The Subject: DuckTales, Disney's first cartoon produced for daily television. It began airing in 1987.
Plot in two sentences: Donald Duck joins the Navy -- finally justifying his years of wearing sailor attire -- and in his absence, his nephews Huey, Dewy, and Louie are sent to live with their Great Uncle Scrooge McDuck, the wealthiest duck on earth. Amidst occasional family friction, Scrooge and the boys, along with supporting characters like the cheerfully bumbling pilot, Launchpad McQuack, become involved in many, many adventures that are detailed throughout the series.
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If there's one lesson that I've learned during the course of doing these retrospective cartoon essays, it's that more often than not, I'm going to be surprised how reality contrasts my gut memory. That is to say, I was expecting to be able to scoff at DuckTales for being a juvenile, treacle-laden offering from Disney. I mean, somewhere along the line, things went downhill, right? That's how we ended up with things like The Lion King VIII: Pride of the Yankees. Well, it didn't start here.
In this case, there are several surprising things about DuckTales: first of all, there's nothing about it that feels cheap or mass-produced, a patina that tends to discolor a lot of daily cartoon shows. Disney seems to have gone at the series full force in this regard -- the art and animation is first-class; the writing, while occasionally plagued with some really cheap outs to complex situations, is strong; and the musical scores and voice work are really top notch. The other notable difference from memory is that this series isn't really what I'd call a "comedy." It has comedic moments, sure, but even a lot of those are written with a dry tone. If I had to label DuckTales as anything (and I sort of do at this point), I'd call it a lighthearted cartoon drama. Comedy is not the point of the series, and it's never played as such. The adventure, the action -- these are what sell the series.
Characterization also plays a strong role. There's long-term development across the series as Scrooge continually learns the value of family. There's another mark of quality in that the morals of each episode aren't heavy-handed or preachy. They're in there, sure, but sometimes you have to look for them as hard as our heroes are looking for treasure.
But enough of the serious analysis. Though this is something worth buying for your own kids, assuming that they've not been rendered too ADD from more modern television fare, there is still plenty about this show to exploit.
Here's a bit of trivia for you: the actor who voices Scrooge McDuck is a guy by the name of Alan Young. You may know him best as "Wilbur" from Mr. Ed. For those of you who have no idea what in the hell Mr. Ed is, first of all, I am sorry that you clearly have missed out on a lot of classic television. Secondly -- get off my lawn, you damn kids!
DuckTales makes for a very curious study of capitalism in that the richest guy/duck in the world keeps most of his assets liquid -- seemingly for the purpose of swimming in piles of coins -- in a giant "money bin," which graces the tallest point in the city of Duckburg. Several points on this: If you're going to keep all that money on hand, why on earth would you do it in coinage? Who's going to take the time to roll that stuff up any time you have to spend it? Secondly, it presents a very lopsided view of capitalism in that Scrooge will do nearly anything to increase his wealth, yet clearly he's reticent to do any investment spending, a key point in any market-driven economy. Money sitting in a bin doesn't grow, unless the mint of Duckburg has developed coinage that asexually divides. Furthermore, Scrooge slaps a giant "$" (which he ostensibly uses as his monogram) on the outside of the building, and then wonders why villains are always trying to break into it. Scrooge, my man -- err, my duck -- diversify. Your money's going to be a lot safer if it's invested in Amalgamated Feather Wax.
That brings up another point, in that I can't determine as to exactly why all the anthropomorphic characters in DuckTales are either ducks (as you would expect) or some form of dogs. Certainly the latter might be to accommodate the inclusion of Scrooge's classic foes from the comics, The Beagle Boys, but why stop there? Wait, now I'm thinking that there might have been some pigs at some point. Well, that shoots my whole damn point right out of the water, doesn't it? Although there's still a conspicuous lack of mice, which, given the company, is strange in itself.
I started to wonder about the specifics of the "Duck" family tree as well. We know that Huey, Dewy, and Louie are Donald Duck's nephews, and this is Disney canon. Donald is the nephew of Scrooge, so therefore H, D, and L are the great nephews of Scrooge. But doesn't anyone have parents in this universe? Donald obviously has to have a brother or sister that we don't know about, -- probably one of those sordid things we'll one day see on True Hollywood Stories. In the meantime, he just ships his nephews off to Scrooge, which makes sense from a financial welfare point of view, but aren't there legal ramifications to this whole thing that we're missing out on? Of course, Scrooge can probably just pop off to his money bin and buy his way out of anything. Deus ex monetaria, as it were.
After seeing how this series held up, I'm surprised that it only produced for about three years before it gave way to the likes of Chip and Dale Rescue Rangers, TaleSpin, and Goof Troop. Then again, if you're Disney and you've got this wealth of intellectual property to draw on, why wear out your welcome with any given series? Still, Disney absolutely led off its daily cartoon campaign with the right show. As a high watermark of 80s cartoons, DuckTales really fits the bill.
