Mark Beaks has very little interest in Scrooge really, he’s mostly just a shewed but lazy tech businessman with a particular interest in Gizmoduck. He someone how managed to reclaim his company after Glomtales, maybe it was just his on-paper money he put into Glomgold’s scheme. Magika has been reduced to a wreck without her powers, and whilst still maniacally evil and hating Scrooge seems content to bide her time and get her powers back first. Glomgold was always meant to be a reflection of Scrooge and The Balad of Duke Baloney! Did a good job in realising that to its fullest whilst keeping his core attributes in-tact. Oh and the Beagle Boys and Ma Beagle have an interesting family dynamic and their beef with Scrooge is interesting.
But with season 3, we have Bradford Buzzard and F.O.W.L.,
easily the most effective and successful antagonists for the show. Magika had a
plan of sorts that came to fruition throughout the season, but FOWL’s is a bit
more intricate and complex and otherwise connects episodes they had nothing to
do with.
And who better to solve a massive conspiracy and the
resident nerd of the Duck triplets, Huey. Huey has been show to be smart,
logical, efficient but also the least stable. When something challenges his
perception of reality, he’s the first to completely break down. This happened a
few times, when Dewey ended up favoured over him in The Infernal Internship of
Mark Beaks! And his interactions with Bubba Duck in Timephoon! To name a
couple.
Let’s dive into season 3 and see how things progress.
We open with Challenge of the Senior Junior Woodchucks!
Violet and Huey are in a race to become a Senior Woodchuck and we see Huey
caught between his competitive edge and credence to the guidebook. He’s also on
the verge of a mental breakdown without the book to his hand, having to conjure
one up in his mind. He ultimately concedes victory to Violet and there’s a
badge regarding failure and the lessons that can be learned from it.
Scrooge and co go on a side-adventure and discover a hidden
journal of Isabella Finch, famed adventurer and founder of the Junior Woodchucks. Inside are
a bunch of hidden treasures that Finch allegedly never found. But unbeknownst
to them a mosquito that had been harassing Donald all day turns out to be a spy
drone made by Gandra Dee, FOWL has been watching.
Next up is Quack Pack, and this is the season where the
reference to other Disney Cartoons from the Ducktales era become more blatant.
Quack Pack was the show that featured teen versions of Huey, Dewey and Louie
being edgy teens and shit. This episode is a bit different. It’s another
attempt at a bottle episode, a meta-version of a sitcom plotline with a sitcom
setup. How did they get into this? Well, one of Isabella Finch’s missing
mysteries is the Lamp of Coli Baba, yeah, another one, this one actually has the Genie
in it and, much like in the original Ducktales movie, he likes to be called
Gene.
But who would wish them into a sitcom? Donald, of course.
It’s interesting that Huey is the first to notice things and it’s an
interesting character bit for Donald, heightened further by the guest star,
Goofy. Yup, we can add Goof Troop to the list of references.
Speaking of references, next up you have Double-o-Duck in
You Only Crash Twice! And yeah, there are some neat references to James Bond
without all the womanising because this features Launchpad and Dewey, a child
and someone dumber than most children. But on the note of dumb, turns out FOWL
has a base underneath Funzos and has recovered a missing mystery of their own,
the third eye diamond.
Black Heron has converted this into an intelligence ray,
which she tests on some very familiar rodents. For some reason they couldn’t
use the names of the Rescue Rangers but these very clearly are the Rescue
Rangers. This is also our proper introduction to Steelbeak, he has a Steel Beak
and is quite strong, though not particularly smart.
Double-o-Duck is a game at Funzos that uses VR, and Dewey
thinks the whole experience of being captured by FOWL and high stakes chases is
all part of the game. Launchpad, enhanced by the intelligence ray thinks
otherwise but sacrifices his enhanced intelligence to stop FOWL dumbing down the
whole world. This, naturally was not Bradford’s plan and he finds the whole
ordeal, and having to clean up their mess, irritating.
I probably should’ve already mentioned this, but they’ve modified the opening theme animation so Della is now also part of the adventure. The Lost Harp of Mirvana! Is next and Della suddenly doesn’t like Fish. I think that might’ve been an excuse to side-line her in this episode. Anyway, the Harp is a truth-teller who must answer every question with the truth and alert everyone when someone is lying. This is interesting for Mrs Beakley who has made a career on secrets and lies, including a few she tells Webby. It’s an interesting shift in the dynamic between Louie and Webby. One thing of note at the end when Mrs B says there are no more secrets between her and Webby, you can hear the Harp tell us she’s fibbing.
