Happy New Year 2025!

 Happy New Year 2025!  

...Or should I, as that famous TV game show goes, phrase it in the form of a question?  

 ...Happy New Year 2025?  

As far as my answer goes... I DUNNO!  

I see some very bad things (or, at the very least, norm-shattering, chaotic things) ahead for 2025 for both our country and the world as a whole! Most of you can probably guess what, as I nonchalantly sidestep the specifics of a topic that is out-of-bounds at this humble Blog.   

Of course, I'm referring to the sudden and unexpected cancelation of THE BATMAN & SCOOBY-DOO MYSTERIES...

...An unfortunate occurrence not to be confused with, or mistaken for, any "real world" events of a political nature - though some of those could stand to be suddenly and unexpectedly canceled too! ...Batman and Scooby, we need your team-ups now, more than ever!  ...There, was that nonchalantly-sidestepping enough for you?  If not, I can try again... Oh, you just want me to move on?  Yeah, I think I should too!  

On the other hand, looking inward (as opposed to the increasingly ominous view "outside", with no more BATMAN & SCOOBY-DOO MYSTERIES to enjoy every month), things are looking very bright - and that's where I will tend to keep my attentions focused!  

Like HERE! 

And HERE!

And the all-great, all-new, all-exciting things comics-wise that are coming in 2025... that, darn it all, I STILL can't talk about!  ...Sorry (at least for now!) 

Happy New Year 2025!  ...For Real!  

Life is Like a Hurricane... And Full of SURPRISES, Too!

I don't know if I'm the first to break this, but it'll be common knowledge soon enough...

But, to anyone who dared brave the expected torrent of (all together now) "Marvel Specificity" and picked up WHAT IF...? DONALD DUCK BECAME WOLVERINE (Marvel Comics, Released July 31, 2024)...

 ...And cracked the cover (NO, not THAT kind of CRACK!), they would see (GASP!)... THIS!  

 Yes, it's a FANTAGRAPHICS AD for THEIR DISNEY HARDCOVER BOOKS!  

Don't know the details - and don't care! Let's just call it a welcome sight, and hope it's a sign of future synergy to come!   

...And hey, that is ONE AMAZING BOOK pictured in the ad above, and also below.  It's even got the fabled Marco Rota Donald Duck biographical story... which I've wanted to see in English since discovering it in 1984!  

Not only did I get to SEE it, but I also got to WRITE THE DIALOGUE for it!  

...Sometimes, dreams DO come true!  

We're still in the thick of taking comments for the previous post on Huckleberry Hound, so look for more on that subject later!  But, now I really had to have this "Fantagraphics Ad Thing", jump the line a tad! ...Your comments are welcome on BOTH posts! 

Huck probably wishes that someone "jumped the line" ahead of HIM, in THIS CASE!

The Future is (almost) Now!

Coming soon is another wonderful book from Fantagraphics (...they sure have some track record, don't they?) MICKEY AND DONALD: FANTASTIC FUTURES collecting the stories that fall under the group title "Once Upon a Mouse in the Future"! 

Another superb effort done for the Disney 100th Anniversary and available to everyone on or about February 06, 2024!  

This is a very interesting book, and not just because I did four stories for it, but because it's a whole bunch of different takes on Mickey and the Gang - different types of story, and different types of art - each of which takes a classic Disney animated short and reimagines it "100 Years From Now"!  

But, there's more to it than just Mickey, Donald, Goofy, and sometimes Pluto cavorting around as they often did in those classic shorts... While the cover doesn't show it, you'll find Dr. Einmug, Chief O'Hara, and the Phantom Blot in these pages! 

...The classic shorts were never like this!  

I'd just gotten my contributor's copy as I write this post, so I really haven't dug into it beyond a cursory reviewing of my four stories - but I must say that the best of those four is "Mr. Mouse Takes a Space Trip", which magnificently turns "Mr. Mouse Takes a Trip" on it's great big round ears!  

...And there's even a hilarious "great big round ears" gag in the story! I cracked-up even while translating it from it's original Italian!  

I'll say no more beyond it having art perfectly suited to its setting and subject matter, but enough!  I want you all to enjoy it - and the whole darned book - to the fullest!  

And, you WILL enjoy it, too, from the editing expertise of The Incomparable David Gerstein, to the the dialogue stylings you love by Thad Komorowski, Jonathan Gray, and yours truly, this Future's looking Fantastic indeed! 

Between "Fantastic Futures" and THIS, 2024 is off to a great start, comics-wise!  

Coming to (Nay, NOW AT) a Target Store Near You!

A short while ago, I received my contributor's copy of THIS MAGNIFICENT BOOK from Fantagraphics... and is it ever amazing!  

