More on Mickey...

[David A Gerstein]

	Dear Folks,

	Just reread the "of mice and ducks" arguments and I noticed
that someone challenged me to come up with stories in which Mickey's
personality sets the story moving.  A few examples:

	1931 "MM vs. Kat Nipp" Mickey hears of the town bully Katt
Nipp, decides that his ugly shack on the wrong side of the tracks
would be better as a playground for kids and decides to singlehandedly
cause Nipp's downfall.
	1931 "MM Circus Roustabout" (in this month's WDC&S I might
add) Mickey's attempts to sneak into a circus without pay cause him to
accidentally acquire a job.  His desire to make good then accidentally
traps him in a power struggle between the Skeleton Man and his boss.
	1931 "MM Boxing Champion" Mickey starts a rivalry right away
with Minnie's cousin Ruffhouse, the boxer, by assuming he's a rival
suitor and socking him down unprovoked.  This sets up a showdown
between the two, and when Mickey wins, Ruffhouse realizes Mickey's got
something he doesn't have and he'd better learn from him.  Thus,
Mickey becomes his trainer.
	1933 "The Mail Pilot" Mickey, defying Minnie's wish that he
get a normal job, decides to become a mail pilot and aggressively
works at mastering the craft of plane-flying until he's a success.
And then the intrigue begins...
	1939 "The Miracle Master" Mickey hopes to show up Minnie's
antique-collecting mania, so after a Barks-like succession of
schemes-that-build, he finally accidentally encounters a genuine magic
lamp, and the story takes off.  Mickey's personality has set up the
whole plot.
	1938 "Mighty Whale Hunter" Mickey (again!) exuberantly defies
Minnie by signing on a whaling ship in search of adventure.  Then his
personality plays an integral function in the plot when his sympathy
for whales and condemnation of whaling (in 1938!) set him against the
others in the crew, eventually framing him for wrecking the ship's
engines.
	1942 "MM Working to Win" After seeing that Percy Pig has a job
in a war plant, Mickey decides to get one, too, then his old-fashioned
outlook comes into conflict with the women who work at the plant, all
of whom are better than him.
	1946 "MM as Billy the Mouse" At his cousin Carrie's ranch,
Mickey decides to go undercover disguised as a bandit, but fails to
plan a method of subterfuge beforehand.  Thus, his nervous attempts at
impersonation throw him into wild and unpredictable situations.

	Those are just a few of the plots spawned directly FROM
Mickey.  A few others ("The Crazy Crime Wave," "Island in the Sky,"
"Goofy and Agnes") are spawned by Goofy's personality;  if you think
Goofy's personality is simple stupidity, that last story is
particularly enlightening.

	I'm not denying that Gottfredson obviously loved the situation
of "Mickey getting sucked into an adventure against his will or
completely as a surprise".  The same, albeit less frequently, is a
staple of Barks' stuff:  for example, "Frozen Gold" (Donald really
DOESN'T want to get into that adventure!), "Adventure Down Under"
(Donald's hypnotized condition is no relation to his real personality,
and it could have happened to anyone!), "DD and the Titanic Ants,"
"Queen of the Wild Dog Pack," (Scrooge just finds something's wrong
and goes after it as a matter of business!) etc.

	I'd really like to rewrite the "hoozoo" on Mickey.  It seems
completely derived from the post-Gottfredson mouse, as epitomized by
the words "nice guy," denoting someone inneffectual and boring.  Words
to describe Mickey are "enthusiastic," "overzealous," "emotional,"
"aggressive," "scheming" and even "chauvinistic" after a fashion
(Mickey often makes some crack about 'women' after a conflict with
Minnie, and is inevitably shown in the same daily to have the same
problem he's condemning!  "The Miracle Master"'s first strip is the
best example of this).  And how about 'conceited'?  Mickey all too
often, particularly in the early stories, leaps before he looks.

	The negative opinion so many Barks fans have of Mickey is, I
see now, almost entirely due to the prominence of Paul Murry's Mouse,
which just can't compete with Barks' Ducks.  Does Gladstone know about
this?  Maybe they ought to think about whether or not they really want
to have more recent artists in _Donald and Mickey_ or JUST Gottfredson
and Scarpa in both D&M _and_ WDC&S!

	(Okay, I mean Murry's AND Bradbury's AND Moores'.  Not to
slight individual talent, just their attitudes toward MICKEY.)

	Again:  Barks Fans, Gottfredson is No Murry!  There's More to
Mickey than you Think...

	Your friend,


	David Gerstein

	"The only way to get ahead of Mickey Mouse is to run in front
of him!"
		-- Mickey via WD, "Mickey Mouse in Death Valley"