#and don't get me started on the mad disrespect to Jim Cummings

[masterhallmark]

Talespin nerd chiming in. Rant incoming

Don Karnage actually was never stupid. He had moments where his emotions got in the way, but there were multiple episodes where HE ALMOST WON.

Hell, the beginning of "Stuck on You" is literally him winning, and his plan only being foiled because he tried to make a dramatic entrance and Baloo accidentally hit him while not paying attention to where he was flying. Oh, and that same episode, he had a $10,000 bounty on his head. Since it takes place in the 30's, that's OVER $228,000 IN TODAY'S CURRENCY. Do you have any idea how much of a THREAT you have to be to get a bounty that big!? That's just below a typical FBI most wanted list bounty. You have to have AT LEAST killed someone and be considered armed and dangerous to get that kind of bounty.

Sources:

The FBI's most wanted list for bounty comparison (warning, some of these entries committed highly disturbing crimes, such as child murder, human trafficking, domestic murder, terrorist connections, etc.):

In Talespin, while Don Karnage could be funny, he was still a GENUINE THREAT, and it's even made clear that Baloo is one of the FEW characters to be able to thwart him consistently. Heck, half of the comedy in Talespin featuring him was Don Karnage having to deal with the antics of his dim-witted crew, and there were multiple episodes showcasing how the crew couldn't function without Don Karnage in charge. The one time he sent them to do a simple kidnapping on their own, the would-be victim took over the ship by convincing the pirates they needed to practice being intimidating. They NEED him to function.

And don't get me started on how they took Kit Cloudkicker - a child prodigy with a talent for piloting and navigation- and turned him into a complete moron who could do neither. Like, HOLY CRAP how do you mess up a character that badly?!

I'm 99% sure the people who worked on DT17 never actually watched Talespin at all, and got their ideas from a summary made by a hater who also never actually watched the show.

I was thinking about how it seems like a common criticism for the Ducktales is the fact that the characters can be a bit too stupid... and yeah.

It isn't that noticeable in new characters. But in older characters it definitely is. In some cases it can fit or be really funny that you kind of let it slide (Doofus and Flintheart come to mind)

But in many cases it just feels like it oversimplifies the characters and remove what initially made them so interesting in the first place. Steelbeak comes to mind as he we went from being a suave James Bond-esque villain to just a stupid lackey. Don Carnage went from being maybe a little bit of an idiot, but still competent with his enemies being usually adults (and a kid), to barely competent with his core enemy being a child. And I know I said Flintheart Glomgold earlier as one of the "acceptable" ones, but I still miss how he was reflection of Scrooge at his worst and a devious legitimate threat.

And another character that I really think was screwed over by this... is Launchpad. Now some people have mentioned this already and some might be confused. But what I thought was interesting when reading the pitch bible for the Darkwing Duck spinoff is that they seem to go out of their way to clarify that Launchpad is very stupid and that didn't sit right for me.

Tbh I know Launchpad mostly from Darkwing Duck and while he can be oblivious, naive, and not the most intellectual... I don't know if I would call him stupid. He feels "stupid" in the same way Goofy is, and I wouldn't call Goofy stupid either. I kind of wonder if this mindset influenced how they characterized him and the others and is part of the reason why some characters feel so off.

I feel like the writers saw making character's stupid was an easy way to make characters funnier, but it didn't work all the time and made them more frustrating than funny. Again especially if you knew the originals and saw how they had more to them