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New Ducktales Thoughts
9 months ago
I just finished watching DuckTales 2017
Not that anyone would give a shit, but my finishing thoughts...
All in all it was pretty great. I expected worse. I enjoyed it.
It's still a mystery to me why they are hell bent on creating their own universe instead of using the 50+ years of duck comics. Can't fault new ducktales for this, old ducktales did this already. Many of you may not know that but the ducks have thousands of comics going back to the 60s and there are constantly new ones created. I happen to have a big collection of them :3
In the comics, there are already a wide variety of superheroes, starting with my favorite phantomias (or paperinik as he was known originally). Basically Donald got a price win meant for his cousin gladstone by accident, an old villa outside of town. Going there, he found the diary of an old gentleman thief and decided to take up that persona. Or Supergoof, goofy that swallows some super peanuts and is able to fly and stuff, complete with a costume that is just long winter underwear. Or indiana goof, a cousin of goofy that is pretty much just indiana jones (not superhero, but kinda close). Or Gamma, Mickys friend from the sixth dimension that can pull everything out of his femboy miniskirt. Or..
Save to say, there really was no reason to invent gizmo duck. But again, that is a fault for the old duck tales as well. And I do like Gizmo, but if I could have had Phantomias instead, well..
And other inconsistencies, like Scrooge living in a villa. In the comics he lives in the Money Bin. Think about it. someone that is the personification of greed and frugality, yet he splurges for a villa and doesn't live where he is close to his money? Bah, humbug
Then.. What they did to gyro is inexcusable. They made one of my favorite characters, an always benevolent scatterbrained crazy professor that basically gives away his inventions.. into an always angry egomaniac nerd focused on selling them. That fails in his inventions more often than not. That feels like someone on the writing team really hated the original gyro and wanted to piss on him as much as possible. Disgraceful.
Magicka is a yes and no. Magicka was probably one of my first teen crushes. I wait until you stop laughing. Ready? good. I still just wait for an opportunity to get some nice NSFW art with her, but the issue is she'd have to be somewhat antropomorphized, well even more, because the comic her, well, duck butt.
Her new design I like in some ways, hate in others. I liked how they made her a tad more mystical. The added anthropomorphization was welcome (see above). I like her new outfit.
But why make her green? She was never green in any iteration. If you wanted to signify "she got her magic back" you could have done that in 100 different, better ways. I like the purple lock in her hair, but why did they shorten it? OG hair is just a tad longer, that makes no sense.
Why give her yellow eyes and triangle pupils? Just like the green skin that makes no sense and just makes her uglier.
And giving her no eyelids at all when her purple makeup'd eyelids were one of her most noticeable facial features in the OG duck tales (in the comics it's a bit of a crapshoot, sometimes she has them purple, other times no color).. tsk.
But the bags under the eyes, the one thing I wouldn't mind losing, you had to keep.
And honestly, making her trusty raven sidekick, called "Nimmermehr" here (nevermore, after the poem by edgar allan poe), into her brother was kinda.. I dunno, disgusting. Probably just if you know the comics and know that while she loves that raven, she often just uses him as a guinea pig. It also takes away from her because "what, she can love a pet? no way, she can only love it because it's actually her brother". The raven was her pet for many decades, that just feels like sidelining that ravens actual character.
I liked the new version of webby. I always disliked the OG ducktales version, she always seemed so useless. BTW, there's no webby in the comics. No Beakley either.
But in the reboot, it feels like they did all they could to make her the main character. Most other characters seem to be supporting roles to her.
Della.. Kinda meh. The buildup to her was building her up so much, and then she shows up and.. Is mostly just webby but different. She was kind of a disappointment. Btw, no della in the comics either, it's all just nephews, uncles and cousins all the way down, only exception I can think of is elviry, scrooge's sister.
Glomgold. I never had too much love for that one, in the comics, he sometimes appears but is a very very side character. But Making him pretty much just a retard, where's the fun in that?