Louie’s Eleven! Is next, and if you’ve followed my reviews
or know about classic heist films, or just have good taste you’ll know which
film this is a reference to. The 3 Caballeros need to perform in a big gala
to gain recognition and Louie has the ‘perfect scheme’ to get them in. Their
major obstacle is Daisy Duck. And they’ve done an interesting job in updating
Daisy from the old ball-and-chain stereotype. She’s still headstrong and
hot-tempered, but it’s less directed at Donald and it’s interesting that whilst
it’s become a running joke that no-one understands Donald, she understands him
perfectly, and even enjoys his singing *shudders*
Falcon Graves is running security, nice to see him back, DJ
Daft Duck makes a reappearance and Donald and Daisy get their meet cute stuck
an in elevator. Who are Louie’s 11. Well, Louie himself, Donald, Jose and
Panchito obviously, Huey gets a minor role, Dewey is annoying wildcard as per
usual, Gyro provides them with com-links, then we have Jane, his inside guy at
Funzos who’s working catering here. A Harpie got roped into this somehow. Webby’s
here facilitating the aforementioned meet cute and Manny serves as the muscle
when it’s revealed Falcon was playing to con to rob the place. Anyway, when
things go completely awry, a wildcard like Dewey is actually pretty useful.
This episode was a blast to watch, but this is a Huey season
and we need a Huey story, and we get one with Astro BOYD! Turns out BOYD was a
robot created by Gyro when he was intern in the city of Tokyolk. And yes, the
title is a direct reference to Astro Boy and it’s not difficult to see the
parallels. BOYD shows he’s a force to be reckoned with in his own right, able
to take on and even defeat Gizmoduck.
Moving onto Rumble for Ragnarok! introducing semi-Norse
mythology into the already existing semi-Greek mythology, like God of War
except without the blood. Interesting that they turn a throwaway line from a
Christmas special into an episode concept. Huey and Dewey both get thrown out
of their comfort zone and Louie very much into his, I enjoyed this, moving on.
The Phantom and the Sorceress! Is a very important episode
as it’s the conclusion to Lena’s arc in the show. And it’s a proper
introduction to the Phantom Blot, who has a knockoff Infinity Gauntlet capable
of absorbing magic and really has it out for Magika, he was undercover as the
Funzos Mascot, where Magika briefly worked and never took his opportunity.
Anyway, Lena needs Magika’s help to master her magical
powers to take on Phantom Blot and it’s revealed that he was a resident of a
village Magika destroyed a long time ago. Anyway, through the power of an 80's
montage, Lena unlocks her true power, friendship and turns super-sayan or
something. Magika regains and loses her amulet, but now Lena has the power to
match her, in part thanks to Magika’s training. Gladstone is plagued by
Donald’s luck in this episode and that’s just cathartic after his antics.
They put a Moonlander on Earth! Is a curious episode
focusing largely on Penumbra. I wish we saw more of her with Della but the
parallels they draw with Webby in this episode are well handled. It’s also one
of only 2 major appearances by Glomgold this season. The Moonlanders have been
allowed sanctuary on Earth which is interesting, you’d figure at least some of
the spears would’ve survived and I can’t imagine Earth taking too kindly to the
invaders becoming their neighbours.
The Trickening! Is Ducktales’ only true Halloween special,
so be prepared for a lot of fun horror references. The next missing mystery is
the Forbidden Fountain of the Foreverglades! A fountain of Youth. And when
there’s a fountain of youth, Goldie won’t be far behind. This is a great testament
to Goldie and Scrooge’s complicated relationship. Rockerduck also appears here,
it feels like a footnote but he’s here, his youth is restored and Jeeves is
turned into a baby. It’s another great showcase for Louie as he’s the first to
work out the scam of the hotel.
Next up is the two-parter Lets Get Dangerous! And it had a
hell of tightrope to walk, as it’s ultimately a backdoor pilot for a Darkwing
Duck series but it’s also rather important to the story of Ducktales so I’m
probably gonna be breaking it down in more detail.
We’re heading to Saint Canard, the Hometown of one Drake
Mallard and supposedly supervillain capital of the world, except thanks to the
efforts of recently anointed Mayor Owlsen, it’s not anymore. Scrooge, Huey and
Louie are visiting Taurus Bulba, a McDuck scientist who is on the verge of a
breakthrough, though not without a series of costly accidents. Duey and
Launchpad are there to film with Darkwing Duck.
