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thewebcomicsreview · 2 years ago

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The Webcomic Reviews Mini Reviews Masterpost, Part 1

People always ask me what I think of various webcomics, so I decided to start collecting my thoughts in one place! Click the images to go to the comic! Comic titles with a ⭐ after them are recommended, but even if I don't give a comic a star, that doesn't mean you won't like it.

[un]Divine ⭐

What is it: A highschooler sells his soul for a big titty demon gf, and now has to have anime battles against angels who keep trying to eat him.

The Good: Excellent art and monster designs, some of the better fights in webcomics.

The Bad: Danny is kind of a bland protagonist. The comic keeps threatening to veer into femdom porn, which may be a good thing for some of you. Comic is on permanent semi-hiatus and updates very infrequently

You should read it if: You wanna read a comic with big fights, big angels, and big titties.

Ava’s Demon

What is it: A bunch of kids possessed by demons have space adventures and are sad

The Good: Extremely good art. Occasional "high production value" moments with music and limited animation. The single-panel page format really highlights the art.

The Bad: Bland writing, weak characters. The single-panel page format really slows the flow of reading it.

You should read it if: Learning that the Wrath demon is named “Wrathia” doesn’t strike you as comically dumb

Awkward Zombie ⭐

What is it: It’s a comic that makes jokes about video games

The Good: It’s the best comic that makes jokes about video games

The Bad: If you haven’t played the game in question, you might not get the jokes. Awkward lack of zombies.

You should read it if: You like jokes about video games. I don't....it's not a complex premise.

Camp Weedonwantcha ⭐

What is it: A bunch of kids are left at summer camp forever by parents who’ve abandoned them to die. Wacky comedy and feel-good moments ensue.

The Good: Cute adventures with kids, reminiscent of some of the better Nicktoons from the 90s. Surprisingly emotionally effective when it wants to be.

The Bad: While the ending is satisfying in its own way, many plot threads go unresolved

The Terrible: Nickelodeon bought the rights and is sitting on them.

You should read it if: You like slice of life adventures with blasts of dark humor and feels

Cloudscratcher

What is it: Ducktales, with Genocide!

The Good: Cute and generally likable characters. Decently paced

The Bad: Doesn’t really excel at anything. Weirdly insistent about totally not being a furry comic even though it obviously is.

The Terrible: The author is a white nationalist, and the lack of link is intentional.

You should read it if: You like 80s cartoons and hate minorities

Cornucopia ⭐

What is it: A ninja is sent on a mission to literally steal candy from a nation of morons, fails.

The Good: Good art and well-paced storytelling. Clever use of different types of word balloons. High joke-per-page ratio

The Bad: Doofy tone may not be your cup of tea. Seems to have died young, though the first chapter is still a complete story

You should read it if: You like JelloApocalypse’s videos on YouTube, or his series Epithet Erased, since he made this

Dresden Codak

What is it: A genius inventor has wacky adventurers, then goes to a flying city and spends most of the comic’s run embroiled in a conspiracy run by evil anime villains.

The Good: The drawings are pretty. The early comedy adventures are quirky and charming.

The Bad: Panel layout and composition, especially early in Dark Science, is atrocious. Presents the comic as a feminist power fantasy, but the main character usually has her tits out and has had her clothes burnt off on multiple occasions.

The Terrible: The author is a notorious jerk. As of this writing, The Dark Science storyline has been running for eight years and has yet to reach a triple-digit number of pages, even though it’s a full-time job for which Diaz earns $4,000+/mo on Patreon.

You should read it if: You thought the best part of Ghost in the Shell was the lesbian orgy boat.

Drop Out (NSFW) ⭐

What is it: Two girlfriends go on a road trip to kill themselves in style

The Good: Short enough to be read in one sitting. Surprisingly good visual storytelling for a first comic. Realistic dialogue and high tension keeps you engaged even when not much is happening. Subtle details that don’t become apparent until a second read reward paying attention.

The Bad: Heavy subject matter. Lettering can be tough to read in early pages.

Content Warnings: Drug Abuse, Suicide, Mental Health Issues, Detransitioning….a list of all the difficult content in this comic would be so long it’d look like I’m making a joke. This is a heavy comic.

You should read it if: You like arty dramatic comics that deal with uncomfortable topics

Dumbing of Age

What is it: College students obsessed with late 80s-early 90s pop culture have relationship troubles

The Good: Of all the popular comics it’s trendy to shit on, this is by far the best. Solid gag-a-day strip with plots that move at a decent pace.

The Bad: Realistic depictions of abusive parents co-exists in the same comic as a literal superhero, leading to some jarring tonal confusion.

You should read it if: You like newspaper-style drama comics.

Everything Is Fine

What is it: Maggie and Sam are a normal married couple in a very strange world where proving your loyalty is the key to winning, and the best way to prove your loyalty is to show someone else is disloyal. And also everyone wears mascot suit cat heads all the time.

The Good: Well-written characters, a novel premise, and excellent pacing. I’m not the biggest fan of the webtoon “really tall page” format, but it’s taken advantage of at times for nice transitions

The Bad: The webtoon format can be irritating, and the worldbuilding is toeing the line between “compelling mystery” and “If there were two astronauts on the moon and one shot the other wouldn’t that be fucked up?”-ism.

Content Warning: Gore, Suicide themes. Every page with such content has a warning on it (which works better in Webtoon format, actually)

You should read it if: You liked the dystopian fiction fiction books you had to read in high school.

Gunnerkrigg Court ⭐

What is it: A girl attends a scientific school in a magical world that’s honestly not even slightly like Harry Potter but people say it is because they think J. K. Rowling invented British schools

The Good: Good art and fantastic panel composition. Slow-burning dark fantasy mystery.

The Bad: Takes a little while to find its groove. Starts feeling rushed and confusing near the end.

The Terrible: Boxbot

You should read it if: You like dark fantasy stories, or stories in general.

Homestuck ⭐?

What is it: A kid wants to play a video game but it’s downstairs and he doesn’t feel like talking to his dad yadda yadda yadda the universe explodes. Was briefly ungodly popular.

The Good: High production values, many updates are music videos with excellent music. Great character writing, especially in Act 5. Toby Fox, the creator of Undertale, did a lot of the music, and arguably isn’t even the best musician featured.

The Bad:The early part of the comic is brutally slow-paced, and is an impossible hurdle for some.

The Terrible: The ending is widely considered a major disappointment, and attempts to turn the comic into a franchise have been met with mixed reviews. The prose epilogues are deeply divisive.

Content Warning: A lot gorier than you might expect, mitigated by the cartoony art style, abusive relationships, the epilogue is just generally gross.

You should read it if: You want to see what the hell all those kids in grey face-paint at anime conventions were about

You should also consider: Just getting the music off the bandcamp, it’s really good.

Homestuck 2

What is it: A “dubiously canon” sequel to Homestuck, following from The Homestuck Epilogues, made by a different creative team. Follows two intersecting future timelines

The Good: The art is quite nice, and the new characters are fun and likable. Very bold in its ideas, for better or for worse it’s rarely boring. One of the few webcomics to be able to integrate trigger warnings clearly while remaining non-obtrusive with them. Faster-paced than the original Homestuck (low bar!) and has a few clever presentation ideas. Willing to be its own thing. If you’re worried it’s just “Homestuck 1 but more of it”, this is not that.

The Bad: Not at all a stand-alone comic, Homestuck 2 is completely incoherent if you’re not familiar with Homestuck 1 and the Homestuck Epilogues. Does not have the big multimedia productions Homestuck 1 was known for. Beloved characters from Homestuck 1 can come off really badly, which upsets a lot of people. If you’re looking for “Homestuck 1 but more of it”, this is not that.

The Terrible: At times, this comic is actively trying to piss off the readership by dragging out unpopular plot revelations. I actually like this about it, but unsurprisingly a lot of people don’t.

You should read it if: If you have to ask “Should I read Homestuck 2?”, the answer is probably “No”. This is a comic for people who are riding the Homestuck train to the bitter end.

You should also consider: Reading my Liveblog of it

Kiwi Blitz ⭐

What is it: A precocious young girl gets a Kiwi-shaped robot and decides to become a superhero ridding the world of nefarious furries. More of a cute character drama than a superhero comic, and more of a superhero comic than a mecha one.

The Good: Cute artstyle. Not without dramatic stakes, but fairly light and fun throughout minus a few people getting shot. The android 42 is stand-out great character.

The Bad: Prone to long hiatuses as the author's main comic is now Sleepless Domain.

You should read it if: You liked Sleepless Domain, and are looking for a somewhat lighter comic by the same author.

Latchkey Kingdom ⭐

What is it: A girl goes on adventures in a magical land of idiots

The Good: Good but not overbearing comedy. Tight chapters. Strong side characters

The Bad: Thanks in part to Patron-backed stories in between the “main” chapters, can feel like an episodic series with no main character or driving plot

The Neutral: Willa is a semi-silent protagonist, and often gets overshadowed by the wacky people she meets. Cerberus Syndrome, executed well

You should read it if: You like adventure, silly characters, and jokes about Dark Souls.

Leasebound

What is it: Two lesbians are contrived into sharing an apartment, then the comic becomes a polemic about how trans people are evil. The second-best TERF webcomic on this list

The Good: This comic has no redeeming qualities

The Bad: It’s hella transphobic, and not even particularly interesting about it the way Sinfest can be. Everything that’s not hateful is boring, and the comic is practically going “Go on, be offended, blog about me, give me atteeeennnnttttiiiiiooooonnn!”

You should read it if: You really shouldn’t, and I’m not linking to it

Least I Could Do

What is it: Rayne Summers is the best at everything and you should listen to him

The Good: This comic updates on time regularly. Sometimes it updates without word balloons by accident, making it surreally funny

The Bad: Poorly thought-out political rants; few jokes, severe overuse of beat panels, copy-pasted art.

The Terrible: Designed to go viral, not to be entertaining; makes panels wordless just so they can be used as preview images

You should read it if: You have committed horrible sins and wish to atone

Legend of the Hare

What is it: I wrote this! A white trash loser girl is peer pressured into becoming a magical girl by a pair of pushy rabbits. A spinoff of the print comic Blade Bunny, written and drawn by the current creative team of Saffron and Sage.

The Good: Bouncy and cartoony art. Strong and memorable characters. Very weird and freewheeling.

The Bad: The plot is an absolute mess, stalling out and even going backwards at times, though it mostly comes together at the end. The tone is wildly inconsistent.

The Terrible: Kind of South-Parky in its humor sometimes

You should read it if: You like Saffron and Sage and want to see a comic by the same team when they were less experienced.

Nan Quest ⭐

What is it: In this spiritual sequel to Ruby Quest, a goat girl electrician sets out to fix a broken fuzebox and ends up ensnared in a psychological horror conspiracy.

The Good: Much more effective use of the simple MS Paint art style, with more color and some simple animations (animated panels being marked [A], a convention Homestuck would later adopt for its [S] sound panels). The characters are better fleshed out than in Ruby Quest, and the horror is more effective as well, with less gore and more tension.

The Bad: Though used effectively, the art is still MS Paint doodles. The story mechanics behind the mystery are much more ambiguous, which can be a plus.

Content Warning: Gore, threatened sexual violence.

You should read it if: You like Ruby Quest and/or psychological horror comics that can be read in a few hours.

Moby: Back from the Deep

What is it: A zombie killer whale attacks a small town.

The Good: The art is nice

The Bad: Egregious overuse of narration.

The Terrible: It’s a beat for beat ripoff of the movie Jaws, down to some characters having their names only marginally changed from their Jaws counterpart (e.g. “Alex Gardener” is the name of the Alex Kintner analogue)

You should read it if: You can’t find a Jaws torrent.

Mokepon ⭐

What is it: A dickhead teenager is forced on a Pokemon adventure, and learns a valuable lesson about friendship while being dragged into a criminal conspiracy. A Pokemon fanfic that’s somewhat darker than the source material (though not really “grimdark”)

The Good: Good action scenes, nice manga-style art. Notable improvement in art and storytelling over time. Atticus’ slow-burn character growth is satisfying.

The Bad: The early chapters are almost a completely different comic, and it takes a little while to find its groove.

You should read it if: You liked Pokemon Special

Monster Pulse ⭐

What is it: Kids’ internal organs become sentient external organs, and they have to keep it a secret from an evil orginization.

The Good: Cool twist on the surprisingly rare monster pet genre. Not afraid to upend the status quo

The Bad: No real obvious flaws, but if you don’t find the premise interesting, you probably won’t like it.

You should read it if: You were a fan of monster-pet stories like Digimon Tamers

The Monster Under The Bed

What is it: A teenager finds a demon girl under his bed, rom-com ensues

The Good: Cute anime-esque premise

The Bad: Gets progressively hornier to to point where I'm not sure if I should even leave it on this list. Egregious use of photos instead of drawing backgrounds, making outdoor scenes look awful

You should read it if: You like trashy Japanese animes

Narbonic ⭐

What is it: A shlubby loser gets a job working for a mad scientist. Mad sciencey things occur, and the comic experiences an incredible jump in quality in the back half

The Good: Short comic, comfy and easy to read. The best and most satisfying ending arc of any webcomic ever.

The Bad: Some “LOLRANDOM” humor, especially early on.

The Terrible: The first few comics are almost literally unreadable due to messy handwritten lettering and low quality scans.

You should read it if: You love seeing a story build to a proper conclusion, and you don’t mind a rough start.

Octopus Pie ⭐

What is it: Slice-of-life dramedy where twenty-somethings try to become adults and/or get laid while navigating New York life. Completed comic.

The Good: If you direct your attention above, you will see the incredible coloring. There are other comics that have better plots and even better characters, but Octopus Pie is uniquely good at hitting a mood. Occasionally does some infinite canvas stuff that’s neat.

The Bad: This is a comic about exploring ideas and kind of drifting around through life, and isn’t a big plot-focused comic with a lot of big dramatic reveals. Which I don’t think is bad, but it might not be your thing.

You should read it if: You liked stories about adults trying to figure out how to grow up, and like seeing characters age.

Out-of-Placers ⭐

What is it: A human man is turned into a female rat creature, and has to navigate a low-fantasy world while learning their incredibly stupid ways and trying to get himself back to normal.

The Good: Really good worldbuilding, with interesting, fleshed out, and unique fantasy races. There are licensed Dungeons and Dragons books with less cool ideas for a campaign in them.

The Bad: Can get kind of edgy in ways that don’t always work, and occasionally gets a bit gross. If the premise made you think it was a furry fetish comic, it’s not, but it keeps threatening to become one if you don’t whap it with a newspaper and say “No” very firmly every now and then.

You should read it if: Your favorite DnD race is kobolds.

Paranatural ⭐

What is it: Kids bust ghosts in a parody of shounen anime tropes

The Good: Good banter, creative panel layouts, and characters you want to root for.

The Bad: The story rapidly increases in scale, causing the pacing to slow down somewhat. The story later transitions to an illustrated prose format, which some people can't really get into.

You should read it if: You liked Bleach before it became Dragonball

Prequel -or- Making A Cat Cry: The Adventure ⭐

What is it: An Elder Scrolls fanfiction, in which an alcoholic catgirl heads to a new land to try to make a better life, and generally fails.

The Good: Inventive use of the web as a storytelling medium. Great character writing. Lovable protagonist. Excellent payoff to years or life kicking the protagonist in the face.

The Bad: Years of life kicking the protagonist in the face. Can thus be depressing, especially early on, sometimes to the point of being offensive (see Content Warnings)

The Terrible: Very slow and irratic update schedule

Content Warnings: Alcoholism, Depression, the protagonist gets blackout drunk and wakes up in bed next to strange men several times, which is played for comedy.

You should read it if: You like slow burn character development. You like stories where the protagonist has a hard time

Problem Sleuth

What is it: A detective tries to leave his office using user-submitted commands, and gets in a few tangents along the way. Mostly known now as “The thing Andrew Hussie did before Homestuck”, but it was a popular comic in its own right.

The Good: Much better art than most reader-driven comics, bizarre and clever, with a dramatic finish.

The Bad: Holy shit, you thought Homestuck meandered? Problem Sleuth will do nearly anything and everything readers asked him to do, and this is a veeeeeery convoluted comic that has thus aged somewhat poorly.

You should read it if: You thought Homestuck was best before the Trolls got involved.

Questionable Content

What is it: Humanity achieves a technological utopia in the background while hipsters in Massachusetts complain about their dating lives. Later begins focusing much more heavily on all the robots.

The Good: A rotating menagerie of quirky cute girls. Had a major trans character before it was cool.

The Bad: The comic kind of transitions from being about one thing to being about another thing several times, to the point where onetime protagonists show up less and less or even get dropped altogether in favor of the New Thing the comic is.

You should read it if: You want a comfy and diverse slice-of-life comic.

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the-robot-bracket · 2 years ago

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Last Time! The Top 50 Robots Submitted

1. Five Pebbles - Rain World (13 times)

2. Wheatley - Portal (11 times)

3. GLaDOS - Portal (10 times)

4. Data - Star Trek (9 times)

5. Zane - Ninjago (8 times)

6. Murderbot - The Murderbot Diaries (8 times)

7. WALL-E & EVE - WALL-E (8 times)

8. Gir - Invader Zim (8 times)

9. K1-B0 - Danganronpa (7 times)

10. Look To The Moon - Rain World (7 times)

11. Aegis - Persona (7 times)

12. Pixal - Ninjago (6 times)

13. CAR-11E - Hi-Fi Rush (6 times)

14. Fresh Cut Grass - Critical Role (6 times)

15. P03 - Inscryption (6 times)

16. Starscream - Transformers (6 times)

17. Emma Matthews - Hatchetfield (6 times)

18. Mettaton - Undertale (6 times)

19. Calculester Hewlett-Packard - Monster Prom (5 times)

20. Frobo - Amphibia (5 times)

21. R2D2 - Star Wars (5 times)

22. Robecca Steam - Monster High (5 times)

23. One-One - Infinity Train (5 times)

24. Marvin - The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (5 times)

25. Echo - Ninjago (4 times)

26. Hatsune Miku - Vocaloid (4 times)

27. Baymax - Big Hero 6 (4 times)

28. Luna - Zero Escape (4 times)

29. AM - I have no mouth and I must scream (4 times)

30. V1 - Ultrakill (4 times)

31. Jenny - My Life as a Teenage Robot (4 times)

32. Wubbox - My Singing Monsters (3 times)

33. Boyd - Ducktales 2017 (3 times)

34. Drossel von Flügel - Fireball (3 times)

35. K9 - Doctor Who (3 times)

36. Hal 9000 - A Space Odyssey (3 times)

37. Karen - SpongeBob (3 times)

38. Connor - Detroit Become Human (3 times)

39. F.R.I.D.A. - Critical Role (3 times)

40. Goddard - The Adventures of Jimmy Neutron, Boy Genius (3 times)

41. Hera - wolf359 (3 times)

42. Virgil - Portal Stories: Mel (3 times)

43. Astro Boy - Astro Boy (3 times)

44. C-3P0 - Star Wars (3 times)

45. Janet - The Good Place (3 times)

46. Lil' Hal - Homestuck (3 times)

47. Yes Man - Fallout (3 times)

48. Carl the Robot - Meet the Robinsons (3 times)

49. Cryptor - Ninjago (3 times)

50. Metal Sonic - Sonic the Hedgehog (3 times)

And the Top 20 Fandoms:

1. Portal - 103 times

2. Ninjago - 28 times

3. Rain World - 24 times

4. The Murderbot Diaries - 16 times

5. Star Wars - 16 times

6. Transformers - 14 times

7. Star Trek - 13 times

8. Invader Zim - 12 times

9. Danganronpa - 10 times

10. Ultrakill - 10 times

11. Doctor Who - 9 times

12. Detroit Become Human - 9 times

13. WALL-E - 8 times

14. Critical Role - 8 times

15. FNaF - 8 times

16. Persona - 8 times

17. Undertale - 7 times

18. Hi-Fi Rush - 7 times

19. Zero Escape - 7 times

20. Astro Boy - 7 times

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crxwnedalex · 5 months ago

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Master Post IG

All the cool kids are doing it, so here I am too /stolen

(img/gif above was found on Pinterest, all the others below are from https://www.deviantart.com/king-lulu-deer!)

