Walt Disney Uncle Scrooge and Donald Duck: Return to Plain Awful

This is an interesting volume as it contains some “oddities” - stories written but not drawn by Rosa and a story drawn but not written by him.Plenty of “first and onlys” in this one.

***SPOILER FOR ONE OF THE STORIES***Apart from David Tennent*, Don Rosa may be the luckiest fan in any fandom; going from an admirer of Carl Barks, one of Disney’s most beloved comic creators, to becoming either equally as beloved or at least second only to Carl Barks as a fellow comic creator for the same characters he grew up with. It’s not hard to see why.Like his idol, Don Rosa told interesting and thought-out stories. His specialty were adventure stories where the ducks (mostly the nephews) follow clues and use history to find treasure to make Uncle Scrooge’s money bin even more over-flowing. There are also funny suburban stories and short gag comics but it’s clear (partially because Mr. Rosa said it himself in this collection) that he prefers longer stories and the thinking he must do to make them work. As a reader, while I prefer the more equal mix you get reading Carl Barks, I won’t argue with what brings great art.He is clearly a Carl Barks fan as he fills all his stories with allusions to or facts first revealed in the older comics, if they’re not already sequels to Carl Barks’. The thing that makes these sequels intelligent stories is that they don’t require you to know the originals. For most of my time reading Duck comics, I’ve ended up reading Mr. Rosa’s stories BEFORE Mr. Barks’ and never had trouble following it. Everything I need to know is in Don Rosa’s story and I get a fun surprise when I come across Carl Barks' earlier work.To Don Rosa’s assertion that he’s a lousy artist and writer, I say “Ah, phooey”. While I do prefer Carl Barks’ and others’ styles, that doesn’t mean Don's art style is bad. He said he got complaints about over too many panels per page and too much detail. While I occasionally had to enlarge a page to read it, I can’t argue with his reasoning (put all the story he could within his page limits), and it ultimately doesn’t hurt the final product (for me at least). Also, his big establishing shot panels are often gorgeous and works of art themselves. In addition, some of the funniest gags are background material that are sometimes their own mini-stories. Finally, to those who do think his art is crummy... well, it’s better than my own drawing attempts (I could manage his script drawing style but that’d be about it).Now, to illustrate the power of Don Rosa’s story-telling abilities (and Carl Barks’ for that matter): This is not a review of someone who’s childhood was filled with Donald Duck and Uncle Scrooge comics as I didn’t read my first Rosa comic until I was in my 30s. That’s right, old Don got an adult hooked on a comic about talking ducks. Fantagraphics deserves credit as well for reprinting his works in the Don Rosa Library, making it available to a new generation of fans who can’t get their hands on the original copies or can’t pay prices only Scrooge could afford.As a new Duck fan, I can’t say much about how well the coloring matches the originals. That said, my only gripe in recoloring a comic is when the new colorist completely changes the color (like Batman: The Killing Joke, even though I prefer the new color) or adds details that would be near impossible at the time (Superman vs Muhammed Ali, where Muhammed got gradients that would’ve been impossible in the original 70’s printing). To Fantagraphics’ credit, that is far from the case. I may not have read the originals, but I’ve seen pages online, so I know enough to see Fantagraphics didn’t reinvent the color wheel. Heck, I’ve heard and seen examples of Fantagraphics collections where they just scanned the comic pages with off-register color and evidence of the original dot printing showing. That’s too far on the other extreme so I appreciate Fantagraphics’ middle ground in recoloring for a solid look that still matches the originals. The line art is solid, without the fuzziness I heard other collections have (again, only started reading with Fantagraphics’ reprints).However, the crème de la crème of the Don Rosa Library, and what pushes it past Fantagraphics’ similar Carl Barks Library, is the behind the scenes section of every volume. Don himself tells of what went into the creation of each issue, all the research and references from both world history and Carl Barks’ work (reminder, Don Rosa’s work is technically Disney-approved fan fiction ;) ) and where to find his secret tribute to Carl Barks and Hidden Mickeys. It gives you a whole new appreciation for the man’s craft. It usually ends with additional covers Don Rosa drew that didn’t correspond to his stories but are still cool to see.As to why I consider Volume 2 the best of the entire collection (thank for staying with me this far :) )...For the most part, you read one Don Rosa Library