Problem, there’s no crime until they spot a young girl
breaking into the McDuck industries lab. Taurus Bulba has been working on a
project called the RAMROD, which seemingly creates matter from thin air. Huey
is immediately suspicious of this and Scrooge knows to trust him. Darkwing
discovers the intruder and chases her away, earning the adulation of the town
he so craved. But the girl, Gosalyn reveals that her grandfather also worked on
the RAMROD project, and disappeared after discovering a flaw in the plans.
Turns out the RAMOD utilises on of the missing mysteries,
the Celego Circuit. Celego was a scientist who believed that works of fiction
are doorways into other dimensions, which I guess the RAMROD has proven to be
true. Anyway, Gosalyn’s grandfather is alive just in another dimension, the
problem is they don’t know which one and the dimensional rift grows more
unstable the longer it’s opened. Scrooge orders it shut down but is sucked into
an alternate dimension that greatly resembles the original show and I’m sorry
but David Tennant can’t deliver “a sea monster ate my ice cream” like Alan
Young.
There’s a good amount of development for Darkwing too but
I’m trying to keep this segment as short as I can. As the episode closes 4
villains from the universe that inspired the Darkwing TV show arrive: Bushroot,
Megavolt, Quacker Jack and the Liquidator. Part 2 begins with Bradford Buzzard
paying Bulba a visit, yes, Bulba was a FOWL agent but has seen beyond their
ambitions and locks Bradford up along with the kids.
The kids rescue him but grow suspicious as he denounces
adventuring and calls Black Heron to pick him up.
“If you hadn’t meddled with forces you don’t understand,
Magika would never have broken the bin; the Moon would never have invaded Earth
and all of reality wouldn’t be in jeopardy!”
I’m gonna circle back to this at some point but for now all
I’ll say is, he’s full of shit!
Bushroot has grown vines blocking off access to the city,
Gizmoduck is desperately trying to cut through them whilst also talking to
Drake about how there’s no reliable way to get back Gosalyn’s grandfather using
the RAMROD! In fact, he can only open the portal once more before it becomes
too dangerous.
And he opens the portal once more and Darkwing makes him way
through, getting himself completely obliterated by the assembled supervillains.
Bradford is found out and throws the triplets into the old series dimension.
Gosalyn and Launchpad arrive to back Darkwing up before he’s thrown in as well.
Launchpad and Darkwing use their knowledge of the Darkwing show to counter the
assembled villains as Gosalyn searches desperately for her grandfather, freeing
Scrooge in the process.
But the portal is growing unstable and Gosalyn decides to
sacrifice any further chance at finding her grandfather for now by destroying the
RAMROD. Bulba is knocked down and the villains sucked back into the portal.
That may well have been a misstep if they wanted to use this as a springboard
for the show. They chase after Bradford who escapes in a FOWL marked Helicopter
because of course Black Heron used a marked helicopter, but lets Scrooge know
that FOWL is not only back but his own director is leading the charge.
Drake offers Gosalyn a position as his crime fighting
Partner whilst they find other ways to bring back her grandfather and Launchpad
is going to split his time between them and Scrooge. I guess this was
inevitable as Della has largely replaced him as the resident pilot.
It does a stellar job acting as both a pilot for a Darkwing
show and an episode of Ducktales, utilising both the FOWL and missing mysteries
plotlines, connecting them both together. Tying Taurus Bulba to Scrooge and
FOWL was also a good choice and we get an insight into the mindset of Bradford,
even he’s a complete hypocrite. I like that Dewey got a little time with
Gosalyn, since her journey is not dissimilar to his from season 1.
After giving themselves one hell of an act to follow, Escape From the ImpossiBin! Succeeds with another of my all-time favourite episodes. Beyond anything else the main through-line is paranoia and the lengths that can make you go to. Scrooge and Mrs Beakley are the primary focus of this. Scrooge has strengthened his defences through a series of death-traps and Mrs Beakley is trying to prepare Huey and Dewey by having Webby stage attacks on them, without any training of how to counter that.
This has got some great moments, Della’s rant about Gyro
(although in his defence, the black liquorice kept you alive for a decade) the
actually pretty inventive death traps, just about everything with Webby and her
Fight with Mrs Beakley at the climax. Louie gets to show off his skills,
finding inventive solutions to the death-traps.
