at least one scene. As the character was killed off at the end of season two, having Langly acknowledge the movie quote passphrases probably isn't a coincidence, but Harris getting as close as possible to a formal meeting of the nerds. That it instead occurs in a quiet almost spiritual, between-the-lines way that only a fan like me would pick up on makes it bittersweet and all the more respectable.</div>
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Colin Lorimer's stark, dour ("gritty" would work, too, but it's overused) realism and the bleak moods created by his shading work well for <i>Millennium</i>. He does an admirable job of translating Frank's (and now Jordan's) heavily stylized "vision flashes", a staple of the show, into a comic format. Colorist Joana Lafuente deserves a lot of the credit here, as it's the abstract layers of color over what would otherwise be "regular" drawings that make these equivalent to the way that they were done on the show. (However, to no fault of Lorimer's, I'm not sure if they work in comics -- having to work them into a page layout makes the transitions in and out of "vision" less clear-cut.)<br />
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A few years ago, when the fan-driven "Back to Frank Black" Internet campaign for a new <i>Millennium</i> film or TV production was at its most active, I saw some detractors argue that since the year 2000 is now well-behind us, there'd be no point to revisiting <i>Millennium</i>, because -- they claimed -- the whole show hinged upon anticipation of the year 2000. In actuality, the show never even said, let alone promised, that anything in particular was going to happen at the turn of the (...you-know-what). What the show <i>did</i> do, in its earliest days, was allude to Evil's unseen hand directing the portions of humanity it was able to sink its hooks into, once or twice vaguely suggesting that Frank was getting so many gigs because Evil's influence was growing. "Things are getting worse and worse, and the whole world could go to hell any minute now" seemed to be the basic underlying sentiment.<br />
<br />
But if <i>Millennium</i> were made during the Great Depression, the WWII era, the Cold War era, or, er the NSA-and-ISIS era, would not its gloom-and-doom orientation seem but a reflection of reality? I believe there was little more to the show's title than the producers seeking a timely hook. In any other era, they could have just called it <i>Zeitgeist</i>, and the title's function would be the same, except in that it wouldn't be dating itself.<br />
<br />
The graceful, lyrical "voiceover" coda that brings the mini-series to its close underscores what Harris had just been accomplished: the series' dual nature, preoccupied with both existential human angst and the unseen influence upon humanity by the opposing spiritual forces of light and dark, has been embraced as timeless; and Frank and Lucy were approached and handled as the manifestation of age-old, undying archetypes, while staying completely true to their original characterizations on TV.<br />
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The very final word used in this wrap-up narration is a play on the franchise's title, recasting it in light of a millennium being a <i><b>very long</b> </i>span of time. What should you take away from that? That the content and subject matter of <i>Millennium</i> is too <i style="font-weight: bold;">good</i> and too <i style="font-weight: bold;">BIG</i> to write off for good just because of a stupid, tacky Dick Clark countdown to a stupid, tacky "ball drop" that was live on national TV several months after the show ended. There was no reason for the passing of such a pointless few moments to preclude catching back up with Frank and Jordan, finding out what's become of the Millennium Group, and seeing Frank triumph over lucy in a battle of their wills. And I'm certainly glad it didn't.<br />
<br /></div>
</div>
<div>
-- Ryan</div>
Ryan Wynnshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00477919968924048814noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2756369649414088624.post-89450077096374464632015-10-13T03:15:00.000-04:002015-10-13T03:15:50.760-04:00New comic review: Mickey Mouse #312 (IDW, August 2015)<i>Mickey Mouse</i> #312 marks the first occasion of IDW continuing the tradition begun by Gladstone and continued in succession by Disney Comics (primarily post-Implosion), Gemstone, and the pre-IDW licensee: presenting as the lead feature in an issue of an ongoing comic book title a reprint of a classic American Disney comic book story that had originally appeared in an issue of another (or sometimes the same) ongoing comic book title. (Yes, Western was reprint-heavy from the '60's through the '80's, but it was Gladstone that really made celebrated, contextualized reprints a regular thing.) I've appreciated as much as anyone how to date IDW's Disney line has been dominated by so much material brand-new to these shores, but I'm glad and grateful that a place has been made for also upholding this tradition (which in American comics, is a unique purview of ours, the only major exception that I can think of being DC's late-Silver-and-Bronze-Age "100-Page Spectacular" special issues).<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj1TIbJU_1BFJ0VuXaA-Z8-EZ0oQl9JiOiHpQRfqZqZcY4uVTbY74-I9Wpc6-cndt0-69PVAPOuG95Ka3_tD42aDlMS3m2JJlk4L19v5KIA8_PHFyHGypSLrfC0fe7qflJeQRlnKtxiMygo/s1600/Mickey+Mouse+312+cover.jpe" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj1TIbJU_1BFJ0VuXaA-Z8-EZ0oQl9JiOiHpQRfqZqZcY4uVTbY74-I9Wpc6-cndt0-69PVAPOuG95Ka3_tD42aDlMS3m2JJlk4L19v5KIA8_PHFyHGypSLrfC0fe7qflJeQRlnKtxiMygo/s320/Mickey+Mouse+312+cover.jpe" width="210" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">Jonathan Gray's rich, explosive "</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">Mysterious Crystal Ball"-based</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">cover for <i>Mickey Mouse</i> #312</span></div>
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Though even many of the more adventure-oriented (whether they take place on locomotives, or in the desert or jungle) Paul Murry-drawn <i>Mickey</i> serials from <i>WDC&S</i> can be classified in the procedural genre, as the plots almost always involve Mickey unraveling a mystery and in the end nabbing the "common criminal" crooks/swindlers behind it, "The Mysterious Crystal Ball" is overtly a police/detective procedural. What distinguishes it is its magic and supernatural themes, although true to these stories', errr, grounded nature, all of the magic and supernatural-ness is a hoax perpetrated by the story's villains, who are... "common criminal" crook/swindlers. If anything, the villains' convoluted and tedious-to-execute but bare-bones scheme and methods for deceiving and diverting Mickey and the police from a plain ol' bank robbery, errr, elegant in their simplicity. The narrative is almost <i>definitively </i>straightforward, textbook, patchwork crime-detective genre fare -- if only the real world's crimes and the solving and stopping of them were so neat-and-tidy and cut-and-dry! ...that is, once the villains' plan is laid bare. <br />
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(Really, for one night, the <i>entirety</i> of the Mouseton PD's manpower was invested in these thugs' shenanigans! Bless their hearts that this was as bad as things got in the Murry-drawn Mouseton, and that they weren't cynical enough to think to contrive a search warrant for the swami's tent to nip the whole thing in the bud!) In fact, the only thing that make the whole operation remotely elaborate is the live broadcasts -- twenty years later, they could have just pre-taped all of it with a home video camera! (Actually, since they had the ability to play films in the crystal ball, given the zoo instance, why <i>didn't</i> they just film everything?)<br />
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Still, a fair degree of story craft is evident, given that up until the scene
in which the plan was explained, it wasn't apparent (at
least to me) what exactly they were up to. It's just that, as can be
generally said of most of Western's <i>Mickey Mouse</i> stories, the storytelling is dry and not very dynamic. But as a fan, I enjoy and appreciate them, "Mysterious Crystal Ball" included, in their place and for what they are.<br />