Speaking of him, Rockerduck is the richest duck #2 in the comics and scroges lifelong rival. Making him some.. civil war era resurrected cotton farm owner was really a low blow. They even dressed him in those wild west clothes, wtf. And they ruined his iconic hair.
This is how he looks like in the new ducktales: https://static.wikia.nocookie.net/s.....Rockerduck.png
This is how he oughta look: https://static.wikia.nocookie.net/d.....1/Flairsou.PNG
I don't remember if he was in the OG ducktales tho
The inclusion of adult Kit was fun, but making him just a recolored Baloo was lame. Also, not giving Baloo or Rebecca any screen time was lame. Excluding Molly was based tho, she was to TaleSpin what Webby was to the OG DuckTales.
All in all, I feel like wanting to bring in the universes of TaleSpin, Darkwing Duck and others hampered it more than it helped, because it felt way more like a sitcom than an adventure show. Episodes not centered around the home life and interpersonal conflicts of the ducks were half spent on other, unrelated characters. Sure, it just getting 3 seasons kinda made it hard to go on too many adventures, but it still felt like the new series spent way too much time being "at home" and way too little time going on treasure hunt.
That was another place where they could have borrowed from the comics. Imagine the ducks went on to explore the "Tal der Sieben Sonnen" (dunno the english title if it has one, the valley of the seven suns) for example. Went on time travels to the past using the time machine built by prof. Zapotec in the comics. Etc.
Hell plenty of the comic book adventures could have made great episodes. Just recently one came out that I remember clearly (because magicka looked so hot in it ^^;), "Die Nummer Eins der Nummer Zwei" (the number one of number two), a comic where magicka steals the first owned coin of the second richest duck in the world, which is btw Rockerduck in the comics, and becomes a force to behold, all just to get scrooges first coin
I don't know why I wrote this
Not that anyone would give a shit, but my finishing thoughts...
All in all it was pretty great. I expected worse. I enjoyed it.
It's still a mystery to me why they are hell bent on creating their own universe instead of using the 50+ years of duck comics. Can't fault new ducktales for this, old ducktales did this already. Many of you may not know that but the ducks have thousands of comics going back to the 60s and there are constantly new ones created. I happen to have a big collection of them :3
In the comics, there are already a wide variety of superheroes, starting with my favorite phantomias (or paperinik as he was known originally). Basically Donald got a price win meant for his cousin gladstone by accident, an old villa outside of town. Going there, he found the diary of an old gentleman thief and decided to take up that persona. Or Supergoof, goofy that swallows some super peanuts and is able to fly and stuff, complete with a costume that is just long winter underwear. Or indiana goof, a cousin of goofy that is pretty much just indiana jones (not superhero, but kinda close). Or Gamma, Mickys friend from the sixth dimension that can pull everything out of his femboy miniskirt. Or..
Save to say, there really was no reason to invent gizmo duck. But again, that is a fault for the old duck tales as well. And I do like Gizmo, but if I could have had Phantomias instead, well..
And other inconsistencies, like Scrooge living in a villa. In the comics he lives in the Money Bin. Think about it. someone that is the personification of greed and frugality, yet he splurges for a villa and doesn't live where he is close to his money? Bah, humbug
Then.. What they did to gyro is inexcusable. They made one of my favorite characters, an always benevolent scatterbrained crazy professor that basically gives away his inventions.. into an always angry egomaniac nerd focused on selling them. That fails in his inventions more often than not. That feels like someone on the writing team really hated the original gyro and wanted to piss on him as much as possible. Disgraceful.
Magicka is a yes and no. Magicka was probably one of my first teen crushes. I wait until you stop laughing. Ready? good. I still just wait for an opportunity to get some nice NSFW art with her, but the issue is she'd have to be somewhat antropomorphized, well even more, because the comic her, well, duck butt.
Her new design I like in some ways, hate in others. I liked how they made her a tad more mystical. The added anthropomorphization was welcome (see above). I like her new outfit.