I'm gonna be shitposting a lot so uh yea.

Hi, the name's Alexander! You can call my Alex, Slime or Spaghetti!!

I'm from the Caribbean and I'm a minor, i'm also a silly little transmasc!

(I like cats :P)

I like Writing, Art (like, any type of art), Music, Coding and Technology(but im a noob) I love analyzing characters and stories, goofing off and found family (i LOVE found family)

You can find me and most of my work on Quotev- Q.DivanIsMyNumberONE

You can find my ao3 posts/fics through -ZanderAlex_Questionable

I'm literally on almost anything (besides facebook and snapchat) so if you ask, i likely have!

(I use to have a Starmaker account, with a lot of friends but i'm locked out now so uhh)

I have a few tags i've 'created'

Spaghetti's Art - i tag all my own art with this, whether it's a sketch, doodle, full peice or old peice, if its mine, it's tagged

Spaghetti rambles - for some of my random ramble posts

Spaghetti's dsmp rewrite - what it says on the tin :)

and

random Spaghetti aus - is for my random au posts lol

Also a fan of Fantasy, Triller/Horror, Comedy, Space Adventures, Musicals, Minecraft, Stray Game, Cats(I have a lot of cats-), Rain, nighttime. etc

I'm back into Dream SMP right now and I have a megafic/longfic writing for it since last year. So expect a good bit of DSMP content!

I'm also a massive DuckTales 2017 fan, I post Creepypasta and Southpark content for shitsngiggles sometimes.

though my fixations change almost every other day, so uh, be warned ig lol

Never expect me to be smart, I do a lot of shit sometimes.

(here are some more fandoms i'm in the circle of!)

#shitpost #stupid shit #master post #pinned post #about me #long-ish post #spaghetti rambles

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moon-swag-tourney · 2 years ago

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Propaganda below!

Luther Hargreeves

He is a weird huge monkey man with daddy issues. What’s not to love

Spaceboy!

Della Duck

just look at her shes badass she amputated her own leg and made a prosthetic out of spare rocket parts shes not perfect but shes trying her goddamn best to be a good mother okay she is The character ever

greatest character of all time!

dear tournament runner i am so so sorry for the essay i'm about to write but i am not normal about my girl della

della duck is donald duck's twin sister and huey dewey and louie's mother

the whole history behind her is so interesting bc she unintentionally became the greatest mystery of the disney duck comic verse

one of disney's many weird rules is that their main 6 characters are not allowed to have children or parents. this rule is kinda wobbly in the sense that on one hand, it does get broken (goofy has a son in some canons & donalds mother is shown in some comics (though only in scrooge's flashbacks, she's never allowed to interact with donald)), on the other hand, it also tends to sometimes get applied to characters who are not part of the main 6 but still main characters. this rule meant, that when they wanted their main characters to interact with kids, they invented nieces and nephews. which had the added bonus that when they wanted to stories without them, they didn't have to explain the kids' absence (like for example mickey's nephews, which barely ever appear and, fun fact, were actually invented before huey dewey and louie). so, in one newspaper comic strip, huey dewey and louie were introduced and with them, della was mentioned for the first time, in a letter asking donald to take care care of the boys while their father is in a hospital from a prank they pulled. (said father was never mentioned again btw.)

after that, della didn't appear again for a while, and several shorts and comics revealed that donald has legally adopted the kids. different comics implied that donald has been taking care of the triplets their entire life, instead of just since recently like in their first appearance.

later comics actually showed della for the first time - however, only in flashbacks to donald's childhood. these comics also made her donald's twin. the only piece of media that showed her as an adult was her portrait in the duck family tree.

that is, until 2014 the first comic showing adult della and her fate was released - a dutch comic that was only reprinted in brazil, germany and the netherlands, and even in those countries, anything containing this story is pretty hard to get. it was never officially translated to english (thank god for fantranslations, tho). this comic showed della as a pilot, who tested a rocket and got lost in space when huey dewey and louie were babies. this is where her association with space and a lot of her ducktales 2017 characterisation originates from.

so, let's get into her biggest ever appearence - the ducktales reboot!

from the very beginning of this show, she's set up as the big overarching mystery - a little bit like the author from gravity falls. the pilot ends with dewey discovering a painting of her. it's a very shocking moment and for most viewers the first time they've ever seen della.

so like in the comic, she's a pilot, and she's been going on adventures with donald and scrooge for years. scrooge builds a rocket for her as a surprise gift for when her children hatch but she finds out about it and decides to take it for a test ride, during which she crashes it on the moon. so, she's stuck there, but nothing can stop della duck! she spends the entire 10 years fixing the rocket until she finally manages to get back to earth to her kids.

della is funny, strong, determined and just one of the best characters in the entire show. and she tries so hard to be a good mom to her kids after being absent for a decade even though she struggles so much to adjust back to life on earth.

i just love della so so much

#luther hargreeves #the umbrella academy #della duck #ducktales 2017 #ducktales spoilers

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duckburg-amphitheatre · 23 days ago

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Hello there Fandom!

Here is a little fun fact regarding me. I cannot draw to save my life!

Now perhaps one day that may change because there's so many ideas I have in regards to the DuckTales fandom that I would love to see come to life. From the drawing of character that I enjoy, to illustrations for the stories that I have enjoyed especially those I am crafting.

However for the meantime I am left to be a collector of fan art. Trust me when I say I have amassed a large collection. So much that while I would love to give credit to each and every artist whose piece I display here and then other sites, 9 out of 10 times I do not have that artist's name. I can only hope that they appreciate and approve my posting of their works with the full knowledge that I am not taking credit for it, ever. And that those who view these works will look up the artist on their own.

In the meantime I will add the fact that I do write fanfiction as my time permits. Sadly these days I have less time than when I did back when I wrote fanfiction years ago. Taking care of work and home is always a priority in these matters.

I write in bits and pieces at the time permits, hopping around from a chapter here or a chapter there. Sometimes at the beginning of the story, the middle or even the end and work my way backwards.

The following piece is from a work-in-progress that is post canon, with Father story dealing with Lena find out she has more family than Magica let her to believe. Since we were robbed of hearing Lena fully sing in the series, that's going to happen here. And the song she is definitely made for her.

There is a music video done for the song that is sung by a woman who is pretty close to how Kimiko Glenn could possibly sing this song. I may add on the link to it later on if anyone is curious. Note that if any of you have not seen the Arcane series on Netflix the song would be a big spoiler!

Ducktales: The Slap (WIP by Loki Darksong)

Lena was no stranger to slaps.

She had seen it done in movies, on TV and of course in real life.

One of the main reasons she saw for slapping a person was usually to wake them up so to speak from whatever stupor or hysterics they were in. She had done this to Scrooge when Magica had possessed her, taking control of her body. Which made what had just happened all the more ironic.

No one in the room moved nor made a sound, least of all Lena.

Magica had slapped her.

She stood frozen. Slowly she began to become vaguely aware of certain things. She was looking over her right shoulder. That's right. When Magica had slapped her, her face had turned in that direction.

Magica had slapped her.

She realized slowly that her eyes were wide open but she couldn't really focus on anything. Her mouth was also wide open but she couldn't seem to bring herself to close her beak. Her head was still turned to the side. In fact Lena couldn't bring herself to do anything but stand there.

A thought crossed Lena's mind. This must be what being in shock feels like. It was something like when Magica had reabsorbed her body back into her shadow but only worse. She still had a physical body this time around.

With that thought came awareness. The first was sound or at least the memory of sound. Even though the room was deathly quiet, Lena could swear she could hear the echo of that slap still ringing in the room.

Magica had slapped her.

Lena then became aware of a growing sensation on the side of her face. She had been hurt enough times to know what that meant! She had no idea what her face must look like. That would be a future Lena problem, borrowing the line from Louie. At that moment she had a bigger problem.

Getting out of that room!

All she had to do was to turn around, get her body moving, and find a safe space to collapse in. Webby’s bedroom was the first to come into her mind. Good plan. But first she had to turn around. The only problem is that Magica was still standing there in front of her.

Maybe that was a good thing. Turning around and seeing the obvious look of anger on Magica's face could help Lena deal with the emotional turmoil she felt rising up her guts.

She already had one meltdown. But then she was in the comfort of two girls and two grandmothers. The one she was feeling creeping up her spine was going to be volcanic! Given her place of birth, Lena loved the irony.

Her breath began to quicken. The sensation on her face was becoming painful. Slowly jerkingly Lena brought up her left hand to touch where Magica had slapped her.

Her face felt hot. She guessed that it was probably red looking. Maybe even swelling up as she stood there. In the whirlwind of emotions swirling through her head, rage now took center stage.

Definitely time to go!

Movement returned to her body. Lena closed her mouth, her eyes now fully focused. Out the corner of her left she could see Magica was still standing right in front of her.

Good!!!

Slowly, left hand still on her face, Lena turned her head back forward. Back towards Magica. She had fully expected the usual look of utter contempt or anger or arrogance or some combination of them all wrapped up in the older duck's usual scowl.

She was ready for it! Needed it! Lena was fully prepared for it. But she was not prepared for the actual look on Magica's face.

There was no anger. There was no contempt. There was no arrogance. What was there was a look of fear, shock and regret!

Lena was not ready for this! Not at all! Magica looked actually sorry for slapping her! Magica DeSpell!!!??

That was too much! She couldn't deal with this! She had to go! Get out of that room! Webby's bedroom, she thought! Webby’s bedroom now!

Tearing herself away from Magica’s face, Lena turned and began to walk to the staircase. Her legs were shaky. She knew that out of everyone both Webby and Violet had eyes on her. She knew they both were probably torn between running to her side or launching themselves at Magica. She knew that if she had turned to look at them she would not make it up the staircase.

Keeping her eyes locked on the staircase, Lena forced herself to keep walking. Forced herself to keep down the emotional pain, the likes of which she had never felt before, until she reached Webby's bedroom and then let the chips lay where they fell.

As she walked, Lena wished she couldn't keep thinking about the true source of this pain. The physical pain of the slap was still there. But it wasn't enough to combat the pain in her heart.

I tried, she said to herself. But this is who she is. This is who she wants to be.

It was getting harder for Lena to see. Now, on top of everything else, she was struggling to keep from crying. The tears she would not let fall were blinding her. She had known that she reached the staircase until her foot banged into it.

As she grabbed hold of the banister, Lena felt her strength giving way. She was not going to make it. If Scrooge had not been given the ability to shut down all their magic, Lena would have transformed to her full sorceress state and flown up the staircase. Hell! She would have flown across the country to be away from the Mansion at that moment!

Her feet wouldn't move.

No! No! No!!!! Lena choked back a sob in her throat! She had to get upstairs!!! She couldn't wouldn't fall apart in front of everyone. Most of all Magica!

Magica. Why! Lena closed her eyes trying to drown out the image of Magica's look of regret from her mind. Why did she have to look like that??!! Why!! Why now?! Why does it hurt me so much!?!!!

She did not know what was holding both Webby and Violet from running to her. For that Lena was grateful. But it would be only a matter of time before that changed. Running out of options, Lena looked deep into herself and pleaded, Please! Please come on! Help me!!

And from deep within her soul, something answered.

Inside her mind a melody began to play. Lena automatically knew only she could hear it. The melody was on a piano. It was soft. It was sad.

There were no words, yet. Just an intro. It was a song coming from her heart, waiting for Lena to give words to her sadness. And she did.

Lena began to sing. As she did she found she could now move.

“I Am The monster you created.

You ripped out all my parts.

Worst of all for me to live

I have to kill the part of me that saw that I needed you more.”

Slowly Lena walked up the staircase. Her sad lyrics giving her the strength to move while holding everyone in place.

“I hope you know we had everything.

But you broke me and left these pieces.

I want you to hurt like you've hurt me today.

And I want you to lose like I'll lose when I play what could have been.

Oh what could have been.”

Lena had reached the midpoint landing when a bubble of pain made itself known. She gripped the banister and let that pain be heard.

She cried out loud, “Why don't you love who I am!” What we could have been.”

Another few steps, another lyric.

“I am your ghost. A fallen angel.

You ripped out all my parts.”

The pain of her heart breaking threatened to keep her from reaching the top of the staircase.

“I wouldn't have cared what invention you made me. Because I.” Lena turned to look down the staircase to look at Magica.

“I was meant to be yours”, the lyric coming out in a choked sob.

Lena turned back gathering what emotional strength she had left to finish going up the stairs to finish her song.

“I hope you know we had everything

But you broke me and left these pieces

I want you to hurt like you hurt me today

I want you to lose like I lose when I play.

She could no longer hold back the tears.

“What could have been.”

With a cry, Lena hurled herself up the remaining flight of stairs.

At the top she broke into a run. Some small part of her was glad that she knew the layout of the Mansion at this point since she couldn't see where she was going. But somehow she made it to Webby's bedroom. Which she only realized when she tripped and fell face forward onto her friend's bed.

Only then did she let the tears loose.

#ducktales #ducktales 2017 #dt17 #lena sabrewing #Magica DeSpell #ducktales fanfiction

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toonqueen · 1 year ago

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Duckvember Day 22: Loved Duck

I was gonna try to draw Gene and Faris looking cute on a motorcycle but I have failed. I’ll try later maybe. Instead I picked a song from each of my shipping playlists. SOME CHARS I don’t have a full shipping playlist for them but I have shipping songs on their character playlist if that makes sense lol. TUMBLR will only let me post 10 links at a time so I will reblog this with more links and info. Next part coming in a second!

Duck Revenger x Alpha (Nega Donald and Nega Uno)

So I have a headcanon for Negaverse Donald and Alpha would still kinda be heroes. But of course, being the Negaverse, they have more edgy drama. Also Uncle Scrooge is evil and they have to deal with that.

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Duke L’Orange x OC Gallery

Gallery belongs to @fluxchix

This is actually from a playlist I made for a story that took place wayyy in the future where Gallery is resurrected by magic and Duke’s been alive for a good thousand years (also because of magic.) LOOK it’s a long story. There was space travel and mysteries it was great okay.

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AND THEN here’s a normal shipping song I always think of them with:

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Faustina (OC for Ducktales/Darkwing)

GOD her shipping playlist just has so many good songs in it to pick one is hard. It’s not having her shipped with anyone in particular just how she does relationships lolol. Lot of the songs make her sound worse than she really is I swear. >_> Two for her

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Also this song this has gore:

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Non Gore version:

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Fethry x Poe (Ducktales 2017)

So I ship these two for my headcanons for 87/comic blend universe. Poe and Fethry in that universe don’t start being an item until Magica and Gladstone have been together for awhile. I don’t really have a playlist for that ship because there isn’t really any drama to it to have a playlist lololol. For 2017 I have Poe being an active villain so of course more dramaaa. This playlist has a lot of Raven based songs but the main one I picked to show is just a nice angst with a twist ha.

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Gene x Djinn

Oh lawd I’ve been trying to fill their shipping play list for more happy songs because MOST of their story is happy. It’s just easy to find songs for when that ONE bad thing happens. (*cough* Merlock *cough.)

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Grimstone (Nega Gladstone) x OC Sheldrake Netta

My headcanon for Nega Gladstone is up to stuff with @cataradical OC’s Sheldrake. But they are both bastards so their playlist is full of bastard love songs.

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#duckvember #duckvember 2023 #Youtube

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writebackatya · 2 years ago

Note

⭐️ for Up, Up, and Away?

First let me just thank you @christianfoxymc for the ask and the star about Up, Up, and Away!. For those who do not know it's one of my personal favorite stories of mine and it's the first (and so far only) story in my series The Iron Duck of Steel: The Gizmoduck Movie, Part I!. Second, probably not a good idea to let me choose what to talk about because I choose the entire beach scene from the story because it contains so many different headcanons and characterization things I want to talk about! Mainly the Dewey and Gandra dynamic I want to do for this series!

Perfect timing too! A mutual of mine was questioning me why out of all the triplets and Webby would I want Dewey to be assigned to her, my answer: He’s perfect that’s why! I’ll elaborate more below but I’ll just start off by saying this thought came to me when I was thinking how often Dewey is a sidekick/partner to someone in the show (Webby, his mom, Launchpad, Kit, etc) and how Gandra often picks who she works with. And then I thought wouldn’t it be great if just once Dewey selected an adult he wanted to go on an adventure with and that adult wants absolutely NOTHING to do with him?

Before I begin I might as well give a brief summary of what’s going on in this story just in case:

Both Dewey and Webby are working on a movie called The Spear of Selene which is about their journey to find Della as well as Della’s journey home. Besides writing and directing and composing music, Dewey is playing dual roles as himself and Della. Other members of the team include Lena and Violet as well as recently signed on producer, Louie. Currently the family is at the beach to film some Moon scenes but can’t due to Funso’s Fun Zone using the space to film a commercial

While that is going on both Fenton and Gandra Dee are fighting Gizmoduck’s villain of the week, The Punnysher. A villain Gandra inadvertently helped create

But enough about that, let’s talk about the most underrated character of DuckTales: Jane the Funso’s Fun Zone employee

You know who's a great DuckTales character? Jane the Funso's Fun Zone Employee. Her job at the Fun Zone is one she clearly doesn't want to work at forever for she has plans on moving out of Duckburg, but for now she continues to work there with a smile on her face while letting a certain sharpie schemer get away with a few things such as free fruit punch. Not to mention she's worked alongside Magica and Phantom Blot, which I'm sure is no easy feat

I'm sure everyone is familiar with that fan theory that Donald Duck knows that Louie's Kids is a scam by Louie but pays his sneaky nephew anyway to support the kid and his fake children's charity. Yeah, I never was a fan of that theory, just doesn't seem to fit Donald's character in my opinion. However, I do think something similar is happening with Jane and Louie in the show

Personally, I like to think the first time the two met was when Louie first pulled off the whole "asking for a cup of water to get whatever drink he wants" scheme at Funso's. When she caught him in the act, Lil' Sharpie acted quickly on his feet and bribed her with a Funso's Token so that she saw nothing. Now obviously Jane was not going to snitch on Louie because why should she care? She just works there. But she decided to play along with it because she loved the kid's spunk and the way he was quick to think on his feet plus she doesn't care how much money Funso's lost from Louie's free drinks, thus beginning a beautiful friendship

I always loved Jane's interactions with Louie as well as Webby. When she's with Louie she's down to do whatever with the payment of a Funso's Token, including participating in a scheme to boost Louie's Uncle's failed college band into stardom. And her first and last interactions with Webby are very beautiful too. I always loved when Webby attempted to do the free drink scheme you can see Jane knows what she's trying to do and even tries to lead her to say the right thing. And in the finale when Webby asks for a cup for water you can see Jane proud of the young duck and the growth she went through. So yeah, if you ask me; Jane is a part of the McDuck found family

Besides Louie and Webby, I always figured Jane is just chill with everyone who comes to Funso's and isn't an asshole, so she's friends with the whole McDuck Family

One of my favorite things to do when writing DuckTales fanfiction is come up with nicknames for characters from other characters since that's something the show does a lot and I like the ones Jane had for the kids. I had her call Violet "Ms. Sabrewing", which yes is definitely inspired by the fact she calls Louie "Mr. Duck", but I'd say the reasons are different. For Louie, she calls him Mr. Duck in a more professional sense, while she calls Violet Ms. Sabrewing in a more formal sense because Violet always refers to others by their proper names. And as for Dewey, she calls him "The Dew Man" because of that thing Dewey Deweys with his name all the time.