At a whopping 256 pages and a size of approximately 13.5" by 10", its prodigious production values, combined with its super-size, make a fitting tribute for Disney's 100 Years Celebration!   

It is a Target Stores exclusive, so you'll have to get it there rather than your usual sources of such books, but, having now held it in my hot little hands... YES! 

 

Just some of the highlights would include Carl Barks' "Mystery of the Swamp", Don Rosa's "His Majesty McDuck" (my personal favorite Rosa story!), Super Goof's "The Thief of Zanzipar" by Bob Ogle and Paul Murry from SUPER GOOF # 1 (1965), a beautiful Seven Dwarfs story by Romano Scarpa... a famous-in-many-lands-but-this-one Tony Strobl story with Donald, Fethry, and Scrooge written by Dick Kinney.... 

...And a Casty Mickey Mouse story that features another of Casty's recurring characters that has yet to be seen in the United States - enthusiastic oceanographer Estrella Marina!  

I did the Translation and Dialogue (for whatever that's worth) in support of a great story - and what may very well be Casty's BEST ART!  Certainly the best I've ever seen!  Some of it is actually breathtaking!  

Aw, heck... THE WHOLE BOOK is breathtaking so, as unthinkable as it might be, I'm going to close by saying... stop reading my Blog - and start reading this book!  

...You can always come back to the Blog later.  Promise I'll be here!  

Oh, and when you DO come back, take a peek at the Chip 'n' Dale post I put up this morning... which has become overshadowed by this BIG BREAKING NEWS! 

...That's breaking NEWS, not breaking HEADS! 

Coming Soon from Fantagraphics "The Complete Carl Barks Disney Library Volume 28: Uncle Scrooge: Cave of Ali Baba"

Depending on when you first read this, here's your first alert for a milestone book from Fantagraphics - or it's my "Go Out and Buy It, Already!" request for - "The Complete Carl Barks Disney Library Volume 28: Uncle Scrooge: Cave of Ali Baba" (Fantagraphics, 2023)!

What makes this a "milestone" is that it covers the period of transition from Dell to Gold Key - meaning that it contains UNCLE SCROOGE #39 (Dell)-40 (Gold Key). 

Its coverage of UNCLE SCROOGE #40 (the first Gold Key issue) is something we've seen relatively little of in the past. 

While the text article for "Oddball Odssey" by Matthias Wivel hits on this in a minor way, my piece on Gyro Gearloose's "Posthasty Postman" may very well be the most comprehensive examination of the radical formatting changes introduced (...and quickly abandoned) by Gold Key that... well, that *I* have ever seen anywhere!  An aside: It well exceeded my allotted word count for the piece, forcing me to cut from some of the other pieces I wrote just to get it all in - but it was worth it! ...And thanks to editor Mike Catron for allowing that!  

I've written about this several times in the past... fanzine articles, this very Blog, Gemstone letter columns, etc., but pulled it all together and put it in one place - with some new information to boot! So, anyone who has as great an interest in this sort of thing as I do, will enjoy it. 

EVEN MORE MILESTONING: This volume also includes Daan Jippes' finished version of Carl Barks' "unfinished" Gyro story "The Pied Piper of Duckburg"!  

Not to be confused with the previous printing of Don Rosa's version of the tale, this is a new (...and different!!!) Fantagraphics Exclusive presented in English for the first time!!!  

Oh, and this book MUST be a "milestone" in that it kicked me back into Blogging Mode... something I hope to better sustain going forward!  

Junior Woodchucks or "More Fantastic(s) from Fantagraphics!"

Wanna win a Junior Woodchucks Merit Badge the easy way?  Just get yourself a copy of THE COMPLETE CARL BARKS DISNEY LIBRARY Volume 25 "Donald Duck Balloonatics" from the great folks at Fantagraphics - on sale November 16, 2021!  

In it, not only do we have many of Carl Barks' Donald Duck Ten-Pagers from the latter days of Dell Comics' WALT DISNEY'S COMICS AND STORIES and some of the Barks-drawn Grandma Duck FOUR COLOR stories, but... 

...Specially included are some of the earliest Barks-written stories for Gold Key's HUEY, DEWEY, AND LOUIE JUNIOR WOODCHUCKS title circa 1970-1971, but the versions drawn by Daan Jippes in that "Late Dell Period Carl Barks Style" - perfectly fitting in with the rest of the contents of the book.  Five stories in all! 

Some of Barks' original pencil-rough layouts for these stories are also included!  

This volume marks my writing debut for this particular series of books, and I chose the Woodchuck stories as my initial topic because, having read those stories hot off the newsstand (and having purchased the first one on the very first Earth Day in 1970), these stories are very special to me, and I hope I've done them proud!  