But why make her green? She was never green in any iteration. If you wanted to signify "she got her magic back" you could have done that in 100 different, better ways. I like the purple lock in her hair, but why did they shorten it? OG hair is just a tad longer, that makes no sense.
Why give her yellow eyes and triangle pupils? Just like the green skin that makes no sense and just makes her uglier.
And giving her no eyelids at all when her purple makeup'd eyelids were one of her most noticeable facial features in the OG duck tales (in the comics it's a bit of a crapshoot, sometimes she has them purple, other times no color).. tsk.
But the bags under the eyes, the one thing I wouldn't mind losing, you had to keep.
And honestly, making her trusty raven sidekick, called "Nimmermehr" here (nevermore, after the poem by edgar allan poe), into her brother was kinda.. I dunno, disgusting. Probably just if you know the comics and know that while she loves that raven, she often just uses him as a guinea pig. It also takes away from her because "what, she can love a pet? no way, she can only love it because it's actually her brother". The raven was her pet for many decades, that just feels like sidelining that ravens actual character.
I liked the new version of webby. I always disliked the OG ducktales version, she always seemed so useless. BTW, there's no webby in the comics. No Beakley either.
But in the reboot, it feels like they did all they could to make her the main character. Most other characters seem to be supporting roles to her.
Della.. Kinda meh. The buildup to her was building her up so much, and then she shows up and.. Is mostly just webby but different. She was kind of a disappointment. Btw, no della in the comics either, it's all just nephews, uncles and cousins all the way down, only exception I can think of is elviry, scrooge's sister.
Glomgold. I never had too much love for that one, in the comics, he sometimes appears but is a very very side character. But Making him pretty much just a retard, where's the fun in that?
Speaking of him, Rockerduck is the richest duck #2 in the comics and scroges lifelong rival. Making him some.. civil war era resurrected cotton farm owner was really a low blow. They even dressed him in those wild west clothes, wtf. And they ruined his iconic hair.
This is how he looks like in the new ducktales: https://static.wikia.nocookie.net/s.....Rockerduck.png
This is how he oughta look: https://static.wikia.nocookie.net/d.....1/Flairsou.PNG
I don't remember if he was in the OG ducktales tho
The inclusion of adult Kit was fun, but making him just a recolored Baloo was lame. Also, not giving Baloo or Rebecca any screen time was lame. Excluding Molly was based tho, she was to TaleSpin what Webby was to the OG DuckTales.
All in all, I feel like wanting to bring in the universes of TaleSpin, Darkwing Duck and others hampered it more than it helped, because it felt way more like a sitcom than an adventure show. Episodes not centered around the home life and interpersonal conflicts of the ducks were half spent on other, unrelated characters. Sure, it just getting 3 seasons kinda made it hard to go on too many adventures, but it still felt like the new series spent way too much time being "at home" and way too little time going on treasure hunt.
That was another place where they could have borrowed from the comics. Imagine the ducks went on to explore the "Tal der Sieben Sonnen" (dunno the english title if it has one, the valley of the seven suns) for example. Went on time travels to the past using the time machine built by prof. Zapotec in the comics. Etc.
Hell plenty of the comic book adventures could have made great episodes. Just recently one came out that I remember clearly (because magicka looked so hot in it ^^;), "Die Nummer Eins der Nummer Zwei" (the number one of number two), a comic where magicka steals the first owned coin of the second richest duck in the world, which is btw Rockerduck in the comics, and becomes a force to behold, all just to get scrooges first coin
I don't know why I wrote this
I have to admit, I am not that much into the comics, mostly know the Ducktales universe from the 80s TV series. I too was worried that it will suck but did enjoy it. I especially liked Louie? (Track), he was as lazy as I am. :')
I also have to agree with Gyro, just...why? ._.
I must admit, giving the three duckings such diverting personalities was welcome, because it alwas felt a bit lame they were all the same.. but I still couldn't really tell them apart XD
The character names are a real bummer. Besides donald, I think every single character has another name in every language region :D made writing this not easy.
And the names...yeah. In your journal, I mostly deducted the character by your description, instead of their english names. :')