So yeah, post-canon Jane still works at Funso's as a means to get by in life and as we learn is going through some rebranding:

While Dewey stood by his mother’s side, the other crew members of The Spear of Selene began exploring the set of the Funso’s ad.

“I know nothing lasts forever,” Huey said as the five birds looked over at the fake palm trees being set up by the water, “but I’m really going to miss the old Funso.”

“A lot of fun memories were had thanks to that wonderful walrus.” Louie solemnly agreed.

“I just hope I’ll have a better first impression with the new one than I did with the first one.” Webby sighed, “I’m gonna miss that walrus.”

“I mean, he’s still going to be Funso,” Lena assured the group, “just slightly different I’m sure.”

“Rebranding usually happens when a company needs to revitalize their image.” Violet stated. “But business for Funso’s Fun Zone hasn’t really shown signs of slowing down. I wonder why they’re changing their iconic mascot.”

“Well, when your last Funso was played by a member of a criminal organization and said criminal organization worked underneath your business, you might wanna do whatever it takes to make sure the public forgets about it.” An older voice answered, catching the attention of the five birds.

“Oh, hey Jane!” Webby greeted.

“Hey.”

“So word got out about F.O.W.L. and ol’ Blotty, huh?” Lena asked.

“Oh yeah, it happened like a month ago, right after your family’s last adventure-”

“Oh, that was not our last adventure.” Huey clarified.

“Yeah! We’ve been on a lot of adventure since then!” Webby added.

“Too many.” Louie chimed in.

“Okay.” Jane said trying to get back on track. “Right after your family’s last adventure that I was aware of, some disgruntled employee leaked out information about that F.O.W.L and that Blot guy. The higher ups were not too pleased when they found that out and had Blot fired, and now they want to do whatever they can to make people forget about that little ordeal.”

“Be honest,” Lena folded her arms, “was that employee you?”

Jane scoffed. “While I am honored you’d think I have the skills and intel to leak all that, it wasn’t me or any of the other Funso’s employees. The disgruntled employee was from F.O.W.L. And let me tell ya, that employee is my personal hero. Blot was honestly the worst to work with, always micromanaging. So good riddance.”

Why yes I am proud of that meta humor joke and gee I wonder who that F.O.W.L. employee was that Jane was talking about...

Anyway, could be just me, but I always wondered what kind of an effect the whole F.O.W.L. operating under Funso's would have on not just the kids, but with the general public. To me, the kids would not care. Funso's is still Funso's and all the evil people are gone! But I always imagined if word got out, the Funso company would panic and quickly do something different with the brand so the public would just forget about it? So what do you do when the previous mascot was played by a villain? Get a new actor and reboot the character of course!

So yeah, Funso's is filming an ad where the kids want to film their movie which is unfortunate for the latter and leads to an interaction I like because of each of the characters involved in it:

“We obviously do not want to disrupt the business of Funso’s Fun Zone, but the rest of the beach is being used for Duckburg’s Annual Sandcastle Building Contest,” Louie explained.

“I can’t believe we forgot that was today!” Huey said to both Violet and Webby who nodded in agreement.

I just wanted to remind the audience that these three are the huge nerds of their little group

Louie, Lena and Jane quickly glanced at one another before the green triplet continued speaking. “Anyway, do you think it'd be possible to share some of your guys’ space to film?”

Louie flipped a token to Jane, who instinctively caught before handing it back to Louie. “I’m sorry, but that is beyond my power, Mr. Duck.”

“She’s not taking the bribe, Louie.” Lena stated. “Maybe try giving her your 10 Free Funso Tokens birthday coupon.”

“I can’t! I already used mine as well as Huey’s and Dewey’s!”

“How could you?!”

“Well Huebert, I have perfected my impression of you and since we’re triplets I can pull of a very convincing Dewey look, but I’m still struggling with the voice. So I just don’t talk while I play him.”

I just love Lena being snarky about Jane and Louie's relationship while Louie takes her sarcastic suggestion seriously to which Huey finds out what his brother did causing him to question why he did it in anger to which Louie explains how he did it knowing full well what his brother meant. I love writing snarky characters

Webby frowned as she looked over to Dewey and watched as she saw him slowly accepting the fact there was no way they were filming any moon scenes on the beach today. “Well since we’re already down here, we might as well check out that sandcastle building contest. Or maybe Aunt Della could take us to Funso’s. You know, so our trip to the beach wasn’t a total waste.”

As Jane looked over to Dewey, she could not help but notice two crew members carrying a large surfboard over to the fake palm trees. A small smirk snaked its way onto the eagle’s beak as she spoke in a rather laid-back casual tone. “Would you guys be interested in meeting Funso?”

“We very much would.” Louie responded for the group as he flipped his token back to Jane, who of course caught it and pocketed her payment.

Things I love here: Webby showing empathy for her brother/best friend/co-director (also she calls Della "Aunt Della"!!), Jane using her powers of as a Funso's employee to pull a few strings for these kids, and Louie being the good employer he is and paying Jane for her good work

Speaking of Della, I love Della in this story! (Surprise, surprise). All though she is not a main character in this story (in fact she's sharing the D-Story with Team Magic) I still think I gave her a lot of great moments in the story. I wanted to show off her "Soccer Mom energy" in this story where she's doing whatever she can to make sure her kids can accomplish whatever they put their mind to, but I didn't want her to go full Karen at any point, so I didn't want her to be mean to the crew member she argues with to let her kids film their movie

Even after that fails, she still tries to salvage the day for Dewey who is well aware his mom is doing her best and that these things are out of her control

“Dewey!” Webby ran over to the two ducks waving her hands around in excitement. “Dewey! Guess what! We’re going to be the first ones to meet Funso!”

“Whaaat?! Well, lucky you guys.” Della said in awe as she looked back and forth between Dewey and Webby. “How did you score a sweet deal like that?”

I love Della here, acting like meeting an actor playing a fictional walrus is the coolest thing in the world right now, because it is.

“Let’s just say they have connections at Funso’s Fun Zone.” Jane answered as she and the rest of the birds joined the trio.

“Oh, hey Jane!” Della stood up and waved.

“Hey.”

EVERYONE KNOWS AND LOVES JANE IN THE MCDUCK FAMILY

Dewey offered a small wave to Jane. “Thanks, but I don’t really feel up to meeting the new Funso.”

“Dewford!” Violet exclaimed in disbelief. “Not many kids are given an opportunity such as this!”

Lena looked over to her sister in slight confusion. “…You do realize it’s probably gonna be just another guy in a walrus costume, right?”

“I know that.” Violet responded in a more rational tone. “Just because I know that, it doesn’t mean I can’t suspend my disbelief and buy into the illusion.”

I love this little back-and-forth between Lena and Violet. Lena just being a teen and not really as interested in this as the rest of her younger friends and sister, who she expected a little bit better from. And Violet being like, "Yeah, I'm not stupid. I can still have fun, Lena."

“Actually, they’re switching things up and got an actual walrus to play him.” Jane chimed in.

“You guys can go ahead and meet Funso,” Dewey assured the group as he broke away from them, “I just need some time for myself to think things over…”

After the day Dewey has had, he really doesn't feel like doing anything right now. And Louie is nice enough to go comfort his brother allowing his friends and family to not miss this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to be the first to meet the new Funso

As the group watched Louie join his brother, Della could not help but chuckle softly. “Guess some things never change.”

“What never changes?” Huey asked.

“Huh?” Della replied now realizing she just spoke out loud. “Oh. Nothing, just thinking about your Uncle Donald and his old band.”

“He was in a band?” Violet inquired.

“He didn’t actually sing, did he?” Lena queried.

“Yes and yes,” Della answered the two Sabrewing girls as she reminisced, “back in our college days, Donald started a band with his buddies.”

“Ms. Duck, were you a member too?”

“Who, me?” Della looked over to Violet in disbelief before chuckling again. “Nah, they were The Three Caballeros and having a fourth member just wouldn’t make sense. All though I did hang out with them enough that it felt like I was part of the band too. I’d watch them practice, give them my feedback whether they wanted it or not, there were even times when I’d join in their songs.” The older duck sighed happily to herself. “I miss José and Panchito.”

It is a possibility that Lena and Violet did know about the McDuck Family's adventure with the Three Caballeros, but I still wanted this scene as an excuse for Della to talk about her perspective on this chapter of Donald's life, plus we got that somewhat snarky question from Lena. I always loved that bit where Donald tries to reassure the girl only for her to respond, "What?"

I also love this section cause it gave me and excuse to draw more parallels between the triplets and their mother and uncle. Out of all the members of their family, the Duck Boys have the most in common with their mom and uncle Donald, they all have traits from them and I think that's great

It's very common to see parallels between Dewey and Della as well as Louie and Donald, but for this I wanted Della to see the parallels between her and Louie here while also seeing the parallels between Donald and Dewey.

Speaking of which, let's check on 2/3rds of the Duck Boys!

Dewey was unaware of his brother approaching him for he was far too busy flipping through his script. Which was good news for Louie, it gave him plenty of time to assess the situation at hand. As he arrived at the shore, the green triplet went ahead and grabbed a smooth stone that was near his brother.

“Hey.”

Dewey looked over to his brother. “Hey.” And then immediately went back to his work.

Louie went ahead and tossed the stone across the ocean and watched it skip a few time before sinking into the ocean. “All right, three skips.” Louie then went ahead and picked up another stone. “Betcha can’t beat that, Dewford.”

“Not now, Louie.”

“Oh come on, it will only take a few seconds.”

Dewey let out a frustrated sigh before grabbing the stone from his brother and effortlessly tossing it to the ocean. “Oh no. It looks like you won. Good job.”

As Dewey looked back at his script, Louie watched the middle triplet’s stone skip across the water several times before hitting a buoy.

DING

Louie placed his hands in his pockets as he looked over at the buoy and then back to Dewey who was caught up in his own world.

Do you think Louie ever gets jealous of his brother's comedic dumb luck?

Anyway, while Dewey is a main character in this story, Louie will be there with him by his side for the majority of the middle triplet's storyline. These two had a great dynamic in Louie's Eleven! and it's something that I want to expand upon. Seriously, I find it very underrated and it often gets overshadowed by the Huey and Louie dynamic which is also great

But back to Dewey and Louie, one aspect of that episode that I think about a lot are the scenes where Dewey expresses how he thinks Louie doesn’t really have faith in Dewey’s own abilities and I wanted to show the growth Louie had in that episode in this scene by having him be the one to let Dewey know that no one thinks he’s dumb and that they do have faith in his project and that they’re just trying to help

Another thing I want to explore in Dewey's storyline is the duck's creative side: The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly. A very important moment in Dewey's character to me was the first appearance of Dewey Dew-Night where we see Dewey has had an internet show that his brothers were at the time not aware of

I remember seeing a comment on a video of that scene saying that Dewey is basically the kid that played by himself at recess and that's something I agree with and wanted to show in this story and for the rest of the story

All though he is more comfortable with sharing his ideas and visions with his friends and family, those things are still very personal to him. He has his perfect vision on his creations and the final results aren't always going to look like that, especially when you have help from other people. At times it does not feel like the personal story you wanted to tell

And the thing that Dewey is worked up about is a scene that would depict his mom as the badass she is while also negatively depicting the moonlanders which is a problem that everyone fully understands, except Dewey. Not that he doesn’t understand why, he just thinks he can still salvage the scene cause the song he made for it is too gosh darn good and he’s proud of it, dang it

Louie nodded. “It really helps to have another perspective. You wouldn’t happen to have that song on you, do you?”

“Uh yeah,” Dewey pulled out his phone, “why?”

Louie scoffed. “Because, dear Dewford, I would like to listen to it. You might think that is should only be played during mom’s epic space battle, but maybe I might find another use for it. After all, you did work really hard composing it, it would be a shame if we were to just drop it.”

“Oh…” Dewey smiled at Louie, “okay!”

“And hey if we can’t find a spot in the movie for that song. No big deal, you could always give it to DJ Daft Duck.

“No! This is NOT a DJ Daft Duck song!” Realizing he just shouted, Dewey immediately awkwardly lowered his volume. “It’s just not the right vibe for him, you know?...Also, I’m kinda taking a break from DJ Daft Duck stuff…cause the movie and all.”

“Oh…well okay, it’s not a DJ Daft Duck song. It belongs in the movie” Louie acknowledged.

Gee I wonder why Dewey is so adamant about it not being a DJ Daft Duck song. I sure hope this gets explained later on in the story during a heart-to-heart moment with one of the other main characters of this story

Dewey smiled at Louie before pulling his phone out of his pocket only for the moment to be ruined by Louie’s phone.

RING

Louie quickly looked at his phone and glanced at the screen. “Ooh boy” Louie looked over to Dewey, “I’ll listen to it soon. I promise. I just have to take this REALLY important phone call. I’ve been waiting all day for her to call back!”

Before Dewey could say anything, Louie answered the phone in buttery smooth tone as he walked and talked. “Why hello Aunt Gertie! Yeah! I just wanted to thank you again for the very thoughtful and might I add generous Christmas card you sent us last Christmas…Yes Aunt Gertie, I can hear your lovely kisses over the phone. Oh, how I wish you were here with me so I could receive them. Anyway, your favorite very talented and very creative nephews are putting together a movie about our family, and we can use all the help we can get.”

“…” For a brief moment Louie stood in silence. Suddenly a satisfied smirk grew on the green triplet’s beak before he smiled over to Dewey giving his brother a thumbs up. “Oh, thank you so much Aunt Gertie! I promise you; you’re making a wise investment…”

It wouldn’t be a DuckTales 2017 fanfic without cameos/shoutouts to other Duck characters from the Duckverse that didn’t make the cut! So here’s Aunt Gertie! An aunt of the boys who for all I know only had one appearance in my childhood favorite Christmas movie Mickey’s Once Upon a Christmas! I love Louie pulling the schmooze on her

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But enough about her. Let’s talk Darkwing villains! Let’s check on Jane and the kids:

As the four kids waited, they watched as the older bird walked over to a walrus wearing a white sailor hart, orange sweater, blue pants, a yellow scarf, and a pair of white gloves. Most likely the new Funso. Jane returned to the group accompanying her was the walrus. “Hey guys I’d like you to meet-”

“FUNSO! Of Funso’s Fun Zone!” The walrus introduced himself with a rather jovial tone.

“Hi! I’m Webby!” Webby introduced herself as she shook hands with the walrus. As the two shook hands, Lena could not help but stare at the new Funso.

“…Wait. I recognize you!” Lena stated catching the attention of everyone in the group.

“Of course, you do; he’s Funso.” Violet said.

“I know that, but that’s not what I meant. He’s that walrus from that show!” Lena explained.

“…”

“The one our dads took us to last week.”

Violet’s eyes widen. “I think you’re right,” she turned to Funso, “excuse me but were you a cast of member of MacDuck from last week’s Drakespeare in the Park?”

“And didn’t you play like seven different roles in that play? Tuskerninni, right?”

“Arturo Tuskerninni!” The walrus properly introduced himself; it was as if Funso was no more as the walrus spoke in a more boastful yet gravitas tone, as if every single word that came from his mouth was said was dripping with pride (or in other words, extremely British). “Graduate of Julliard, Director, Character Actor, Writer, Performer, Filmmaker, and now Funso of Funso’s Fun Zone: Where Fun…is in the Zone. It’s great to see I have fans who appreciate my art and recognize my talent.”

Fun fact about me: I never watched the OG DuckTales show or Darkwing Duck until I started writing DT17 fanfiction. And I’m really glad I did! Especially Darkwing. And the first time I saw Tuskerninni I knew I just HAD TO use him for a story! He was honestly the first Darkwing villain (besides the main villain of this story who has not appeared yet but has been mentioned by a couple of characters) I chose to put in this story

I just love the character! He dresses up in a lot of costumes, is a huge ham and has an even bigger ego than Darkwing! He’s just a lot of fun! And since this is the reboot I headcanon him having a celebrity voice actor and I can’t think of anyone better to play him than Matt Berry:

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Also MacDuck and Drakespeare is a reference to an OG DuckTales episode called Much Ado About Scrooge. Good episode, I recommend watching it if you’re a 2017 Louie fan

Neither Lena nor Violet were fans of Tuskerninni. Their dads took them the outdoor play so they both could be exposed to some culture. And all though Violet kept her full attention on the play, she found it hard to enjoy the scenes that featured Tuskerninni since the walrus could not help but chew the scenery every time he was on stage. The only reason why Lena even remembered the walrus' name was due to boredom. It was during one of the walrus' many drawn out monologues that the young sorceress took it upon herself to look through the show’s pamphlet and upon discovering the walrus’s name she immediately showed her sister the name and sneered “More like Tusker-weenie.” To which Violet said nothing and continued watching the play while Lena chuckled to herself. Needless to say, that was the highlight of Lena’s night.

“Uh, yeah sure.” Lena confirmed.

I just want to say this my favorite joke I’ve ever written for Lena and Violet. I love these two

“Excuse me, Funso,” Huey began as he winked to Tuskerninni, “as the new Funso what are you brining to the table to differentiate you from the previous Funso without deviating too far from what we expect to see from such a beloved role?”

“Well, in my commercial debut, you will see I bring the fun wherever I go!” The new Funso replied, “I will arrive to the masses from the sea on a surfboard and let the whole world know that Funso’s Fun Zone is where Fun is in the Zone. I like to think I’m a more hip and happening Funso than the previous one and I plan on brining more to the table.”

“And is one of those things, penguin minions!?” Webby asked as several penguins approached the group.

“Nope.” Jane answered for the walrus. “They came with him though. And have been here all day…”

“Yes of course they have!” Tuskerninni responded to the overworked Funso employee. “They are my cortège. My posse. My homeboys. My entourage. Wherever I go they follow.”

I really proud of the Webby line mainly because one of my beta readers told me “I can totally hear Webby saying that!" Also we gotta have Tuskerninni’s penguin minions! Also WWDITS fans will probably be able to catch that “subtle” reference I put at the end there

One of the penguins then waddled over to the walrus, to which Tuskerninni then bent down, so the penguin could whisper into his ear.

“Hmm. Yes.” Tuskerninni nodded before turning back to Jane. “My homeboy Ray brings up an excellent point, Jane. We are an hour behind the schedule and the director is still not here. Something must be done, Jane.”

“Well it’s not like I can control the traffic or whenever supervillains attack, I’m just a Funso’s employee.” Jane deadpanned as she kept her cool. “You’re just gonna have to wait, Funso.”

“Ah…” Tuskerninni responded, “in that case: while we’re waiting, my colleagues and I would like to split a pizza. We’ll take a large pizza that’s half red and half white. On the red half the crust is to be stuffed crust while the white half’s crust will be thin crust. The cheese needs to cover every inch of the sauce, however it needs too put on lightly on the white sauce. On the white half, a fourth of it needs to be topped with green peppers and the other fourth with pineapple, but the whole white half needs to have banana peppers. The red sauce half needs to be one fourth pepperoni and one fourth bacon. We’d also like anchovies which is our topping of choice that needs to be cover all of the pizza, both the white and the red halves. And a large Diet Cherry Pep.”

“A number four with a large Diet Cherry Pep, got it;” Jane said as she walked away from the walrus and over to the kids “well duty calls.” The eagle then pulled out two birthday coupons and handed them to Huey before heading her way back to the Funso, “I’ll catch you kids later.”

Two things I wanna say about this: Jane is a good employee and giving Huey back his as well as Dewey’s birthday coupons was really cool of here. And two. The complicated order joke is a joke I stole from this scene from the rom-com spoof They Came Together it's the first joke in the clip if you're interested in seeing:

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I figured no one would notice cause I don’t know how many DuckTales fans have watched a movie made by the people who made Wet Hot American Summer.