Turns out though that whilst all this was going on, FOWL had
made their movie. Steelbeak had stolen the Celego Circuit plans, some of the
eggheads had stolen the Harp of Mirvana, Phantom Blot had stolen Gene the Genie
and someone from FOWL stole the Fountain of Youth. With that, Scrooge decides
to go on the offensive. If they want the missing mysteries, they’ll have to
contend with him and his family.
And we very quickly arrange in The Split Sword of
Swanstantine! And if I were to complain about an episode for a minute, Lena
needs to be completely useless in order to service Huey’s arc, she could take
Magika on head-on but Steelbeak, nah! Also, Violet serves as a straight-woman
to a lot of proceedings, and it’s a fun note that she has gay fathers but this
is the second episode this season where her role is being better at something
than the person who’s good at that thing.
The episode itself is a fun little story and ends with the
FOWL agents having accomplished their objective, obtaining a feather. New Gods
on the Block! Isn’t all that important, it’s another step for the Donald and
Daisy relationship but it shows that Donald has no idea how to clean his
houseboat. It's time for an episode of good idea bad idea
Good idea:
Taking out the trash
Bad idea:
Throwing trash into the pool
And now for an encore:
Good idea:
Cleaning with disinfectant
Bad idea:
Using a gaseous disinfectant around food
Those were such lovely heart shaped sandwiches, but they’re
probably ruined now.
This is an example of the kind of arguments that Daisy and
Donald can get into without it making Daisy look like a nag, because she’s
totally justified in not liking swimming in garbage and Storkules is every kind
of annoying. Also, this might be another of Della’s shining episodes as a
mother.
The First Adventure! Is a flashback episode featuring the
origin of FOWL, the first meeting of Scrooge and Donald and Della and an
important artefact in the finale, the Papyrus of binding. Anything that is
written in the Papryus is taken as Gospel, to stop Black Heron getting her
hands on it, Scrooge writes that the Papyrus will only present itself to an
heir of Scrooge McDuck.
The fight for Castle McDuck! Introduces another of the missing
mysteries, the Blessed Bagpipes of Clan McDuck. Webby gets a more active role
in this one, the Phantom blot gets a FOWL egghead sidekick named Pepper and
them getting along is adorable and we meet Scrooge’s sister, Matilda.
How Santa Stole Christmas! Finally answers the question of
what Scrooge has against Santa. Turns out they were going to set up a business
together, and even found an artefact that would help them accomplish it in one
night but Scrooge was forced out for wanting to charge people for it. I’m
making it sound like Scrooge was the victim but he really wasn’t.
Beaks in the Shell is the final appearance of Mark Beaks, as
he makes another play for the Gizmoduck armour. Waddle, his company is
apparently tanking since his phones continually catch fire. Anyway, Fenton and
Gandra Dee have been working on a secret project known as the Gizmocloud and
Gandra has been sabotaging her FOWL exploits and plans to leave once the
project is up and running. Mama breaks Louie bringing up a fake charity
mentioned in a previous episode, yet another reason why she’s awesome.
Beaks is ultimately defeated of course but just as Gandra is
about to leave, Bradford captures her and has her taken to ‘the lost Library.’
The Lost Cargo of Kit Cloudkicker! Is a treasure trove of Talespin
references, but also introduces us to another missing mystery, the Stone of
What Was. It was recovered by FOWL a long time ago but their cargo plane,
manned by Kit came under attack by Don Cornage and his pirate crew and the
stone was lost.
Dewey is immediately fascinated by Cloudkicking but he’s
not all that good at it. They recover the stone but a piece of it was chipped
off in the fight for Don Cornage, and he recovers it for FOWL. Dewey has
decided his dream is to become a full pilot.
The Life and Crimes of Scrooge McDuck! Is the penultimate
story of the show and is the cap to Louie’s personal character growth and a
showcase for many of the antagonists of the show. Scrooge and Louie are
summoned to a karmic court, Scrooge is on trial for creating his enemies. The
setup is reminiscent of Trial from Batman: The Animated series. But what are
the crimes well, for Glomgold it's about stealing the spotlight during a
treasure hunt. This incidentally was the first time that Scrooge connected with
the people.
