Uncle Scrooge #336

November 24, 2004

Quick Rating: Great
Title: A Christmas For Shacktown and other stories

Only Uncle Scrooge can make Christmas merry for the children of Duckburg – but can Donald convince him?

Writers: Carl Barks; Marco Rota; Pat & Shelly Block & Paul Halas
Art: Carl Barks; Marco Rota; Pedro Alferez Canos & Jose Maria Millet Lopez
Colors: Scott Rockwell; Egmont & Susan Daigle-Leach
Letters: Susie Lee; Travis Seitler & Willie Schubert
Editor: John Clark
Cover Art: Ulrich Schroeder & Sue Kolberg
Publisher: Gemstone Comics

It’s Thanksgiving week, friends, and that means its time for the deluge of holiday comics to begin. Gemstone put out not one, but three Christmas comics this week, including Walt Disney’s Comics and Stories #651, Walt Disney’s Christmas Parade #2 and this issue of Uncle Scrooge. I haven’t read the other two comics yet, but if they’re as good as this one, there’s enough to keep you in the holiday spirit well into January.

The lead story in this issue is a classic by the master himself, Carl Barks. In “A Christmas For Shacktown,” Daisy Duck is struggling to organize a celebration for the poorest section of Duckburg and has all but $50 dollars. She recruits Donald to plead with Uncle Scrooge for $25 for turkeys and $25 for a toy train for the children. Scrooge isn’t heartless, but his practicality reigns supreme – he agrees to buy the turkeys, but only if Donald can raise the money for the train himself.

What follows is a brilliant Barksian domino effect as Donald’s efforts set one chain of events after another into motion, all of them finally colliding in a hysterical conclusion that, of course, winds up with a great big happy ending. Unlike a lot of writers, though, Barks resists the urge to make anybody learn some big sappy “lesson.” He just gives the upper hand to the characters who had their hearts in the right place all along.

Next up are two non-Christmas tales. “The Egyptian Prince’s Secret” by Marco Rota features Donald meeting an archeologist hunting for the lost treasure of an ancient Egyptian prince. Scrooge, a classic treasure hunter himself, finances the expedition. The story seems like your standard treasure hunt story before running into a great twist at the end. Pat and Shelly Block and Pedro Canos then chime in with a three-page Grandma Duck story. The boys are amazed at Grandma’s ability to predict the weather, but don’t necessarily follow her advice. It’s basically a long gag strip, but it comes with a great punchline.

Finally we get the other Christmas tale, Paul Halas and Jose Maria Millet Lopez’s “Christmas Magic.” Donald, Daisy and the boys ride up to Scrooge’s cabin on Bear Mountain (a nice nod to Barks here – the first-ever Uncle Scrooge story featured the old man inviting his nephews to Bear Mountain on Christmas), only to find him holed up and terrified of an invasion by his frequent nemesis, Magica DeSpell..

All in all, we get three good stores and one excellent one. That’s well worth your money. In fact, if you’re trying to get your kids to read, this would be a great stocking stuffer come Christmas morning.

Rating: 9/10