DCML Digest Issue 40

Don Rosa donrosa at iglou.com
Wed Apr 21 15:14:14 CEST 2004


> From: "Lars Jensen" <lpj at forfatter.dk>
> Subject: Donald's uncle Ludwig
> Daniel J. Neyer pointed out that in the
> cartoon "Kids is Kids", Ludwig Von Drake is a bachelor. Don Rosa has
> stated Ludwig is married. How do those two "facts" fit with each other?

As with Mr. Matthews, I want to make sure you are not imagining I've
"stated" more than I actually have due to the surfeit of discussion about
*anything* I do or say.
I have never actually used Ludwig in a story. I've done no more than shown
him leaning out a window in a crowd scene in 1988, and the back of his head
in another crowd scene in 1997. So I've certainly never stated anything in
print about his marriage status (though it would seem pretty obvious to me
that, for this German/Austrian character to be related to Donald, it would
of necessity need to be through marriage).
My non-use of a character I *like* is because I was told by Egmont that he
was "officially dead", i.e.: to be never again used, in this Egmont comic
Universe. I don't know if that has changed despite the fact that I think he
has turned up in a few spots in the comics lately. Remember, you have one
division of Egmont creating the stories and all the various local publishing
branches deciding what and how to publish that material. The division of
Egmont I work for might still want to consider LVD "dead", while a local
publisher likes him and digs up some material to print on their own. I
dunno...

> Don dislikes Fethry Duck and has stated this character doesn't exist in
> his universe.

Well, that's true enough, despite my acquiescing to place him into my Family
Tree (and omitting LVD) as long as I could do the rest of it as I saw fit.
But it's not just *my* decision -- when I created that Tree in the early
90's, they wanted Fethry there. A few years later, Egmont told me that
Fethry was "officially dead" along with LVD (which made no difference to me
since I considered him "unborn"). What Egmont's attitude currently is, I
dunno...

> > Someone had said that Rosa had no right to regard Ducktales as an
> > "unauthorized" take on Barks' universe, since his stories are also
> > "unauthorized."
>
> I don't remember Don calling DT "unauthorized", so I won't comment on
> that.

Then I will.  No, I never said "DuckTales" was "unauthorized". What I said
was I wanted to bring "DuckTales" into my storylines by having it (*in the
story*) as an unauthorized but very popular Duckburg TV version of $crooge's
life, and have $crooge wanting to sue the creators, etc.
The word I used in my own description of "DuckTales" was "counterfeit". But
I still thought it was a good show as TV cartoons go, which is why I would
have been happy to bring it into my stories in some fashion.




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