This month's "Previews"

[DAVID.A.GERSTEIN]

      I sent this message yesterday, but something seems to be wrong 
with my E-Mail system;  Jakob didn't get a few of my private letters 
and this didn't turn up in the Digest for today.  So here this is for 
what I hope will be the first time.

      I went by two comic-shops today.  One, which doesn't get 
Gladstones due to some legal hassle from Fleetway (publishers of the 
infamous MICKEY AND FRIENDS), had gotten their comics in;  the other, 
where I was expecting to find WDC&S 598, hadn't.
      But the one without Gladstones did have a "Previews" catalogue 
which mentioned some upcoming Gladstone comics:

      DD 294 has "The Dye is Cast" (the 1957 Barks 10-pager in which 
Gyro's off-red and water-colored dyes wreak havoc on the water 
resources of Duckburg) and the usual AT strips.  The cover was shown 
and is a reprint of AT's cover to WDC&S 17 (1942), although that 
wasn't noted in the advertisement.
      DD+MM 2 has "Special Delivery" (the 1956 Barks 10-pager about 
HDL being blocked by a lion from delivering packages) and part two of 
"Mickey Aladdin".  A page, which actually looks like the first page 
of Part 1, was shown.  This looks to be from the same crew that 
brings us the GO-history series (as I expected).  Mickey is Aladdin, 
Goofy is the Genie, and Pete is the Sultan (JUST as I predicted).
      USA 35 contains Ben Verhagen's "The Treasures of Temple Khaos". 
Here's disney-comics mailing list at work:  Harry's Database revealed 
the story, I sent it in a list to Gladstone, and Dwight translated 
and dialogued it.  Gladstone couldn't have done it without us, so 
it's got to be good.  ;-)
      COL 2 (solicited as "Walt Disney Giant #2", suggesting that 
this may in fact be what the series has been retitled to) is titled 
"Uncle Scrooge in Arabia."  Beautiful cover lettering and, for once, 
a cover made of rearranged Barks art that really looks nice.  John 
Clark told me that Bruce Hamilton edited this issue.  The first half 
of this 48-page issue contains Barks' "The Mines of King Solomon."  
The second half... welllll....
       The second half...
       What else do you think would comprise the second half of a 
comic book titled "Uncle Scrooge in Arabia"?
       That's right, a full reprint of the 1949 Disney/Whitman Little 
Golden Book "The Cold-Blooded Penguin."  An illustrated text story 
with that penguin from Walt Kelly's "Three Caballeros" story (and the 
film itself).  Around 20 pages of penguins, in fact.
      Dwight, you're our only contact with Gladstone right now.  I 
can't call them because it costs $4 per minute from here.  Maybe you 
want to call them (I can't do so, for various reasons) and see if 
something (like moving the material that was to have comprised the 
second half of this year's now-cancelled 64-page US issue) can be 
done?  I'm sorry to say it, especially because I personally like old 
Disney story-books, but I think that reprinting a Little Golden Book 
without a single Duck in it in the back of this comic may be 
commercial suicide (no matter what the quality of the penguin tale 
itself may be).
      COLLECTORY is apparently what's going to determine Gladstone's 
position from now on on "whether or not oversized issues sell".  This 
is a critical situation.

       David Gerstein
       <9475609 at arran.sms.ed.ac.uk>