Category Archives: comics

One of the great pleasures writing a history of the New York animation studios is finally doing some appreciative analysis of John Gentilella, or “Johnny Gent,” and his work. Admittedly, it will be brief. He was a relatively minor player—he worked at a higher skill level than any of his Famous Studios colleagues on increasingly mediocre cartoons—but he was an amazing repository of knowledge on the inner workings and personalities at Van Beuren, Terry’s, and Famous. It’ll be nice to have his memories give color to the larger story.

Bob Jaques called my attention to a story drawn by Gent for Giggle Comics #4 (January 1944). Gent said he recalled doing a few stories, and it’s easy to see why his memory was fuzzy. The art here reflects a bit of his animation’s dynamism in the posing, but largely looks like it was dashed out in a lunch hour between working on Popeye. But it’s still his, and to me (and maybe only me and Bob), anything Gent did is of interest.

What are my qualifications to never post?

Well, I’ve been busy as a freelance writer and journalist as per usual, and all of my free time for animation writing has been devoted to pitching and starting an exciting new project. I’m pleased to say that my friend and colleague Charlie Judkins and I are co-authoring a new book: a history of New York studio animation (from the teens to the ’60s) to be published by Wesleyan University Press. That’s all I can give away for now, but I assure you we aim to give these neglected films and artists the scholarly attention they’ve long deserved.

Now, on a completely unrelated note…

I’ve also been translating stories for the new line of Disney comics by IDW. The process is taking a script (generally of Dutch or Italian origin) and spicing it up in my own voice for American publication. It’s a job I’ve missed dearly. My friend, collaborator, and boss David Gerstein had me do a few for the Gemstone line nine years ago, and I’m delighted to be a regular contributor for IDW.

The translating team includes Jonathan Gray, Joe Torcivia, and Gary Leach. We’re all students of the Disney masters, so we all “get” these characters. But on our personal writing styles, I’d say Jonathan and Joe are always in a “stupidest puns” competition mixed with pop culture references reflective of their eras (Joe a child of the ’60s, and Jonathan an ’80s kid), whereas Gary is very much a classical Barks scholar proper whose excellent work goes back to the original Gladstone days. Myself: I think it was Jonathan who described my style as stewing in a seat in the corner making “really cynical, really mean-spirited” jokes. Suits me. (Joe’s enthusiastic analyses can be found over at his blog, The Issue at Hand.)

You can judge for yourself this month: Jonathan has started a year-long serial in Walt Disney’s Comics and Stories #721, Joe has a story in Mickey Mouse #311, and Gary begins a two-parter in Uncle Scrooge #408. I had the pleasure and privilege of translating a rather convoluted but funny ten-page Donald Duck for WDC&S #721. It’s a classic 1982 story by Daan Jippes and Freddy Milton with Donald as a tortured bookie runner, once too hot for American publication. Donald Duck #370 features my spin on “The Siege of Nothing Atoll”, a spy-spoof with Donald and cousin Fethry illustrated by the great Giorgio Cavazzano.

Note that this is classic, not modern Cavazzano. His style today is good, if a little standardized. Cavazzano drew “Atoll” in 1976, still fresh from his days assisting and inking the other great Italian Disney master Romano Scarpa. In those years he managed to make every pose unique and funny, and could make something as standard as an airplane flying or explosion cloud a surreal extravaganza.

It seems the new line of Disney comics is selling rather well, particularly Mickey Mouse, whose launch issue last month was essentially a sell-out all over the New York City/New Jersey area. Some of the team has presumed the popularity of the new Toon Boom Mickey cartoons for the Disney Channel has given the character better brand recognition. (Jonathan said his brother was stymied after watching a few with his daughter: “These are funny. Mickey Mouse’s not supposed to be funny.”) My low opinion of those cartoons aside, anything that helps give these comics longer press life is fine by me.

I’d tell you to watch for an update, but, well, we know how that goes.

Some old comics are classics. Some old comics are just old. Some old comics are just stupid.

This one is kind of all three.

Just as Jim Davis’s cozy little comic shop for criminal publisher Benjamin Sangor was shut down in the summer of 1948, Sheldon Mayer retired from editing for DC to do full-time cartooning. Under Mayer’s example, the DC “funny” titles soon adopted a bombastic personality that at times can seem forced, but ultimately shows a self-referential wit that was usually foreign to these “animated comics.” The meta-element is often in the form of Tex Avery-style fourth wall breaking where the characters are aware they’re in a comic-book story, although it sometimes runs deeper in the knowingly ludicrous plots. It’s as if they said: “We can’t be as wry or smart as Barks or Stanley, but we can be wackier!”

As the Superkatt post shows, some cartoonists were more than capable. Most of the cartoonists that worked for DC weren’t, and Mayer’s Bo Bunny, Doodles Duck and Dizzie Dog features were rarely topped. One exception was Jim Davis, who had already been producing comics with the Columbia characters for DC. He soon found a niche drawing the same comics again with writers Hubie Karp (and later Cecil Beard) and got a kind of principled brilliance out of the deceptively thin premise of Fauntleroy Fox versus Crawford Crow. Reoccurring characters never appeared beyond the titular two, yet the stories’ hilarity was certainly reoccurring from roughly 1948-54.

The Davis-drawn stories with the Columbia characters proved rather popular, and by the end of 1951 they were appearing in four titles: Real Screen Comics, Comic Cavalcade, The Fox and the Crow, and Flippity and Flop. The cat-and-canary team also had its share of funny moments, with the two (and Sam the dog) fulfilling their animal roles almost obligatorily, in a way foreshadowing the Chuck Jones/Mike Maltese sheepdog and wolf series at Warners.

Given the number of stories needed, the steam ran out rather fast. The sharper stories began appearing in The Fox and the Crow and those in Real Screen Comics lost their edge. The [alleged] tactic to give the new title a boost appears to have worked. In 1954, The Fox and the Crow switched from bi-monthly to monthly publication.

The Fox and the Crow no. 14 (Feb. 1954) was the first monthly issue, and therein is one story that has nothing to do with Crow’s standard chiseling escapades. They say there’s nothing inherently funny about slipping on a banana peel. But if you can prolong the setup of said banana peel slip to a ridiculous six pages—and shove in a direct plea to the kid readers to read something else besides this stupid comic-book—it can be very funny indeed.