What A Cartoon! - DuckTales "Back to the Klondike"
Added 2019-04-22 04:00:02 +0000 UTCDuckTales has come up SO often during our discussion of animation history, it's about time we podcasted about it! Disney's televised treatment of one of their B-list characters ended up being an A-list series, and one that forever raised the bar for children's entertainment. On this installment, we (alongside duck expert Matthew Jay from [the deep end] podcast) dig into the history of Uncle Scrooge and his creator, Carl Barks, the character's rich life in decades upon decades of comics, and, of course, the behind-the-scenes details behind the ambitious and expensive production known as DuckTales. And for our up-close exploration of the show, we focus on "Back to the Klondike," an episode loosely based on a Barks comic that dives into Scrooge's past and also explores a bit of his softer side.
Comments
Just got around to hearing this now, and no, Bob, you're fine, very nice job all around. :D Although I've gotta ask why Matthew likes the Boom books of the Rosa material. He got jacked around on that deal (don't ever give one to him to sign). The Fantagraphics books represent the way you "should" read them, according to him. (And I saw that fucker's abuse on that project up close.)
Thad Komorowski
2019-05-07 15:36:08 +0000 UTCEvery time Dong Yang comes up, I'm reminded that during the course of Batman the Animated Series their continued improvement and TMS not working on the later seasons led them to go from the worst studio on the show to the best.
Zachary Adams
2019-04-25 12:58:22 +0000 UTCAs a verified Scottish person, I was well aware of the "mean" stereotype from watching (mostly English) TV shows from a very young age. Still to this day, living in England, whenever I buy someone a drink, I feel the need to mention that I'm not as mean or as cheap as the person might expect. I suppose it's a stereotype that I still sort of struggle with on an almost subconscious level. Ducktales is definitely playing off this trope with Scrooge's character but it strikes me as a mostly harmless depiction. You can certainly call it a lazy stereotype if you like but it hardly compares to what almost any non-white person goes through on a daily basis. Also, I was surprised that Larry Burns' joke "this place is emptier than a Scottish pay toilet" didn't get mentioned. Anyway, keep up the awesome work. ^_^
To Boldy Joe... Moore
2019-04-24 20:17:24 +0000 UTCI went to art school in Dawson City, Yukon, where Scrooge made his fortune! The town has 1200 people, but at least four original floppy copies of "Back to the Klondike", including one in the Gold Rush Museum Archives and one just sitting in the local laundromat -- which honestly, I should have stolen. I hope the town will one day make some Scroogishly cheap monument to Barks. Barks and Rosa draw on a lot of real Gold Rush history, as well as the now-dead genre of "Northerns", and Glittering Goldie was based on the actual Kathleen "Klondike Kate" Rockwell, a Vaudeville mogul who swindled miners, but had a heart of gold.
Jon
2019-04-23 20:16:59 +0000 UTCNice! I have to admit to being pretty jealous now. We are the same age (1982 here also) and looking back now I see that show ended up reinforcing so many things in me that are hardwired to this day.
Pumpkinbob
2019-04-23 20:14:33 +0000 UTCI forgot to mention it, but I actually did buy an original Darkwing drawing from Tad Stones.
Bob Mackey
2019-04-23 19:58:46 +0000 UTCI'm surprised you guys got through the discussion of racism and Scots without mentioning Groundskeeper Willie's "Damn Scots! They ruined Scotland!" bit
PurpleComet
2019-04-23 19:45:42 +0000 UTCOn the artists at cons note, I remember going to my first convention when I used to live in Hawaii and Stan Sakai (Usagi Yojimbo creator) was there in at a little table in the corner and I saw maybe one person talk to him the whole day. I was amazed that he was there just sketching and people were acting as if they didn't even see him there.
Pumpkinbob
2019-04-23 16:17:50 +0000 UTCThe Barks comics are available digitaly. I have all of them on amazon/comixology.
Sadie Carter
2019-04-23 09:16:17 +0000 UTCGrowing up younger than even Matt means that I'm way more familiar with WB's toons lineup (and even Fox Kids') than Disney Afternoon's - I don't have a lot of strong memories of watching DuckTales as a kid even though I know I did. This was also true with Gargoyles, but I had stronger memories with Darkwing Duck than the other two (probably partially cause of it remaining my favourite of all those shows). -- Disney doing Disney+ is certainly problematic for various reasons, but if they actually put up all their stuff in one place, it'll make returning to stuff for episodes of WAC (and whatever else) a lot easier since I don't own the DVDs of shows like these and even when finding "collegiate" streaming sites to watch them, the episode order is wonky (not following production or airing order, seemingly)
Dylan (batmanboy11) Freitag
2019-04-23 01:44:21 +0000 UTCFun fact: the scottish trope for cheapness is also why scotch tape has it's name... the cultural context at the time being that scottish people were frugal and hard-working. Scotch tape was a denigrating aphorism for cellophane tape and the advertisers that 3M used decided to go with it.
caseyjones
2019-04-22 21:53:33 +0000 UTCI'm a bit of a Donald Duck purist so the talk of changing is voice is practically blasphemous to me. They've been doing the bit about his voice though going back to the old shorts, probably most prominently in the 46 short Donald's Double Trouble where Daisy dumps him for how he talks and he hires a look-alike with a British accent to take his place. I've never had much trouble deciphering what he says, especially Tony Anselmo's Donald which may just be due to the quality of the equipment he's been able to use throughout his career vs what Clarence Nash had. I've always felt that way, but now I'm even more biased as I've had the benefit of conversing with Anselmo a few times and he's a super nice guy and gave me and my kids some original artwork just for the hell of it. It was around the time the show Mickey and the Roadster Racers was premiering which does not feature his voice and it's the first time he hasn't done Donald since taking over for Nash. The actor in that show is doing the duck voice so who knows what the behind the scenes motivation was, but he did tell me that there are some folks at the company that considered giving Donald a "normal" voice. They actually made him audition for the new DuckTales and, according to Anselmo, it was Bob Iger that made the call that Donald needs his duck voice. Like Bob, I think DuckTales was the first TV show I loved as well and it was absolutely my favorite for a time. Disney, and Michael Eisner, should be credited with upping the quality of televised animation largely just by throwing money around, but that's what Disney should be doing. Other shows would come along and complete the animation renaissance by then upping the quality of the story-telling along with the production values as this show can be a bit dry. It does look great though and it's not without its charm. Put me down as another person who really likes the new DuckTales series. Visually, it's certainly inferior but at least we seem to now be past the era of poor 3D CG animated cartoons so it makes the overly flat presentation of DuckTales 2017 easier to swallow.
Joe Hodgson
2019-04-22 21:32:13 +0000 UTCI'm going to use "designed to be kidnapped" to describe some characters from now on
nina matsumoto
2019-04-22 18:29:51 +0000 UTCIf you think of Scrooge as the kind of logical conclusion of "Donald Duck with slightly more self-discipline" it actually makes sense that DuckTales would tone him down because Donald himself was toned down considerably at the time. Similarly, if you view the new DuckTales through the lens of the gradual easing of control around the big iconic characters that started with the online shorts, it then also makes sense that Scrooge finally wound up closer to his "true" Barksian self. In conclusion, I dunno, I guess I just like the comics best.
SomeBloke
2019-04-22 15:30:16 +0000 UTC