For Ma Beagle it was about the deed to Duckburg. This one
holds the least water of the 3, it was a con from the beginning. But finally,
Magika DeSpell and this one holds a few retcons. I know Scrooge is old, but
Magika described her hatred of Clan McDuck as a centuries-long blood-feud. But
it seems that her and her brother Poe first encountered Scrooge after enslaving
a small village and turning most of them into animals. Magika took Poe’s half
of the magical amulet to attack Scrooge but he deflected the magic with his
number-one dime and a spell hit Poe, turning him into a raven, and Magika has
no idea how to change him back. Scrooge let Poe escape out of the window, as he
was busy collecting the assembled treasure.
Scrooge is embarrassed and ashamed by this action to the
point where he doesn’t defend it, even apologising not just to her, but to all
of them. But at the same time, while he may have created them, they created him
too, at least in the sense that they brought out better parts of himself that
make him the man he is.
At the centrepiece of this is Doofus Drake, the orchestrator
of the trial for revenge against Louie. Louie decides that he doesn’t want a
life-long rivalry with Doofus and though it may not seem fair, he apologises
for any harm he’s done. Of course, apologies in reality are relatively hollow
without some action behind them, but there’s no way Louie is telling Boyd to give
Doofus back his inheritance. Still, Doofus takes the apology and decides to end
it there.
Taking responsibility and apologising is not just about the
act in and of itself, it’s about taking decisive action, accepting the
consequences, improving oneself and/or making amends to those you’ve wronged
and that’s where this episode doesn’t really work for me.
And with that we come to the season and series finale. The
Last Adventure! As a 3-parter you could almost consider a tv-movie. And it
starts with Webby’s birthday party at Funzos, Scrooge paid full price and we
get a couple of cute moments, Webby grabs a cup saying it’s for water, instead
filling it with Pep, to Louie’s admiration. Of course, this is full-priced
birthday party, you’d figure drinks would be included anyway.
And then there’s Della finding out form Fethry that Donald
and Daisy plan to sail the Ocean in the houseboat on their own. But it’s time
for ‘cake’ as they take out FOWL’s security coverage of the place. Bradford
believes it’s time for the Last Adventure. Turns out the birthday party was a
cover for a raid of FOWL’s base under Funzos, meaning it’s Webby’s dream
birthday.
How did they find out about it, well Launchpad’s been
talking in his sleep and Huey managed to interpret it. No further questions… FOWL
had cleared out the lab except for one thing, two clones of Webby named May and
June. Yup, the feather that Black Heron retrieved during the sword mission was
in fact one of Webby’s.
Webby is desperate to know anything and everything about
them, and Huey is desperate to know why FOWL created them, but Mrs Beakley
attempts to keep both of them at bay. Launchpad theorises FOWL’s plan is
putting people in boxes, it’s hilarious that it’s the most accurate of their
ideas.
There’s some hijinks going on with the twins putting them at
odds with just about everyone, but the more interesting thing is the little
talk between Della and Donald, it’s a touching moment as she has to come to
terms with it and I kinda wish they had more screen-time together this season.
Huey spots one of the twins stealing the Sword of
Swanstantine and immediately assumes that they’re stealing it for FOWL. Mrs
Beakley packs her weapons and tells Scrooge she’s going off the grid for a
while.
Webby discovers May and June, now also possessing the Blessed Bagpipes of Clan McDuck. They tell her Bradford had told them that if they return with the missing mysteries, he’ll provide answers as to who they are. They also want Webby and so whilst May deals with the missing mysteries, June is left to fight Webby, and immediately gets an edge in their fight with the remaining gummiberry juice.
Of course Webby’s no slouch in a fight with Mrs Beakley's training and
whilst it looks like she’s captured, she’s in fact disguised herself as June,
whilst she holds June, disguised as Webby, tied up. Huey spots this as they head
onto Don Corange’s plane and sneaks aboard after them.
They head to the Lost Library of Alexandria, FOWL’s new
secret base. Bradford isn’t impressed that Webby was taken as a prisoner,
saying she’s the key to find the last missing mystery. Seeing that Huey snuck
aboard, Bradford tells June to take him to his office.
Their disappearance doesn’t go unnoticed for very long,
especially since Huey left his Junior Woodchuck Guidebook behind. The family is
mobilised, and Duckworth is left guarding the mansion because heaven forbid he
do anything useful. They paid his voice actor, David Kaye, I think for 2 lines.
Time for some backstory on Bradford, he was the first Junior
Woodchuck and Grandson of Isabella Finch. Of course, we see his sash and it has
one badge on it, carpentry.