It's a bit more difficult to write about Carl Barks than it is to write about Floyd Gottfredson or Paul Murry, as I've previously done for Fantagraphics, because so much has ALREADY been written about Barks that I don't wish to duplicate, or inadvertently appropriate, the observations of others.  

However, when it comes to these special stories from HUEY, DEWEY, AND LOUIE JUNIOR WOODCHUCKS #6-8, I feel I've hit a satisfactory number of original beats.  

Finally, for anyone interested, to end my Woodchuck observations, I created a new "exclusive to Fantagraphics" Junior Woodchuck rank acronym... because I just LOVE to do those!  

What Did I Do This Weekend?

Gee, this is the second consecutive post that I've titled with a question!  I've really gotta get back into my old groove of "Comic Box Adventuring" and "Mirth Separation"!  

But, to answer that "second consecutive titular question", I must remind you just how much I enjoy reserving Saturday afternoons for reading comic books - and THIS POST will do that nicely!

I don't get to do that as much as I'd like to this days... That old "Horrifically Busy" thing, you know. 

But this weekend (Yes, Saturday AND a bonus Sunday - almost wall to wall) reviewing, researching... and, most important of all - READING many Carl Barks stories of early 1960s vintage in order to prepare story notes for a future Fantagraphics volume.  ...Talk about combining "business with pleasure"! 

Buy these things, folks!  You'll never see a better presentation of these stories, complete with Story Notes and other detailed extra features!  They've certainly made a believer of me! 

R.I.P. Pat McGreal

It's always sad to prepare a "R.I.P." post, as every one of them I create is in tribute to someone who "made my life a little better, or nicer", by either their presence or their accomplishments.  

But, it's all the more so when it's a member of the small creative community that I've been privileged to be a part of - the Disney comic book creative community.  

Pat McGreal passed away May 31, 2021. 

I never met, and know little or nothing about, Pat McGreal, but I DO know that he was too young to be the subject of a post like this!  

With his spouse Carol, Pat McGreal wrote some of the best contemporary Disney comic book stories, which have appeared in comics published by Gemstone and IDW.  

Among my personal favorites were the "Shambor" series of Mickey Mouse tales, and "Ten Little Millionaires", an outer-space version of  "Ten Little Indians" - with ROBBERIES taking the place of murders, of course!   The latter is reviewed in my Blog post on the issue!

In that post, I discuss a few "McGreal-isms" that have worked their way into Disney comic book dialogue - my favorite of which is Gyro Gearloose's exclamation "Great Tesla's Coil!" 

So much so that I integrated it into my own dialoguing work, because it's too perfect not to!  

From Luciano Bottaro's masterpiece "Uncle Scrooge's Money Rocket", as it appeared in Fantagraphics DISNEY MASTERS Volume 2 (2018). 

So, thank you, Pat McGreal, for your place in The Great Continuum of Disney Comics Creators, and for so many inspired and enjoyable moments on the printed page! 

Fantagraphics Disney Masters Volume 16: Luciano Bottaro - Joyously Jumpin' with Jupiter!

Lotsa jumpin' for joy goin' on 'round here today, an' here's why...

Yes, I finally got my copy today and all I can do is envy those of you who have had the opportunity to enjoy this wonderful book even sooner!  

In fact, I did something I have never done with any previous volume of Fantagraphics Disney Masters... I read it through COMPLETELY IN ONE SITTING!  ...Yes, really!  Me? Mister Horrifically Busy!  ...So, maybe I skipped a little housecleaning... and a meal... maybe a doctor's appointment... what of it?  

And, believe me, this volume has had some VERY strong competition... 

But, other than THE PHANTOM BLOT (...aaaand one future volume still in the works), there is none I anticipated more eagerly than this sequel to the previous volume dedicated to Italian Disney Master Luciano Bottaro (1931-2006)!

  Why?  Just one word... REBO! 

REBO: the ruler, the warlord, the imperious, impatient, and impetuous, and most importantly... the S.L.U.G. of  the planet Saturn!  (S.L.U.G. = Supreme Leader and Unquestioned General)  ...An acronym I created for the character with sheer delight!  

With his two obsequious generals in tow, this volume finds Rebo taking the battles (perhaps not nearly as hard-fought as he would have wanted) away from Saturn and his "target" Jupiter, and bringing them to Earth.  

We lead off with "Fear the Wrath of Rebo"... a title I admittedly cobbled together from two other genre favorites - "Fear the Walking Dead" and "Star Trek II: The Wrath of Kahn".  

Having miraculously cheated death (as all the best villains tend to do), Rebo and his generals stow away on a Jovian SNARK ("Space Navigational Ark" seen above) bound for Earth and "The Great Hero of Jupiter"... Donald Duck (...?)

