To sequel or not to sequel - is that a question?

[Mattias Hallin]

Aloha, Music-lovers, and welcome to...

                                      ...OOOPS! Sorry! Wrong number... I mean:
hello there, one and all, and in particular Don!

So sorry - never got round to the family tree this weekend; but as I said it's
no big deal, and I'll be back on that eventually.

Of course I think you should do sequels, if YOU want to do them (I don't mean
to sound pretentious or condescending - I'm plainly stating MY plain view and
hope you don't mind), for one thing because they're usually very good, both in
themselves and as sequels, I think. They're good sequels for the obvious fact
that they represent very thorough and painstaking research into both the
original story and the (Barksian) Duck universe as a whole, but also because of
what they're NOT: they don't aim to tell us "how it all ended" - did Rhett
Butler return to Scarlett? Did $crooge have an affair with Goldie? (I will
certainly never read the "Gone With the Wind" sequel, but I don't mind
rereading the original novel once in a while; it's not a very bad book,
actually) - or I don't think they do; but instead tell a NEW STORY with NEW
GAGS and NEW MORALITIES even when locale and characters are the same as in a
Barks story. I also admire your sequels very much because of how they are built
around CHARACTERS and how much thought goes into every little thing the
characters say or do, and how consistently you depict the duck's personalities.
It helps, too, of course, that your stories, whether new or sequel, are almost
always howlingly funny at many levels.

Also, I think you are (if once again you'll remember I don't mean to be
condescending) entitled to this choice for the reason that in a sense you are
the first, and so far I think the only, TRUE DUCK ARTIST. ("Blasphemy,
blasphemy!!! Stone him!!!") Not that Barks or Gottfredson or Taliaferro or
Jippes or you-name-em weren't or aren't ARTISTS; they most certainly are - BUT
in my mind you are the only one so far to whom THE DUCKS are not only what you
work with, but your CHOSEN MEDIUM, and that by preference, too! I think it only
fair to say that Barks's truest artistic INCLINATIONS were nowhere near the
ducks, by whom he made his LIVING; but rather, according to my recollections of
the Barrier book, in the very first place the short story, and as a cartoonist
or even comic book artist towards a realistic adventure strips. That he was too
good and conscientius a craftsman to turn out a hack's job, and that he
happened to have a talent bordering on genius for what he more or less by
chance ended up spending 25 years at - that's a duck of a completly different
colour (courtesy of Little Old Ladies Society, Sparta, IL). I think the same is
MORE or LESS true about almost any other duck artist, except you is first an
ARTIST and secondly a duck artist, while you are but the one: DUCK ARTIST.

My oh my, have I been ramblin'... In a way I feel very bad about publicly
trying to dissect a very nice guy, who I hope I might even be bold enough to
call a friend; but then again - that is perhaps part of the price one pays for
being an artist; and if I may quote another artist - my father - the main point
is not whether people LIKE one's work or DISLIKE it, that they REACT to it,
that is what matters - THAT is the question!

All my best

Mattias