Anyway, Tuskerninni rants about superheroes and their over-saturation when the Gizmoduck fight finally makes it to the beach (also Huey is the first one to notice because Huey fanboying over Gizmoduck will always be adorable to me) , yada yada, let’s just move ahead to Dewey and Gandra’s first scene together

In fact, Dewey could not keep his eyes off the superhero battle ever since it made its way to the beach. As soon as the two figures whooshed by the young filmmaker immediately pulled out his phone and started recording the whole thing.

Though his phone was focused on both Duckburg’s beloved superhero and the town’s villain-of-the-day, Dewey could not keep his eyes off the hen who was in-between this battle. He watched as the armorless bird attack the villain head on.

The attack was certainly not planned, more of an impulsive move. He knew that for sure, for his dropped jaw match the one on Gizmoduck’s face as the two watched as the freelance agent kicked the jetpacked rat off his flightpath and towards the ground. Using the force of her own kick, the hen flipped backwards off the costumed villain whilst that was happening, she made sure to unhook her sweatshirt from her waist and used it to help lessen the impact of her fall; she landed several feet away from Dewey.

As the sand cleared in front of the middle triplet, Dewey peeked from behind his phone as he watched Gandra rise up from the ground, tying her sweatshirt around her waist as she shot a smirk up at Gizmoduck. “Told ya I could knock him down!”

So for the first scene with these two I just knew I had to give Gandra a badass entrance. Cause she deserves it. Anyway…

“I didn’t say you couldn’t!” Gizmoduck retorted, “I suggested we consider our other options first!”

Gandra Dee rolled her eyes and shrugged. “The opportunity was right there and figured I might as well do it.”

And it was those choice of words that made Gandra Dee Dewey’s new favorite member of Team Science. Before it was Manny, probably…

Dewey put his phone down as he watched the hen pull out a device from her pocket.

“Go on after him, I’ll catch up!”

As the superhero flew to the direction of the knocked down villain, the young hen immediately got to work. A projection came out of her eye, which displayed what Gizmoduck was seeing through his visors as well as some other things that Dewey was sure must be very important cause they looked scientific. Having a projection come out of one’s eye must have not be as distracting as Dewey thought it would since the young adult was multitasking; he watched as she unscrewed the bottom part of her device and attached it to her palm as if she was powering it up.

A projection came out of her eye, which displayed what Gizmoduck was seeing through his visors as well as some other things that Dewey was sure must be very important cause they looked scientific. -

That’s my way of saying “Look use your imagination cause I don’t know how to describe what I’m seeing in my mind

“Wait, I know you!” Dewey finally spoke up. “You’re Huey’s friend; Sandra, right?!”

“Huh?” Gandra must have not noticed the middle triplet was with her the entire time, because for the first time today she was caught off-guard. She looked over to Dewey as she did her best to put a friendly smile on her beak. “Uh, yeah I’m Huey’s friend. And it’s Gandra, Gandra Dee.”

These two have met previously of course in The Splitsword of Swanstantine! where they fought one another (Dewey of course had help from Webby), Dewey of course was told about the events of Beaks in the Shell! from Huey so before properly introducing one another, he would know Gandra as Huey’s friend because she is. She likes Huey. Everyone likes Huey.

Also Huey will be alongside Gandra and Fenton for the majority of Gandra’s story. It’s what he deserves

I do this a lot in my fanfics, but I love having Gandra introduce herself by going “Gandra, Gandra Dee” Why? Cause that’s how she introduced her name to Fenton, that’s why. It’s her spy introduction. Like how Bond says “The name’s Bond, James Bond.”

Also Dewey thinking her name is Sandra is a reference to where the OG Gandra got her name from, Sandra Lee, who was a…{quickly Googles Sandra Lee} an American TV Chef and author…huh.

Anyway. Let’s delve into something I haven’t talked about yet: the OC I made up for this story Rick Rath aka The Punnysher

So here’s the thing about me. I don’t really go out my way to make up OCs. Just something I never really feel like doing unless I really feel the need to for a story. And more often than not, they’re jokes. Which is exactly who Rick Rath is

So for the Gandra and Fenton side of the story, I knew I wanted them to work together as Agent Dee and Gizmoduck to take down Duckburg’s villain of the week. I wanted this villain to be some lucky jerk that Gandra knew through her freelancer career and was an absolute dork. I didn’t want to use a Darkwing Duck villain (I saved that for Drake and Gosalyn) because I didn’t want any Darkwing fans to think I did one of their favorite villains dirty. (And if there are any Darkwing fans who thought I did Splatter Phoenix dirty I promise you SHE WILL BE BACK with a vengeance later in the series)

Anyway, besides working for various evildoers as a means to get by, I always headcanon Gandra’s freelancing job involved smaller projects for the everyman. Fixing stuff, selling her own stuff, etc. And Rick is that, just an everyman and longtime client of Gandra that mainly kept to himself until one day he snapped

So who is The Punnysher? Well he’s basically an amalgam of some of my favorite “pathetic nerd type” villains. He was inspired by my favorite Darkwing Duck villain Megavolt, Paul Dano’s Riddler from The Batman, and Stu from Scream (I personally like to think Matthew Lillard voiced him). His name is Rick Rath cause alliteration, it sorta sounds like riffraff (street rat!), Rath sounds like wrath, and Rick I’m pretty sure I chose because of the Spidey Send-Up character from Superhero Movie was named Rick and that movie is just one of my biggest guilty pleasures. Yeah. Go ahead and judge me but it’s nowhere near as bad as the other _____ Movies of that horrible era of bad spoof movies

And yeah he was created as an excuse to make puns

Earlier in the story, both Fenton and Gandra talk about wanting to avoid causing any property damage when taking down the Punnysher. So I thought it’d be funny if the climatic battle would be at the beach where instead of building being knocked down it’s big sandcastles. Still all that sand everywhere would would be a nightmare what with it being coarse and rough

ANYWAY back to Gandra and Dewey:

“-just keep him busy, Gizmoduck.” Agent Dee said into her earpiece. “I’m just about done here.”

“It was so cool how you knocked that bad guy down! Have you always had the ability to shoot lightning out of your hands!? Don’t tell me, you’re magic, right!?” Dewey asked as he ran up to Gandra.

“Uh, nope. Not magic, just science.” Gandra removed the charging Kill-Bitch from her hand to show off her ungloved hand, giving the young duck some visual aid, “I’ve got nanites in my bloodstream.”

“…Nanites?

“Really tiny microscopic robots.” Gandra explained, emphasizing their size by pinching the air with her thumb and finger to Dewey.

Dewey’s eyes widened as he watched Gandra once again attach her device to her palm.

“YOU’VE GOT ROBOTS IN YOUR BODY!?”

Reasons Why Gandra Dee Would Be Dewey Duck's Favorite Member of Team Science:

She's a badass

She's a spy

She can shoot electricity from her hands

She's an independent freelancer

She's part robot

Dewey's reaction to Gandra having robots in her body is my favorite line in this entire story because you can't tell me that wouldn't be his reaction

So another reason why I think Gandra would be Dewey's favorite Team Science member is because I personally think out of all the members she'd be the one who can explain science related stuff to Dewey the best due to her bluntness and getting straight to the point

Speaking of Gandra, I might as well talk about her for a bit since she is also a main character of this story (also Gosalyn and in a way Boorswan but they're not here so I'm not talking about them)

Now if they're were a Season 4, I'd want a storyline about Gandra trying to fit in the McDuck Found Family because I'd think that'd make for a great story. Out of all the characters, she probably has the weakest connection to the family for the only reason why she became a part of it in the first place is because she hooked up with one of McDuck's employees. Not to mention she doesn't have the highest opinions of Scrooge

I always saw Gandra as more of an anti-hero throughout the show, kind of like Goldie, and I like to think that post-canon she still has some of those qualities. She is still a freelancer but is currently working on the Gizmocloud with Fenton and Gyro

I've said it before but I'll say it again, I really don't like the idea of Gandra working for McDuck Enterprises as part of her character development. It just seems like a betrayal to her character by going corporate and just feels like she's being shaped to be more like Fenton or Gyro when she's a punk garage scientist. I fully support her anti-corporate attitude

I always loved DuckTales for how they show a member returning or trying to turn a new leaf is often a difficult transition for both the member and the family. We saw that with characters like Della when she returned and with Lena when she was trying to hide the De Spell side of her, to me it makes sense doing something similar with Gandra who hasn't really had the chance to interact with the rest of the family, who all their own dynamics and little groups that were able to grow while she was not a part of that family, and I wanted to explore that with this story

“Okay can one of you kids gotta help me out here, but who is she, what exactly is her connection to our family?” Della asked as she pointed to Gandra. “I feel like I know her from somewhere, but I don’t know what…”

“Oh her? She’s Gandra Dee.” Huey answered. “She’s currently dating Fenton.”

“Thanks to us.” Webby proudly added, to which Huey high-fived in response.

I like to think that both Huey and Webby are so proud of the date they put together for Fenton and Gandra that they like to think they played a big part in the two's relationship. Also Huey will totally be Fenton's best man for their wedding and will credit Webby in his speech for their job well done

“…Wait, Fenton is with her?” Lena asked in confusion as she looked over to Violet, “I thought he was with Gyro.”

“Gyro!?” Della repeated in a tone that was a mixture of disbelief and disgust. “Oh please that duck can do waaay better than that hack. And the evidence is right there! I mean did you SEE that landing!? And she can shoot lightning from her hands?!”

“Well, she is a spy and a scientist.” Huey explained.

“Who worked for F.O.W.L.” Louie reminded the group.

“Wait, they were still seeing each other while she was working for F.O.W.L.?!” Della asked.

“Yep.” Huey answered.

“Cool.” Della, Webby, and Lena reacted in unison.

Della, Webby and Lena are Team I Don't Mind that Fenton and Gandra were Seeing Each Other While Gandra was a Part of F.O.W.L. because That is Honestly Really Hot and I Probably Would've Done the Same if I was in Fenton's Position

“Oh yeah, so cool how that she and Fenton found time to see each other while she was busy hacking the money bin and Uncle Scrooge’s robot that nearly killed us.” Louie deadpanned.

“That’s where I know her from!” Della snapped her fingers as if she just remembered the lyrics to a song she hadn’t heard in a while. She then turned towards Louie. “Yeah, crazy day huh? At least she’s on our side now. And hey, she looks like she’s getting along with Dewey, maybe she might need our help.”

I did a joke similar to this in my Indi-Quack! story Convergence at Bud's Dispensary! where both Della and Louie have two very different opinions on Gandra Dee's role in the Escape from the Impossibin!. I still love Della's reaction to it all like she just remembered the name of an actor in a movie she's watching on TV while Louie is a little less forgiving than his mother

This will be explored more in the next story, but when it comes to the triplet's opinions about Gandra Dee now a part of the team it'll be very similar to what we saw when the triplets first hung out with Webby and when their mother returned

Dewey is the most optimistic member of the trio who is ready to welcome the newest member in open arms without a second thought. Louie is the most skeptical, but is not entirely against them being here and still has an open mind about the situation. Huey of course will be the most logical, being a good balance of his two brothers and is not only seeing things from their point of view but also the new member's point of view; understanding how this situation can be complicated for everyone

“HEY AGENT DEE!!?” Della shouted.

“Huh?” Gandra looked away from Dewey and over to the middle triplet’s family.

I've done this in my other stories, but I really love the idea of Della almost always referring to Gandra as Agent Dee kinda like how she calls Beakley by her spy name, 22. Gandra Dee is a spy after all and that is her spy name. Plus I think it'd be nice if for once someone called her that who wasn't using her for their own gain and is only calling that because they think her being a spy is cool

“Hey Gandra!” Huey waved to the hen.

“Oh…” the projection coming from the hen’s eye disappeared as she waved back to the oldest triplet, “hey Huey” Gandra’s eyes surveyed the small group of birds who waved back, “…and family.”

“Do you two need any help?!” Della shouted to Gandra. “Because we’re all ready to fight!” Della looked back over to her son Louie, who was still sitting comfortably on his blanket, shaking his head in indifference. Della looked back. “Well most of us are!”

Isn't nice that this found family is now big enough that some members can sit out of adventures if they need it

“Help?” Gandra repeated in slight confusion. “Oh. Uh, nope, we’re fine here.”

“Aw, are you sure!?” Webby called over. “Because we’d be more than happy to help!”

“We are experienced.” Violet stated.

“And I’m magic.” Lena added.

Gandra's storyline honestly would be a much shorter one if she hung with Della and Team Magic. They are way more chill than Dewey and are allowing Gandra her space. Also I really wanted to capture Gandra's awkward energy we see her have everyone now and then in this scene

“Oh no, no, it’s fine. It’s not necessary for you all to join in.”

“You heard the woman!” Louie exclaimed. “This is one adventure we’re allowed to sit out of! Let the power couple handle this.”

“Right, thanks…” having forgotten his name, Gandra’s Eyebuds scanned the green triplet for more information, “…Llewellyn.”

“It’s Louie, actually!”

It might take Louie awhile to warm up to Gandra...

“Louie, right.” Gandra corrected herself. “But don’t worry, we got this. We’ll get rid of the supervillain so you guys can go back to enjoying your beach day.”

“Yeah! Don’t worry guys,” Dewey said as he stepped by Gandra’s side, “we got this!”

“We?” Gandra asked as she looked down at Dewey in annoyance.

“Yeah! I wanna help you two!” Dewey said as he looked up at Gandra with an excited grin. “That supervillain stands no chance against the collaborative team-up of Gizmoduck, Agent Dee, and their super sidekick Dewey! I even got a team name for our little group, The Super Spies! You know cause Gizmoduck is a superhero, you’re a spy, and yours Dew-ly is a little bit of both. I’ve helped Darkwing Duck on his superhero adventures, and I helped Launchpad beat Double-O-Duck which I know is a video game, but like it’s a VR video game, so it’s pretty much the same thing. I’m basically the Ultimate Sidekick!”

Dewey is looking up at Gandra, while she is looking down at him. Symbolism.

Also I decided to flex Dewey's resume here to further prove why he'd be great with Gandra (as well as Fenton). Also I like to think Gandra's eyelids went lower when he said "yours Dew-ly"

“Oh really? That’s cool and all, but did you not hear what I just told your family, kid?” Gandra grumbled.

“Nerp! I was too busy looking at the sleeves on your shirt!” Dewey answered. “I really dig your style! Did your shirt come like that or did you cut them yourself?!”

“I-..what?” Out of all the responses Dewey could have given Gandra, that was one of them that she was not ready for.

Honestly, that's a question I always wondered about Gandra's shirt but I'm too scared to ask. Dewey wouldn't be tho

“Agent Dee?” The sound of Fenton’s voice music to Gandra’s ears as it came out of her earpiece, “Not to sound too impatient but is the Kill-Bitch ready yet, I could really use your assistance.”

DING

The moment the device dinged, Dewey’s eyes widened as he immediately grabbed the Kill-Bitch out of Gandra’s palm.

“Okay! What do you want me to do with this!?” Dewey said as he examined the device. “It looks dangerous, but don’t worry Danger is my middle name! Pretty cool that you made something that looks deadly that’s no bigger than my phone!” Dewey exclaimed as he put the Kill-Bitch by phone for the size comparison, accidentally causing the device to latch onto his phone. “Oh no…”

I love Dewey cause he's always down for whatever adventure he gets caught in and always ready to help. Which I'm sure can be a nuisance for some especially if he isn't caught up with what's going on

“What are you doing!?” Gandra yelled at Dewey, “I was going to use that to destroy The Punnysher’s jetpack!”

“This thing’s gonna destroy my phone?!” Dewey yelled back in shock as he instinctively threw his phone aside, landing it in the water.

BZZT

“No!” Gandra groaned as she pulled Dewey’s phone out of the water and detached the Kill-Bitch from the phone. “I didn’t waterproof this thing.”

“But don’t worry, my phone is.” Dewey replied hoping to make the hen feel better.

“Yeah but the Kill-B-…my device still was able to do some damage to it.” Gandra tossed Dewey’s phone to the middle triplet while she pulled out the other broken Kill-Bitch from her pocket and examined the two broken devices. “…Oh yeah, I can fix it.”

I always imagined Gandra would be a mixture of being both good and bad with children. But she does know not to swear in front of children. We saw that in Beaks in the Shell!, seriously watch the scene when Huey enters the Gizmocloud, she almost dropped an F-bomb in front of sweet Huey.

“Oh no!” Dewey examined his phone, “I just got upgraded my phone recently! Aw man, do you know how many ducks are on our family plan? My turn to upgrade won’t be for a long time now!”

I too am from a big family and on a family phone plan. Waiting for your turn for an upgrade sure is a bitch

Gandra rolled her eyes as she pulled out The Thanks, Bitch from her pockets and attached it to Dewey’s phone. “This thing will ding when it’s done. Do NOT throw it into the ocean. Now please give me some space so I can help Gizmoduck.”

“Wait! Gandra I’m sorry for messing up, I wanna redeem myself! Please let me help you guys, I’ll do whatever you tell me to do!”

Gandra did not know what could have possibly come over her, but looking down at the young duck dressed as an aviator who looked like he disappointed his elders, made her not want to tell him no. But at the same time, she did not want any of his help at all.

You know I did want to do a joke about Dewey dressed up as his mom for this scene with Gandra. Something along the lines that he looks like he's going to fight the Red Baron, but I couldn't find any good space for it that wouldn't disrupt the flow of the story

When writing these scenes where Gandra is brushing Dewey away from, I really wanted none of this to feel mean-spirited and I hope it didn't feel like it at all

“…Hey Dewey, do you like music?”

Dewey grinned up at Gandra, “I sure do! Actually I’m a-”

“Great!” Gandra responded as she crouched down so that she was eye-level with the duck and mirrored his grin and spoke in a peppier voice. “I like music too. In fact, I love listening to it whenever I need to work on my gadgets or do spy missions.”

“Oh! So you can stay focused and not be bothered by any annoying distractions, right!?” Dewey asked as he bounced his body up and down in excitement.”

Don't you just love it when people don't know they're insulting themselves?

“Right.” Gandra said as she pulled out her phone and handed it to Dewey. “Now I need you to help me pick out one of my playlists for me to listen to while I make a new device to take down Gizmoduck’s bad guy.”

“…Oh.” Dewey looked down at the phone and then back to Gandra. “And that will be helpful?”

Dewey may not be the brightest character in DuckTales, but I don't think he's an idiot and I wanted to show that by having him question Gandra.

“It sure will!” Gandra exclaimed as she got to taking apart both Kill-Bitches to combine them into one working Kill-Bitch. “The playlist you pick will also be the one I listen to while fighting that bad guy over there, so I’m counting on you on picking out something good.”

What Gandra is doing her is the equivalent of handing a younger sibling a video game controller that isn't plugged in and saying "Yeah, you're helping!"

The hen immediately got to work as Dewey started scrolling through her various playlists, finding the task to be more difficult than he thought since he wanted to pick out something really good for Gandra that would be perfect background music for what was going on.

-Workout

-Running

-Sciencing

-Just wanna smash something

-Sciencing (w/ Fenton)

-F%@# the System!!

-Just Vibing

-Gaming

-F.O.W.L. Work Playlist

-Gizmocloud

-Just wanna “smash” something (Fenton)

“Uh…” Dewey said as he looked through.

I had too much fun coming up with different names for Gandra's various playlists. And don't worry, Dewey doesn't understand the meaning behind the final one.

and I ain't explaining it if you don't know

DING

“Sorry for the delay, Gizmoduck. I’ll be joining you shortly.” Gandra said to her earpiece as she stood up and looked back at Dewey. “You done, kid?”

