"Plot paid by Burbank" D-stories...

[BFOSTERLA at aol.com]

Re: "Plot paid by Burbank" D-stories...

Disney Comics, Inc. bought the original scripts for these stories  before its 
1991  
"implosion"; but after the "implosion," Disney Comics'  budget had been 
reduced, so they could no longer afford to have the stories  drawn.
 
Yeah, that jogged my memory. I remember suggesting to the sales and  
marketing wizards that long stories would be a good thing to do. Maybe run them  
initially in several issues of one of the titles, then reprint the compilation  in 
hardback book form. I think some of them ran about 96 - 100 pages, but these  
were fully fleshed out stories with great plots, sub-plots and tangential  
character exposition. I'd forgotten about Huck Akin's "Oak Island Treasure." I  
remember he did a ton of research and came in with an exciting plot outline 
that  just had to be done. Pat McGreal did one involving Hawaiian mythology that 
I did  see in print. I recall another story notion based on a Swing Music 
orchestra  contest involving a symphony-sized gathering of Beagle Boys entitled 
"Boogie  Woogie Beagle Boys," but I don't know what happened with that. 
 
I don't have easy access to whatever records I might have, so unless I see  a 
script synopsis or some artwork, a title and code number don't do me much  
good. 
 
I think the Disney "implosion" was more of a 1992 event and was  one of the 
things that motivated my departure. The  budget was reduced because the numbers 
crunchers wanted to show more profit.  (The best way to increase profit is to 
do better stuff that more people want and  more people will buy, not by 
decreasing the budget and cheapening the production  values.) I believed long 
stories that could be reprinted later as hardback books  that could go on 
bookshelves in bookstores, not just comic shops, would be a  great item that fans and 
non-fans alike would want. I wanted to do a line of  comic BOOKS, hard covered 
editions of about 120 pages, that would appear monthly  but were not 
cover-dated so they could stay on bookshelves year round. 
 
As for "...so they could no longer afford to have the stories  drawn..." good 
grief! If the money controllers had just stood behind us  and supported us, 
we might have done some memorable, groundbreaking stuff.  But, no... they had 
to squeeze us into monetary oblivion. Gladstone operated for  years on a 
handful of dedicated and talented people in modest offices in an  affordable area 
(Arizona). Disney had about 35 people in some of the most  expensive real estate 
in Burbank, with computers (I didn't get one), secretaries  (not me), and 
supervisors (I had four). No wonder they couldn't afford to  publish comics. My 
favorite quote by one of the semi-suits - "Here at WD  Publications, we're not 
building a publishing empire, we're building  resumes."  They saw Disney 
Comics as a way to prove they could reduce  budgets and still get the work done, 
then used that skill to get jobs elsewhere. 
 
David, you also said, "But because Disney Comics, Inc. in Burbank  had 
already paid for the scripts, Egmont didn't have to pay for them  again."
 
I'm not so sure that's entirely true. I think Gutenberghus (Egmont) did buy  
the scripts, perhaps at a reduced price, but maybe also as a diplomatic favor 
to  Disney. It doesn't make sense to me that the budget conscious folks in 
Burbank  would ever simply give anything away without breaking even on the 
expense. 
 
Finally - Hello to Flemming Andersen! Still playing the drums? 
 
- Bob
 
 
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://nafsk.se/pipermail/dcml/attachments/20060515/01721978/attachment.html