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<div style="text-align: left;">
I enjoyed the antics of "<a href="http://coa.inducks.org/character.php?c=Shamrock+Bones+from+WDC+164">Shamrock Bones from WDC 164</a>". As a comic relief-oriented peripheral active doppelganger to Mickey for the duration of a case, he actually reminded me of Casey in "Mickey Mouse Outwits the Phantom Blot"... except that Bones actually had a hand in the case's <i>success</i></div>
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I can't help but comment on <a href="http://coa.inducks.org/story.php?c=W+WDC+164-15P">a note Inducks made on this reprint</a>: "Detective's gun replaced by truncheon on page 6" (of Part Three). Really? It's not okay for one of the good guys to shoot <i>back</i> at the bad guys? Even when he's working with the police, if not police himself?<br />
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[<i style="font-weight: bold;">Update:</i> I mistakenly had in mind a panel other than the one that Inducks was referring to. In the panel that they actually WERE referring to, Bones was actually shooting at the bad guys as they fled, not "shooting back" at anyone, so my criticism was erroneous. See 1.) Hex's comment below on the changes made to the story for <i>Mickey</i> #312, and especially see 2.) his detailed post at his own blog exhibiting side-by-side comparisons of the original and this reprint. He mentions and links to said post below, and I'm also link to it <a href="http://disneycomicsrandomness.blogspot.com/2015/09/the-mysterious-crystal-ball-censored.html">here</a>.]</div>
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As a string of gags (eighteen days' worth, in fact), I wouldn't consider Colette Bezzio and Rick Hoover's "Ecks and Doublex Reform" (from the <i>Mickey Mouse</i> syndicated newspaper strip, 1994-95, and teased in Vol. 2 of Fantagraphics' Gottfredson collection) to be a full-fledged sequel to the truly classic "Blaggard Castle", but the manic, kooky behavior of the professors (both reformed and un-reformed) is spot-on. Kudos, Colette and Rick!</div>
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"The 'Lawn'atic", this issue's ancient British relic (1938, actually) features an atypically neurotic Goofy, but I actually really liked this gag, which is perhaps the closest I've ever seen a Disney comic come to <i>Curb Your Enthusiasm</i>. Surprising, considering its age! But I guess that's because <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_humour">"[a] strong theme of sarcasm and self-deprecation, often with deadpan delivery, runs throughout British humour."</a></div>
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<br />
And lest I forget there's two more Walsh-Gonzalez <i>Mickey Mouse </i>Sundays (from '50 and '53, respectively) featuring Ellsworth. In he first, Mickey leaves the roughneck, sarcastic mynah in Goofy's care, and in the second, Horace's. Ellsworth causes upheaval in both residences, with Horace decidedly finding it more grating. Both strips are as unpredictable, rowdy, original, and clever as Ellsworth himself is.</div>
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-- Ryan</div>
Ryan Wynnshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00477919968924048814noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2756369649414088624.post-9459226403107934152015-10-13T03:05:00.000-04:002015-10-13T03:05:51.402-04:00New comic review: Donald Duck #371 (IDW, August 2015)<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiFu1jBXiik27tMWIVxkuiCvIWZHrhvHSUOFDz-pt57pAGyW2ojlqkX_WZlR_few6p2HSu1HvrO9vlCWYsax_pisRd1aUoghDssr2g5VvKM9Q2ZyiPJzAGE28X9Ii39reBOEc-WZNJWl3dT/s1600/Donald+Duck+371+cover.jpe" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiFu1jBXiik27tMWIVxkuiCvIWZHrhvHSUOFDz-pt57pAGyW2ojlqkX_WZlR_few6p2HSu1HvrO9vlCWYsax_pisRd1aUoghDssr2g5VvKM9Q2ZyiPJzAGE28X9Ii39reBOEc-WZNJWl3dT/s320/Donald+Duck+371+cover.jpe" width="210" /></a></div>
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Receiving top billing in this issue is "The Perfect Calm", a 1974 story written by Rodolfo Cimino and drawn by Romano Scarpa. I haven't seen very much of Scarpa's work from this era, but there's a decided contrast between Dave Alvarez' cover representing "Calm" (above), which nearly could be a still from a fully-animated Disney production, and the 40-years-older story's art, which looks more UPA-esque (especially some of the incidental and background characters). Oh, and in a couple of panels, I would have taken Donald for being Al Hubbard's.<br />
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The story itself actually reminds me of the more satiric episodes of <i>DuckTales</i>' second season, such as "The Big Flub" and "My Mother the Psychic", specifically because of the shared motif (with Flub) of Donald/Fenton introducing a mega-popular, incredibly lucrative new craze of some sort to society that runs away with itself to the point of evolving into a mass catastrophe ("Flub") and the shared premise of Scrooge exploiting a "mystic" individual for profit ("Psychic"). Also, the lighthearted spoofing of Eastern mysticism evokes the satiric quality of those episodes and the second season in general. In fact, the way that the adventure scenes are played in a more farcical (and here, very silly) way and are used as a means to set up the major events of the story involving calamity at home in Duckburg brings season two to mind, "Attack of the Fifty-Foot Webby" in particular.<br />
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My only real criticism of the story is that it would have been thematically stronger to pave the way for Donald's introduction to the Perfect Calm with a series of increasingly and <i>extremely</i> unfortunate events that push him to brink of rage, rather than the mopey "Woe is me" Donald who meets his mentor in jail after merely one little pedestrian sidewalk accident. Perhaps Joe Torcivia -- who peppered the nephews' dialogue with a lot of wry asides and zingers at the expense of their uncle, and I suspect is wholly responsible for the non sequitur (briefly) running joke about, er jokes (of the goat variety) -- could fill us in as to whether there was a "Day of Gifts" in the original story, or if there was some other reason everyone was walking around at the beginning of the story holding wrapped gifts!<br />
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[<b><i>Update:</i></b> See Joe Torcivia's comment below -- he confirms that the "Day of Gifts" was in the original version, urging, "Give that proper credit to Cimino (and perhaps Scarpa?)"]<br />
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Speaking of presents, another ancient British relic by Wilfred Haughton is presented to us, in the form of 1937's"Hampered!" As crude as they are and as off as the characterizations can be, I love seeing these, and find them quite interesting historically. Case in point re: characterization, here, Mickey is indifferent, even callous, to Morty and Ferdie in a way that I would only expect of the early Donald toward <i>his</i> nephews. As Mickey is in fact in cohort with the early Donald himself for the duration of this strip, perhaps his belly ache-prone pal had rubbed off on him for the moment. </div>
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Don Christensen and Paul Murry's very nice "Chore Chump" (1962) features a rare comic book appearance by Ludwig Von Drake in which his erudite, elitist tendencies are apparent. Though it may seem more like Scrooge's department to disapprove of Gus Goose's aversion to working, period (not just harder than hardies), it makes sense that Ludwig would frown upon Gus' atrophy as a whole, not just intellectual (Ludwig's prerogative). Of course, Grandma is sharp-witted, too, but doesn't flaunt it, and so her getting the best of Ludwig in the end, unofficially punishing him for basically inducing in him via hypnotism a permanent state akin to the effects of Adderall at their peak (until he undid it), hits an especially sweet, wry, and understated final note.</div>
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-- Ryan</div>