“I…Uh, wait! I think I know the perfect song for you!” Dewey exclaimed as he went away Gandra’s playlists and searched for another song which he selected.

Gandra stood in place for a brief second as the music started to play out of her headphones. “Hmm…”

So the song I selected for this fight sequence is the song Runaway Baby by Bruno Mars. I think I first heard the song at work listening to Spotify when it randomly started playing and I instantly loved it and thought it would be the perfect song for this sequence. It also pairs well with the storyline I have planned for this unlikely duo

“…Did I select a good song?”

“Hmm?” Gandra looked over to Dewey. “Oh yeah. I mean, it’s a bit mainstream for my liking, but I can work with this.” The hen spoke into her earpiece. “Going radio silent, Gizmoduck. Heading right into the action.” She took the earpiece out of her ear.

Gandra's a hipster and I just love making fun of her for that

“Anything else I can do, Agent Dee?!” Dewey grinned at Gandra.

“Nah, don’t worry kid, we got this.”

“Oh…” Dewey held up his phone. “Is it cool if I record the fight once it’s done getting fixed?”

“Sure thing, just try not to be in the crossfire; okay kid?”

“Okay!”

Gandra smirked as she placed her headphones and made her way to the battle on the beach, doing several flips in the process.

Right now, the nickname Gandra has for Dewey is "kid", something short, simple, and to the point. Also we see Gandra with those headphones but we never saw her wear them! She deserves to have a fight scene where she's listening to music while fighitng

“…Were all those flips really necessary?” Violet asked as she watched the fight happen before her eyes.

Since I already established that Lena and Webby both think Gandra is really cool I thought it'd be funny and a good balance if Violet was the least impressed with her.

“Shut up, Violet.” Lena answered as she kept her attention on Gandra.

“Yeah, Violet, sh- no.” Della stopped herself before she could say anything else. Della looked over to Lena. “Lena, Violet is entitled to her own opinion. Now how about we just watch the fight before our eyes without any commentary.”

Part of me wanted Della to actually say "shut up", but I really don't think that'd be a good look for Della. Plus I don't want anyone to think I hate Violet. Violet is great

“Hey Rick!” Gandra called up to the Punnysher.

Rick looked over to Gandra the very moment she decided to stick her middle finger right up at the rat, further emphasizing the finger with electricity surrounding it. Needless to say, he took the bait as he charged right at the hen. “It’s The Punnysher!”

So here's a funny thing about how I write Gandra during her cockier scenes. I know how she's hated character to various people in the fandom, well when I write her I like to pretend that those people are reading the story and I do whatever I can to emphasize the traits they don't like about her as if she's holding a middle finger at them

The smirk on Gandra’s face stayed on as she waited to the last possible second to jump over the villain and onto Gizmoduck’s back which stood on. “Thanks for the ride, Suit.”

“Glad you’re back, Agent Dee, what took ya?”

“Just a minor inconvenience that I took care…Seven o’clock!”

"minor inconvenience" She's talking about Dewey! It was a pun!

An arm came out of the front of the Gizmosuit and threw a pie in the seven o’clock position which hit yet another one of the drones out of the sky, while Gandra herself took care of some of the drones surrounding the duo. Gizmoduck kept his focus on the Punnysher who was still ahead of him.

Besides the two doing more sciencey stuff together, I always felt the show could have used more scenes showing their skills as fighters. Fenton's a superhero and Gandra's a spy, they're a pair of dorks but also badasses

Once the drones were no longer an issue for the dynamic duo, Gizmoduck stopped trailing the jetpacked villain and flew at him head-on, throwing one final pie at the Punnysher. Which unfortunately did not land on the villain and instead hit a random citizen at the beach.

“AHHHHHH!! Coconut!”

“Sorry!” Gizmoduck shouted to the pie-covered civilian and then looked back to his partner. “That was my last pie.”

I actually really love coconut cream pie. I just knew that would be the funniest flavor to complain about

“Got a number four with a large diet Cherry Pep for Tuskerninni…” Perhaps it was because she was too frustrated with all she had to do on what was supposed to be a chilled workday, or maybe it was because she was used to Duckburg’s many different inconveniences, but it was not until Jane was back with the rest of the cast and crew of the Funso’s ad that she noticed what was happening. “Oh. A Gizmoduck battle, neat.”

“Jane, look out!” Louie called over to the Funso employee.

“Relax, Mr. Duck, I’m fine.”

Of course Louie would be concerned for Jane's safety. He's a good kid

And although that may be true, she was however unaware of the middle triplet who was filming the battle on his phone. And since Dewey’s focus was on the battle he was unaware of his own surroundings, which was why he collided into Jane causing the Funso employee to knock the pizza box out of her hands.

“My pizza!!!” Tuskerninni reacted in terror as the box landed closer to the superhero battle.

It was then Gandra landed on the ground. “Perfect!” The hen picked up the box and called up to her boyfriend “Yo! Gizmoduck! Special delivery!”

Gizmoduck flew by and grabbed the pizza from Gandra.

“Hey!” Tuskerninni snarled in anger. “Those two stole my pizza!” He turned over to Jane, who was busy comforting Dewey.

I just want say Spider-Man 2 is my favorite Spider-Man 2 film out of all the Spider-Man 2s out there. And I'm pretty sure this bit was inspired by the film's opening. Pizza Time.

“You okay, Dew-Man? I didn’t see ya there.”

“Yeah, I’m fine. I didn’t get hurt.”

SPLAT

“YAAAAARGGHH!! It burns!!”

Dewey, Jane, the McDuck family members and friends, as well as the rest of the beachgoers looked over as they watched The Punnysher (whose face was now covered with pizza) crash down to the ground yet again.

“Nice throw, Suit!” Gandra said before looking back over to Jane and Dewey. “Oh, hey Jane.”

“Hey.”

This isn't the first time I've written Gandra and Jane together in a story. In the Indi-Quack! story F.O.W.L. Play! I had Jane vent to Gandra about her job at Funso's. I personally like to think that while Gandra was at F.O.W.L. she ran into Jane at Funso's and the two hit it off by complaining about their horrible jobs, cause sometimes you just need one person to listen to you about your crappy job who understands what you're going through

The rat got up and wiped the hot pizza and sand off of his face and was greeted to the sight of a smirking Gandra Dee.

“Hey Rick.”

“Gandra…”

“You done playing supervillain?”

“Never.” Rick once again started his jetpack, only this time it didn’t turn on. After hitting the button several more times while Gandra stood and watched in amusement.

“Having some performance issues, Rick?”

The rat took off his backpack and glared at the Kill-Bitch which Gandra stuck on when he was done, he attempted to pull the device off, but it wouldn’t budge.

BZZT

The jetpack part of the backpack was completely powerless, completely drained, and no longer useful. But it could serve as a decent backpack. The rat looked over to the hen who simply shrugged in response.

Gandra's a smartass and I love when I can write her as such

“You bootlicking bi-”

BZZZZZT

Gandra punched Rick right in the gut with a full force of electricity coming out of her hands, causing the rat to fall to the ground. “There are children present, mister.”

Gandra knows not to swear in front of kids

Rick groaned as he curled on the ground in pain. “…Can I at least get a refund on the crap you broke?”

“No refunds on damaged goods.” Gandra stated before she kicked the rat, damaging his goods.

Yeah I’m proud of this crotch kicking joke, he deserved it

“Ha! Nice!” Della commented as she watched Gandra kick the villain in his groin before looking back to the kids she was accompanying at the beach. “Man, I love that everyone we know is some type of adventurer that knows how to fight.

Besides Dewey, I love to think Della also really loves meeting new members of this adventure found family

Gandra looked over to Gizmoduck as he landed beside her. “He’s down.”

“I saw…” Gizmoduck stated as he looked down at the villain curled up in the sand, groaning in pain.

Don’t worry Gandra, Della thought it was funny. I like to think when it comes to superhero battles Fenton is a real boy scout like Superman. Or I guess Junior Woodchuck in this world

The duo then looked away from the villain as they heard the sounds of the beachgoers and the press (who arrived shortly after the fight) making their way to the trio involved in the superhero fight.

It was then Gandra felt a hand clamp onto her shoulder.

“Why don’t you kids get out of here?” Della offered as her children, Webby, and the Sabrewings followed close behind. “We’ll make sure he doesn’t get away, plus I don’t think you want to deal with all that.” Della motioned over to the various news teams and police officers heading their way.

Della is a pro at adventure and knows the press is the last thing these two need to deal with

“Oh, thanks.” Gandra looked over to Fenton. “Mind giving a ride back to work?”

“Not at all.” Fenton held out his arms, to which Gandra hopped up into.

Look I just think their finale end credits appearance was adorable, okay!???!

“Gandra, wait!” Dewey, who still had his phone out, tossed the Thanks, Bitch to the hen.

“Almost forgot.” Gandra caught the device and then winked at Dewey. “Thanks for the help, kid.”

Dewey stood in silence as Huey joined him by his side, the two watched as Gizmoduck fly away with Gandra.

“We know some pretty cool people, huh, Dewey?”

“Yeah, we sure do…”

Oh Gandra. If only you knew what a little bit of praise from an adult does to these kids…

Pretty soon the police arrived and arrested Rick Rath, while the press started to do their thing.

“Roxanne Featherly reporting live at Duckburg Beach where excitement is in the air.Gizmoduck has stopped yet another supervillain from attacking the city. Or so we are to presume for the only evidence we have is eyewitness accounts.”

“Wrong you are Roxanne.” Louie said as he slipped his way onto the cameras, snagging Dewey’s phone from his brother. “For my very talented filmmaker brother was able to capture the whole fight on his phone and yes are willing to share it with this highest bidder.”

Louie leaned towards Dewey and whispered. “Dude we are going to get so much money for this project it's insane.”

As the press started to make their bids to the green triplet, Webby could not help and smiled towards her friends. “Even though we didn’t get to film any more of The Spear of Selene, I’d still say this was a great trip to the beach.”

“Indeed” Violet agreed, “for not only did we get to meet the new Funso in person, Dewford also got to participate in an exciting superhero battle.”

“Well,” Della stretched before grabbing the keys to the car, “I’d say we’re done here. Let’s go home.”

I didn’t say this in the story but Della got the car from Donald

Lena then looked over to the parked car with a devious grin on her face. “Shotgun.”

“DAMN IT!!!” Louie shouted in annoyance.

I love brick jokes and knew this was gonna be the final joke in the Dewey storyline of this story when I started writing this

Well I hope you enjoyed this commentary, christianfoxymc! Thanks again! Here’s hoping I’ll be able to continue this story real soon!

#the iron duck of steel the gizmoduck movie part i #ducktales fanfiction #ducktales headcanons #director’s cut #christianfoxymc #writebackatya #dewey duck #gandra dee #fenton crackshell cabrera #gizmoduck #louie duck #webby vanderquack #huey duck #lena sabrewing #violet sabrewing #tuskerninni #jane ducktales #ducktales jane #all these characters are tagged cause this post took awhile to write okay!?

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thebigbidea · 2 years ago

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Media I've obsessed over throughout the years!!

2010-2019: My Little Pony: FIM

Was definitely my favorite show. I still love that show sm. Definitely has the most active fan base of them all. Making art for this show definitely inspired me to be the artist i am now. -- This show rased me, and raised me good. The older fandom is questionable, there's definitely some generational trama given to us Gen Z by them, but it was a very pro-lgbt space, and i loved this so sm.

Favorite character then: Fluttershy / Now: Trixie

2017-2021: DuckTales!! (Woo-hoo)

Always kinned Louie, and always will. I mean hell, i named my first MLP OC after Lena!! -- I really loved the episodes Quack Pack and GlomTales! (the latter if wich being because is was A. it Louie centered episode, and B. he proved to his mother that his scamming isn't all bad which i was proud of him for). I think i loved him sm just bc, well one, my favorite color has always been green, but two he's so relatable. Like the episode where he wasn't so sure and up to the idea of Della suddenly coming back and being his mom when he'd never even spoke to her once was just so good. Now i can look back and see how it was relatable, but even then when i didn't know what ik now i found him to be the most logical person in that situation.

Favorite character then: Louie (maybe i liked Lena a lot too?) Now: Louie

2019-2023: The Owl House

When MLP ended, this was the show that came in and swooped me up. As of writing, the shows only been officially over for about an hour. And while yes, DuckTales was there when MLP ended, it still definitely made me feel like something was missing. It did take about a season for me to realize TOH was filling that feeling but it got there. This show has probably effected me about as much as MLP. Like through the episode “Lost in Language”, apon watching some reviews and theories on the episode, i found out Luz was bisexual. At the time i hadn't really heard the term b4, but only about a day of finding it out, i was already comfortable going by it! It just fit too well!! I also got my preferred name/s from Emira and Edric!! Sigh, i could write sm about TOH since it literally just ended, but i don't want to be here all day.

Favorite character then: Hunter, Now: The Collector. // Kinnie: Edric and Emira all the way, baby.

2023-???: Welcome Home! @:3

And now we're here. I already know this will be the thing i obsess over for the next 3-4 years, i can smell it. If things wrap up before 2026, i know the fandom will still be alive. Like idk maybe I'll laugh at my naivete in like two years rereading this post but come on!! Everything lines up way too well!! When MLP ended, TOH was there. Not TOH is ending and, oh, what's that?? WH!? I don't think its too unrealistic to think this story can take 3 test to make.. look say DHMIS, The Mandela Catalogue, and the Walten Files!!

...And well i mean if not, South Park has been going to 25 years and strong!! So I'll probably love that.

Favorite character: Julie!!!! (And Frank) // Don't make me pick favs from SP bro they're all so great. :')

Bonuses!!!

2021(-2023?): Loki

Bc of this show, i discovered i was gender fluid :]] I also found a wonderful community from it, and i love all of those people i met!!.. except for J***. You know who you are. Lmao, jokes. But yea, I'm no marvel fan or anything, but i love Greek/Norse mythology.. so it's no surprise i love Thor and Loki as much as i do!

Fav: Owen Wilson.

2021-2022: Inside Job (+ the 2000 other animated shows Netflix cancelled after one or two seasons..)

Yes there are shows that ended justly, like Kid Cosmic and CentaurWorld. They only planned on having two seasons so they ended great and with a banger. But like,, Dead End, and Glitch Techs, and give BNA another season, goddamn it!!

Fav: Brett 1000%

2020(-2023?) And 2021-2022: Animatics and The Cuphead Show respectively

I decided to add these two after ranting in the hashtags bc i just had to. :] Not much to say, i rlly love these shows. Made some art in my sketchbook and sh/t.

Fav: Wakko // Muggsie.

There's so many more shows (on tv, steaming, or online!) I'd live to acknowledge but I'm bored as hell do I'm calling it. Buhbies!!

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ducktoonsfanart · 1 year ago

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Did you have any plans for DuckTales in space as a DuckTales Space AU? And if you are, do you want to improvise it? Do you think it's a good idea to have Huey, Dewey and Louie from Ducktales 2017 as future astronauts? I would also like to ask you if, apart from the DuckTales reboot version, do you have any such plans for other versions as well? I'm just asking, I'm interested in your opinion. 😄

Sorry for the late reply, but I'll put it this way. Yes, I had planned it before, although with numerous obligations I am not able to do everything. If you have seen my previous answer, I think it speaks volumes.

But I'm already making some plans about it and I'll post in the next days and months about it, as well as my drawings related to the given topics, and also about Ducktales in space, as you mentioned.

I think they would make great astronauts considering their mother Della Duck, but they would fare better if they were a little older to the boys and adults when they went on endless adventures. Unfortunately, aside from Della Duck's trip to the moon and the Moonvasion episode, we didn't get to see the space adventures (I guess you mentioned that earlier in your posts), and the OG Ducktales had a lot of episodes about that, even pretty unrealistic ones, but that is still cartoon. Yes, I have a lot of gripes with the Ducktales reboot and yes, I too wish they had focused more on space travel, considering the current themes, unless you're a flat earther. There are alternatives though and I hope I can help you with this. And don't worry, there will be a lot of surprises about this, and you might like some topics about it. If you want, you can recommend me some things about the next fanfictions and my future drawings. Using other versions besides the Ducktales reboot wouldn't be bad, although I have different views on the other versions.

For now, if you want, look at online comics related to Donald Duck and space travel and there are interesting stories there and you can read them freely. Thank you for asking and I hope you are satisfied with my answers and if you want, feel free to keep asking me. I wish you a nice day.

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phecdasolar · 2 years ago

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Hey have a fandom masterlist:

TMNT <3

Homestuck <3

Transformers <3

MCYT (Dream SMP, Hermitcraft, Life series) <3

Ninjago <3

Dreamworks Trolls <3

Lego Monkie Kid

Gravity Falls

Ducktales

How to train your dragon

MCU (Ironman and Spider-Man <3)

Into the Spiderverse

Steven Universe

Deltarune

Undertale

Warriors

YuGiOh (All except Sevens, but GX and Arc-V my beloveds <3)

Sky COTL

5 Worlds (if you know what that is I will marry you on the spot so help me-) <3

The Owl house

Amphibia

Assassination Classroom <3

My Hero Academia (BNHA) <3

Castle

Psych

White Collar

Leverage <3

The Rookie

Pokemon

Sanders sides

Star v TFOE

She-Ra (2018 and 1995)

He Man (Revelations and 1983)

Thundercats (1985 and 2011)

ATLA

Avatar (blue people)

Miraculous

Good Omens <3

HILDA I LOVE HILDA SO MUCH <3

Infinity Train <3 (I watched every single episode in one day in one sitting no I am not kidding)

Kipo ATAOWB

Centaurworld

Tales of Arcadia

Hazbin Hotel/Helluva Boss

Sonic the hedgehog

Young Justice

Total Drama Island

OK KO

Lab Rats

Mighty Med

Liv and Maddie

Bluey (only watched a little bit)

Mao Mao (also only watched a little bit)

Snowflake Mountain

Pacific Rim

Megamind

Minecraft

Among Us

Fairy Tail

Bungou Stray Dogs

Wings of Fire <3

Order of the Seven <3

Percy Jackson

Bravelands <3

Land of Stories <3

Goddess Girls

Classroom of the Elite

K (anime)

Encanto

Erased

Thundercats

Webtoons:

CASTLE SWIMMER MY BELOVED

THE D!CKHEADS MY FREAKING BELOVED

Suitor Armor

Little Trashmaid

Live With Yourself

Jackson’s Diary

Lore Olympus

LUFF

High Class Homos

Acception

The Mermaid Scorned

Muted

Fluidium

LoveBot

The Makeup Remover

Cursed Princess Club

The Croaking

Loving Reaper

Space Boy (I have physical copies of book 1+2)

Forever after

Mage and Demon Queen Lumine

Hooves of Death

Code Adam

Sunny Side Up

Axed

Watermelon

————————————————

I can’t tag everything sorry (^^;)

But yeah this is most if not all of the stuff I’ve been into over the years! Talk to me about any of them please <3

Edit: I’ve forgotten so many things I’m realizing

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ursathered · 2 years ago

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Creative Journey (Re)Begins - Part 2

To part 1....

Above are pencil drawings I did in high school of friends I went to school with. The eye was in the same sketchbook.

The Black Panther fanart was on the cover of a card I sent to my nephew as an attempted start to exchanging letters to help with writing for him. Lilo was a reminder I'm capable a couple years later.

Another reminder of my abilities (I've needed...a lot). We lost my cat child, Ziva, a year ago. A couple days or so later I did this off of a picture of her in about 15 min?

My first chibi! I did this on a "get well soon" card for a friend who had brain surgery and was struggling some after. References were found on Google, from moosoppart here on Tumblr.

