My God! My God! There’s Duck Guts Everywhere! (Ducktales (2017))

Commissioned by Aleph Null

The second most bitter Doctor Who cast reunion.

My history with watching cartoons has always had a preference towards those of Cartoon Network, Nickelodeon, and KidsWB than those of the Disney Channel. There are, to be sure, good Disney cartoons I watched as a kid: Fillmore, The Emperor’s New School, The Proud Family. But more often than not, I’d find myself watching Courage the Cowardly Dog or Fairly Odd Parents or Johnny Test than any of those. Even during the television cartoon renaissance, I’d lean more towards Steven Universe and Archer than Phineas and Ferb or Star Vs.

Ducktales is no different. I can certainly see its quality as a show and I do try to watch it every so often, but there isn’t that oomph to actually watch the series that I get from any of the other shows that I do watch. That’s not to say the show is bad per say, merely that it’s not go to television. There are a few reasons why that is: the vast amounts of orientalism for one. In particular, the episode that introduces Gladstone Gander where, as Jen Blue notes in a vlog, it could have easily been a riff on Las Vegas, but because they decided to set it in Macaw, ends up being about how Asian cultures aren’t as real as western ones and ultimately suck the life essence (i.e. money) out of those who travel in them.

I’m not sure if I’m fond of the characterization of Scrooge as being an adventurer who’s incidentally a billionaire rather than a billionaire adventurer. The distinction is notable in the series’ general focus on Scrooge’s money. It simultaneously wants being a billionaire cheapskate to be core to his character (such that Glomgold’s motivation is partially due to Scrooge stiffing him on the bill) as well as being not core enough to his character that he will spend vast portions of his money on seemingly frivolous things like saving his niece from being lost in space. The vultures effectively act as his “I’m a billionaire, why should I help” side that I feel is vital to his character at that point in the narrative of his life.

Around the time the show started, I did what every single comics scholar has done before me and started to get into Duck Comics. There, Scrooge’s character becomes a bit clearer and one the show doesn’t get despite trying to be a holistic exploration of the entirety of Duck comics such that it literally has Fethery, Fergus, and Della Duck in it. (The only way it could be more holistic is if there was an entire episode devoted to Donald Duck running around the city as a superhero calling himself the Duck Avenger while everyone else calls him Paperinik.) Scrooge’s character at the point in the narrative the show starts at is, shall we say, a bit of a bastard. For the past 30 some odd years, Scrooge has worked his way into becoming the richest duck in the world, be it through buying out businesses hurt by the financial crash, bamboozling native tribes and destroying their homes pushing them to send a zombie after him in the name of revenge, or evicting a group of children from their Boy Scout base because he wants to house his billions of dollars. Even when he’s with the kids early on, he’s still a bit of a bastard, unwilling to let go of even a miniscule portion of his vast wealth to feed a homeless shelter and let them have a good Christmas (as is the case with many a billionaire).

But as the years go on, he starts being less of a bastard. He’s not the kind of person who would give up his for the sake of a village he burnt down, but he’s also no longer the kind of person who would burn down said village. His growth is becoming someone who cares about people, even if he doesn’t want to admit it. The problem is that the show wants to start at the point where he cares about people rather than build up to it.  It’s not a bad take per say, there are many a hero who start from that point. But Scrooge feels like the kind of character who needs that arc. He shouldn’t be patting Webby on the back of the head after one minor adventure is what I’m saying.

But, again, that’s just a personal point of contention. It’s not an objective “Ducktales (2017) is Garbage and Here’s Why” claim. It’s just a factor within my preference for other versions of the characters I like. The season arc, likewise, is part of a genre of “main characters keep secrets from one another for their own protections only for it to blow up in their faces” stories that I personally don’t like. I get why they didn’t tell their family what was going on, but there comes a point when such storylines get tiresome and drab.

However, there are reasons why I watch the show. The voice acting is phenomenal, the animation is delightful, I like the ways the characters bounce off one another (when they’re not keeping secrets from each other). The bit with Donald getting a voice change is hilarious and I hope that they actually do a crossover episode with the actual Duck Comics version of the cast and there’s a gag where Donald sounds like a normal person because his words appear clearly in a word balloon. The action scenes are always a delight with my favorite being the musical Three Caballeros reunion. Most of all, it’s a fun kids show that’s not fully catering to my tastes as a fan of Scrooge McDuck comics. There are worse things it could do, like the aforementioned orientalism it does a lot in the show. I mean, how hard is it to not be “evil foreigners are evil because they’re foreign and not as real as us westerners” when it comes to your one off baddies?

Also, I would really love it if there were a three cousins episode where Donald, Fethry, and Gladstone had to go on an adventure together. Those were always fun comic stories to read.

A Kind of Uncle

A Poem

To Fred.