Ryan Wynnshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00477919968924048814noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2756369649414088624.post-69096646935024560832015-10-01T15:06:00.003-04:002015-10-07T02:43:30.916-04:00New comics review: Uncle Scrooge #408-409 (IDW, July and August 2015)<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<span style="font-size: small;">As far as I'm aware, with its two-part serialization in <i>Uncle Scrooge</i> #408 and 409, "The Grand Canyon Conquest" (titled as such for the U.S.) is the fourth (of six) stories to have been printed in English from the <a href="http://coa.inducks.org/publication.php?c=de/AODS" style="font-style: italic;">Abenteuer aus Onkel Dagoberts Schatztruhe</a> (<i>Adventures </i>[<i>from out of</i>?] <i>Uncle Scrooge's Treasure Chest</i>) series.</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;">Sweetening the deal in a mighty fitting and serendipitous way, "Grand Canyon"'s auteur, Miquel Pujol (per Inducks, he wrote the first five of the <i>Treasure Chest</i> stories, this being the fifth and the only one that he also drew) created and provided IDW with original covers for both issues:</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhgy4IvDjNjlvN_jEcCJYwnHeEG4J01FwqHULq46_mX0Vb30NBDw10x0NekbCIBw1btOcjT-ZTkYzXJO4p-tW9jcpO2nd8VnTEIjJwmJomSoV6Mmee3e2mjh9JKd67PFQgRr4zqPFbDu0Rh/s1600/Uncle+Scrooge+%2523408+cover.jpe" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhgy4IvDjNjlvN_jEcCJYwnHeEG4J01FwqHULq46_mX0Vb30NBDw10x0NekbCIBw1btOcjT-ZTkYzXJO4p-tW9jcpO2nd8VnTEIjJwmJomSoV6Mmee3e2mjh9JKd67PFQgRr4zqPFbDu0Rh/s320/Uncle+Scrooge+%2523408+cover.jpe" width="211" /></a><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEieIjy43Xu0E-oJwq54kckEO4RuiXIAX9SsXrVDekwH51WuYW8whWNRAyD_om1GQeqPKYP9qOs-k-JngYHzAs4N9sRp5TJSUtClGr7y2CM10kDmGjFtYerN32ZSITTKDBwsGghbCjU4zUrN/s1600/Uncle+Scrooge+%2523409+cover.jpe" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEieIjy43Xu0E-oJwq54kckEO4RuiXIAX9SsXrVDekwH51WuYW8whWNRAyD_om1GQeqPKYP9qOs-k-JngYHzAs4N9sRp5TJSUtClGr7y2CM10kDmGjFtYerN32ZSITTKDBwsGghbCjU4zUrN/s320/Uncle+Scrooge+%2523409+cover.jpe" width="207" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">(In fact, per Inducks, Pujol drew the first five in the <i>Treasure Chest</i> series, but this is the only one that he also wrote.)</span></span><br />
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<![endif]--><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The premise of “Grand Canyon Conquest” surely owes a debt to
Barks’ renowned “Horseradish Story” – note the similarities: a surly stranger
claiming to be an old acquaintance (in this case, of Scrooge; in
“Horseradish”, of a McDuck ancest<span style="font-family: inherit;">o</span>r) shows up out of nowhere claiming to have
legal rights to everything that Scrooge owns (or, in this case, <i>half</i> of that), spurring a race to find
the MacGuffin that will vindicate Scrooge. Whereas “Horseradish” opens with
McSue paying a call on Scrooge and presenting his case, “Grand Canyon” picks up
<i>after</i> the equivalent exchange between
Scrooge <span style="font-family: inherit;">and Blair Dunwitty </span>has already taken
place, as a panicked, frantic Scrooge shows up on Donald and the nephews’
doorstep in the middle of the night (a dark and stormy night, even, for
dramatic effect – say, didn’t I write almost the same sentence in a recent
review?), seeking their assistance (as is requisite of an <i>Uncle Scrooge</i> adventure) in solving the <span style="font-family: inherit;">Blair Dunwitty</span><b><i> </i></b>dilemma. </span></span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">
</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Coming out of the gates running, the emergency already in
effect and Scrooge taking action (even if he isn’t yet sure what to <i>do</i> with all his energy) and igniting a
fire under his nephews' tail feathers to get them to join in, is a good way to
quickly hook the reader, and the comic relief embedded in this opening scene
(Donald’s cynicism toward and resistance of Scrooge and his offer; and then,
when we relocate to the bin, the flustered Miss Quackfaster, who the
in-crisis-mode Scrooge has kept working all night) <span style="font-family: inherit;">is</span> not only funny, but by
reinforcing some of what makes the respective characters tic<span style="font-family: inherit;">k</span>, makes the
proceedings more intimate for the reader. However, on the subject of character
depth, between<span style="font-family: inherit;"><b> </b><span style="font-family: inherit;">Blair</span></span><b></b>’s spoiled<span style="font-family: inherit;"> </span>frat boy vibe and his twerpy sidekick whom we meet as part of Scrooge’s
hotel staff, actually a double agent planted by<span style="font-family: inherit;"><b> </b>Blair</span><b></b>, they may be
just smart enough to have pulled together a plan that genuinely threatens
Scrooge, but they come off as a bit in over their head…as opposed to Chisel
McSue, who though he was underhanded and low, was sly and cunning enough to
come off as a relatively sinister menace.</span></span></div>
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Pujol's art -- which might be likened to a quirkier Vicar (at least in terms of his ducks), as it certainly isn't as quirky as, say, Cavazzano's -- is quite rich, inspired, and lively.</span></span> Deft at both comedic (see the backpackers getting a surprise from the runaway boat) and dramatic action (see the anguished Scrooge in the opening scene, the furtive slinking about of the villains, and the determination of the ducks when they give chase to said villains), the flair to the momentum from Pujol's pen strokes carries the story <span style="font-family: inherit;">with a smooth, <span style="font-family: inherit;">fast but steady flow.</span></span> That's especially to his credit seeing that </span></span>this story appears to have be<span style="font-family: inherit;">en</span> created for European audiences
as a vehicle for a “tour of the American southwest” showcase. Despite what one
would expect to be distractions (the appearance of “Golden Age” Hollywood stars
in the L.A. club that Donald and the nephews find too expensive for their taste
and the gratuitous Disneyland ride chase scene – to say nothing of the
continuity questions raised by the <i>costume</i>
versions of Mickey and Goofy seen in the park!), the ducks are always trying to
solve the mystery surrounding <span style="font-family: inherit;">Blair's</span>
claim and or/chasing him, and so to the story’s credit, it never loses the plot
or the momentum initiated in the above-discussed opening. </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">In fact, between the
Disneyland rides and, at the climax, the ducks’ decidedly wilder,
death-defying, unpredictable ride that traverses – precariously -- several
fronts set in the wonder of nature named in the title, the story has a certain
amusement park-type of fun to it; I was originally thinking “popcorn movie”.</span></span><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"> And speaking of movies, at 44 pages and in the
four-tiers-per-page format, for a duck comic, this is almost a feature film
(or, say, a novel). I enjoyed following Donald and the nephews once Scrooge had
sent them to check into the hotel to do their reconnaissance work – maybe it’s
because the scene had more room to stretch its legs, or the story beats were
more fleshed out, than would be the case in a standard-length story, but Donald
and the boys almost felt like real people in the real world. (The intended
realism of the story’s settings may have been factor in this, too.) And the
apropos comic relief – much of it stemming from the budget allotted them by
Scrooge n<span style="font-family: inherit;">ot b<span style="font-family: inherit;">eing sufficient for </span></span>the expenses they run into – added a great deal of
charm, and like the afore-discussed comic relief in the opening sequence, added
another dimension to the palette, making it far from flat.</span></span>
</div>
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="line-height: 115%;">Getting back to that showstopper <span style="font-family: inherit;">of a </span>“wild ride” – it actually
bore a striking resemblance to the epic, tumultuous gondola flight/sled ride
(which escalated into a tumultuous iceberg ride) of Don Rosa’s “Last Sled to
Dawson”, which this story predates by two years! The coincidence gets odder:
“Canyon”’s flashbacks to Scrooge and <span style="font-family: inherit;">Ow<span style="font-family: inherit;">en Dunwitty</span>'s</span><b><i> </i></b>days as young