These fan art pieces were done as a start to playing with the pens and colored pencils. Huey (Ducktales 2017) was first, as you can guess. Not as good. Progress goes Huey, Webby, Louie, Dewey, Amy from Space Boy, a Webtoon Original by Stephen McCrainie, from the cover of his 2nd Omnibus book you can find on Amazon.

My current profile picture...following images are stages getting there. The last one is proof of concept sketch from my buju.

Eventually, this bear will transform into a character in my still in the planning and designing phases comic, Hera: Sisters of Fortune (space steampunk-y...dunno...with pirates).

First (well second, but....) attempt at my MC, Hal.

My first comic is presently in art development. Its from my writing group's stories about our OCs based in the Star Trek world. Scary, so decided this is a good first comic to start with to get used to the waters while I develop Hera.

To part 1....

#drawing #pencildrawing #colored pencil #comics #fanart #clip studio paint #art journey #star trek fanart #tng fanart #webcomic #webcomic fanart #ducktales fanart

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ducktoonsfanart · 2 years ago

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I usually don't take requests that much, not because I don't want to, I actually want to, but the problem is that I don't have enough time to get everything done. And there are people who are constantly annoying with those requests.

But it's okay if you ask me for requests because I see that you are inspired by my drawings and I support your ideas. I have ideas about Ducktales in space myself, just to put my ideas and some drawings around it. But depending on how much free time I have. I hope you understand me. But ok, you have the right to express your ideas and your right to your demands and I support you in that.

I would like to request someone, but I doubt that anyone will do it for me. Especially since I have some great ideas.

If anyone is willing to do it for me, feel free to contact me.

#I agree with the given suggestions #I just don't have enough time to devote myself to so many other requests #I will probably present my ideas about various stories and plans gradually #i think it's ok #ducktales space au is actually a good idea and I've been thinking about it for months but I don't have time to realize it because I have ot #and I already have some ideas for it ;)#and thank you for rebloging my fanarts #I appreciate it :D

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orithereticent · 2 years ago

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Masterlist

I take writing requests, as I am often bored and uninspired, just ask and you might get a fanfic out of it.

The lists are in alphabetical order.

Fandoms I like:

Doctor Who

Ducktales

Emily Windsnap

Ever After High

Fablehaven

Good Omens

Land of Stories

Miss Fisher’s Murder Mysteries

Monster high

Night at the Museum

Owl House

Pearls Before Swine

Scooby Doo Mystery Incorporated

Stranger Things

Things I like:

Astronomy

Chess

Drawing

Dungeons and Dragons

Fairytales

Frankenstein

Mermaids

Sewing

Shakespeare

Space

Writing

Ships I like:

Abbey/Heath Burns (Monster High)

Crowley/Aziraphale (Good Omens)

Eda/Raine (Owl House)

Fred/Daphne (Scooby Doo)

Headless Headmistress Bloodgood/Hexiciah Steam (Monster High)

Hunter/Willow (Owl House)

Jack Robinson/Phryne Fisher (Miss Fisher’s Murder Mysteries)

Jedidiah/Octavius (Night at the Museum)

Kanan/Hera (Star Wars Rebels)

Launchpad Mcquack/Drake Mallard (Darkwing Duck)

Luz/Amity (Owl House)

Patton/Lena (Fablehaven)

Red Hood/Froggy (Land of Stories)

Ricky Owens/Cassidy Williams (Scooby Doo Mystery Incorporated)

Robin Buckley/Nancy Wheeler (Stranger Things)

Velma/Marcie (Scooby Doo Mystery Incorporated)

Venus Mcflytrap/Robecca Steam (Monster High)

My Ao3:

https://archiveofourown.org/users/OritheReticent

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popculturebuffet · 3 years ago

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Go Team Venture!: A Venture Bros Retrospective: Season 1

Hello all you happy people! Last year I decided to do something a little special for my birthday, deciding to review something I had a long, personal history with, loved dearly and wanted to start a full retrospective on, resulting in my Scott Pilgrim Retrospective, a long and storied look at one of my favorite comics ever.

This year I decided to continue that tradition... albeit about two weeks late because my schedule slip got really bad combined with my life getting really busy, but the spirits’ the same. And for my 30th birthday, there was really only one option. One show that has been part of my life for over two decades, but i’ve never rewatched in full, and one that’s a true masterpiece, an adult cartoon ahead of it’s time that much like Scott dominated my Teen Years. As you can tell by the top it’s time to Go Team Venture as I take a months long look at The Venture Bros, easily one of my faviorite cartoons of all time and what I consider to be one of the best, most influential and most funny, warts and all.

For those less aware of the show a bit of backstory: The Venture Bros was an adult swim show that started in 2004. Masterminded by Jackson Public and Doc Hammer, a former writer and former artist for the Tick respectively (Both the 90′s cartoon and the 2000′s live action series), the show lasted for a bind bogglingly awesome 14 years, with the creators taking decent hiatueses between seasons to recharge. It was Adult Swim’s most popular show before a certain abusive alcholic took the crown, and is almost easily my faviorite, tied closely with Tuca and Bertie, not an easy task given the network’s long history and great back catalogue.

The show was also ahead of it’s time: while shows with rich continuites, snappy dialouge, pop culture shout outs, and deep, often heavily flawed characters who change considerably are normal, Venture Bros was one of the only ones at the time like this and probably the only one in adult animation. There were other good shows sure, but Venture Bros slowly evolved from a messy if fun parody of adventure shows like Johnny Quest, into a deep involved world that skewered the superhero supervillian dynamic, had characters who changed with every season in interesting ways, deep cut refrences, and a status quo that never settled for more than a season. It’s inventive, hilarous, and throughly itself. I also feel the show is directly responsible for some of my faviorites: the Ducktales reboot plays to me like the Venture Bros if the world wasn’t realistically broken, Bojack took the concept of having a deeply flawed protaganist who struggles to be better and ran with it, and Final Space comes off as the venture version of Guardians of the Galaxy. It was thanks to Jackson and Doc taking the leap, making their singuarly weird show and doing it the way they wanted that other shows could fly along with them and carry on the torch after their gone. This show isn’t without it’s flaws, which I won’t hesitate to point out, but I can’t help but geninely and wholeheartdly love it.

So let’s start at the beginning: back in the late 90′s, a young man named Christopher McCulloch, the future Jackson Publick, was working on The Tick. For those of you who don’t know what The Tick is.. i’m sorry it took you this long to find it you poor bastard, and it’s a superhero franchise that lovingly spoofs the genre, following a cheeful, gung ho, nigh invunerable big blue lunkhead and his nervous sidekick arthur as they fight crime. It’s crossed comics and three tv series and Jackson was working on the first of those, an animated series. There Jackson honed his craft writing and drawing under the watchful eye of his friend and Mentor, Ben Edlund, creator of the Tick and later Supernatural. So we have him to thank for that time Mystery Inc mentally broke down after finding out their world isn’t real. Thanks Ben!

While doing that a co worker brought in some books from a series he used to read, Tom Swift Jr, about a boy adventuerer who was the son of the previous tom swift who had his own boy adventures. He sketched two dorky brothers, one saying “Ma Venture didn’t raise no fools”... and thus the Venture Brothers were born. According to the book Go Team Venture: The Art and Making of the Venture Brothers, a massive and beautiful book from Dark Horse that covers the first 6 seasons of the show that not only reignited my love for the show but serves as most of my background material for this retrospective, Doc had the name venture from the second he sketched their “Dumb little heads” and never wavered on that for good reason. Also just to head this off if your wondering why i’m not using the DVD commentary it’s simple: I don’t have the dvds, I can’t afford to buy all of them, and it’d slow the retrospective down greatly to have to watch each season twice so if I miss something that was on the commentary, feel free to point it out politely.

Anyways Jackson kept these two in the back of his head, slowly coming up with the idea to make them a Johnny Quest pastiche, while having the father be a second generation adventurer like Tom Swift Jr. He tried bringing them to comics while working at Jumbo pictures as the animators there had a regular anthology comic called Monkeysuit, but wanted them more fleshed out. He picked at it for a while and eventually realized it’d just work best in animation.

So he tried one of the only games in town for Adult Animation: Comedy Central. As you can tell by the whole “Adult Swim” thing, that didn’t really pan out and Comedy Central passed on what could’ve been another flagship show.

Granted it’s for the best: the show didn’t quite fit Comedy Central. So Jackson shelved it for a bit to work on the first live action Tick show, moving to LA for it and getting an agent who asked if he had anything to shop around. He had some venture boys to shop around, so his agent brought it to a company that was experimenting with Claymation. Given Dean and Hank never went on an adventure to save baby new year, you can see where this went.

After the 2000′s Tick bottomed out because Fox was a sink hole for good ideas back in the day, in case you were wondering “Gee why didn’t he try Fox?”, Jackson decided to get serious about the Venture Bros, headed back to NYC and made a proper pitch bible for the series, a book that’s a general idea for what the series will be. To my shock most of the stuff in the pitch bible made it to the series. From Dr. Venture’s pill addiction, to his unspoken attraction to brock, to Brock being the Boys true parental figure, to characters like Mol, Monarch and Underbeit. The only really notable bit they never got around to was Army Joe, Brock’s long lost brother whose told what to do by a hallucination of uncle sam on his shoulder. They just haven’t found a way to make it work. And Brock having a brother IS canon and was mentioned in season 3, something Jackson pointed out... he just never found a way to make it work. It happens.

He shopped it around and just happened to be friends with one of the execs at Cartoon Network, who was looking for new pilots for Adult Swim. They said “Sure why not” and the race was on to actually make it.

This is where the other half of our dynamic duo comes in: Doc Hammer. Doc and Jackson were already good friends at this point, having met at a party through Edlund and hit it off. When Jackson had needed a workspace in NYC, Hammer gladly let Jackson use his, christned the astrobase because their that level of nerd and that’s part of why I love these guys. What started as a workspace for a bunch of guys slowly evolved into a fort for two guys to work in the middle of the night, randomly shoot the shit about whatever popped into their heads, make swords or props to fool around with and general shenanigans.

So when Jackson needed help with the editing and music for the pilot, as his production studio NoodleSoup knew how to make cartoons in flash but not edit them. Keep in mind flash wasn’t as ubiquitious as it is today, nor as heavily abused as it’d soon be. So Doc naturally agreed since..

Jackson also needed to cast the core four: Starting with what’s truly our lead, Jackson had only one person in mind for Doc: James Urabanik. He’d seen James at a stage show a few years back and given Dr. Venture looks like a sadder more desperate version of him, something James noticed but gladly agreed to do. Next up are the boys. Jackson wanted to do a voice himself as he’d always WANTED to on the Tick but the weird way the animation industry worked back then, they refused to let writers do character voices. This stands out to me because, in part thanks to adult swim doing just that a lot this show especially, it’s now fairly normal for one of the creators to do a voice if they want, with Alex Hirsch voicing three major characters on Gravity Falls, Ian Jones Quarterly voicing two of the leads on Ok KO and Olan Rogers of Final Space voicing at least two including leading man Gary. It also scratches my head WHY they woudln’t, especially with a creator as it saves on money.

So Jackson ended up just deciding to do Hank and given he was at ease doing this from the pilot, it’s clear he was always meant to be a va. This would be the first of dozens of voice he and Doc would do and god bless em for it, they really have a ton of talent in the craft. Anyways, Hank wasn’t a solo act, yet, but finding that right Dean charm was tricky. Thankfully a friend of Jacksons recommended Micheal Sinterniklas. This and TMNT 2003 have made Micheal a faviorite of mine even if he does games and anime more. Though he did do Kappa Mikey so he has that going for him. He was the perfect dork for the job and that just left Brock, who like Doc Jackson had someone in mind, Patrick Motherfuck Warburton. Warburton was already a name thanks to Seinfield, and had starred in the 2000′s Tick Show, playing the roll to perfection. And he was already a VA at the time, having just started his career with Buzz Lightyear and Family Guy, the latter he’ll probably be doing till a hellmouth opens and finally claims what’s left of the show and the earth. He’d go on to VA for some time and still does, one of the most notable being Sheriff Bronson Stone for Scooby Doo Mystery Inc. Patrick happily agreed and the cast was set with Jackson filling in the gaps. And Mike but... we’ll talk about that when we get to the episodes themselves, and thus the pilot itself.

The Pilot was enough of a success that after a short wait, the show got picked up and Jackson was happy to procede as usual. The show switched to traditional animation, got simplier backgrounds jackson hated and moved on for season 2.

There was a hiccup though: Writing a show by yourself.. is incredibly hard espiecally when your also showrunning it. This is why most shows have multiple writers on most episodes and even ones that have the creator write every episode usually have at least two. So Jackson naturally went to Ben for help since he knew how to do this, but Ben, while a great guy and still friends with Jackson to this day, was also busy with his own stuff and couldn’t commit to a full season workload. So Doc, who was in the room because of course he was, agreed to help so Jackson could keep a show. While Doc hadn’t written before, Ben could teach him the ropes, then pass it off to him when he was ready. In Theory. In practice Ben helped a bit, enough that Doc knew the formatting and stuff, but had to leave the learning curve to the poor guy as he got pulled away. So through this Doc became one half of a team, and the two scrambled through the season. The season ended up being a sleeper hit, not too much bigger than adult swim’s other shows but enough to get them renewed. But is “Good enough for a sure why not renewal” good enough for today’s fat guy at a computer? Find out under the cut!

So since this is my first review of a full season of a show in months, i’ve streamlined things a bit, breaking it down into three sections. More sections can be added based on the show, but for this one we have

Seasonal Stylings: The style of a certain season, how it feels unique, what it changes from last time, what it fixes or messes up, that sort of thing, or in this case what’s different from future seasons.

Roll Call: Going into the characters and their development each season, how they grow and evolve or if they step back any.

Episode Breakdowns: Going through each episode and giving my opinon on them, what I liked, what I didn’t that sort of thing along with some fun counting gags.

Super Good and Holy Dammit Christmas Awards: The best and worst episodes of each season.

Now we have that settled

Seasonal Stylings:

Season 1 of a show is where most shows, ESPECAILLY animated ones find their legs, taking time to find out just how to tell their stories the way they want, slowly set up the world, and work out that awkward sweaty puberty their going through to get to the adulthood most season 2′s achieve. Venture Bros is no less sweaty in it’s first outing.

Season 1 is very much the show at it’s most basic plot descritpion: A neurotic wreck of a legacy hero super scienteist with no scruples, no care for his sons, and a desperation for cash goes around the world on various adventures with his naive, sheltered and mildly dimb sons and best friend/bodyguard/sweedish murder machine... and instead of the bigger more typical genre adventure stuff, we see the awkward messes that result instead due to Doc’s greed and reality smacking this world on the back of the head: Doc’s desperate attempts to prove he’s still young and get some lead to him getting jabbed with science and turned into a caterpillar, the local Dr. Strange becomes their tenant and tries to stop Doc’s orphan heart powered wish machine, Dean gets testicular tortion and has to have it humiatingly treated while Brock and Hank serve as hostages and help the Monarch have a truly happy birthday, The Monarch and Baron Underbeit argue over who gets to arch venture over orderves. The misson statment of tempering a cool, super science, comic book world with the pain of failure and real life constraints is there from minute one and works perfectly. It feels like your picking up a comic in an already well involved shared universe with plenty of past stories, volumes, and weird side stuff that’s been going on for decades yet the characters, our main ones anyway, haven’t aged a ton. The venture bros universe is essentially the marvel universe with large dollops of johnny quest, other boy adventure stories, the music doc and jackson like, and any refrence they want, major or minor, all mixed together into this loving brew and while it takes some time to reach peak awesome, the heady mix is there from the start.

The thing that makes season 1 stand out though is all the pieces aren’t quite settled yet. Jackson hasn’t quite figured out HOW much marvel style nonsense he can dump in (the answer being ALL OF IT), and thus costumed supervilliany isn’t the major focus it would be. The reason for this is simple: it’s focusing point, the Monarch, wasn’t INTENDED to be a main character

Yeah I was stunned too but the Monarch was originally intended to be one of many guys making Dr. Venture’s life hell, hence why Baron Underbeit exists, with episodes having more unique antagonists. Instead he just kept popping into scripts, with them realizing slowly it was far easier to just have one weirdly dedicated jackass assault our hero with silver age nonsense and wave after wave of his own men then come up with some new threat or rotate them out. With the Monarch the show slowly develops the core of it’s unvierse, one built on costumed villany that also has strick rules in escaltion, threat levels and who can attack who. It’s mind boggling to think that the Guild isn’t properly introduced till Trial of the Monarch but from then on the show knows what it is and has a ranting, butterfly obessesed, manically laughing, green gobliny center to it to progress the core of it’s world while the Ventures various antics build out the rest. The Monarch’s still important, appearing in about half the season and having his own dedicated subplots, but it woudln’t be till the end of the season he firmly became the show’s duteratognist, with his own involved story arcs every season.

Instead Season 1 is built entirely on the other core concept and character of the series: Rusty, and as a result almost every episode is focused on him and his failure to live up to his dad. It’s weird to look back and see just how Rustrycentric the season is: every plot ballances on him in some way or form. Even the Dean-Focused “Are you there god it’s me dean?” is just as focused on Doc trying to help him as it is the poor boys humilation. As the series went on it involved to make all four of the core of Team Venture involved and give them plots and development so i’ts weird to see the show essentially focused on one lead witht he Monarch, The Boys, and Brock all supporting players to rusty’s life instead of being leads in their own right.

While the season is diffrent though.. it holds up SHOCKINGLY well. I found myself laughing a hell of a lot and even episodes i’d dreaded going back to were wonderful to revisit. The show has some rough patches here and there of course: as Doc and Jackson fully addmited in the book, they hammered on both “Go Team Venture” and RUSTY IS ADDICTED TO PILLS WE HAVE TO BRING THAT UP every episode because they felt they needed to be well established. The former would be scaled back while the latter is just.. no longer a thing honestly. Rusty probably is still on a bunch of shady perscrption drugs, but given it was never the yukfest they seemed to think it was outside of two really good gags, they made the right call.

Overall though it’s utterly hilarious, with great timing, parody concepts and animation. It’s stilted compared to the later seasons, but even for the early 2000′s it looks gorgeous. Some bits haven’t aged well comedy wise but for the most part Season 1 is an enjoyable ride the whole way through, a loving parody with a sense there’s a deeper world there.

It’s only real drawback is the characterization is limited: while Doc and Brock come out of the gate fairly realized, the boys are two dumb peas in the same dumb pod. Their slightly diffrent: hanks a jock , dean’s a nerd, but it takes the season for them to really evolve into who they are: A shy withdrawn boy whose slowly growing tired of this adventuering life but is scared to admit it, and a reckless weirdo living in his own world of alter egos, grinder sales, and adventure. This is something they corrected quickly though and both the network and the crew wanted to make the boys more distinct and vital to the story. The Monarch slowly emerges from his cocoon as who he is, but at this point 21 and 24 are just two especially chatty minons (Though 21′s geekiness is starting to shine through) and Dr. Girlfriend the Monarch’s.. well girlfriend and #2. There’s hints she’s far more capable and has more of a past, but we again won’t really see that in full till next season. The pieces are there.. they just haven’t been moved into the proper position yet.

But despite this and the ocasional joke that amounts to “haha brock has a giant penis, haha dr. venture pissed himself, ha ha brock has to masturbate loudly”, which are few and far between, the first season is STILL throughly enjoyable and watchable almost 20 years later. It’s remarkable a season crunched by time and by two guys not quite in step yet turned out as good and memorable as it did and it’d only get better from here.

Roll Call:

Onto our casts, who as I said are at their most basic starting positions here, with most depth being added next season. Still there’s plenty to pick apart so pitter patter, let’s get atter.

