Echoing Frank’s system, I’ll save commentary for after the strips to prevent spoilers. As the strips originally appeared from April 27th to June 6th, 1936.
Mickey shows off some real acting skills here never seen in the films. In a bit of self-parody, he plays a naive, “goshing” hick to get in Trigger’s good books and trail him without sacrificing his position. Gottfredson also portrays Mickey as a great observer of human behavior, almost echoing the great detective flicks that filled many a matinee in this era. As previously stated, the Gottfredson mouse delivered just about everything the screen mouse did not.
As Mickey’s adventure continues, he is reacquainted with the most colorful of all Disney villains, Peg-Leg Pete. Though usually more fleshed-out as a character than the ones he oppresses onscreen, the animated Pete’s nasty charm was primarily carried by the brilliant performance of Billy Bletcher. Remembered for bullying Mickey onscreen, the thuggish cat was at his best terrorizing Donald in notable shorts like Timber, Trombone Trouble, and The New Neighbor.
Pete in this story does not fit the typical weenie/Disney villain criteria. He is not merely a domineering bully, but a true sadist. Make no mistake of the undertones in the lengthy section where Pete subjects Mickey to torturous ‘duties’. While it is a diabolically delicious way to get Mickey off of his and Trigger’s trails, this is payback for all of the previous cat-and-mouse battles they’ve had previously. The bodily harm (fairly graphically depicted in the art) is simply not enough for this monster. Pete knows that Mickey is aware of what he’s doing, and takes savage pleasure in seeing Mickey refusing to jeopardize his mission in any way, bearing the shame the whole time.
Before it folded, Gemstone Publishing printed a slightly altered version of the May 7th strip, where the African cops are redrawn as dogs (probably by Daan Jippes, the only person alive who can draw in the style of any Disney cartoonist perfectly, not to mention having an amazing style all his own). Probably the biggest bone of contentions with printing the Gottfredson dailies are these antiquated racial caricatures, littered here and there throughout the strip’s history. While the stereotypes are merely incidental here, certain other stories, notably In Search of Jungle Treasure and The Plumber’s Helper, go far beyond the typical ‘darkie’ types and give us an unfortunate insight into Gottfredson’s prejudices. This is not to play a game of pointing fingers or put Gottfredson down in anyway, but it is an unavoidable issue when studying the richest portions of the man’s oeuvre.
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Relevant to the discussion of Disney storytelling, I see that my colleague David Gerstein, inbetween telling Scrooge McDuck what to do in Norwegian and sending whiny texts to Tom S. and I about the crying babies on the plane with him, has had another back-and-forth over the use of written prose during the Disney studio’s golden age. If you can read the whole thing, David is, naturally, right and amazingly patient in his dialog with a blatant fraud, supporting his protection of history with his many months of painstaking research. When you are done reading, don’t forget to click the PayPal button on the right and deposit some funds to support my own archive/porn bill. See youse.
Christ, Pete is a sum bitch here.
I really like how this is unfolding, imagine this strip as a two-reeler ? That would be awesome.
Again, thanks for posting these strips! I was really surprised to see Pete appear – I’m only casually familiar with Disney’s universe, so it caught me off guard. I’m still loving the strips, though, and you’re convincing me to make an effort to find the reprints you’ve mentioned. ^_^
Keep up the great job!
Dhave Gerstein is my hero.
I guess my failure in the literacy department of the narrative virtues and dramaturgy of Mickey Mouse dailies pretty much leaves me out of this discussion.
What a tremendous thing a roundtable discussion with the estimable Stathes, Gerstein and Komorowski would be. “Tonight, Black Bart-: paste board baddie, or AntiChrist?”
When will Pete ever learn that Mickey never gives up?
Well, the lines are drawn. As interesting a debate Gerstein and Worth undergo, larded with artifacts and speculations as to their interpretation covering the production process and the role of writing in all of it… I can’t help but see a philology of the frivolous, here. Worth’s position can be traced to a production philosophy active in his circle which attempts to found itself on what it takes the Golden Age process to be. This interpretation favors draughtsmanship and a certain spontaneity they associate with the process of drawing. You guys are more like clinical historians, disinterestedly (sic) going about assembling the data art historically, all the while, this evidence as to the fundamental role of writing to the production process gratifies your sensibilities as writer’s yourselves.
Aping an analytic model will not necessarily bring back the past, nor make a good cartoon. Establishing the details of the production process art historically is, perhaps, important. But none of this shit gets me any closer to the cartoon.
K. Nacht, it just so happens that David and I (and Tom) have some art training to speak of. (In fact, David informed me that HE was the one who redrew the art in the Gemstone reprinting of this story to be more “PC”, so go figure.) I can’t speak for my friends, but I sought it necessary to at least have some training to get an idea of how difficult it was for real artists to make everything sing.
Disney using written words in the creative process is a fact too large to ignore, and that’s all we’re saying. I have more eclectic tastes than my peers, and while their best is some of the best ever done, I really dislike a lot of Disney cartoons in general, so I personally am not making a case of “this process made the films better”. We don’t need to gratify our positions, so don’t insult us. Worth is, to be blunt, disingenuous.
Certainly not aiming to insult you and your comrades, (although I’m starting to warm to the idea.) Your cartoonist credentials are noted. Funny thing is, I was attempting to be as impartial as possible, for I’ve really no stake in this kind of discourse. I just like cartoons. (I’m reading Don Quixote again. Any cartoon writer should read the Quixote, there’s enuff material in there to spin a centuries worth of shorts! Also Gargantua and Pantagruel by the great Rabelais!—you outta college yet kid? You workin’ on yer Ph.D.?)
Speaking from personal experience I have a much easier time writing my ideas down first instead of any drawings. Obviously, the written word is a quicker process then any drawings and you’ll have a sort of mental block if you worry about you’ll set up a scene in your drawings. So I write with the images in my head.
Also if your intention is presenting a story to your crew. I think it’s best that the drawings are done after the writing.
Yes, executives have stripped artists of a lot of creative freedom in modern cartoons and writers are often dominant. That sucks and the executives are retarded for keeping that dysfunctional system in place.
However, that doesn’t mean that writing has no place in animation. I learned that around the 10th time Steve invoked “No True Scotsman” in order to discredit Dave’s evidence.
I commend you for making it to the Tenth Invocation, your credulity is astonishing.