prospectors evoked the Klondike set Scrooge-Cornelius Coot flashback of “Last
Sled” on a level off the charts! I’m not suggesting any borrowing on Rosa’s
part – this story hasn’t been printed in the U.S. until now, and he’s recounted
how when he first ran into some of the earliest Gladstone comics in a store, it
was his first encounter with new Disney comics since the ‘70’s (indicating that
in the ‘80’s, he wasn’t reading European Disney comics). As I called it above,
it’s just a coincidence, and a very compelling one, at that.</span></span></span><br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="line-height: 115%;">______________</span></span></span></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="line-height: 115%;">In the backup stories department, both issues deliver some choice rarities. Re: #408, in Al Hubbard's "Belle Corners the Coin Collection", created in 1967 for the Disney Studio program, we meet an old flame from Scrooge's youth who has grown into a quite brassy southern belle (and physically, grown to proportions of which there's quite a bit more than Scrooge remembered). Anticipating their reunion, Scrooge raves to the nephews that he'd found Belle to be his kind of girl simply because she <i>had</i> money -- but as a heiress, you'd think he'd want to teach her about <i>earning</i> money, just like he did with Goldie! Love is nearsighted, I believe the saying goes....</span></span></span></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="line-height: 115%;">In #409's "The Inventors' Picnic", a <i>Gyro Gearloose </i>story by Freddy Milton (whom we don't see enough of)<span style="font-family: inherit;">, </span>all of the pompous, jerk members of the inventors society are put in their place when Gyro rigs up on the fly a fantastical way of saving their lives from a flood. It's especially nice to see Gyro get his due when he's so humble, as reinforced by his being oblivious to the ingenuity of the inventions he provides Daisy, Donald, and Scrooge in the scenes preceding the picnic. (It was nice of those three characters to show up at the picnic to vouch for Gyro, even though in their function here, each comes off as notably more selfless than usual.) And as anxious as Gyro had been about receiving his peers' approval, he isn't driven to improvise the literal lifeline that he provides out of spite, but because he just doesn't want to see anyone die. He's a good egg, that Gearloose kid.</span></span></span></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="line-height: 115%;"><br /></span></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="line-height: 115%;">"Picnic" is followed by "Enter the Dragon" (written by Frank Jonker and Paul Hoogma, drawn by Bas Heymans)<span style="font-family: inherit;">, which </span>depicts a McDuck ancestor that in one respect had none of Scrooge's values, but certainly had his drive and zeal. I got a kick out of the Viking equivalents of Donald and the nephews, who, though more barbaric than their likenesses, echo their descendants in opting to spend their money on fun, much to their uptight, frugal uncle's disapproval. </span></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="line-height: 115%;">Both
issues close with a one-page gag from the writer artist team of Alberto Savini
and Freccero, both of which are funny, clever, original bits in the “Scrooge
takes his penny-pinching to silly extremes” tradition begun by Barks. However,
in using perspectives so as to conceal the gag until the last panel, “Winning
Washout” was a bit confusing as to where Scrooge actually was and what he was
doing at certain points. My one question about “Going Places”: Scrooge actually
said that he <i>would</i> dispose of the
used materials if he was renovating? :D</span></span></span><br />
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="line-height: 115%;">-- Ryan </span></span></span></div>
Ryan Wynnshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00477919968924048814noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2756369649414088624.post-77054459900118528442015-09-21T15:36:00.004-04:002015-09-21T22:11:02.137-04:00New comic review: Donald Duck #370 (IDW, July 2015)"The Siege of Nothing Atoll" (this titular pun I'm assuming is the work of Thad Komorowski, the story's English dialogue scribe [<b>Edit:</b><i style="font-weight: bold;"> </i>It's not Thad's! See his comment below.]), dating from 1976, is much earlier than most of the Cavazzano-drawn stories that we've seen lately, only a few years out from his original gig as Romano Scarpa's inker (which lasted from 1961-71, per Inducks).<br />
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Apparently, at this point, Cavazzano had not yet developed the more blocky, jagged style that he is known for: the line work here has a sketch-like but fluid quality and is richly inked, and I would go so far as to describe the poses as squash-and-stretch, as they're about as close to being animated as they can get without actually being animated... and by "poses," I'm not just talking the characters: what should be solid, unyielding objects and geological structures are personified and characterized with human behaviors. (Well, okay, the mad scientist had actually built his island, which I guess accounts for the volcano's belching and other utterances.)<br />
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After the story's mysterious, intriguing setup, which actually takes place on a dark and stormy night at an airfield, the atmospherics played up in Cavazzano's eerily-lit "sets", the plot is as simple as can be: Donald and Fethry track the source of Scrooge's missing planes to... not a sea monster eating Scrooge's ice cream, but a mad scientist's faux island base, where they find he's planning to take over the world... from which they stop him by blowing up the island. Really, that's it! The mad scientist, cackling and boasting with much bravado of his as-basic-as-they-come world takeover ambition and scheme, epitomizes and even overdoes the "mad" part of his job description -- more so than any other mad scientist I've seen in quite some time. The gleam in his eyes and the gape in his front teeth make him look more like an escaped mental patient than the usual backstory of a respected scientist who cracked -- it's not that hard to imagine that his long white lab coat is actually a straightjacket, of which he'd managed to untangle and modify the sleeves.<br />
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That's not to say that the story isn't a fun read, though -- it <i>is</i>, largely because, visually, it's a sheer, unabashed delight, thanks to Cavazzano's dynamic, sizzling art: there's numerous splash panels, all of which are so vast in scope and intricate in the action (barely) contained therein, they're a veritable sensory overload to behold. Visually, the cinematic tropes hit the rights notes for an espionage-tinged sci-fi adventure, from the urgently scrambling and bewildered air traffic control crew handling an atypical emergency to the villain's laboratory-cum-missile-silo lair, which has a Cold War <i>Bond</i>-ian feel to it. (In the former scene, I loved the dead-serious, intolerant-of-mistakes Scrooge snapping at the crew and acting like lives are at stake -- even though the pilots of the downed planes have all returned safely -- and then collapsing into jelly when he realizes that the unseen enemy has seized one of his planes yet again.) Surprisingly, Fethry doesn't get to annoy Donald very much in this story, but as with the <i>T.N.T.</i> stories, sending them on a duo mission has a charming "buddy flick"-esque road trip feel to it. The <i>Looney Tunes</i>-esque "blackout" gag sequence encompassing Donald's successive attempts to breach the villain's island were especially fitting, given that the story's dominated by squash-and-stretch-esque visuals. I could go for more like this!<br />
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As I always try to note, with their backup features Gerstein and his editorial team make it a point to account for the "classic" era of American Disney comics. Here, they deliver with a rather good two-page Al Taliaferro gag from <i>Walt Disney's Comics and Stories</i> #102 (1949) in which Donald tries to cut corners in his garbage disposing, which he finds decidedly not to have been worth it when punishment is dished out upon him by a fed-up citizen. (Although, life ever treating him unfairly, Donald is being blamed for a bunch of stuff that <i>others</i> did before him, and to which the severity of the punishment is roughly proportionate, rather than to his meager, one-time [to date, admittedly] offense.)</div>