Lena makes the plane invisible to allow the grownups to head
in to take on FOWL, Lil Bulb is left with Boyd. On their way in, Gyro and Manny
run into Phantom Blot who describes Manny as the Manhorse of the apocalypse. We
finally get a gargoyles reference in this show, about damn time.
Gizmoduck and Darkwing argue as the come up against
Steelbeak, inadvertently they make Launchpad feel bad and give away that the
kids are around, which Steelbeek reports to Don Cornage. His task made much
easier as Duey orders an exhausted Lena to drop the cloak.
Bradford tells Huey that he deliberately planted the map to
the journal for Scrooge to find, which is hilarious considering they didn’t end
up using it in that episode. Donald, Della and Scrooge defeat the egghead
guards but Jon Rockerduck uses some of the fountain of youth to re-age Jeeves
back into his big strong form.
Webby discovers a project file called Project April. And
yes, April May and June were originally a female counterpart to Huey, Dewey and
Louie from the original comics and yes, I think this an absolute genius use of
them. She find security footage of Mrs Beakley breaking into a base and
escaping with a baby. May and June were cloned using the stone of what was…
somehow and aged up using reverse youth tonic from the fountain.
Gizmoduck and Darkwing have Steelbeak on the ropes until he
uses the third eye diamond and the intelligence ray to make himself smarter.
Bradford hopes that Huey can talk Webby into finding the last missing mystery.
Just before Huey can agree Bradford is called away and Huey spots Gyro being
taken to a cell, and we see her that they have indeed been putting people in
boxes. Including Gandra but also Ludwig von Drake, who just never got around to
dying, he’s been too busy.
Ludwig reveals that Bradford was not just the first but the
worst Woodchuck, he hated going on adventures with his grandmother and seeks to
remove everything adventurous. He’s created a dimensional void using the celego
circuit and plans to chuck anything and everything adventurous into it. FOWL
has managed to captured a lot of supporting characters, gotta wonder how. I
guess Phantom Blot combined with Gene is just about powerful enough to conquer
Ithaquack, apparently since Zeus, Storkules and Selene are among those captured.
Jeeves is finally finished off by Mrs Beakley, who had been
undercover as an egghead. Unfortunately, they’re soon captured by Black Heron
and May. Dewey plays a game of chicken with Don Cornage, Dewey wins but the plane
crashes as a result. Mrs Beakley is taken to a room to be interrogated with the
Harp of Mirvana serving as a lie detector. ‘June’ is left to interrogate her.
Mirvana gets one line which may well have been a reuse of one from a previous
episode, but they’d still have to pay her for it, it’s amazing the lengths this
show is going to.
So the truth, Agent 22 was raiding FOWL’s HQ but found there
a clone, and decided to forestall her spy game and raise this child in the
safest place she knew, McDuck Manor. Bradford, having worked out the deception
decides to make an offer, if she helps him get what he wants, he’ll tell her
the truth of her creation.
The kids survived the crash though somehow BOYD’s body is
gone and he to borrow Lil Bulb’s for this mission. Webby is taken somewhere and
she approaches the alter a familiar papyrus presents itself to her. Bradford
tells her she was created to help defeat Scrooge McDuck once and for all, and
with that, she just did.
Lena and Violet re-enforce Manny in his fight against
Phantom Blot and Lena is able to beat Blot relatively easily, freeing Gene who
disappears since the Lamp is elsewhere. Manny takes on his full Gargoyles form.
BOYD and Gosalyn re-enforce Launchpad in his fight against Steelbeak, with Darkwing
and Gizmoduck both in a nearby cell.
Dewey and Louie rescue Huey, Gyro and the others but are
quickly recaptured by May and June. Bradford talks with Scrooge, he believes
the chaos created from adventuring is damaging to the world. He also implies that he was involved in Duckworth’s death.
He and Scrooge fight but to gain an edge he carries the
Sword of Swanstantine. Boyd attempts to hack the armour but whilst Gosalyn and
Launchpad have Steelbeak on the ropes, Steelbeak evens the odds by opening some
more cells, they captured Flintheart Glomgold, the Beagles and Magika, and for
some reason, Phantom Blot didn’t immediately drain her magic when she was
captured. Gosalyn is defeated, as are Lena, Violet and Manny when they arrive,
leaving just Launchpad and the Gizmoduck armour.
