Scrooge's Last Adventure part one: "The End..."

 Well, here we go.  Let's do this.  I actually had this story in French some years before the English version came out--all four parts were published in a single Super Picsou Geant.  But at that time, I didn't really get into it.  I read the first part but then did not have the motivation to continue.  Why?  Well, we shall get to that.

You can see it does have some nice art, in that loose Italian style.  The kind of thing you might shy away from if you're more used to Barks-type stuff, as indeed I did back in the day.  Art by--let's see--Alessandro Perina?  Don't know him, sad to say, but not surprising; I'm definitely not too up on my contemporary Italian artists.  Or writers: this is written by Francesco Artibani, another stranger to me (okay, so it transpires that he's actually written a lot of US-published stories; I still don't know his name!).  What can you do?  I guess there are a lot of things you could do.  But I'm not doing them!

So the fact that can't be denied is, I'm kind of prejudiced against villain team-up stories like that.  I think you know that about me.  And when I try to think why, I come up with several reasons: first, there's the sort of meta-reason: there's always the sense--the accurate sense--that this is being done because some writer has decided that I am supposed to be excited about this.  "Look!  All your favorites together at once!  ARE YOU NOT ENTERTAINED?"  I suppose in a sense this is a meaningless complaint, since obviously EVERY story is meant to appeal to readers, duh, but I always feel it with things like this.

Still, I do like the characterizations here.  Good writing from Gray.  I especially like how Glomgold is done here: I've certainly complained over and over again about how this guy bears little resemblance to Barks' original conception, but let's face it, there's only so far that that could go if he's to be a recurring character.  If he just exists in a kind of liminal state between being redeemable and not...it could get tedious real fast.  And although as far as I know this doesn't have any precedent, it really is rather clever to have him be the more hard-edged, serious villain as compared to the more hapless, childlike Rockerduck (I guess that's sort of a spoiler at this point in the proceedings.  Welp.)

But to return to my complaining, the other thing that bugs me about team-ups like this is the way they seem to implicitly devalue the characters.  Now, I hope it doesn't count as a spoiler for me to tell you that no given villain is going to end up defeating Scrooge.  Absolute worst-case scenario for him, you'd kind of be looking at a tie.  And yet, I don't know how you read these stories, but for me, you're always sort of engaging in a little bit of magical thinking in the back of your mind: you know he's not going to lose--but what if he does?  Whereas here, it really rubs in the idea that the villains are really just a buncha goofy bumblers who could never win anything.  That's not what I like to see!

But, I mean, to be clear, I think this is a very well-done story that handily transcends whatever problems I may have with this premise.  Just in case it seems like I'm being excessively negative here.

Of course, another potential hurdle is that you have to actually WANT Scrooge to win.  That's true of any story, but to me it somehow feels more crucial than ever when the story is billed as a super-climactic thing like this.  This was definitely a sizable problem in "A Little Something Special," but this one does a mostly reasonable job, I think.  This is pretty funny, although you have to wonder: Quackmore presents two reasons why the klaxons didn't go off, but surely it's only one?  Ie, they didn't go off because of who it is?  Otherwise...they'd never go off, surely?  Hmm.

Considering how many of Scrooge's treasure hunts Donald has tagged along on, you'd think he' understand that him giving her a present from his stash of artifacts would actually be incredibly generous.  Is this slightly questionable writing on Artibani's part?  Maybe.

Okay, probably, given that you can flippin' well see how cool his trophies are in this picture.  Would you rather be given a small cash gift, or that rad-ass gold-and-ruby falcon?  The question answers itself.

That "too many...for one man" looks like it's meant to be suggesting something, but I don't think it actually is.  This is fine, although it is sort of Scrooge 101--memories inhering in physical objects.  And I'm just gonna say it: as a person who, no denying it, gets way too attached to Things, I don't think this is a healthy way to live.  I just don't.

Anyway.  This Bin-raid stuff does feel a trifle pro forma; I suppose there are only so many ways you can depict things like this.  It has good energy, though.