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I honestly didn't realize that Taliaferro had created gags like this one exclusively for <i>WDC&S</i>; I've always thought they were reformatted Sunday pages.</div>
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-- Ryan</div>
Ryan Wynnshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00477919968924048814noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2756369649414088624.post-48377638019222563362015-09-01T01:35:00.002-04:002015-09-02T14:31:35.384-04:00New comic review: Walt Disney's Comics and Stories #721 (IDW, July 2015)July 2nd, 2015: The Phantom Blot commanded the spotlight on the covers of not one but <b>two</b> comics released on this date! (I already covered the other one, <i>Mickey Mouse</i> #311, <a href="http://ryanwynns.blogspot.com/2015/08/new-comic-review-mickey-mouse-311-idw.html">here</a>.) I'm not sure if this was completely unprecedented in the history of American Disney comics, but it seems to me a pretty good wager.<br />
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Between Dave Alvarez' suave, flamboyant, slick take on the Blot fronting <i>MM</i> #311 and Jonathan Gray's more ominous, wraith-like Blot expressionlessly, (presumably) silently beckoning us within <i>WDC&S</i> #721, we have two markedly distinct Blot "essences", both of which, I'd argue, are rooted in the original Gottfredson story.<br />
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...but, wait, we haven't even touched on the <b>rest </b>of Gray's cover! The Blot centerpiece separates A) a busy, crowded, detailed, fiery, breathtaking, monumental, mysticism-tinged illustration featuring Mickey, Goofy and the ol' gang, from B) a rendering -- with much those same qualities -- of Donald and Scrooge in the company of <b>their</b> gang. (You have to squint to see both of these panoramas, though, as this cover is anything if not <b>crammed!</b>) Ah, well, surely, the deal here must be that the cover is giving equal space to this issue's duck story and its mouse story, right? And perhaps the Blot is the villain in both (as unusual as that would be for a duck story), hence how he's positioned at the axis point between them!<br />
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...<b><i>NOPE!</i> </b>If you're reading this, I' going to assume that you're at least as up to speed on the subject as I am, if not more so (which, especially if you're from Europe, you may be). "Long a Disney classic in Italy" per David Gerstein's July <i>Crosstalk</i>, and a veritable "legendary Disney epic" per IDW's <a href="https://www.idwpublishing.com/product/walt-disneys-comics-stories-721/">soliciting</a>, the twelve-chapter <a href="http://coa.inducks.org/story.php?c=I+TL+1780-AP">"Search for the Zodiac Stone"</a>, originally serialized in <i>Topolino</i> from January to March 1990 (remember, they get twelve issues for twelve weeks), from what I gather, has quite the rep in certain circles for being an epic mouse-duck crossover that spans the furthest reaches of space and time. And as a Disney comic fan who can hold my own in a discussion about the vast sociological and philosophical truths encapsulated in the subtle craftsmanship of any given Barks 10-pager but who has secretly (okay, at certain points in my fandom record, not so secretly) always fantasized about the Disney duck-mouse comic book universe's own version of <i>Crisis on Infinite Earths</i>, my fanboy id is <i>totally</i> psyched for this story. (Though perhaps it'd be better likened to a <i>Rocky and Bullwinkle</i> serial, which wouldn't be a bad thing!)<br />
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The first installment is wholly functional and adequate insofar as setting the stage and getting the ball rolling. (And there are no ducks or Blot present; Gray's cover is looking ahead.) The opening, though it overtly expresses "epic", "cosmic" ambitions (unorthodoxically and boldly joining Mickey and Goofy on an already underway and [nearly] completed time travel mission; establishing a centuries-old secret society-based conspiracy that aspiring Illuminati-themed YouTube documentary filmmakers wish they had mere scraps of source material on) plays out quite procedurally and literally. The dry, step-by-step, linear progression of the detective narrative that ensues, from identifying two Zodiac Society descendants through to figuring out the real function of one of the brothers' seemingly superstitious, eccentric "good luck" rituals (...and like we didn't know that outdoor fish tank and the butler's description of his master's coin-tossing routine were brought up for a reason!) hasn't exactly left me waiting with bated breath for the next installment... but I'm actually far more of an idealist than I am a cynic, so I'm still eagerly looking forward to the remaining vast bulk (11/12ths!) of this story that's barely gotten underway. I'm in no position to talk about its craft, but from what I do know, the next 11 issues are going to be fun, especially in the trustworthy hands of Gray, Gerstein, et al. In fact, whether or not the story lives up to its "rep", under their stewardship, I am already completely confident that it is worthy enough of the <i>Walt Disney's Comics and Stories </i>legacy so as to absorb a year's worth of issues.<br />
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(I'm just hoping that if the serial really does stick to a "one-Zodiac-Stone-fragment-per-chapter formula, that each installment is individually strong enough to make up for such a skeletal framework.)<br />
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The afore-cited July <i>Crosstalk</i> promises that for the duration of its run, "Zodiac Stone" won't be <b>it </b>for <i>WDC&S</i> and that there will be room for material in the "classics" vein. As proof, #721 delivers a Walt Kelly <i>Gremlins </i>gag, a 1933 <i>Silly Symphonies</i> Sunday starring Bucky Bug at his most quaintly charming (and I mean that), and best of all, a new-to-the-U.S. 1982 Jippes-Milton-Verhagen <i>Donald Duck </i>10-pager with razor-pointed art that befits all of the pain and suffering that poor Donald endures throughout, but also befits the sting his nemeses feel and the acidity with which he beams when, in the end, he comes out on top.<br />
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-- RyanRyan Wynnshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00477919968924048814noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2756369649414088624.post-11433233950373403562015-08-31T14:52:00.004-04:002015-09-01T14:41:09.098-04:00New comic review: Mickey Mouse #311 (IDW, July 2015)When a few months ago I first saw Dave Alvarez' delicious, delectable cover prominently displaying the Phantom Blot in all his glory, <i>Mickey Mouse</i> #311 immediately became one of my most eagerly anticipated of the issues of IDW's first summer of Disney.<br />
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For a 33-page story, which is on the long side by Disney comics standards, it's surprising how little of a plot there is to it: the primary conflict is Mickey's altered (in fact, enhanced, but in a way that often seems more like a hindrance) hearing. Though his condition is caused at the story's beginning during a scuffle with the Blot, it's by complete accident, not at all intended by the "black-cloaked blaggard". (Kudos, Torcivia!) Later, the Blot takes advantage of the situation, making things hairier for Mickey... but by not showing what the Blot is doing and how, and the ambiguity about whether or not any of it is in fact the Blot's doing, holding off on the big reveal -- via a gloating Blot soliloquy that precipitates the hero and villain's final showdown -- makes the story read confusingly and disjointedly. The specs of said soliloquy of revelation illustrate a scheme contrived and cobbled together on a "winging it" level never before attained (or stooped down to?) by the Blot. There's so little to it, the story doesn't even ever build to that much of a climax; Mickey just all of the sudden puts everything together and we make a clean break in cutting <i>right</i> to the aforementioned final showdown. The way that Mickey surprises the Blot by nonchalantly strutting into his hideout as he delivers his aforementioned soliloquy is funny, but Mickey's explanation as to how he seemingly magically found the hideout is another one of the story's forced, head-scratching-inducing shortcuts that you kind of have to just put out of mind to go on reading.</div>
