Monday, May 16, 2011

A Final Peek at Pirates!

We end “Pirates Week” at TIAH Blog, and our week-long celebration of “Donald Duck Finds Pirate Gold… Again” with a parting look at some other favorite pirates of ours – who may or may not have any gold to their “skull-and-crossboned-names”!

THE FLINTSTONES # 28 (Cover Date: August, 1965): “The Pirates of Skull Rock”. A wonderful story straight out of the show’s fifth season (1964-1965), when some adventures were worked into the mix – but we’d not yet met The Great Gazoo! The great Harvey Eisenberg superbly illustrates this tale of a pint-size pirate, who stands atop the shoulders of a large prehistoric parrot!


MICKEY MOUSE # 114 (Cover Date: August, 1967): “Mickey Mouse Meets Blackbeard the Pirate”. Hmmm… I sense trouble for the bearded-one! Art is by the great Paul Murry!


LOBO # 39 (Cover Date: May, 1997): Um, I just sense trouble… Period! Yo-Ho-Fraggin’-Ho!


…And, from “The Fantasy Worlds of Irwin Allen”:


LOST IN SPACE: “The Sky Pirate (Original Air Date: January 26, 1966) and its sequel Treasure of the Lost Planet(Original Air Date: March 01, 1967): Actor Albert Salmi plays Captain Alonzo P. Tucker, a human victim of an 1876 alien abduction, who escaped from 120 years in stasis and turned to space-pirating as a means of survival. In a wonderful touch, Tucker’s constant companion is a robot-parrot!


VOYAGE TO THE BOTTOM OF THE SEA: “The Return of Blackbeard” (Original Air Date: December 31, 1967): It seems Mickey Mouse wasn’t the only one to meet Blackbeard! The notorious pirate shows up to wreak havoc on the world of 1982! Blackbeard is played in suitably hammy fashion by the great character actor Malachi Throne, exasperating Richard Basehart’s Admiral Nelson!


Oh, Blackbeard asked me to remind you that you can still leave comments on the previous post about Donald Duck Finds Pirate Gold… Again… or you can converse with his cutlass! Personally, I’d leave a comment. You wouldn't like him OR his cutlass when they’re angry!


More DVD reviews coming soon! Oh, joy!

4 comments:

joecab said...

Can you believe I completely missed Scrooge on the cover until after I read the book? it sure made for a pleasant surprise.

Joe Torcivia said...

Joe C.

Well, there IS a lot of detail – and things going on – on that cover!

Even the Beagle Boys aren’t easily discernable – and THEY’RE one ones on the receiving end of the act of comic violence. Donald’s prominence makes up for his disappearance over the story’s last few pages, I suppose. And, for this tale, Yellow Beak SHOULD be exactly where he is!

Compare it with the far more sedate and straightforward cover Jippes did for the 1986 reprint of the original “Pirate Gold” (also pictured throughout this series of posts), and you can see just how much Daan Jippes’ style has changed.

This is also reflected in the more contemporary stories he’s illustrated – and the adaptations of Barks stories that Barks did not originally draw! I like what he does now. It’s very energetic and full of life!

Blackbeard and I both thank you for your comments!

Joe T.

ramapith said...

Arrrrrrh!

(I've run out of anything more useful to say.)

Joe Torcivia said...

Arrrrrrh, you sure about that, David? :-)