It's difficult to imagine two relationships in comics as different as Mickey Mouse and Goofy and Fauntleroy Fox and Crawford Crow, but they still managed to pull off the same cover gag, becoming "Separated at Mirth", in MICKEY MOUSE # 23 (Dell Comics, Cover Date: December, 1952 - January, 1953) and REAL SCREEN COMICS # 107 (DC Comics, Cover Date: February, 1957)!
Things to Note:
Goofy is merely being his simple and eccentric self, while Crawford takes great delight in besting Fauntleroy.
Mickey and Goofy are skiing right to left, while Fauntleroy and Crawford are skiing left to right. If you were to place these comics next to one another, with REAL SCREEN COMICS # 107 on the LEFT and MICKEY MOUSE # 23 on the RIGHT - and set their characters into motion - Mickey would run over Fauntleroy, and Crawford (on his downward arc) would slam into Goofy!
Fauntleroy could just as easily have been SKIING DOWNHILL, as was Mickey, only to have Crawford pass him in the rocking chair. There was seemingly no need for the SKI JUMP aspect of the gag, except maybe to give Fauntleroy an ADDITIONAL PRATFALL to go with his defeat.
Crawford may be smiling now but, if he lands "forward-rocking-rungs-first", he's looking at a far worse pratfall than Fauntleroy! Whoever laughs LAST, you know...
The cover of MICKEY MOUSE # 23 was reprinted as the cover of MICKEY MOUSE # 140 (Gold Key Comics,Cover Date: February, 1973).
The covers of MICKEY MOUSE # 23 and REAL SCREEN COMICS # 107 were drawn by Dick Moores and Jim F. Davis, respectively.
Unlike Crawford, if Goofy just CONTINUES TO LEAN BACKWARD, he will be okay. ...Unless, being Goofy, he leans TOO FAR BACKWARD!
There you have MICKEY MOUSE # 23 and REAL SCREEN COMICS AND STORIES # 107 - Separated at Mirth!
4 comments:
Interesting...I like to think that dumb ol' Fox could NEVER pull any sort of cool stunt like that off. But Goofy, being Goofy, can do whatever he wants; transcend time, space, or otherwise, as long as it's for the gag.
That's a great cover on the Mickey. Dick Moores is a bit of an acquired taste but I'm a fan of that.
Austin:
Goofy is indeed amazing, even without the aid of his trusty Super Goobers!
Why he even had side conversations with the creator of THIS STORY that helped him get out of dangers, and influence the overall plot!
I kid you not, because I helped him accomplish this… Respect the Power of the Goof!
Dick Moores was “different” from Floyd Gottfredson, Paul Murry, and Bill Wright but he was also great in his own right. Just read THIS STORY (as I did in its 1965 reprint in MICKEY MOUSE #100) and you’ll be a Moores fan for life!
Lovely to see some Fox & Crow on here! Contra Austin up there, I actually think Fauntlery Fox *could* conceivably mimic Goofy's stunt, if things were aesthetically reframed somewhat. Instead of a folksy, cozy rocking chair, picture him sliding down that slope in just the poshest, leather, embroidered armchair… calmly sipping a cup of tea or reading a book, even as he hurtles down. Then it becomes a joke about Fox's outlandishly unflappable gentlemanliness, and bob's your uncle. While the Crow, simple and practical, is using regular skis (and, much like Mickey, doesn't actually get into any mishaps of his own, but merely boggles at the way the Fox overcomplicates things and gets away with it.)
Not to say the actual Fox & Crow variant of the Mickey cover doesn't work! But I think you could also have pulled it off the other way around without too much trouble.
Anyway: some hollow musings on titles.
The Mickey cover announces the story as being about “the Icy Hand”… makes the snowy setting appropriate! I wonder if that was entirely coincidental, or if there was some sort of mild effort to use a cover gag that didn't jar too much with the announced title. (Even though, as I recall, the somewhat odd story of “the Icy Hand” doesn't contain any actual snow or ice, but merely a criminal with abnormally, but not supernaturally, cold hands. What a strange premise that was.)
I notice the “Fox & Crow” comic is from a publication entitled “Real Screen Comics”. I do wonder what fake screen comics look like. An empty notebook with a Fox & Crow cover taped to the front to make it look like a genuine comic issue?
Ironic that there's a caption advertising "all-new stories" when the cover gag is, seemingly, a sneaky lift from an earlier source… Of course, we can quibble on the degree to which a cover, even one with a clear "gag", should count as "a story". But still: bit funny.
Achille:
Actually, I think you’ve got ol’ Foxie nicely characterized. Less prone to pratfalling of his own making, vs. that born of the machinations of Crawford Crow. Skiing in the aesthetically pleasing (though impossibly complicated) manner you describe, would be akin to the way he tries to arrrange his solitary private life… until the Crow comes-a-knockin’ on his door with mischief on the mind.
I would say the Mickey cover was most likely “paired-up” with the “Icy Hand” story, but created independently of one another. This was during the period that Dell moved away from covers that illustrated the lead adventure story in favor of gag covers for its titles that graduated from the FOUR COLOR umbrella to regular ongoing series (MICKEY MOUSE, DONALD DUCK, BUGS BUNNY, PORKY PIG, etc.), but the pairing of cover gag and story title would have been hard to resist.
As I expect you and many others know, REAL SCREEN COMICS was the precursor to THE FOX AND THE CROW comic book and was the anthology title for the animated characters of Columbia Pictures (before they later outsourced their theatrical cartoon shorts to UPA and later Hanna-Barbera). Beginning in 1945, it ran alongside the spinoff FOX AND THE CROW title for pretty much the entire 1950s.
It was the Columbia studio’s answer to WALT DISNEY’S COMICS AND STORIES, LOONEY TUNES AND MERRIE MELODIES, OUR GANG (MGM with Tom and Jerry, Barney Bear, etc.), NEW FUNNIES (Walter Lantz), AND TERRY-TOONS COMICS – among the ranks of funny-animal anthology titles that were common at the time.
And, I would join you in the notion that REAL SCREEN COMICS was kind of an odd choice for the title of the magazine, I can only posit the following as to (possibly) why…
During the period there were many other funny-animal anthology titles cranked-out by many different publishers. Even if not overtly, they gave the general impression that the characters found therein were also “stars” of the theatrical screen, as were Donald Duck, Bugs Bunny, Gandy Goose, etc. …And maybe REAL SCREEN COMICS was DC or Columbia’s way of differentiating itself among these many titles.
These are the REAL SCREEN COMICS! Accept no substitutes!
And, of course THE FOX AND THE CROW was indeed a Columbia Pictures theatrical animated series. I can’t say for certain if the other two features of the book (Tito and his Burrito and Flippity and Flop) were, as I’m not all that steeped in Columbia cartoons, but it seems likely.
And for anyone who’s never read it, Flippity and Flop was the TRUE highlight of REAL SCREEN COMICS, even outshining the far more popular Fox and Crow. A bird (Flippity), a cat (Flop), and a dog (Sam – who gets no title billing but is in just about every story) go through their expected bird-cat-dog paces with good physical humor – and GREAT verbal humor! …And you KNOW how much I value comics with great dialogue.
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