Bradford defeats Scrooge with one final revelation, that he
told Della about the Spear of Selene and I think it’s time for the rant I’ve
been saving for most of this review. Bradford is an agent of order but his
action have directly and indirectly lead to as much chaos as Scrooge. So,
remember this line
“If you hadn’t meddled with forces you don’t understand,
Magika would never have broken the bin; the Moon would never have invaded Earth
and all of reality wouldn’t be in jeopardy!”
So the first one of those is accurate to an extent,
especially given what we saw in the Life and Crimes of Scrooge McDuck. The
other two are very bold lies. Bradford told Della about the Spear with the
intention of tearing Scrooge and his family apart, that to me at least implies
he knew about cosmic storm that stranded Della on the moon and gave Lunaris the
last thing he needed for his invasion plan. The second is even bolder a lie, as
Bulba was hired by Bradford and the chaos was caused by him following orders.
More proof of this is that he hired Gandra Dee, so she could
do dangerous experiments with minimal oversight, the exact kind of chaos he
hoped to contain. The others at least had motivations that could align with
some of FOWL’s goals, like world domination, Gandra just wanted the space and
funding to do her own work.
Bradford is as much an instrument of chaos as anyone else,
his goals are from the get-go unobtainable and I realise that might be the
point I just wish that in a show this self-aware, someone might actually have
told them that.
So Bradford gives Scrooge an ultimatum. He’ll toss his
family into the vortex that eliminates things from existence if he doesn’t sign
away his right to adventure and to ensure that the contract can’t be broken,
he’ll sign it on the Papyrus of binding. This plan requires giving the papyrus
to Scrooge, he could do any number of things with it to save his family and
stop Bradford if he were sneaky about it.
To show his conviction he throws Black Heron into the
vortex, which she could’ve probably escaped with the grapple arm if she wasn’t
so damn impressed. Now the kids have seen the Papyrus and the know how it can
only appear to an heir of Scrooge, the conclusion is obvious. Webby is in fact
Scrooge’s daughter/clone.
It's actually a pretty good twist, there have been hints of
this from day 1 and it’s a great payoff to all her character growth. And makes
the line from Last Crash of the Sunchaser when he tells her that she isn’t
family hit even harder in retrospect. This breaks May and June who realise
they’ve just been pawns to get the paper, Webby appeals to them to get her and
the others free and save their family.
Back with Launchpad, he’s along against a whole gaggle of
villains. Fenton and Darkwing give a speech about how Launchpad inspired them
to be a hero, and several others including Penumbra for some reason chime in to
agree.
“We may be heroes, but you have the heart of one”
Screw that, Launchpad is a hero in his own right! As he shows by donning the
Gizmoduck armour and crashing his way through the assembled villains,
destroying the intelligence ray and freeing everyone. Scrooge is stalling by
reading the fine-print so Bradford grabs his most trusted ally, Donald Duck and
holds him over the vortex. That’s enough to get Scrooge to sign the contract.
From there it’s up to his family to save the day, first Gyro
shuts down the vortex, saving Donald in the process, Webby holds her own with a
spare cane that I guess was lying around and Louie grabs the contract to look
for a flaw, and find a flaw they do. And yeah, this is cheesy but it’s been the
mantra of the show since the beginning so there’s no way it couldn’t work.
“Family is the greatest adventure of all”
But the final defeat of Bradford doesn’t come at the hands
of Scrooge’s family, instead it’s Scrooge’s villains who get the final word,
Magika turns Bradford into a more conventional buzzard and they fly away. I
guess they didn’t want to content with the assembled masses of Scrooge’s
family. Or it was a one-time deal since they just rescued them. Mrs Beakley is
about to head off, but Webby is quick to assure her she’s still family to her.
And what of May and June, well Donald intends to take them
on his adventure with Daisy. A cute ending for them.
So that was the third and final season of Ducktales, a
season that went big without sacrificing what made the show special. A lot of
care was taken to give each character their individual personalities and their
personalities clashing is a source of a lot of the comedy. Not to say that the
stories themselves aren’t comedic, the show has a very self-aware style, they
know how dumb some of their stories are and are very aware of the tropes.
The show isn’t going to show you a run of the mill adventure
story very often, in fact they often build it up, to subvert it for a
completely different story. I can’t see many a complaint about it because life
in Duckburg can be just as adventurous as life chasing people around in
minecarts.
