Mouse & Duck Worlds (re: Are they famous?)

[Olivier]

Hello everyone!

>>Gilles:
>>Donald is also a little famous, by his bad reputation in Duckburg, but as
>>I told in my History of the Ducks, nobody remembers his shortn
>>cinematographiccareer
>>in the Hidden Mickey from "A Little Something Special", he seems to be
>>a star (Searching from the present Scrooge will most enjoy, one of the
>>Duckburgian propose him a dedicaced photograph of Mickey).

Two questions are often debated regarding Mickey, Donald et al, viz:
    -    which "facts" are to be ignored / taken into account depending on their
         source: Barks / non Barks, comic book / comic strip , comics / cartoon, ...
    -    how do the Mouse & Duck worlds / universes relate to each other.
Sometimes an attempt to solve the problem is to consider that the character
appeared in the cartoons as an actor, or that the story is a fancy.

I just thought of  something.
Have you read Michael Crichton's "Timeline"?
The novel hinges around time travel; a character is invited to try a time machine
and is trapped in time; his friends go back in time to rescue him; from then on
the story is set in the Middle Ages, in France.
As usual with Crichton-- and Don Rosa-- a solid theory backs the technology used.
Here, the starting points are quantum mechanics & the theory of  "multiverses".
It's somewhat like "Sliders".
The idea is that there exist other universes which are so many possible variations
on the one we know.
Given the huge amount of  people and the huge amount of  decisions each has
to make, the number of  combinations and resulting consequences is astronomical.
Then you can imagine a machine that would enable you to visit these other possible
worlds: the "Sliders" explore drastically different places (where Dinosaurs aren't extinct
or the whole planet is aflame); Crichton's machine explores worlds that are close enough
to our own to be considered replicas of  our past.

Now, that's exactly what we have with Mickey & Donald. True, no need of  such complex
theory to know that the comic books, comic strips and cartoons are diffferent media,
ie, different universes. But this doesn't account for the difference in content. Whether it's
the script or the cartoon, the story is the same. Just as there are model sheets for the
animated features (and Barks was asked to do some for the comics at one point), the
Company could very well have made edicted rules regarding the background & relationship
of  the characters-- like, "Donald can never appear with Mickey, albeit as a foil who only
appears in 30% of  the story and only says 2 lines"..
But there are no such rules and everyone does as he likes.

So we might very well consider all these stories as multiverses that sometimes happen
to overlap. The Barks & Don Rosa stories are a case in point: Don Rosa is most true
to Barks' creations, but, still, the characters have acquired Don Rosaian (-esque?)
traits.
In one universe (Gottfredson's early period), Donald' was part of  Mickey's team.
In another one (Gottfredson's later period), he disappeared from the Mouse stories.
In still another one ("Mickey & Donald" covers) they were reunited.
And so on...

Again, I'm aware, it's going far in theory to state a very simple thing (there are comic books,
comic strips, cartoons, and they just aren't the same), but-- well...


Olivier

wishing you a good week!