Disney-comics digest #215.

[David A Gerstein]

	Hi, Folks!

	A few things to put in my two cents about today:


	Torsten on selling comics in supermarkets
	======================================================

	"Time/Warner places People and Life by checkouts.  If DC 
Comics (owned by Warner) had the rights to Disney, they'd probably 
be there by now.  I wouldn't be surprised if the new Looney Tunes 
comic book is place near checkouts."

	HUH?  NEW LOONEY TUNES COMIC BOOK???!  I didn't know about
this!  Have you actually seen such an item, or do you just mean that
activity magazine with about 4 pages of subpar comics that's been sold
for years?

	If there's a new LT comic line finally appearing in this
country, it's time to start pressuring DC to reprint Carl Barks'
"Porky Pig of the Mounties" -- that Barks Bear Book is a pretty muddy
reprint, and it ain't in color either, Doc.


	Re-reprinting Gottfredson
	=========================

	"After paying $7-$10 per story for your previous albums,
I am not at all interested in paying *another* $5-$8 per story to
collect them in installments again, so I don't."

	(That's Andrew Krieg BTW)

	I am willing to buy the re-reprints because I like the new
color and I want to support ANY Gottfredson publications.  But this
doesn't mean I'm as happy as I'd be if Gladstone reprinted a few of the
stories I most want to see:  "MM Boxing Champion," "MM and
Tanglefoot," and "MM vs. Kat Nipp."  In sideways format, there
WOULDN'T be the massive production costs that hampered Gladstone's old
MM series...

	I'd also like to see "MM in Death Valley."  Unfortunately it's
basically too long to be serialized in WDC&S (as, BTW, is "Monarch of
Medioka" unless it's stretched over six issues!  I hope this is not
the plan...).  If Gladstone EVER has the guts to try a few MM issues
to "test the waters" anew, this is the one I'd like to see the most.
BTW it's legit with Disney, as they were actually planning to reprint
it for a while in a softback book (but had to cancel that when their
cutdown occurred;  I actually saw some proofs for the book at the
Disney Publishing office one of the two times I was there).

	BTW one of the two 1935 Carl Barks MM publicity drawings,
which he submitted to Disney to get his job, is a fine Western drawing
(MM and Minnie on a runaway stagecoach or something I think).  That
could be the cover of the first of this Death Valley series.  That
Barks cover would sell a heck of a lot of issues for MM.


	Original "South Seas" and "Darkest Africa"
	==========================================

	Harry said, "Maybe Gladstone can publish more original
versions of "Darkest Africa" and "Race to the South Seas" in the 
colour albums CBL?  GARY: What are Gladstone's plans?"

	Just so you know, Gary, the French printings of "Darkest
Africa" indeed use the original art.  And Mondadori's version of "Race
to the South Seas" uses the original art.  Unfortunately both have
been extensively reformatted as these publishers are wont to do... but
perhaps they could be restored for use here.  I know we're talking
about a lot of work, but this would be a major publishing event if
these two stories were at last reprinted in their original forms (with
the changes in "Darkest Africa" reinserted if necessary).


	The banned HDL 1st app
	======================

	Gary said, "I suppose, given our past and even current 
inclination to modify the past to make it possible to reprint it in 
the present, we could change that note in Taliaferro's HD&L 
introductory strip, but Disney simply won't pass it now."

	Do you mean by this that Disney won't allow the strip to be
reprinted WITH the change?  Or by "now" do you mean, NOW while the
strip is still in its original form?

	If they'll allow the thing to be reprinted with the change, no
need to order it fresh from Disney's archive.  You can just dig up your
old proofs to WDC&S 522, retouch the letter, and jam it into an issue 
at the earliest opportunity!

	Maybe, on the other hand, I'm making this sound easier than
the process actually is...


	Don critiques my knowledge... and rightly so!
	=============================================

	"Though you seem to know an extraordinary amount of stuff
about things Disney, you do sometimes ask questions I would think you
could see the obvious answer to."

	You better believe it.  When it comes to the marketing angles
of things, I know next to nothing!  So please forgive my dumb
questions now and then.


	Gary on censorship
	==================

	"Is trying to improve the past, for whatever reason, any more
justifiable than suppressing it?"

	I, for one, say yes.  For example, in Disney Adventures'
recent truncated reprint of "Lost on a Desert Island," I would have
rather seen the natives reinked from black to white and renamed
"cavemen" from "cannibals" if necessary, if it meant that the story
could have been published more complete.  As it was, about 2/3 of the
story was cut out (and not all of that just the offensive stuff;  they
also removed the post-cannibal stuff too, leaving the plot itself
incomplete.  Huh?).

	I talked to Byron way back in 1989 and he told me that Disney
had requested he do this when the story was printed in 1988's MM 60th
Anniversary special... and that that's why he decided to not print the
whole thing, only the first week.  Then, as now, I'd rather have seen
the whole thing even if it had to be retouched.