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Not Mickey Mouse, cute TV star,
Not Mickey Mouse, suburban slob,
But the Mickey Mouse of 'Mickey Fights the Phantom Blot
-Joseph Sanders
My friend Kev sent me a link to old Mickey Mouse comic strips as profiled on Boing Boing. These strips show Mickey Mouse attempting suicide after losing Minnie's affections to another mouse.
I was first introduced to the real Mickey Mouse through the Comic-Book Book, a collection of essays on nearly forgotten comic strips and books. This was my first exposure to The Heap, Carl Barks and Jack Cole. And Floyd Gottfredson, the Phantom Artist on the Mickey Mouse comic strip. The essay, by ur-comic historian Bill Blackbeard, revealed a Mickey lost in time, one who, though he was still a stand-up guy, was no weakling. This Mickey had no problem picking up a gun, making woo with Minnie, or promising his adversaries that he would "tear you apart with my bare hands." He faced every manner of danger in what was one of the first, and best, mixtures of the comic and adventure strips, from alligator pits to giant spiders to the Phantom Blot and Pegleg Pete. these strips are almost shocking now, so much so that, like the person from Boing Boing believed, they seem to be parody. It's likely that this is the same cloth from which the Air Pirates created their version of the Mouse (which resulted in an infamous lawsuit involving Disney, as detailed in the recent Fantagraphics publication The Pirates and the Mouse, by Bob Levin).
For nearly the entirety of his run, the cartoonist behind the exploits of this other Mickey Mouse obscured by a Walt Disney byline. Like Carl Barks, it took fans years to find the culprits behind these cartoons. According to Gottfredson, it wasn't Walt's will that they remain unknown, but the demands of the newspaper syndicates, who didn't want to confuse their customers by replacing Disney's brand name with someone else. There are a few places to find out information on this Phantom Artist, the best of which is the excellent Comic-Book Book, which I have found in various libraries. Web resources include this biography and examination of the artistic development of the strip and a more concise biography from Lambiek. There is also a look at Mickey Mouse as detective, and a comparison of the character to Will Eisner's Spirit. Perhaps the best web resource on this artist is an extensive audio interview available to the end of July on The Comics Journal website. This was originally conducted by the comic artist formerly known as Arn Saba (don't ask) for a CBC radio series on cartoonists of the Golden Age. It's an absolutely delightful interview, but if you miss it, the transcription is available in The Comics Journal #120.
But enough of all this talk. Here's a smattering of sample strips that have not been, and probably never will be, reprinted due to potential damage to the squeeky clean image of the modern version of the Mouse, including Pluto Catches a Nazi Spy and Mickey Mouse and the Nazi Submarine. And don't miss the (slightly off-topic) Rare Donald Duck strips, especially Donald Duck's Atom Bomb. Perfect summer reading.
"When you look at my stories in the comic books you'll see that I was trying to follow in the format that Gottfredson established, having Mickey and the other guys involved in funny situations at the same time as they were having serious problems. And [then] they solved their problems by funny means." - Carl Barks. |
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