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All that said, I actually <i>like</i> the story(!) After all, hey, it's the Phantom Blot! Thanks in large part to Cavazzano, the story is a whole lot of fun, with the hyperactivity of his art engendering a bold, sweeping dynamics and the illusion of rapid pacing. Also, I'm getting to really like Cavazzano's Mickey, drawn with certain quirks and details that make him one of the most attractive pupil-eyed Mickeys I've ever seen. The deftness of Cavazzano's dazzling dynamics especially enhance the bookend pair of Mickey-Blot slug-fests, which are presented as archetypal confrontations between our staunch detective hero and his most formidable arch-nemesis. The laboratory setting of the first battle and especially the clock tower setting of the one at the climax take things over the top aesthetically, really playing up the whole arch-villain thing. I've taken issue in the past with how all non-Gottfredson takes on the Blot have forgotten that he was a foreign spy with a very specific mission and cast him as an all-purpose super-villain, but as I'm several decades too late with that complaint, showing him without the hood through the whole story and playing up his penchant for disguises (besides his usual one, that is) and for building things (it's not just death traps anymore!) is a good consolation prize. Torcivia's several references to the death traps sweeten the deal, too. </div>
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Like the original Blot story, this one is heavy on Mickey working with Chief O'Hara, much to the (though he won't admit it) envy of Detective Casey, story choices that to me go a long way in creating the "feel" of a Phantom Blot story. Casey's reassignment to traffic cop is a legitimately funny new spin on his comic relief role in the original, where, repeatedly, his bravado only made the embarrassment of his bungling all the worse. Casey's hooting and hollering over Mickey and the Blot's brawl brought to mind Sgt. Bullock's emphatic ravings as he witnessed Azrael-as-Batman take down Bane in the "Knightfall" story line. This brought me a certain satisfaction, as I've always considered that as Bullock is to Gordon, Casey is to O'Hara, and I've always considered Gottfredson's original Blot story the closest a <i>Mickey Mouse</i> story ever got to being a <i>Batman</i> story.<br />
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With these characterizations (the Blot, O'Hara, Casey) and with the emphasis on Mickey's friendships with "the ol' gang", writer Bruno Enna plays into and with the audience's familiarity with the respective cast, playing a fresh, new variation of an old song, so to speak. Though the Mickey denunciations that Mickey himself overhears -- that are in fact faked by the Blot -- have the story for a few seconds approaching (sort of inverted) <i>It's a Wonderful Life</i> territory, the "quintessential" characterizations give the story a sort of <i>This Is Your Life</i> "tour" feel akin to "A Little Something Special" (but although "Sound-Blot Plot" is special, it's not quite<i> that</i> special). In the plot's casual coincidences and the atypical story momentum that comes from Mickey just trying to have a normal day, except weird things are happening to him, and as they appear incidental rather than the result of a scheme or (if you will) plot (in fact, they are in part incidental),, for a good while there's no particular goal or objective driving the narrative; it reflects Mickey's confusion, and that's not bad writing; it's wildly appropriate. There's actually a certain kind of quasi-realism (kind of like with "The Duckburg 100", now that I think of it), with Mickey and his pals feeling like they have one or two more added dimensions just because we see them in something (weirdly) resembling "real time".<br />
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Goofy's sweetness was a nice touch, and his harmless but eccentric "hoarder"-esque habits was a fresh take. (In fact, with his bird fostering and silent, mimed communication that he prolongs much longer than Mickey needed, he actually comes off as lighter version of Charlie from <i>It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia</i>!) His intervention at the climax was perfectly timed, as well as both funny and touching. <br />
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Once again, the backup features satisfy one's "classic rarities" needs: another Walsh-Gonzalez Sunday featuring Ellsworth, and a crude but historically interesting British gag from the early '30's(!) in which Mickey performs physical comedy that back in the States, via Gottfredson, he was already well evolved beyond (for which I'm grateful).<br />
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-- Ryan</div>
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Ryan Wynnshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00477919968924048814noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2756369649414088624.post-2839972476309896392015-08-26T00:21:00.001-04:002015-08-26T00:21:24.639-04:00Aladdin (the TV series) 20th anniversary -- Episode 19: "Sneeze the Day" (9/24/94)<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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It's easy to imagine that Motz and Roth came up with this episode during a "Hmm, what can we do with Genie?" writers' meeting during which their train of thought led them start to musing about how a genie "works" (physiologically, biologically, the quirks of their powers, etc.), somewhere along the line positing, "Do genies get sick? If so, what's it like?" In fact, it's logical to suspect my favorite line of the episode -- "Wait, is a hundred years a long time to you guys or not? Oh, I keep forgetting!" -- just may have been a byproduct of such a brainstorming session. Also, said line is a prime example of what distinguishes this episode: Genie's fantastical nature is given precedence over his default role as comic relief.<br />
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A good few minutes' worth of screen time is given to depictions of Genie's symptoms. In the sequence preceding Aladdin's search for the Orb of Machina, when we're first shown the guava juice-afflicted Genie, the assorted items -- a kitten, a set of false teeth, several swords flung through the air with their tips aimed at Aladdin -- that Genie's sneezes produce against his will and without premeditation individually aren't particularly imaginative or funny, but looking at the big picture, the random, <i>non sequitur</i> nature of this barrage of sight gags assures a silly, whimsical, energized episode. Moreover, the items and costumes generated are easy to imagine being used appropriately by Genie in good health, so his power going awry in this way is a very clever, fitting answer to the "If genies get sick, what happens?" question.<br />
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Aladdin's near-miss with the sword signifies that Genie's symptoms have turned perilous and prompts the story thread of Genie bemoaning the danger that he now poses to his friends. To reinforce that the swords weren't an isolated incident, the moment Al's survived the sword attack, Genie's next sneeze incites the launch of a rocket missile that carries Abu off into the stratosphere, a bit that is amusing in its elaborate, step-by-step execution. Later, just before Aladdin finally acquires the orb, we cut back to the palace, where we're shown that Genie's illness hasn't let up if not worsened, given the vile two-headed, fire-breathing serpentine atrocity preying on Abu -- which, though basic in design,is at least more original than a more standard dragon would have been. And insofar as reminding us of the problem Aladdin's trying to solve, it does the trick.<br />