Since he’s the center of the season and the star of the show and what not , we’ll start with Dr. Thaddeus “Rusty” Venture. Rusty, as should be obvious is a massive deconstruction of the kid hero, or boy adventurer as the series puts it. While on paper going around the world, fighting evil and getting to do all so with your larger than life parent and his rougish band of friends sounds fun, this series shows just exactly what that would’ve been like in the 60′s: Getting carted around by an egotistical asshat and his unhinged friends, traumtized all the time, and never making any real friends while your dad gaslights you into enjoying it, then getting trapped in having to fill his impossibly big shoes when he mysteriously dies and leaves you everything, failing because you were never properly prepared for it. Granted nowadays this kind of deconstuction is common: Steven Universe, Owl House, Amphibia, Kid Cosmic, Ducktales the list of shows that have the kid heroes themselves realizing this isn’t easy as it looks goes on. Granted in those cases theirs actual hope of getting better as an adult and growing, but here it shows what’d happen if that moment of self relization and growth and change.. never came. If you spent your whole life wallowing in the mess it was. You get Rusty, a bitter, abusive, selfish shell of a person who constnatly lashes out at his kids and the world and desperately tries to get cash through horrible means. And while a lot of his problems are on his uprbringing and being thrust into a legacy he wasn’t prepared to honor in the slightest, a lot are also just a lack of self awarness: he sees himself as this stifled genius, trapped with two dopey kids and a failing compound who longs to be better than dad. But he just dosen’t put the work in. He dosen’t WANT to get better at super science and at his core hates this world. He’d of been better off leaving it but his own pride , his own love of the craft and his stubborness to one up his dad and prove himself worthy of his legacy means he’s trapped in a world of costumes and scietnfic progress gone boink. It’s the great tragedy of the character: he’d of been WAY happier leaving this all behind.. but he never had a remote chance of letting himself do so and even if he tried, it’s doubtful the original team venture or scoiety itself ever would’ve LET HIM escape his dad’s shadow. He was trapped in this irony sciency cage since birth and can never seem to forge the key out.

While the abuse part is only hinted at this season, with the brisby test ride and learning beds, and the former child star aspect not fully shown to the audience, both would be more promienint in seasons 3 and 2 respectively, we do get a sense Rusty is a guy whose best years are behind him, his worst currently ongoing, and who can’t get past his own ego to better himself as a person.

It takes a bit though for the full rusty to emerge: in the pilot he’s more an oblvious scientest who, while not a good parent at all, seems more out of touch with things than actively incompetnet, not getting why a death ray wouldn’t be welcome at a peace confrence. By the series proper his scheming nature, drug addiction and neglect of the boys is there, best exemplified with one of the series best stingers “I picked two beautiful kidneys, I feel freaking amazing!’. By the way not only were they doing that long before marvel but the stingers are easily one of the shows best touches, allowing an extra joke or some resoultion the main plot didn’t provide.

But while it gets how slimy the guy is, it isn’t as well ballanced as the rest of the series. The reason for this is simple: He has no friends at this point> Brock keeps a wall between them, Billy and Pete are barely around, and Orpheous WANTS to be his friend but Doc’s an ass to him so tha’ts not happening. WIthout those three to bounce off of, Doc is often just either being belittled by people, snarking off to people or yelling at his boys. Later seasons keep him a dick, but by having him have more snappy patter, the bitter medicine of putting up with this jackass goes down smoother and he gets to be more funny. It dosen’t make him a good person, fuck no, but being a good person and being watchable are two diffrent things.

The other thing that makes him hard to watch is he’s a far worse dad. Yes that’s actually possible. He yells at the boys a lot more, is a lot more horrible to them (even if one instance of this in eeny meeny miney magic, the flames speech, is really funny). Later seasons would better ballance it either playing this shit for dark laughs or making it clear the effect he’s having on these poor boys. Season one just dosen’t quite yet get how to make his disdian for his kids as funny outside of a few occasions. But credit where it’s do my memory has him getting better, and season 7 bears this out. Not as a person but as a charcter, he’s far more intresting from season 2 onward. Urabanik is still good at the roll mind you, and Doc gets some great lines, he’s juts not quite to peak rusty yet. He’ll get there.

Brock likewise is a bit more simple. In season one he’s almost entirely just a stoic, murdery happy badass, the only resonable person in the room. He isn’t nearly as close with the family ,keeping doc at arm’s length and while he’s more of a parent to doc than the boys, he still has more slip ups, calling hank a wuss for you know, not wanting to snap a man’s neck. That said his scene in Eeeny Meeny Miney Magic where he and hank hang out is one of the most adorable and one of the definting moment sof his character, cementing the two’s bond and how much he cares. He let’s hank hang out, says scuba with him, let’s the boy look at his tapes, when you’d THINK the guy would throw him out. He even makes up for snapping at hank by taking him with him to fix helper. We see Brock’s nobility quite often, from gently turning down a mexican wrestler hitting on him (And throwing the guy his shirt as a compensation), to helping smuggle a sasquatch, to applauding the boys injunity in eeny meeny miney magic, only mad they didn’t have a plan past “wake brock up” and not letting it show too bad. Brock’s a good guy. .even if ther’es .. one trait of his we’ll talk about next time that’s pretty fucking bad and has aged like fine cheese. Brock is an enjoyably badass macho spy guy and will continue to evolve as the series goes to become both more badass and more of a person.

The titular Venture Bros, my boys Hank and Dean easily needed the most work. By Season 3 I absolutely loved them , with Dean being my faviorite character as a teen and Hank being my faviorite character currently. But at the pilot stage they were just two barely diffrent dorks who loved solving mysteries and were blisfully unaware how terrible the world they were trapped in. They were mostly put off to the side for subplots in season 1 or in supporting role. The most they had diffrent was dean was bookish and Hank’s a wannabe jocks, both neither quite making the roll.

It’s once the show slowly started making them into their own persons they became the characters we know and love. The best examples of this to me are Eeeny, Meeny Miney Magic!, Mid LIfe Chyrsalis and Tag Sale, You’re It! It’s those three episodes where the boys feel most like themselves.

Starting with Mid Life Chrysalis while Hank and Dean still play Jock and Nerd a bit, their personalites start to percolate in how they help Brock prepare for his liscense renewal. Dean tries teaching Brock the written test and when given an awesome and hilaroiusly complex response by brock on how our resident badass would handle the issue his response is simply “The answer is C”. He has the demanor of a dorky school teacher despite being 16. Hank in contrast puts on his best sweats, and tries to immitate rocky, being rough on brock, telling him to eat some eggs he most definetly spat in, and getting a bit too into his drill seargent nasty routine before Brock reminds him “Hank you realize when I get my lisence i’m aloud to kill you right?”. Dean’s inherntly dorky energy put towards pretty normal stuff and Hank’s unique brand of bonkers both shine through here.

It starts to peak through more with Eeny Meeny Miney Magic. Here the two go to seperate corners for the first time and both get definting parts of their personalties as a result. Dean gets his hopeless crush on Triana, as well as an utterly hilarous and awkward bit where he talks about “the box his pop made”, leaving triana speechless. He’s adorably awkward around the poor girl, later kissing his hand and “practicing being a boyfriend pop!” in the bathroom. And hte fact he calls it that tells me he’s not ready. Hank meanwhile is in adorable pie eyed dork mode, fawning over his hero brock as he stacks nickles, says scuba and acccidnetly presses a button. It emphasies the two’s bond which would become the lynchpin of hank’s character in season 4 and as I said i’ts adorable. The ending also shows the boys dynamic well with Hank lightly razzing dean

“She was all over you” “really?” “No” It’s a nice change from earlier epsiodes where Hank’s more of a bully to Dean. here he’s just popping his bro’s bubble like most brothers do.

The two finally emerge in full in “Tag Sale! You’re It!”. With Dean’s hidden reluctance towards adventure and Hank’s exuberance and batshit nature set up, Tag Sale fully fleshes it out: Dean is utterly awkward around triana, can’t process the real world but deseprate what’s the chunk of it he sees in her. Hank meanwhile gets one of his shining moments: Upon finding his dad selling his stuff, he decies to start his own buisness. Now most kids and teens would probably sell food and drink, the gap in doc’s selling, that’s not too abnormal. Hank’s got hustle. But Hank being hank takes it a step further by having everyone wear hats and aprons, dubbing the stand “Hankco’s Lemonade and GrinderWorld” and specifically selling grinders, griling dean when he dosne’t upsell a lemonade with the grinder. He let’s dean have a break to talk to Trianna becaue of “Union roles’ and when the rest of his employees (Dean, Helper and Triana) abandon ship when a supervillian riot breaks out, Hank vows he will not be moved before getting clubbed in the head with an errant shoe. Hank was truly born that day. This kind of nuts would stick and by next season Hank would hit his peak crazy and become who he was always desitned to be: the Bat. So while it took till season 2 for Doc and Jackson to make a concetrated effort to make the two both indivdiuals and a full part of the series instead of just the easy joke of “well it’s called the venture bros but it’s not REALLY about them”, they were gearing up to and the execs asking for it likely wasn’t a tall order.

Now onto our Villian Protaganist. The Mighty Monarch, as i’ve said, wasn’t INTENDED to be as recurring as he was, let alone a main lead. But it’s also easy to see much like Opus or Fonzie WHY he broke out from being one of many enemies venture sighed about to being his obessive one true arch enemy. He’s the perfect mirror for Rusty: unlike Rusty he’s actually sucessful in his own way: he has tons of minons, a cash flow so near-endless it dosen’t run out till season 6, a cool base, and a loving and capable partner in both senses of the word. Yet like Rusty he’s own worst enemy: as the show will go on to point out, he could have a top tier nemsis enemy.. but his weird vendetta with Doc for reasons he dosen’t even remember keeps him tied to a washed up dickwad who sees their rivalry not as some epic, years long war like Monarch wants.. but as some petty annoyance, like the Monarch was some guy letting his dog crap on venture’s lawn. Though I wouldn’t be suprised if the monarch once adopted several dozen dogs, dressed them in butterfly costumes and had them take dumps on venture’s lawn. He’s stuck hating someone who just dosent hate him the way he does, and deludes himself into thinking otherwise. As Dr. Girlfriend puts it in “Mid-Life Chralyis” “You two have a lot in common”. Their both pathetic.. but in their own unique ways that make them the perfect foils.

He’s also just damn funny. Practically every scene with him has a good laugh. Chris never fails to kill with the guy, sometimes literally. He’s an utterly captivating presence and the series was right to make him the duetragonist from Trial of the Monarch on.

Dr. Girlfriend, as I mentioned isn’t at full develoment yet, but makes a great partner: she’s understanding to the Monarch but also blunt, pointing out things like not wanting kids, but truly and clearly loves her deranged boss/boyfriend. She dosen’t really break out though till Trial, where after the Monarch REALLY piles on the asshole, calling her a slut was way fucking out of line, she ends up going back to her ex phantom limb... more on him next season... and rightly calls Monarch’s ass out.. yet at her heart still cares enough to both feel bad he’s going up river.. and to pass the blame to the boys.

Finally on Team Monarch we have 21 and 24. There’s not much to say here really. Their the monarch’s two henchman and much like the man himself they weren’t meant ot be as big as they were.. but Doc and Jackson liked voicing them and it just made sense, much like the monarch himself, to have a few recurring guys. While their screentime here is limited what they get is TRULY amazing: the lightsaber bit in tag sale, SMURFS DON’T LAY EGGS, their publishing of the flight of the monarch with Gary’s utter stupidity in putting the man’s face on the cover, and the finale which has the two just sorta dick around before accidently acomplishing their goal of murdering hank and dean in the most idotic way possible. The two are a delight, one a loveable fanboy living out his best life, the other a middle aged clone of ray ramano. Can’t wait to see evne more next season.

Suppoting cast wise we’ll start with Dr. Orpheous who at this point is easily the biggest member of the supporting cast and would continue to be for the next season or two before being mostly ignored in the latter half of the series. But for now he’s another good foil for Doc: As the men themselves put it, he’s a succesful parent and career man to Doc’s abusive failure. He dotes on his “pumpkin”, at worst embarassing her at a christmas party by announcing her maidenhead is not a prize to be won (Though given the guy hitting on here was Pete aka someone Dr. O’s OWN AGE, I can understand), making sure her dinner’s on teh table. IN short he’s a sweetheart of the mystic arts as well as the master of them. It was also a bold choice to parody Dr. Strange LONG before he had a movie let alone much audience recognition. Even in comics while well loved by writers, he wasn’t a big name at the time. This would change soon with Bendis (HISSSSSSS), raising his profile again, but the point was it shows the guys don’t care how deep the cut is, they just do what they want and it’s what gives the show it’s flavor.

Orpheous is just a hammtastic treat every time he shows up, from talking about his cat being in heat, to mocking the hidden passageway trope, to trying desperately to get a nemisis, a bit where the guys set a thread without realizing it. It leads to the man’s only real moment of weakness, agreeing to the guild’s terms to get him an arch at the cost of the Monarch, but given he both dosen’t know why Phantom Limb wants monarch out of the way and the guild would likely try and get rid of the poor guy otherwise I can’t blame him. Compared to the fuckups of the rest of the cast and the closet thing we’ll get to next time, it’s minor.

Finally we have Pete and White> Their just kinda around at this point. We’ll get more into them next time. ONTO THE EPISODES!

Episode Breakdowns!

Here’s how it works: i’ll go into each ep, what I like about em, and then get into some recurring bits, counting gags and such. They are Rusty Sucks Surprising No One Count: This is any time Rusty is an asshole. So probably once an episode but given how terrible he is this season, funny or otherwise, I needed it. This Didn’t Age Well Count: Again more for my mental health. Bits that just didn’t age well. Can’t be helped on the guys parts but still. Hanktastic: For Hank’s shenanigans. Deanarific: For Dean’s doings. This bit wasn’t ORIGINALLY in the review but I thought of adding it for season 2 and rather than have a segment that will likely run series long start with the second and things be weird I went back and added it here. I usually try to AVOID george lucasing my work, but in this case I felt the acception was warranted. It’s one thing to erase mistakes you made, it’s another to simply add something neat so the whole retrospective is more cohesive. Best Moment: Self Explanitory. First Apperance: Since this show has a LOT of characters, it’s only fitting. If I miss one in the background that’s on me. I’m mostly focusing on the bigger recurring players here though. Super Good Award: Best episode of the season Pissed in God’s Eye Award:Worst Episode of the season. Questions for Later: Bits of Foreshadowing, or things that get followed up on.

Also going by airing order. While it’s not correct order, it’s what HBO Max had. I do feel the DVD order, used by Hulu flows better, but the HBO Max airing has the bonus episodes, so my choice was clear.

0. The Terrible Secret of Turtle Bay Summary: The Ventures head to New York for a conference and have to deal with prostitues, public humilation, sterotypes and the Mighty Monarch. My Thoughts: Terrible Secret is a decent pilot. While the animation is rough, the plot holds decently and I still consider some form of it canon... as does the show as the Monarch’s orginal outfit here, as well as the minon outfit shows up a few times. The characters are in a rough state, but it works well enough and the spirit of the series is there even if it’s not at full steam yet. What holds it back is one VERY grating flaw. So about that... This Didn’t Age Well Count: 3. The first is making a joke over two underage boys accidently soliciting a prostitue and it’s minor, if still ehhhhh. The second is giving Dr. Girlfriend an adams apple as part of that clear “Get it SHE’S TRANS THAT’S A JOKE RIGHT” runner with her. I’ll talk about that more next time but it dosen’t sit well with me even two decades on. The major one.. is Otaku Sensuri... an asian man. Voiced by the very white Michael Sinterniklas using one of the most horribly offensve fake asian accidents i’ve ever heard. This isn’t okay now and it sure as shit wasn’t okay then. Granted since then Jackson and Doc have TRIED to stay away from sterotyping. At worst Dr. Z is borderline and really shoudnl’t be voiced by a white guy, but otherwise they learned their lesson from this. Still makes the episode hard to watch for me whenever he’s on screen though. The fact the payoff for him is that he diddles himself to machines.. does not help. It’s very HE HE MASTRBATION instead of making an actual joke. Rusty Sucks Surprising No One: 1, shocking given even slightly nicer here he’s still annoyed at the boys existance. But no all he did was turn a Dog inside out.. which is still ungodly horrible, RIP Scamp, but is somehow not the worst thing he does all season. Best Moment: Easy winner. Otaku Sensuri trying to escape in a cloud of smoke, the UN Guy saying he escaped only for Dean to casually point out “He’s over there”... cut to the ninja hiding in plain sight in a potted plant. First Appearance: Rusty Venture, Brock Sampson, Dean Venture, Hank Venture, Billy Quizboy, Pete White, Professor Impossible, The Monarch and Dr. Girlfriend.

1. Dia De Los Dangerous!

Summary: The Venture’s trip down Mexico Way finds the boys kidnapped, Helper getting a sweet paint job, Brock buried alive, Doc missing a kidney and The Monarch missing his adopted family. My Thoughts: A truly excellent episode and second pilot. The cast is more defined, the jokes come fast and furious and the pacing is divine. The Monarch’s tragic and utterly silly backstory coupled with Doc’s kidney shenanigans (the way he counts it, Helpers makeover and their half assed tethering are all classic). Brock also gets an iconic moment with “They hit me with a truck” Rusty Sucks Surprising No One: 5. Assuming a doctor will give him pills just for being mexican, calling dia de los muertos “crazy dead people christmas” and stealing his son’s kidney’s. Granted their clones but THEY don’t know that. Best Moment: The Kidney gag. “And I got two beauitful Kidneys! I feel freakin amazing! Hanktastic: Re Helper “He looks liked a dried out turd on a bad Stretch of Road” First Appearance: H.E.L.P.E.r (Not spelling it properly most of the time because it’s a lot), Henchman 24.

2. Careers in Science

Summary: The Ventures go where several men have gone before to fix Jonas’ old satalite. Rusty hallucinates his dad, the boys hunt for a phantom spaceman and brock cucks a pent up manchild by accident. My Thoughts: This one’s a bit of a mess. Doc freely admits the pacing isn’t good, and it’s far slower than it needs to be. Not enough good jokes and Brock beats up a guy for merely touching him and gets punished for.. being upset his girlfriend cheated on him. If she wanted to break up with the guy for you know, not having sex with her, that’s fine. It’d be awkard being stuck with him., so I get why she hadn’t yet, but it’s still wrong to have sex with him instead of just.. telling bud she wants sex. Overall not a great ep, though it has some standout gags. Questions For Later: Sadly Manstrong comes back one more time. Shockingly though the problem light, i.e. the light that turned on to trigger all this in the first place is a VITAL chekov’s gun.. it just took the guys 14 years to fire it. Best Moment: Rusty happily scarfing down some pills to make his hallucination dad go away. Deanarific and Hanktastic: “It’s on it’s off it’s on it’s off” “That’s called blinking boys First Appearance: Manstrong, Baldovich, Jonas Venture (As a hallucination but it’s the first time we both see his appearnce and hear his voice so I count it)

3. Home Insecurity

Summary: Brock goes on his annual wolverine style sabatical, leaving Doc to create a new robot that ends up being more of a problem than a solution, while Underbeit and the Monarch argue over who gets to arch venture this week. My Thoughts: This episode is fine. I remembered not liking it but honestly it has some things going for it: it’s parody of the six million dollar man (whose stuck being unable to pay back those parts), his love of a sasquatch, the shaved bigfoot gag, and the Monarch and Underbeits minons shooting the shit while their bosses have a polite meeting. But overall it’s just.. there. It’s not bad, but it’s not all that memorable nor impactful on the show as a whole. And one of the problems with that. is the Baron himself. Doc and Jackson meant for him to be a bigger character but felt taking him as far into evil as needed to make him funny would be too over the top. Great for the tick but not fitting in this universe. It’s telling the guy shows up three times this season, once next season.. and then disappears for a season and a half. He’s just not funny or intreresting and dosen’t really fit in the world this show becomes. Rusty Sucks Surprising No One: 6. His yelling at Hank, not getting hank was in his own stupid way trying to revivie him. Leave my boy alone. His also not realizing Helper was sentient... decades into knowing the poor robot. Best Moment: Dr. Girlfriend putting out snacks for Monarch’s meeting with the baron. Just the common banality of it. It gets me. First Appearance: Baron Underbeit.