Rebo vows revenge on Donald for the humiliating defeats of the earlier Disney Masters volume, and the fun takes-over with the "pink and rubbery havoc" Rebo wreaks upon Duckburg, Rebo taking-over all the television sets in the city to deliver an ultimatum as if he were The Joker, and Daisy's uproariously indignant reaction to the S.L.U.G. of  Saturn by thinking it's all part of one of Donald's strange lodge initiations. 

A VERY worthy sequel by Mr. Bottaro, especially at it comes decades after the original "Uncle Scrooge's Money Rocket"!  

 Things To Look For:  

You'll find everything you've come to expect in my translation and dialogue efforts: puns and wordplay, "Bertram", "Goat-Ham City", Super Goof (...as a TV cartoon "Super Goof the Animated Series", anyone?) references.  Dog-face surrogates for Jimmy Olsen and Perry White, and not just one but two Lost in Space references - one obvious, and one very oblique (A "Tip of the TIAH Topper" to anyone who... "unearths" that second one!) 

Beyond that, Rebo is more over-the-top than ever, and his two generals all the more obsequious... though one of them is just a liiiittle more "obsequious-er" than the other!

Oh, yes... there's also a reference to the Carl Barks "Donald ducking-out on Daisy's spring cleaning" story from WALT DISNEY'S COMICS AND STORIES #213 (Dell Comics, Cover Date: June, 1958) - where, as noted in our last post, Donald beats a rug! 

...And hey... this book was released in spring! 

We continue IMMEDIATELY where we left off (...literally, the same scene that closes the first story opens the next) with the book-titular "Jumpin Jupiter!", translation and dialogue by "Jonathan H. Gray with David Gerstein".  

Now, I don't know "who-did-what", but these stories are so nicely cross-edited - carrying over some of my characterizations and bits into this story, just as I followed Jon's lead in the "Ice Sword" stories... 

...that I figure at least some of this continuity-carryover might be attributed to David.  He is the best possible editor for this stuff (You'll see other reasons why, later in this post!), because NO ONE goes that extra mile quite like he does!  

Anyway, Rebo meets, and joins forces with Dr. Zantaf, another Luciano Bottaro creation whom you might remember from DONALD DUCK #9 (IDW, Cover Date: January, 2016).

They meet!

But, these things never end well. 

So, how did they go from "comrades-in-arms" to "arm-powered-combat"?  You'll just have to read (and enjoy) the story!  After all, this is a Blog, not a library!  

As if to cleanse the palate after all that Rebo-ranting and Zantaf... er, Zantaf... um, "whatever-he-does", we have a hilarious Bottaro Goofy story co-starring Witch Hazel...

...She of the epic confrontation with Donald Duck that spanned both animation and comic books!  

"Goofy and the Washed-Up Witch", with translation and dialogue by Thad Komorowski (and a better dialogue creator for Witch Hazel... and Magica DeSpell... and Gladstone Gander and other "characters of a certain type and attitude", you'll never find in this modern era).

In short, Hazel goes to extraordinary and absurd lengths to convince a dead-skeptical Goofy that witches exist - and that she is one!  

But, Goofy maddingly counters with the same solid and implacable denial that he once applied to the existence of Eega Beeva  - leading one to believe that Bottaro was directly influenced by Bill Walsh and Floyd Gottfredson's "The Man of Tomorrow" (1947).  

Another one of "those editing things" that I so love is the use of the "Paul Murry Goofy Logo"... 

 

...And the title, "Goofy and the Washed-Up Witch" done up in a "Paul Murry Lettering Font"!  

We end on another wonderfully weird sci-fi effort by Bottaro... alas, one published posthumously in 2007, after his death in 2006!  ...A story given one delightful surprise of an American English title, for a story about Scrooge and Gyro exploring the Black Holes of the universe - "Voyage to the Bottom of the Hole"!   

And, despite the English language reference to one Irwin Allen '60s sci-fi series in its new title, Luciano Bottaro visually recalls another Allen series with his unique artistic stylings... The Time Tunnel!  

I'm not so sure I can even recap this one, so best we let Luciano Bottaro, aided and English-abetted by David Gerstein (translation and dialogue), tell you himself!  ...And tell it he (and David) will in grand style! 

One more HUGE thing on "Voyage to the Bottom of the Hole"... not only was it named after my all time favorite TV series, but check out the title font...

 It's the VOYAGE TO THE BOTTOM OF THE SEA LOGO FONT!!!

DAVID, YOU ARE THE BEST!!!  What a surprise!  ...You had me at the "Paul Murry Goofy Logo and title font", but THIS?  WOW!  

It's enough to make a guy forget about REBO! 

 Just don't tell him, okay?  

The book is rounded-out by a biography of Luciano Bottaro, by Armando Botto.  

After all that, I can say no more beyond... GET THIS BOOK!  

Oh, wait... "REBO SAYS... GET THIS BOOK!"

Um... Better?