DCML digest, Vol 1 #21 - 9 msgs

[Don Rosa]

From: "Anders Christian Sivebaek"
>>>>>They tell that the music Louhi is playing on page 1 of part 3 is from
Wagners The Valcurie. The man on page 5 of the part refers calls the
Iku-Turso the
next-biggest frog, and there's a note about CK. That's the first time
ever I heard about one of Don's pre-disney-comic in the weekly.

Now this is very strange! That joke about the "second biggest frog" has
nothing whatsoever to do with my old "Captain Kentucky" strips. The
Norwegian translator had planned to insert such a comment, but I told him
it was a good guess, but wrong... and as far as I know, it was deleted from
the footnotes in Norway. I know it was not used in Sweden, the only part-3
issue I've seen. But the poor Danes! It looks like they somehow found time
to catch on to the fact that they were missing out on lots of important
stuff by not asking about the intentions of the writer, and somehow (was
there time?) managed to get some extra info for their 3rd chapter, and it
was *wrong* info. They can't win!

>>>What's happening on that page 30? Is Vainamoinen offering $crooge to go
with him to relive the days of the Gold Rush??

I don't know what the Danish translation says or if the translator
understood what my dialogue meant. But in my original, Vainemoinen is
telling $crooge that they have a lot in common with their love of a
beautiful land of the North... then he asks $crooge if he'd rather go to
Kalevala with the Sampo and be wealthy for all eternity, and thereby lose
the chance to ever return to the earthly realm where a lost love still
awaits him. Nowhere do I have V. asking $crooge if he wants to go relive
the Klondike days with him. Izzat what it sez in Danish???
Speaking of misinterpretations in that section, the only bit of screwy
coloring comes in the last panel of the next page where I show a close-up
of a Sampo-snowflake. The colorists don't seem to ever read the stories and
rely strictly on coloring-notes, and I can't always think of all the
different ways that the drawings can be misunderstood by someone not
reading the text. But the colorist did not seem to know that snowflake had
anything to do with the Sampo (it's a top-view of it) and rather than
coloring it gold, he/she/they colored it *white with a bright red
center*... like they thought it was Iku-Turso's big bloodshot eye or
something. I wonder how many readers were perplexed by that panel!?

...> Any ideas? Me? Well, yeah, I mean, I wasn't on drugs or something
when I drew it.
>>>I hope I didn't insinuate that?

No, I was making a bad joke. But you said you didn't understand what my
cover (or something)represented, and you asked me if I had any ideas.... in
English, that sounded like you thought I might not know what I was doing
myself.

>>>>>So are those extra-pages made as
rows of panels like in the 19-page version of chapter 12 of Lo$? or are
they full
pages?

I dunno -- it will be a long time before I need to plan them out. But the
easiest way to do it will be full pages. And the next easiest will be
half-pages. Adding single panels gets *really really* messy!!!

> What was that? You are going to make another seven pages and only the
Finns
> get to see them?? Howl and anguish - cannot someone talk somebody
> into making an English complete copy
>>>Wasn't this what you said Helsinki Media was going to do, Don?

When/if HMC decides to do an English version of this story, those extra
pages may not have been done yet. And as to whether HMC *does* do an
English version, they have an idea how, but I have my doubts they can get
away with it. They will run afoul of the Disney Company who insists that
each separate language requires an entirely separate license, which HMC
does not have. As I said, HMC has a plan around this and to make this still
part of their license. But whether they have a legitimate method to do that
won't matter when they are dealing with a corporation which will say "Oh,
yeah? Well, just the same, DON'T DO IT, see?". But I wish them luck.