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More impressive is the panning wide shot that opens the final act, efficiently establishing the substantial, imposing mountain of assorted objects and major structures in the middle of the desert, relating the severe degree to which Genie's condition has escalated in a way that's visually staggering. Additionally, these scene-setting sights are the last step in the gradual buildup to the most extensive, most calamitous manifestation of Genie's symptoms (and presumably, things would have only gotten worse yet had Aladdin not showed up with the orb): the apocalyptic abrupt generating of two old "friends", the Sultan of the Al-Muddi and Fashoom, along with a mobile contraption of Mechanicles from "Getting the Bugs Out" here increased (ballparking it) twenty times or more in size, so as to stand on par with the two monsters (indicating that these are replications, not the real deal).<br />
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As predictable as are both the <i>"<span style="font-size: x-small;">[*sniff*]</span> My very existence threatens my friends' very lives -- as much as it pains me, I must isolate myself somewhere far, far away from them and anyone else!!!"</i> characterization and <i><span style="font-size: x-small;">[*coughahemcough*]</span> </i>the <i>deus ex machina</i> of the arrival of the orb, it's nice to see an episode in which Genie has his own character arc, not to mention in which he's characterized in any way at all. It's especially satisfying that Genie gets to be the hero at the end (I guess he was able to single-handedly defeat <i>all three</i> beasts in one fell swoop when previously, he proved helpless against each <i>individually</i> presumably because here, he conceived them involuntarily, as I speculated above), when I honestly wouldn't have been too surprised if Aladdin had gotten to be the one who thwarted them even after Genie were cured by the orb. </div>
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Ah, and that brings me to the matter of said object of magic: Aladdin, Iago, and Carpet's adventure in Machina's cave is practically an episode-within-the-episode. They could have gone to, say, the moon to fight and defeat, say, an evil wizard in order to obtain the orb, and the rest of the episode would be <i>no</i> different. The cave sequence takes up approximately an entire third of the episode and pretty much completely sidetracks it, existing <i>only</i> to facilitate Aladdin bringing Genie the orb at what's the exact <i>right</i> moment, as necessitated by the story. As I've already alluded to, Motz and Roth acknowledged the function of the cave scene and its outcome with the name of the orb's guardian... and I'll leave their little in-joke for you to either pick up on or not yourself!<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhl-zuSdQ-XajQviW7UmKNLwEtetV91UIAhW2g9kO2OJWo-Pkaxh03Y8XlwnG1q66YHav3PwfTL8sJUxViFbNy7rfBQVVnVqF4A3gTBqO13zpOkjfwlGzZ9FEv6ie3sQTv1p3ooEdQaM3Q3/s1600/Machina+3.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="238" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhl-zuSdQ-XajQviW7UmKNLwEtetV91UIAhW2g9kO2OJWo-Pkaxh03Y8XlwnG1q66YHav3PwfTL8sJUxViFbNy7rfBQVVnVqF4A3gTBqO13zpOkjfwlGzZ9FEv6ie3sQTv1p3ooEdQaM3Q3/s320/Machina+3.png" width="320" /></a></div>
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Had Motz and Roth gone through the motions with the cave scene with a couple action-based set pieces (a collapsing bridge over a bottomless pit, a cave-in, a runaway boulder, etc.), as such a substantive and <i>distinct</i> segment, it would be very, very damaging to the episode as a whole. However, the predominance of witty verbal sparring and the "punny" riddles and trick questions that serve as the three obstacles between Al and the orb spice up the proceedings considerably. ("I was expecting something a bit more dangerous, like, like fighting a dragon or something!" Aladdin exclaims -- yet another wink-and-nod to those of us paying acute attention.) The ironic revelation of Machina's true identity (recalling Motz and Roth's nebbish worm from the previous episode who turned out to be behind the thundering voice in the Witches of the Sand's lair) puts the comedy-preferring orientation of this adventure in italics, and an exclamation point is added by the sequence's gag-based coda -- a grumbling, griping Machina getting a replacement orb from his warehouse with a seemingly endless supply of them) -- which feels an awful lot like an <i>episode-</i>capping bit. As isolated as the cave sequence is from the rest of the episode, the episode steadily retains its flavor of smartly, sharply written comedy. (Also, I'm no expert, but with Machina's irate nature and his "chirpy", dandy-ish voice and speech patterns, would I be correct in suspecting a homage to something in <i>Monty Python</i>?)</div>
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There are consistent factors visually, too: 1. The squash-and-stretch animation, which like in most episodes where it's used, offers the eye numerous delights and the occasional awkward, rushed-seeming pose -- and is generally befitting of a Genie episode, given the character's nature as sort of a cosmic-powered Roger Rabbit. 2. Just like Genie's "mountains" of unwanted objects and that of the vengeful trio of Gargantuas, Machina, in his three false guises, is very impressive and imposing in scope. Although the sleek, stark, more modern and hip design style used for these visages and the atmospheric backgrounds aren't comparable to anything in the Agrabah and desert sequences (except maybe perhaps Mechanicles' contraption, which in its enhanced size, appears more slender and angular), it still counts as one of those aspects of the tangential cave sequence that make it so strong in its own right, the episode's disjointed structure just <i>doesn't matter</i>. Motz and Roth are right to have been so confident in their plot shortcuts, loose stitching, and clich<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">é</span></span> of a character arc as to include the grinning aforementioned in-jokes, for the episode holds together in exceptionally well and is thoroughly entertaining. In other words, they're doing things that a bad writer would do, but by embracing and <i>owning</i> these things, playing them off so nonchalantly, they "flip" these pitfalls and turn out something that's actually <i>good</i>. Perhaps because they're good writers, they are only capable of doing bad by doing it good? </div>
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Iago being used as a the source of exposition re: the Orb of Machina, recollected from his days of "Jafar always dragging [Iago] around looking for some magical thing or other", is a great touch, logically taking into account his past and easily evoking the Jafar we remember. Characterization-wise, his reluctance to share this information, as he fears getting roped into the quest for the orb, and his inevitable one-liners of grief and misery once he has indeed been roped into said journey, are dead-on.<br />
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Lastly, circling back to the episode's beginning, it was nice to briefly see Amin Damoola again, in all his rubber-limbed, ill-fortuned, unmerited confidence-displaying glory. His butt-of-all-jokes, slapstick-facilitating qualities promise a comedic episode -- which proves true, even though he's only seen in the first couple minutes. The purpose of his altercation with the palace guards is to have Genie incidentally get infected during the fracas. This elaborate, ultimately irrelevant way of getting the plot moving is worthy of some of <i>The Simpsons</i>' infamous epic, excessive, extraneous setups. And in existing just for fun,<br />
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<i><b>Genie Watch:</b> ...</i>HEY!!! I've covered that with more than two-thirds of what I've already written, haven't I? That <i>better</i> be good enough for you! Sheesh! ;)</div>
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-- Ryan</div>
Ryan Wynnshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00477919968924048814noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2756369649414088624.post-86815247841873929482015-07-30T22:59:00.000-04:002015-07-30T22:59:37.083-04:00New comic review: Mickey Mouse #1 (#310) (IDW, June 2015)I didn’t realize that Casty had started only writing and not drawing some of his stories. Is that for scheduling reasons? Or because as he envisioned this story, it was in Cavazzano’s style? And either way, does it mean that a story he doesn’t both write and draw isn’t as much his baby?<br />
