DCML digest, Vol 1 #346 - 9 msgs

[Don Rosa]

> From: "Dr. Archontis Pantsios"
> Lately, however, this has been
> changing and it's mirrored in the growing number of "fans" and in the
> appearance in these past 2-3 years of a number of what "seem to be"
original
> articles in KOMIX--I'm heartened to see that lately they do publish
> interesting original analyses which means that they must have good people
on
> board.

That good people is a very devoted Duckfan who I now correspond with
regularly and whom is quite interested in helping to improve the content of
KOMIX for both Disney comics fans and comics fans in general. In fact, he
and I might soon be collaborating on a series of articles for KOMIX about
old American (non-Disney) comic book history if we can find the time. His
name is Dnµntpns Dnµakonoulos... aka Dimitri Dimakopoulos.
(I'm supposed to write a similar series for PICSOU, which would be fun, but
I just don't know where the time will come from.)

> From: Kriton Kyrimis
> Now, can we address the point that I was trying to make, which is that
> the gags that were excised from "Tightwad" were *not* Don's best, and
> that they might even be considered to be in poor taste?
> From: Frank Stajano
> I'll even say that I much prefer jokes about farts
> (grossly funny) than ones about spittoons (disgusting). Different tastes
I
> suppose.

I thought we'd been through all this already? Yes, different tastes in
humor -- let me spell out my attitude...
Well, I can't even address this idea that it's too disgusting to have
characters with sticky prune goo on them... that seems innocent in the
extreme, unless the reader decides that there are all sorts of bacteria and
germs involved, which is rather adding too much of his own imagination to
the mix (on the other hand, as it turned out in my story, the ugly germs
inherent in a Beagle Boy's dirty pants pocket was exactly what I had in
mind in the following sequence... and even Barks had such a scene when
Donald was once chased by gigantic chicken pox germs).
But as to whether FART humor is more disgusting than SPITOON or SNOT humor
(are we really having this silly discussion?).... I have shown people
getting a spittoon plopped over their heads, I have shown the Ducks in
"Tightwad" with something on them after a misadventure in a handkerchief. I
even once had someone throwing a bedpot with yellow liquid in it out a
window at $crooge in the "Lo$". But in these cases, if there's anything
disgusting about these things, the reader is supplying it. The brass pot is
not labeled "SPITOON", maybe it's a pot for cigar butts, maybe it's a
dirty flowerpot. I let the reader decide what it is and how disgusting it
may or may not be (though it's obviously not supposed to be interpreted as
a favor). I let the reader decide that wasn't the prune goo alluded to in
the text on the pocketed-Duck... if he wants to assume instead that it's
snot, he's free to do so. And I doubt if anyone even knows what a bedpot is
anymore, but that thing did not have "BEDPOT" written on it... it might be
a pot of lemonade. I honestly *don't* decide *exactly* what is going on in
any of these cases, and the humor in the situation (and I'm not saying
there's much in any case) for me is not what is actually happening but it's
the very fact that I'm not making it clear what's happening. I'm *tricking*
the reader to see something that I've never said is true. To me, *that's*
funny.
Now, as to what *I* think is in poor taste, it is that which is unsubtle
and obvious. If I had one of the Beagle Boys emit a loud, rude noise from
his rear and the other Beagle Boys hold their noses and push him away and
chant "176-617 faaarted! 176-617 faaarted!", that's crude and obvious and
puerile (to me), even though I'm sure lots of younger readers would hoot
with laughter. Even if Disney had loads of fart-humor in "Lion King", I'll
have none of it in my comics. And in "Guardians of the Lost Library", I had
a nephew refer to the offscreen JW Hound as being sick, and Disney's
censors changed that to having the nephew say the dog "BARFED"... again, to
me that is crude and obvious and puerile and unfunny (and also embarrassing
to me for having to take credit for their change in my dialogue).
I would never have the Duck in the pocket sit there and say "Yeeeccchh! I'm
all covered with SNOT!" nor would I have the guy who had the spittoon hit
him on the head say "Ugh! I have germ-infested SPIT all over me!", and a
voice from the window would never have said "Why you...! I'm throwing this
piss-filled bedpot at you!" ... that, to me, would be bad taste. I leave
those details to the reader to imagine if they are so inclined.
I am not saying exactly *what* bad taste is... that would be impossible to
determine and we should stop wasting time on the subject... I'm just
explaining how I see what I do as compared to what *I* think is bad taste.
I mean, I recall how Gladstone once got a letter from an irate reader to
objected to the "@#%&$*!" in Donald's dialogue as being in extreme bad
taste. We know, as comic readers, this is supposed to represent such foul
language that it cannot be printed out, so we are supposed to use our own
imagination as to what is actually being said. But this irate reader was
mentally filling in the "blank" with all the most obscene and profane
language she could think of, and was blaming Gladstone for actually
printing something "in such bad taste". Who here would agree with that
attitude? Yet, to her, it was extreme bad taste. So...... all this proves
exactly... nothing.