Scrooge! Donald! Mickey! The Disney Comics Thread!

[LordJulius]

If you could choose only a few volumes of Fantagraphics' Barks and Rosa books, which would you choose? I am mostly interested in their peak period. I don't have enough shelf space and money for this anyway, so I need to choose widely.

I would have preferred to have the long stories in their own volumes, as I don't care about the short ones. But as long as I get the essential stuff, I'm happy.

Thank you!

I have all the volumes so far. Some of the DD ones (I think the last volume particularly) contain more shorts or ten-pagers. The Scrooge books however have lots of longer adventures, i.e. the classics. I'm reading the latest one atm (Lost Crown of Genghis Khan) which has seven long stories in it. Brilliant stuff.

[Balakin]

If you could choose only a few volumes of Fantagraphics' Barks and Rosa books, which would you choose? I am mostly interested in their peak period. I don't have enough shelf space and money for this anyway, so I need to choose widely.

I would have preferred to have the long stories in their own volumes, as I don't care about the short ones. But as long as I get the essential stuff, I'm happy.

Thank you!

I haven't read all and some would say choosing Rosa over Barks is sacrilege but I would say Rosa's Scrooge. That felt to me like the Ducktales cartoon the most.

[Angilasman]

If you could choose only a few volumes of Fantagraphics' Barks and Rosa books, which would you choose? I am mostly interested in their peak period. I don't have enough shelf space and money for this anyway, so I need to choose widely.

I would have preferred to have the long stories in their own volumes, as I don't care about the short ones. But as long as I get the essential stuff, I'm happy.

Thank you!

It's hard for Rosa because there are only 10 volumes and his work is complete. He's pretty consistent throughout, but he does improve a bit... so I suppose the earlier volumes would be less essential? Still missing a few great stories, though.

As for Barks: late '40s to Early '50s period is the best. That's when Carl Barks mastered those long Donald Duck adventure stories (some of which involved developing the Uncle Scrooge character) through the earliest issues of Uncle Scrooge's solo book. The volumes are released out of order (though they're listed in order on the inside) and are all named after one memorable story that appears in the contents of that volume. If I were to choose 6 I'd go with:

-Christmas on Bear Mountain (title story introduces Scrooge, 'Ghost of the Grotto' is one of best adventures)
-The Old Castle's Secret (title story is the first Uncle Scrooge treasure hunt with his nephews, one of the best comics ever)
-The Pixilated Parrot (contains maybe my favorite Barks story - 'Vacation Time', 'The Magic Hourglass' is also great - a more villainous early version of Scrooge)
-A Christmas For Shacktown (title story is essential, also includes 'The Golden Helmet' which is also essential)
-Trick or Treat (title story is okay adaptation of the animated short, but this volume has, in my opinion, the funniest run of short stories... but if you don't care for the short stories, eh, I guess you could substitute Lost in the Andes in this spot, title story in that one is iconic)
-Only a Poor Old Man (collects the first 6 issues of Uncle Scrooge's solo comic and they're the best. The title story, 'Back to the Klondike', 'The Horse Radish Treasure', and 'Tralla La' are as good as Uncle Scrooge gets)

If you're not familiar with many of Barks stories I'd hold off on reading Rosa because so many of his stories are sequels or in some way connected to old Barks stories, most from Barks' peak period (i.e., a many of them included in the volumes I listed).

[Thor2014]

I second the recommendations of The Old Castle's Secret, Only A Poor Old Man and Christmas on Bear Mountain. I would say those three title stories are essential Uncle Scrooge reading. Only A Poor Old Man contains 'Back to the Klondike' which is one of the best Barks stories ever. I would add The Terror of the Beagle Boys volume. It contains the first appearance of the Beagle Boys and includes the story Dangerous Disguise. DD is full of spy intrigue and contains the femme fatale Madame Triple-X.

Another one of my favorite stories is 'Sheriff of Bullet Valley' which I think is in the Old Castle's Secret volume.

[Angilasman]

Now that they're nearing the end of their Gottfredson and Rosa collections Fantagrahics is gonna start a series of hardcovers called "Disney Masters" spotlighting different Disney comics creators each volume. The first one'll be a Romano Scarpa Mickey Mouse volume next summer.

[Thor2014]

I was hoping Scarpa would get a nice collected treatment. Looking forward to when they get to WVH.

[Angilasman]

Whoa! A bunch of old Disney comics back issues from the late '80s/early '90s showed up at my local comic shop and they're were all put in the dollar comics boxes! This same thing happened six years or so ago and between now and then I've got an almost complete collection of the Gladstone I era Uncle Scrooge and Uncle Scrooge Adventures issues! I'm like five issues from having 'em all!

[AdamFTF]

I have both the old trades that collect the stories that were adapted for Duck Tales. I'd buy some of the new collections but I'm afraid there'd be a fair bit of overlap.

[UncleScrooge]

I totally agree with the Fantagraphics praises. I've got almost all the Barks, and all but two of the Rosa collections. I found out about duck books after my daughter and I grabbed 'A Matter of Some Gravity' on Free Comic Book Day. We were both hooked and everything cascaded from there. She is growing up LOVING the Duck Universe. We've also read everything from IDW. I'm glad to see DuckTales is doing reasonably well...hopefully that will spark some renewed interest in Scrooge, Donald, and the Boys!

[Angilasman]

^Glad you've become a fan! I became a fan of the ducks a couple of years before Fantagraphics started their reprints, as I'm a big Usagi Yojimbo fan and every other introduction in an UY book would mention Carl Barks as the master of anthropomorphic animal comics.

I have both the old trades that collect the stories that were adapted for Duck Tales. I'd buy some of the new collections but I'm afraid there'd be a fair bit of overlap.

There is a bit of overlap because the stories adapted into old DuckTales episodes were mostly early Scrooge stories, so I chronological reprint will have those early stories... in early volumes! The first Fanta Scrooge book collects six long stories and a few shorter ones, and three of the longer stories were in the 'Carl Barks' Best DuckTales Stories' paperbacks. If you ever wonder what Disney comics are where just use INDUCKS, the awesome database for finding the stories and publications worldwide:

https://inducks.org/index.php

[theusher]

Just noticed this on Amazon. IDW will publish a trade collecting a few DuckTales classics:

https://www.amazon.com/DuckTales-Cla...dp/1684052963/

[UncleScrooge]

Seriously awesome! Thanks for sharing this. It's a long wait, but this will be a must-have when it finally comes out.

[signalman112]

Just got the latest Carl Barks Library vol. "The Peg Leg mine". Excellent as always.

I haven't bought the Don Rosa Library 7-8 yet. I hear one of the volumes is printed upside down.

[Ivan P91]

I haven't bought the Don Rosa Library 7-8 yet. I hear one of the volumes is printed upside down.

My copies of Vol 7 and 8 are fine.

[mooch]

Just noticed this on Amazon. IDW will publish a trade collecting a few DuckTales classics:

https://www.amazon.com/DuckTales-Cla...dp/1684052963/

There’s a volume 2 for December as well. I just wish IDW trades weren’t so short. Why publish in 5 volumes what you can publish in 15? (And cancel the line after 6 or so)