Getting Dangerous Again

I'm the terror that flaps in the night...

If you grew up watching the Disney Afternoon like I did, you know the rest. Darkwing Duck, the legendary crimefighter of St. Canard bravely fought evil and crime of all sorts from 1991-95. After his initial run in the Disney Afternoon, he had two thirteen episode seasons on ABC's Saturday Morning.

The show was influential on me and my write for two reasons. First was it's focus on combining the superhero and comedy elements with an eye towards parody. The second was introducing a family life in the superhero with the responsibility of raising an adopted daughter.

Clearly the hours I spent watching Darkwing Duck were part of the inspiration when I sat down to write about a family man who gets super powers in Tales of the Dim Knight.

So when I found out that Boom Studios made a sequel graphic novel bringing the Darkwing Duck universe back after more than a decade, my interest was piqued, so I picked up Darkwing Duck, Vol. 1: The Duck Knight Returns.

The plot finds Darkwing in retirement living exclusively as Drake Mallard and being a cog in the giant machine of Quackwerks that runs St. Canard and employees all its citizens.

However, something suspicious is going on. When his daughter Goslin's best friend Honker Muddlefoot is arrested for having downloaded music (which Goslin affirms on behalf of the Walt Disney Corporation is wrong but not worthy of cruel imprisonment), Darkwing goes back into action in time to see that his four biggest rivals (minus Negaduck) are also getting back into the swing of things with Bushroot, Megavolt, the Liquidator, and Quackerjack ready to wreak havoc. This looks like a job for Darkwing Duck.

The book which collects the first four issues of Boom's Darkwing Duck Comic strikes a perfect balance. It's clearly geared towards kids but also towards fans of the original series who have grown up. It explores themes of compromise, growing older, and has a bit of a cyberpunk feel to it without getting too heavy for younger readers. It recaptures the characters and fun of the series perfectly while having the right amount of serious moments to make it more than a trip down memory lane.

It's adorned with colorful art and lots of bonus cover art that makes it a visually stimulating read.

In addition, the book offers some interesting text in the back with some background on how the original series came about that true fans love. The series was originally began as "Double O Duck" but changed radically to resemble a Silver Age superhero show. It still held onto some of the original Bond-elements with Darkwing's battles for SHUSH against F.O.W.L. (The Fiendish Organ for World Larceny.)

It was interesting to learn about because it always seemed like Darkwing Duck had two different types of adventures. There were his battles with FOWL and his battles with Fiendish Five (either solo or together) and related supervillains and never the twain met.

Anyway, it was a very satisfying blast from the past.