Hey little guy. My name is Sean. I’m not quite your uncle, for I am not your father’s brother. But I am his cousin, so I guess that makes me an uncle of a kind. Perhaps I’m an uncle like Scrooge McDuck is. Not so much by blood, but by relationship. I chose to be close to you and yours when I could have not. But here I am, writing this story for you, one about having a younger sibling, a difficult one for me to tell, as I am the younger sibling of my end of the family. So it’s not like I know what it’s like.

I could tell you what it’s like to be the younger sibling. In truth, it’s rather drab. Most of the time, my brother and I talk like people who know each other. They say that there’s a special bond between siblings, that they inherently love each other no matter what. I’m here to tell you, little Freddy Frey, that’s a load of hooey. The truth is a brother, or in your case a sister, is just another person. We’re just people, you see. We hurt, we feel mad, and sad as well. But we feel happy, and cruel, and we help as well. We do these things to strangers and siblings alike.

So then, why care about your little sister? Why should my brother care about his younger brother? If, after all, we are just people, why should we care at all about our blood? About anyone at all?

Why should I care about you?

Simple: because you exist. It’s an odd thing, isn’t it: to exist. The world is such an odd place full of people who think they can be one thing, and one thing only. They can be cruel. They can be kind. They can sing. They can dance. They can think. They can do. They can dream. And that’s it. It’s terrifying, to them, to be able to do more than one thing. To exist is that ability they reject.

It’s so special to see people exist. To see a child be born, sometimes more than once. To see people dance about while singing long forgotten songs, to be cruelly kind, to think about our mad dreams.

I had a dream once. My brother and I were in the woods. Not a real wood, little Fred. It was a memory of a wood. You’ll remember them, one day. We were in the woods, walking about when we came across a little duck. Back then, my brother was deathly afraid of birds, so the sight of the duck caused him to faint. Not me though. I was saddened. The duck was dead, you see. His eyes were closed, his feathers drooping. And not a breath was felt.

Three little ducklings came by to see the duck as I held him. They wanted one more story from him, one more adventure. Alas, not all things can come true. The duck was dead.

“Quack! Quack!” replied the dead duck. He was alive and well, little Fred! He was also quite cross with me. “Quack Quack Quack!” he said, which I took to mean, “Why did you think I was dead?”

“I…” I tried to say, but the duck interrupted me.

“QUUUUUUUUUUAAAAAAAAAACCCCCCCK.” Which I thought meant “I was just taking a nap.”

“I-I’m Sorry,” I stammered.

“Oh, not at all.” Replied the duck. “Now then, is he dead?” the duck pointed towards my brother.

“NO!” I said, not realizing I was shouting.

“Ah, a pity,” said the duck. “He seemed like a comfortable couch.”

And then I woke up. My brother was in the other room, still asleep having spent the night with his grandfather, whom you’ve met before, but don’t remember. They were working on something or other, I don’t recall. But what I do recall is that I agreed with the duck: he did look like a comfortable couch. Comfortable enough to sit on, perhaps. But then I thought, “Nah… wouldn’t be nice. Wouldn’t be nice at all.” Somedays, especially when I was young, I thought it would be funny. And… sometimes it was. But I don’t think it was ever nice.

That’s what it is to be a sibling, to live with other people for long stretches of time: you care for them, certainly. But you also have to deal with them when they’re crabby and thinking that comedy trumps niceness. And you have to deal with your own considerations of comedy and niceness. For there are times, little Fred, when one trumps the other. I don’t know. It was five in the morning when I wrote this poem for you. I don’t want it to be as dead as a duck.

Oh God, December Killed Me. Here's a quick piece on Duck Comics

Commissioned by Aleph Null PanelXPanel #18 can be purchased here.

Sarah Jolley is a writer and artist I found out about on tumblr through her various Duck Comics. Duck Comics, for those unaware, is a colloquial term to refer to the various comics based on and around Donald Duck, in particular the work of Carl Barks and Don Rosa. Jolley’s Duck Comics tend to focus more on side characters such as Gladstone Gander and Fethry Duck than the more famous characters. But within them, she is able to find a depth in even the most progmatic of characters. Her stories range from slice of life affairs involving who gets the armrest on a plane trip to tragically romantic tales of people who can’t be together due to their own hang ups and flaws to “Armageddon, but with Ducks.” But in truth, The End of the Rainbow is about more than that. It’s about the nature of wishes and how stories don’t need to have definitive endings to be important. It’s about the ties that bind us and what it means to be lucky. Its use of color ranges from stark black and whites to wistful sepia. It’s a wonderful comic and I highly recommend them all to you.

Sarah Jolley's work can be found here. There's only one day left to support the One Must Imagine Scott Free Happy Kickstarter.