...is garlic good against Magica?  Is this implying she's a vampire?  Well, okay, fair enough, according to this page, "garlic is a magical plant which keeps people safe, protects animal stocks & households from dark energies, evil spirits, ghosts, evil-eye & various diseases."  And this is per someone called "White Raven," so clearly they would know.

...is it an obstacle course disguised as a doomsday funfair, or the other way 'round?  I like this, even if I can't quite get my head around it.

That's actually cooler than how it looked before, and potentially just as deadly.  Good stuff, good stuff.

Great sense of movement here.

And this is just cool as heck.  Is it an intentional visual reference to Marco Rota's "Money Ocean?"  Maybe so and maybe not, but it definitely makes you think of that one.

Hooray!  I mean, she definitely said it for the rhyme; there's no doubt about that.  But also, the rhyme is the magic.  That's how it works.

This is why I was sort of bored with this story the first time I read it: it's like, oh boy, the Beagles and Magica BOTH do this at the same time?  Such things have never been seen before!  OMG etc.  I mean, it's fine.  But in isolation, it's kind of uninteresting.

I like how the story attempts to sorta-kinda make this a realistic thing on the part of the villains: like, a real financial move that you could make.  Of course, it doesn't pay to think too hard about it.  We don't generally think much about the structure of McDuck Enterprises, and admittedly I don't understand business, but it is hard to imagine that Scrooge himself is not the majority shareholder here.  But IN ANY CASE, I just refuse to believe that there are no safeguards to stop random people from taking over any company they want!  It doesn't make sense!  Blargh.  I know this isn't really an important thing, but still.  It would definitely be interesting to see a story where the point was that everything the villains did was one hundred percent legal.

Oh no!  My hat!

I'll admit it: these characters are pretty cool-looking.  In a way it seems like cheating to just invoke these random people we didn't know existed to advance the plot, but it's fine.  Sure.

Hmm.  That would be "thine endless stream."  You wanna replace "thy" with "thine" when the next word starts with a vowel sound: "To thine own self be true."  It's the same as my/mine: "Mine eyes have seen the glory," but if I had other glory-detection methods, it would be "my nose hath smelt the glory."

I don't want to harp on this too much, it seems petty, but given my background it's extremely noticeable to me, so: let it first be noted that there's no single, monolithic "old-timey English."  Rules varied in different areas and different times--and in any case, if you're using it for a story like this, there's obviously some intentional anachronism, so maybe it doesn't even make sense to complain about these things.  But as someone who's spent just WAY too long studying English, and also is a fan of traditional folk music--some of this stuff really jumps out at me as wrong.  That's all I'll say about that.

(I do think it would be kind of funny if their dialogue were written in actual factual Old English, such that nobody, myself emphatically included, could make head or tails of anything they were saying.)

They set up a fun mystery, though; there's no denying it.  Certainly makes you want to keep reading.

...

Okay okay, I just can't not point this out: unless you're trying to sound like a pirate, you really only want to use that unconjugated "be" in subjunctive constructions--ie, counterfactual phrases generally using "if" or "whether" or the like.  As in, "if he be a married man, hanged he shall be/and if he be a single man he shall marry thee."  And that's seriously ALL I am saying.

I always like when Magica changes forms, so I find this part very funny.  But again, best not to think too hard about it: why do those "good faeries" only use happy magic with balloons and lollipops and horrible striped stockings?  I'm pretty sure it's because their outward form and behavior matches what's in their heart.  A bad-good faerie is probably a contradiction in terms.

Magica glumly giving up and wandering off is interesting.  Not the sort of think you really ever see from her, but appropriate under the circumstances.

Seriously, Scrooge HAS to have a board of directors or something that would prevent things like this from happening, or at the very least ties them up in court forever.  That would actually be a funny premise for a story: Scrooge's enemies try to win using this sort of skulduggery, but there's so much bureaucratic red tape that they never get what they want.

I mean, yeah, okay, fair's fair, ya definitely want to continue.  I wonder where the inspiration for this story came from.  Was it meant to commemorate the eightieth anniversary of Topolino?  If so, it was a year late.  Also, you'd think they'd want a Mouse story for that.  Well, I guess there's no conceivable way of anyone finding out ever.

Anyway, writing about this was fun.  Let's continue!