volume, you read them all (I mean that in the best possible way; read them all if you can). All his stories are about equal with a few below his standards and several that outshine his normal quality. His famous Life & Times of Scrooge McDuck are spread across Volumes 4 and 5 (and definitely worth the read) so why am I saying Volume 2 is the greatest?Basically, it has the most variety, a few neat firsts, and maybe one of Don Rosa’s most heartwarming moments.We have some comics Mr. Rosa drew for other artists that, while fun, aren’t his usual plot or character style and have some plot holes that he calls out in the behind the scenes section. There’s also a “collaboration” with Carl Barks, basically finishing a story Carl Barks abandoned 30 years previously (and showing off the 3 original Carl Barks pages that inspired it). We also got a story that never went past the scripting phase, a cool look at how ALL his stories started and a testament to how great reading his stories can be even when the art is legitimately (but understandably) crummy. We also get a comic he only wrote for the DuckTales magazine, giving extra variety showing the difference between Don Rosa’s style and someone else's. Another interesting story is his first sequel to a Carl Barks adventure, a fun story that has one of my all-time favorite ending jokes in ANY comic.My favorite comic in this volume, and possibly favorite of all Don Rosa’s Disney comics (haven’t seen his college stuff) is the last one, “The Money Pit”. It’s an overall good story but there were two things that elevated it for me.First, it was the story’s message about how hobbies/collecting should be about enjoying the object being collected and its personal worth to you, not worrying about its worth to someone else. The story was about coin collecting but if you already know about Don Rosa’s own comic collection, you don’t need to read the behind the scenes section to see he was ALSO talking about comic collectors. I’ve included my favorite panel to show you (and how the comic looks in Guided View on a tablet).The other part, and it ties into the story’s message, was the ending. SPOILER WARNING:Donald is saved from being buried in the Money Bin after he goes overboard finding rare coins to sell. He’s saved when he blows a coin out of an air tube and Scrooge locates him based on what the coin is. Donald refuses to go back in and accepts the coin he blew out as part of his and Scrooge’s agreement. When Donald goes to sell it, the nephews don’t want him to, saying (quote) “No matter WHAT the price guides say... we can’t think of ANY amount of money equal to having our Unca Donald back!” Followed by the 3 panels it takes for Donald to change his mind makes this, if not quite the same caliber as the first 10 minutes of Pixar’s Up, pretty darn close. The fact Don Rosa manages to include some humor in the page after this moment to end the story with some humor is just masterful. There are other heartwarming endings like this in future Rosa stories but this one always stuck with me.All in all, Don Rosa is for anyone who likes good adventure stories. Don’t let the fact this stars Donald Duck throw you off. Its G-rated to be sure, but Don Rosa tells great stories and made comics for any age group. To me, if Carl Barks is the “Good Duck Artist”, then Don Rosa is the “OTHER Good Duck Artist”. If you do start reading, I can’t think of a better way to read them than the Don Rosa Library from Fantagraphics and I can't recommend enough starting with THIS volume.*David Tennent: fan of the British series Doctor Who, fulfilled dream of playing the Doctor, acted in a special alongside the Doctor he idolized, and even married into said' actor's family. It’s DENFINITELY either David or Don who are the luckiest fans :D

Excelente edición y por supuesto, contenido del genial Don Rosa.

Muito legal a edição americana !!!Tamanho excelente para os leitores aproveitarem os muitos detalhes que o Don Rosa coloca nas estórias !!!Recomendo !!!

Che dire... chi è finito qui è sicuramente un appassionato dei paperi e conosce di certo Don Rosa, l'unico vero grande "erede" dell'Uomo dei Paperi.Questa serie da collezione è imperdibile per la fattura e la qualità del prodotto.Il formato è leggermente più grande di quello previsto per le uscite italiane Panini e per questo motivo l'ho preferito anche se non sono solito leggere Disney in inglese.La collezione completa contiene (conterrà, visto che al momento della recensione non sono ancora usciti tutti i volumi - ne escono 2 ogni anno) in ordine cronologico l'opera omnia di Don Rosa in lingua originale ed ogni volume per buona parte (circa un quarto / un quinto) contiene approfondimenti sulla vita del disegnatore e su TUTTE le storie raccolte.I due volumi annuali escono sempre in versione cofanetto o separati; il presente volume fa parte del secondo caso.Copertina rigida, carta opaca e colori tenui, grande formato e buon profumo. C'è tutto.