"The House of Mystery"

David A Gerstein David.A.Gerstein at williams.edu
Thu Apr 28 05:58:13 CEST 1994


	Dear Folks,

	Don to Sigurdur:

	"As far as unusual stuff for Disney comics, what about the
death of $crooge's father in chapter 9 [of the LO$]? Did you see 
that one?"

	Actually, death was a common motif in the Bill Walsh-written
MM stories of the mid-'40s (FG was still drawing them then, but not
writing them).

	In "The World of Tomorrow" (recently printed by Gladstone),
Mickey finds himself in a land of robots.  One female robot, Mimi,
falls in love with him.  Toward the end of the story, when Mickey is
fighting with Pete and is about to be shot by him, Mimi leaps between
the two.  She takes the shot, which (fired from a futuristic gun)
reduces her to only so many wheels and bolts.  Later Mickey and Minnie
mourn near her remains, which they have placed on a cushion -- they
MAY have put a flower there for her, too, although I don't remember.

	In "The Pirate Ghostship" Greatbeard the pirate, an ancestor
of Pete (this is a time-travel story) is fleeing a volcano's eruption
with MM toward the climax when the urge overcomes him, and he runs
back to take just one chest of treasure along as well.  He is buried
by the lava.

	Finally, in "The House of Mystery," the villainess, an evil
scientist named Drusilla, is consumed in flames when her mansion burns
to the ground.  As he realizes she is done for, her caretaker, a
wizened coot named Jeremiah who clearly feels affection for her, races
inside to be with her when it happens.  "She was so great, and so
horrible," says Minnie.  "She came from the past, and now she's gone
back to it..."

        I'd say that the emotional moments in Bill Walsh's stories are
the best thing about them... otherwise they're wildly inconsistent.  I
far prefer stories that Gottfredson wrote as well as drew, although I
do like Walsh's work more than the writing done for most comic-book
Mouse stories...

	Much earlier, in 1932's "Mickey Mouse Sails for Treasure
Island," Mickey is under the _belief_ that Minnie has been killed, and
spends several strips basically lying on his arms and crying for her.
She's perfectly okay, though, as it turns out...

	And there's the great scene in 1936's "Mickey Mouse in the
Foreign Legion" wherein Pete has sent MM out into the desert to die,
and his boss tells him that he will be himself shot if Mickey passes
on.  Pete's reactions to the apparent discovery that Mickey is dead,
and in the immediately succeeding parts, comprise my favorite sequence
in a FG story (although it's not my favorite FG _story_ per se).

	Barks tried for a scene like this in "King Scrooge the First,"
did he not?  And Dell deep-sixed it with some cheap gag... easy to do
when the story isn't DRAWN yet.

	* * * * *

	On to another topic.  This can be summed up as follows:  We
look back fondly at the days when Disney comics, as published by Dell
then, were infinitely successful in the United States.
	Yet the stories Dell had produced for them, aside from Barks and
early Murry, contain a remarkable number of clinkers after about 1950.
Yet 1953 was when their sales *peaked.*
	I know that a lot of Egmont's scripts may be poor as well, but
I hope I'm not floating alone when I say that in general, the art
quality of material in the new Northern European (Egmont/Oberon)
Disneys is far, far superior to the general quality from Dell.
	Do others feel differently?  I just can't muster the
enthusiasm for Strobl and Bradbury that some seem to have.  I like
Hubbard's work, but not his renditions of the central characters (DD,
MM, US, and such).  I even tend to dislike Murry's art after about 
1958, although there are some exceptions.
	I realize that nostalgia is powerful, but do some people like
this work for any other reason than that they grew up on it?  (I'm
*NOT* trying to attack nostalgia, which I think is good, or Strobl
fans, for that matter -- I'm merely wondering.)
	PLEASE don't take this as a flame!!!!!!!!!!!!
	
	David Gerstein

	"My airplane exploded!  Mickey done it!  Gimme yer gun,
Squinch... I'm gonna clean out Mickey Mouse *right now!*"
	<David.A.Gerstein at Williams.edu>






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