I love all of our main 4 heroes, Huey, Dewey and Louie were
reimagined off sibling tropes. Huey is the most responsible and intelligent
one, Dewey is the attention seeking middle child and Louie is the one who knows
he can get away with stuff. They have distinct and rather adult-sounding voices
and is a bit distracting at first, but you get used to it quickly and their
voices match their personalities quite wonderfully.
But honestly, Webby is by far the biggest departure from the
original show. I don’t know a lot about her in the original show, I know she
had a rather baby-ish voice, she was definitely a lot younger than her
counterpart here. Webby is excitable, socially inept but incredibly capable as
an adventurer, much more-so than any of the boys. She’s able to stand on her
own in stories without the Triplets or Scrooge and the show is better for it. She
doesn’t have her own season arc but has stories scattered throughout and takes
equal billing with Huey in the finale
Mrs Beakley is a vast improvement over the original show. No
jokes about her fainting at the slightest sign of unusual crap, instead she’s a
secret agent, and everyone seems to know, apart from Donald. Maybe she wasn’t
as good an agent as we thought.
It's nice to see the adults act like adults certain
situations. Mrs Beakley especially, she never comes off as annoying and she’s
rarely an antagonist but she’s stern when she feels she needs to be, because
she genuinely cares. Della gets her moments too, I genuinely love her
development in Timephoon, it’s a pity season 3 doesn’t give her a moment like
that. Even if it was her prioritising finding Huey when they land at the library
or something. Still, Della really fits in the Disney Duck universe, and I
wouldn’t be against her reappearing in other media.
Scrooge McDuck is not the main character of this show, there
are episodes where his appearances are minimal, he’s in his own less important
side-plot or he’s absent entirely. That’s not necessarily bad just an
observation. His greedier aspects are toned down for the most part, he’s not
really hunting treasure for the money, more for the thrill.
That’s not to say his trademark greed and stinginess are
gone entirely, he grumbles about paying for Burritos, doesn’t want to pay for a
buffet for Mark Beaks, goes mad over the theft of 87 cents, uses the same
teabag for a month, owns the dead to Duckburg and leases it out to the people,
tries to talk Owlsen down from dimes to pennies for their charity, and then
there’s a side-plot where he gets greedy for arcade tickets and cries when all
it got him was a moustache comb.
Still, the other thing that he values is hard work,
detesting the idea of handouts and despising layabouts like Gladstone. He’d be
a right-wing hero if the right wing hadn’t gone fucking nuts. David Tennant
replacing the late Alan Young as Scrooge had a tough act to follow and I’m
pleased to say he doesn’t disappoint. His Scottish accent is genuine which is
always a plus and he brings the right balance of manic energy and calculating
charm to the character. I wish he were a default voice for Scrooge like Alan
Young has been for all these years.
Donald’s design is an interesting update of his classic
design. Tony Ansalmo has been voicing Donald for a while and he does great work
here as well. I think this the first time they’ve acknowledged Donald’s voice
being difficult to understand in-universe. They even used it as a contributing
factor to his anger issues. It’s why someone like Daisy, who understands him
perfectly and even enjoys his singing, somehow, is the perfect woman for him.
The voice acting is pretty solid with some spectacular voice
direction, I don’t think a single line had off-delivery.
The animation is an interesting style, the characters are
rather angular and the backgrounds are given almost a pointillism-style where
they colour with dots. The animation is very fluid, creating some very
good-looking action scenes and the show has a lot of them, it’s clear this show
had a decent amount of money thrown at it.
Are there any major negatives? Well, I’ve mentioned
Duckworth a few times being a disappointment. I feel like they brought him back
but had no clue what to do with him so ultimately didn’t utilise him. A lot of
his roles from the original show are filled by Mrs Beakley, but I’m sure they
could’ve done something. Maybe have him be the one babysitting Louie in
Glomtales instead of the robot.
Beyond that, the jokes around Mark Beaks are a bit hit and
miss, he’s my least favourite of Scrooge’s villains and the self-awareness can
hit overkill at points. And with such a big family, not everyone gets their
dues. Penumbra has one episode in season 3 before the Moonlanders are basically
forgotten, even having them in the background might’ve been something and
Huey’s overall arc felt like it had some bits missing, the triplets have a
scene where they make up when Dewey and Louie rescue Huey but they’d never actually
fallen out for more than an episode.
Still, these are
minor in the grand scheme of things and I don’t think there’s a single episode
of the show I can call bad.
R E B 9 9 T
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