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However, he did draw the cover:<br />
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With the ducks, especially with Scrooge’s treasure-hunting inclinations, there’s usually a logical reason related to the innate nature of their character(s) that they wind up on the adventures that they do. Even with Donald’s everyman nature, the plot m.o. can be his drive to prove himself. That’s not to say that even Barks didn’t contrive reasons why Donald and the nephews, sans Scrooge, would find themselves in life-threatening predicaments on the other side of the world. But it’s really Mickey, not Donald, with whom more than once, I’ve stopped and wondered, “Hey, just HOW has he had all those adventures, anyway?” (In the stories in which he’s not acting in his quasi-established role of a private investigator. Actually, I’m not even sure if he considers himself one, or if he just is always helping Chief O’Hara out as a friend.)<br />
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The real hero of “The Lost Explorers’ Trail” is Eurasia Toft. By all rights, it’s her story: it’s the pride, passion, and skill with which she takes up being the heir to her father’s legacy that drive the narrative. Mickey and Goofy are just along for the ride. Casty tacitly acknowledges this fact with M&G's very reason for accompanying Eurasia (they want to see how things turn out, as if they’re the reader), and how they become privy to the situation in the first place: a letter meant for Professor Toft is mistakenly delivered to Mickey’s address. It’s to Casty’s credit that I didn’t really notice this the first time through. Their enthusiasm for and earnest curiosity for the mission sells this case of tentative plot logic, which is then reinforced proactive initiative Mickey and Goofy take in a least <i>getting through</i> the adventure, even if they don't really have an impact on much of what happens. More often than not, Eurasia takes the lead...<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiQRgy5tMgB5UEVKWWiG_eCmhex30yZAazu-2VkPPBzPglNMUgxWW_UeMaGg3fWijmare7kJFV1_DZE-9TfcHu73iH2mNPLSLpyksMIpuLY3F-xTEH6P3LRy4rSJEIBGhyphenhyphene8fSHUAPdCiIN/s1600/Eurasia+the+not-so-timid.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="145" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiQRgy5tMgB5UEVKWWiG_eCmhex30yZAazu-2VkPPBzPglNMUgxWW_UeMaGg3fWijmare7kJFV1_DZE-9TfcHu73iH2mNPLSLpyksMIpuLY3F-xTEH6P3LRy4rSJEIBGhyphenhyphene8fSHUAPdCiIN/s320/Eurasia+the+not-so-timid.jpeg" width="320" /></a></div>
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...but Mickey and Goofy prove worthy partners in her adventure, weathering its perils just as well:<br />
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Arguably, Goofy is more extraneous than Mickey, but the opening “pancake contest” scene establishes a joined-at-the-hip “bosom buddies” camaraderie that continues to be exhibited throughout the story, distinguishing it from all those stories where Goofy is pretty much just there. I like Casty’s take on him here: while he’s aware of what’s going on and as and fully engaged as Mickey. See how they're equally at rapt attention here:<br />
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Or how Goof correctly notices something important BEFORE Mickey does:<br />
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But of course, when someone screws up, it's inevitably going to be Goofy... innocently enough:<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg57Gsl6tON18jYiaWzV2bwe4yyGYaqsQI9vdKGwAGbPNmeCZb6xZ_7wTEb7O4_hRaDcQyxtZiHKVW8tsSF0ZF_8pXMpnnCwvRvLZ0Pd_1yb7jgpQtrJSA3hRYKm9gVXiReCtlIRhBRREXw/s1600/Goofy%2527s+fault.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="159" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg57Gsl6tON18jYiaWzV2bwe4yyGYaqsQI9vdKGwAGbPNmeCZb6xZ_7wTEb7O4_hRaDcQyxtZiHKVW8tsSF0ZF_8pXMpnnCwvRvLZ0Pd_1yb7jgpQtrJSA3hRYKm9gVXiReCtlIRhBRREXw/s200/Goofy%2527s+fault.jpeg" width="200" /></a></div>
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I’m not sure what to make of Eurasia, really. My knee-jerk reaction is that I’m not too keen on the employment the “nebbish librarian type who takes off her glasses and is suddenly an ass-kicking hot chick” cliché. (I’m taking it that her mom was a mouse, as her dad isn’t? Hey, I guess what proves that she’s a major character is that she has a Mickey/Minnie-style head, despite her taller height and creepy humanoid body.) In fact, all of the incidental characters in her orbit and the “part” each plays feel very familiar. There's her “jolly”, affable, intellectual, accomplished, now retired father, Pangea, who because of his pure, boundless love for his field, cannot truly forget the mystery he left unsolved and his missing friends. But he has great pride in his daughter, the bona fide apple-of-his-eye, and sees in her hope to finish what he couldn't. Then there's Pangea's equally spirited and insatiably curious adventure chums of academia. And finally, there's their corrupt, backstabbing, deceitful former peer. Even the way the secret valley’s biggest secret turns out to be able to cure Pangea's rheumatism, actually. I’m not saying this familiarity is a bad thing – I’m just observing it. It’s worth noting, though, that when I lay all that out, it becomes apparent that this is more of a <i>Eurasia Toft</i> story than a <i>Mickey Mouse</i> story, eh? </div>
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...look, they even KNOW it!<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjNGpuv0wbC3HibQUnWwm8vGyh4EcgvhDEcHaZoeeoG2Sfzsd6uVMwZ1cCSje3CrO_XVc3WZlQ67dTXUUg5DdKGjtKo6k3L_lV64a0ZnscMGgFHFPf2Jb78-JuLDWCCsdTkGGSZIELNAVUi/s1600/Watching+from+the+outside.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="158" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjNGpuv0wbC3HibQUnWwm8vGyh4EcgvhDEcHaZoeeoG2Sfzsd6uVMwZ1cCSje3CrO_XVc3WZlQ67dTXUUg5DdKGjtKo6k3L_lV64a0ZnscMGgFHFPf2Jb78-JuLDWCCsdTkGGSZIELNAVUi/s200/Watching+from+the+outside.jpeg" width="200" /></a></div>
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Regardless, it IS a <i>Mickey Mouse</i> story in that it was intended and produced as one, and, hey, having adventures is what Mickey does in comics, so the writers have to come up with reasons for him to have new ones, right? As archetypal as the new and/or incidental characters might be, Casty defines them with acute clarity and tells their story with airtight plotting. It struck me as unusually, almost realistically dark for a Disney comic how insidious the villain actually is, in having appeared to be an upstanding citizen but having actually left his friends for dead decades earlier. As fatal as most Disney comic villains’ intentions might be, the effects of their ill actions are usually attempted and thwarted in a linear span of time contained within one story.<br />
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As reflected in (in addition to the almost trans-Mickey plot and trans-Mickey cast) Cavazzano’s (literally) edgy, feisty, "zinging" art and the modern slang used by dialogue scribe Jonathan Gray, this is neither Gottfredson’s nor Murry’s Mickey, no. Nonetheless, it IS a modern incarnation of and in the Mickey Mouse adventure comic tradition that doesn’t betray the character or the genre. And that should be commended and celebrated.<br />
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And for those inclined, the <i>Mickey Mouse</i> comics tradition can be celebrated with this issue’s backup features: a quintessential Don Christensen-Paul Murry 1953 Pluto story (replete with narrative/commentary captions) and two Bill Walsh-Manuel Gonzalez <i>Mickey Mouse</i> Sundays featuring Ellsworth, including his very first appearance. I’ve written before of how from my limited exposure to the character, I wasn’t sure who or what he was ever even intended to <b><i>be</i></b>. But now, at last, I know Ellsworth for the smart-aleck prankster that he <b><i>is</i></b>. Kudos on your editorial choices, Mr. Gerstein. Ellsworth is now squarely established for further IDW appearances.<br />
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-- RyanRyan Wynnshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00477919968924048814noreply@blogger.com4