4. The Incredible Mr. Brisby

Summary: Rusty takes his kids to Brisby land for a buisness deal and in typical Rusty fashion leaves them in the plane while he goes to talk to owner Roy Brisby. He soon finds himself kidnapped as part of Brisby’s grand design, while Brock finds himself working with his black widowy x to track him down and the boys find themselves brainwashed by a bunch of soccer parents. My Thoughts: This is another one I didn’t really care for when I was younger. But on rewatch I found it was ONLY the Mol and Brock stuff I didn’t like. The overblown parody of sexual tension between spies just.. never worked for me and Mol never felt like she had more character than “russian superspy”, that she was more than her parody like the rest of the cast. It’s a shame too: the Ventureverse is very light on female characters.. and one of the only important ones.. is a shallow black widow parody who has no real character outside of “sex pot wild card who plays whatever side’s winning”. It’s a character type i’ve seen before and done better and for this show I expect better. I don’t belivie in adding female characters JUST to up the count but I do feel Jackson and Doc could’ve done more with Mol over seven seasons to make her actually entertaining and just couldn’t. It’s one of the few problems with venture bros that seems to stretch over the whole work: I love Doc and Jackson but they just don’t seem to get that women can pathetically fail too, and often struggle to flesh out female characters, with Dr. G, Warina Sirena and Sally (With time) being some of the only exceptions. I don’t think their sexist or intentionally saying “Nyeah no women in our club”, I just feel it’s easier for them to make male schlubs because that’s easier to write and there’s more characters to pull from pastiche wise.

The other two parts of the ep though? Their divine. Doc’s interactions with Brisby are peak doc, with him smarting off the guy greatly and his Drug addled monologue in a southern belle voice is fucking brilliant. The real star of their plot though is Brisby himself, a paralized man with a rictus grin played to perfection by Chris Parnell, who just steals every damn scene he’s in. From calling Le Le his “Companda”, to having said panda put a sack over Doc’s head, to “coming aflame’ to getting rightfully pissed his base has stairs, there’s not a moment the man’s on screen that isn’t entertaining. He also cleverly sets up the cloning thing for next season, one of the few times the guys fully planned ahead.

Finally the boys bit is decent. While the stuff with them trapped in the x1 is not entertaining at all, the orange county liberation front being a military extermist group stocked with subruban parents is fucking amazing. Rusty Sucks Surprising No One: 7, as bringing his sons to Brisbyland and NOT letting them you know, go putter around while he does his meeting is a dick move even for Rusty. And given we’re only 5 episodes in and already up to 7 on this count, that threshold is vast. Best Moment: “Mandalay i’ve come aflame!” It’s mostly in the delivery. A paralized man being set on fire isn’t funny in itself. But him saying so like this happens all the time, as well as the question of WHY he keeps the fireplace around if this happens. That’s comic gold. Questions for Later: Our first hints of two major things: That the boys are clones, as Brisby comes to doc specfically for his cloning expertise (With Doc likely refusing not to avoid the heat but because he knows his clones have to grow from infancy), and that Jonas was a terrible dad with him taking his son wanting to help as a sign to test dangerous rides on him. Hanktastic: While i’ts more early hank than the later loveable loon, Hank asking his dad if he’s “on the rag” clearly not knowing what that means is still hilarous, especailly Doc just sighing at his son’s stupidity. Deanarific: Dean spotting all the animals. Such a precious boy. I feel bad for the crapstorm of a life he’s already had and that’s only going to get worse. First Appearance: Roy Brisby (Who will show up in the background from time to time so fair enough), Moltov Cocktease

5. Eeeny, Meeny, Miney Magic! Summary: Doc let’s a Dr. Strange rent a room just in time for one of his inventions powered by a forsaken child to ensnare Brock, forcing the boys to rescue him. Meanwhile Dean falls for the new tenant’s teenage goth daughter, and does the mature thing and kisses his owns hand to practice for her. My Thoughts: Another one I glossed over. But on rewatch.. this was a season highlight and VERY nearly got the super good award. Orpheus instantly adds a lot to the show: an intresting foil for doc, another side to this show’s universe we don’t see a lot, a goth daughter to serve as an intresting foil for the boys while also allowing him to be a good dad to Rusty’s shouty one. Add in some all time great jokes, the boys slowly coming into their own, and an orphan heart and you have an all time classic. Talking about the Orpheous Family for a second I feel both are underutilized a bit. With Dr. O while he’s used fine for the first four seasons, he vanishes for most of season 5 and all of season 6 and only gets two episodes in season 7 as part of the morphic trilogy. Triana meanwhile is someone the guys flat out admit they dropped the ball on, that they coudl’ve done more.. but just didn’t quite know what to do with her. I feel she could’ve been a great foil for the boys, and could’ve evolved into just being dean’s friend instead of his love intrest with time, since nothing was ever going to happen there. They had no intention of dropping her entirely either, planning to write some more stuff with her i’ll get to when we get to her exit in a few seasons, it’s just likely like Dr. O they didn’t know where to squeeze her in. It’s the double edged sword of the magic characters: Their a great break from the usual super science.. but as a result it’s harder to fit them in sometimes without writing an episode around them. Rusty Sucks Surprising No One: We’re up to 12 folks! There’s his hilarious rant at Dean about the house being on fire, his FAR less hilarious and more cringy one shouting at hank for TRYING to get his help. I mean I get Hank cries for attention but come on. He then caps it off with two for using an orphan heart, and an additional one for not wanting to shut off what’s clearly a dangerous, rouge machine. That said while this is easily Rusty’s douchiest ep of the season, it’s also one of his most hilarious so fair play to him. His trying to downplay how awful his actions are are hilarious. Speaking of which. Best Moment: The trope namer itself. There was no other choice, this is peak Doc and sums up the character in a few exchanges.

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Hanktastic: Scuba! Do not Eat that Ghost Pie also counts. Deanarific: The ENTIRE Box My Pop Made conversation. I don’t know why it took me this long to truly appricate the hilarous and dark awkwardness of this. First Appearance: Dr. Orpheus, Triana Orpheus.

6. Ghosts of the Sargasso Summary: Doc tries to rob a watery grave while the rest of the family runs headfirst into a Scooby Doo Plot. Also ghosts. My Thoughts: Another banger with a great concept: what happens when one of those Scooby Doo Schemes has to run in perpetuity? Or runs into a REAL ghost. Granted the franchise had done the latter by Witch’s Ghost but still. The Pirate Captain is an instantly awesome addition to the cast, being uniquely hilarious for his bizzare life choice of being a scooby doo villian, pirate accent and genuine nature. His interactions with Dean are some of the funniest things here. Add in Brock teaching hank how to murder and Doc monloguing to himself while trying to grave rob and you have an all time great 7 seasons on. Rusty Sucks Surprising No One: 13. Robbing a man’s grave after his dad left the test plane down there out of respect for the dead. It says when Jonas “Take his friends corpse and make it a robot slave” Venture is more respectful of the dead than you. Best Moment: While Dean’s goofy “Maybe” when asked if he’s not a good liar nearly got it I have to give it to the entire sequence with the Action Man’s ghost, from it just shrieking a lot, to the “Your dead sweetie” conversation to the action man making it so much worse, all capping in Rusty being Scarred for life for the 99th time. One more and he gets a free sundae. Hanktastic: Hank whizzing off the deck while making weird sound effects. Questions For Later: We see our first glimpse of Old Team Venture... and our first indication the action man is an asshat. Deanarific: It could only be this exchange. Pirate Captain: Your not a very good liar are ye dean? Dean: (Goofily as shit) Mayyyybeeee First Appearance: The Pirate Captain, The Action Man, Kano, Col. Gentleman.

7. Ice Station Impossible

Summary: Dr. Venture and Conjectural Technologies get recruited for a think tank for Silver Age Reed Richard Richard Impossible Naturally Rusty has to deal with urine tests, degraded copies of the rest of the ff, a woman being intrested in him and said woman’s husband leaving him for dead. Meanwhile Hank gets conked with a super serum made by Impossible and Brock has to scramble to save him. Oh and some kids fiddle around with Race Bannnon’s corpse. My Thoughts: A decent ep, it mostly fumbles from the first fourth of Doc’s plot, where he mostly struggles with a urine test and not much happens that’s actually funny. It dosen’t help Pete and Billy still aren’t defined just yet and are just kinda there. It won’t be till later this season we actually figure out who the heck they are. The impossibles are a great addition to the venture verse though: Having their reed be the same smug, abusive, gaslighty dick he was early on because, while a loving husband, Stan Lee clearly had issues writing women, mostly with having Hank Pym and Reed Richards constantly rebuff their girlfriends and downplay their thoughts and feelings like condescending dicks while having the x-men all horn over poor jean grey a bunch. The boys take that and run with it, having Sally be desperate to escape while her reed is a smothering dick who keeps her hidden out of shame, mentally gaslights her, and tries to murder a guy for giving her the attention he won’t. The other deconstructions are more unique: having the torch not really be a character because his trait is constantly in pain from being constantly on fire, but without the powers johnny has to make tha tnot an issue, and Ned being entirely unique, being a mentally handicapped version of the thing whose in pain moving due to his mutation making him a callous instead of a golem. Ned is also surprisingly well treated for the time: Doc’s mom used to work with mentally disabled kids, so as such Ned is treated as a human and when someone calls him the r-word later on, their framed entirely as an asshole, as is richard for essentially penning up a disabled man. Despite the pain of his mutation ned is easily one of the nicest, sweetest characters in the venture verse and I honestly wish we saw more of him.

The Subplot here steals the show a bit, as Jackson got away with murdering race bannon and using his actual name. This would fade by season 3 as it was clear these werne’t just parodies but characters in the universe, and thus CN wasn’t comfortable with them outright using warped versions of the Johnny Quest characters. Still this marks a turning point: not only are our heroes a Johnny Quest parody on some level, but Johnny also lives in this world.. and as we’ll see next season when he debuts properly it hasn’t treated him well. But the kids playing around with Race’s spy gear, Hank’s slow death and dean panicking once he realizes his dad CAN’T fix this if they find him and their all going to die.. it’s all great.

Two more things ot note. One, Richard is played by Stephen Colbert, yes THE Stephen Colbert. Colbert is a perfect fit for Dr. Impossible, plays the guy to smary, clueless, abusive perfection, and is part of why the guy is so entertaining despite being a monster. Sadly Stevie would only hang around one more appearnce. It’s why Doctor Impossible only shows up ONCE in season 3, voiced by Chris, before returning in full in late season 4 voiced by THE Bill Hader. Colbert would return for the Gargantua Special which, for now, is Richard’s swan song, so it’s a fitting full circle thing. Richard is also the V-Bros character with the most va’s, clocking it at four (Chris’ brother peter voiced him in the pilot).

The other is that this has one of Rusty’s few shining moments early on. When Impossible wants to shoot Hank, Rusty steps in front of him. There’s no one else around at the time, Pete and Billy come in right after, he KNOWS the boys can be cloned.. but he steps in anyway when Hanks in real danger. It shows that while he hates his sons.. he DOES also love them somewhere deep down.

Rusty Sucks Surprising No One: 17. First a minor one but having your kids piss in a bag to pass a drug test is pretty yikes. The major one though, which gets orphan heart level double points, is his treatment of sally. Shockingly i’m NOT putting him clearly wanting to sleep with Sally on the list. While yes she is cheating on her husband... her husband is an abusive, coldly distant dick who sees her as an embarrassment to hide due to a mutation HE CAUSED. She can’t leave him: he’s rich, powerful and at this point in the series lives in an arctic base away from anyone who could help her. So her wanting to sleep with the first man she finds attractive.. I can’t blame her. I can blame Rusty though for abandoning her. I get not wanting to escalate into a relationship with her but dude, you have room in the x1. Just take her and her family with you. Just up and ditching her. This also leads to a surprise count! Sucky Sampson: When Brock fucks up. In this case going with Doc’s plan. He also gets post added counts, since I came up with this on the fly, for Careers in Science (choking a man for touching him) and Terrible Secret (Leaving the boys to bang a prostitute) totaling up at 3. Best Moment: No contest. It’s when Brock arrives to get Impossible’s help only for Richard to assume “You just want to beat me up” He procedes to form weird boxing stances while stretching. Brock’s response is iconic to me, as is Warburton’s shouty, pitch perfect delivery.

Hanktastic: Once brock shoes off some local kids playing with Race Bannon’s dead body “Someone killed him” “Those kids? Dammit and we let them get away!” Deanarific: Dean’s utter faith in his father to fix this.. and his utter breakdown when it’s clear he can’t. Questions For Later: Introducing the Johnny Quest Cast in the first place. Also the pregnant stinger at the end... likely not INTENDED to be anything more than a cruel button on things, but it ends up being vital to the followup to this episode next season. First Appearance: Sally Impossible, Cody Impossible, Ned

8. Mid-Life Chrysalis: Super Good Award Winner!

Summary: A stop by the airforce leads to identity crisis for both the venture adults: Rusty is desperate to prove he’s still got it and goes out looking for women.. and finds Dr. Girlfriend who injects him with Science Juice and turns him into a caterpillar for her boyfriend. Brock meanwhile finds out his lisence to kill has expired and the boys rally to help him get it renewed. My Thoughts: The first ep Jackson and Doc did together and unlike other shuffling around with the episodes this one was intentional, wanting Brock’s badassery to be built up before i’ts yanked away. It’s also one of my personal favorites. The jokes are dense here, from “Eat eggs and crap eggs” to “What’s a matter you don’t like zep” , The runner with the strip club guy that pays off with brock shockingly NOT killing him , as he’ll return, but taking an eye. There’s too many gags here to mention and as I mentioned before Hank and dean truly come into their own. Doc’s plot is also fucking great, showing some humanity in Rusty by showing just how.. pathetic the poor guy is. He’s aging badly, his attempt to deal with it is to go out looking for women, I empathize with the guy... and thank god i’m not quite as bad or awkaard, but it’s one of the first times in the series Doc is nakedly sympathetic. It humanizes the bastard. Add in the Monarch’s awkard jealousy, and you have one of theseries best on Jackson and Doc’s FIRST try as a team. Good gravy. Winning best of the season... was a tough competition. Eeeny Meeny and Tag Sale both were serious competition.. but ultimately it’s character that wins this one out. We see Rusty in his most pathetic state, Dr. Girlfriend show she has a heart by refusing to let him turn into a butterfly monster, and Brock gets an excellent showcase. We see him vunerable for once, having lost everything.. and see how despite his attempts at distancing himself at this point... he’s truly PART of this family. The Boys put in a true effort to help him pass, and Brock apricates it even if he dosen’t show it. Seeing HELPR hug him was also really cute. The climax of his arc is also awesome, tanking the written by drawing icarus from Led Zeplin, but utterly decimating the fire arms course without taking a shot. Treister’s speech sums up what a legend Brock is.. and how it dosen’t phase the guy. Overall a deserving winner. Rusty Sucks Surprising No One: 20. Making change in a stripper’s G-String, they work hard for that money bitch, and bragging about his sex life while his kids are right there. The rest of his creepiness this episode is too pathetic to count honestly, though he gets one more for trying to make his robot nanny shoot him in the head. Best Moment: A fucking HARD choice. There’s so many great ones, from the montage to Brock’s return at the end. But I gotta give it to the reveal of Caterpillar rusty. Rusty’s summation of why he thinks this happened “I pissed in god’s eye and he blinked”, may be Rusty’s second best line, but Hanks lack of reactoin to it, from casually poking his dad to marveling at his shed skin is great, and truly defines the kid. Hanktastic: The aforementioned casual dad poking. Phrasing. Deanarific: Dean’s acting like your nerdiest high school friend helping Brock perpare for his test. Questions For Later: General Tresiter is mentioned, and once again a barely mentioned character becomes vitally important. But only this once does it result in us getting peak Toby Huss and that’s magic. The boys mom also gets brought up for the first time outside the pilot. This will be teased to all hell for the rest of the series till it’s shocking reveal at the end of the final season. First Appearance: Strip Club Guy

9. Are You There God? It’s Me, Dean Summary: Just as the Monarch is on the cusp of sweet victory in the amazon involving urethra fish and Grover Cleavland’s Presdential Time Machine, our heroes arching gets benched when Dean has testicular torsion. While Dean deals with the most embarrassing day of his life, Brock and Hank are kept as leverage and end up salvaging the Monarch’s birthday for the guy. My Thoughts: Another banger that plays to the series strengths: superhero cops and robbers being hit over the head by the needs of reality and beruarcy and some good old fashioned humiliation.

This results in two great plots: First off we have poor Dean put through the ringer, literally as his testicles twist and figuratively as he has to deal with a ton of embarrassment. While dickish as always, Doc’s integration on him, wondering if he put heroin in his balls and blaming Triana for it is fucking amazing for how utterly stupid it is. Things only improve when Doc’s forced to call an actual doctor (or his closest thing), giving Billy and White their first real adventure and setting up who they are: a sensitive opsitmstic guy who gets shit on by life and his snarky useless partner he keeps around anyway who reguarly bill their best friend and only client for money because Rusty has no other friends and this would be sad if it was anyone else they were bilking. We have Billy referring to himself as a “Boy genius” even though he’s like 40 (and it backfiring as Dean understandably didn’t want a child touching his nuts) and White’s usual criticism. But we also see that billy IS shockingly talented, easily solving Dean’s issue.

Really most of the humor in this one is from dean’s humiliation cumulating in the poor guy in a diaper while everyone, including Triana, lines up. For once though the two have something resembling a moment as she asks if this is the most humilating moment of his life showing evne if she dosen’t find dean attractive.. she still likes the guy. The answer: “Easily”

As for the other plot i’ts pure fun as the Monarch tries to impress his captives, from an attempted “I am your father” even hank dosen’t buy, to an attempted call. Brock however sympathizes with his captor and has some fun going on a rampage, which allows monarch to go full bore .. and both to have to cove rit up. The ending is also perfect with it being hank’s turn to get his nuts in a twist. Rusty Sucks Surprising No One: 21. The diaper thing is well meaning dad stuff, which is rare for him. But accusing Triana of being a drug addict for being a goth is so stupid it hurts. For one who is he to judge someone’s parenting and for another, if anyone would shoot drugs into their nuts it’d be hank and it’d be by accident and we both know it Rusty. he’d try throwing a needle like a long dark, it’d reflect, hit his junk. Sucky Sampson: We get our first peak into the worst part of Brock of Ages: His transphobia. Which is TRIED to be plied as a joke. He refuses to sleep with Dr. Girlfriend... because he thinks she’s trans, something played for LAUGHS. Good god. The guys REALLY need to apologize for this and shit we get to next time but in general the Dr. Girlfriend is trans LAUGH AT IT gag was really fucking bad and thankfully not used often apart from “She has a deep voice GET IT FELLAS”. It was also thankfully stamped out in Season 3 by explaining it by smoking so.. there’s that at least. Still fucking awful, 2 points sampson. 5. This Didn’t Age Well: GUESS. Also 2 points. 5. Best Moment: Doc’s resignation at the fact his teenage son say things like “My no no’s hurt” in front of other people was close. But I have to give it to the darth vader fakeout, from even HANK not buying it to the fact Monarch really dosen’t notice he dosen’t. Deantastic: Dean’s “easily” when Triana asks if this is the most humilating moment of it’s life. It’s one of the first small glances that dean is, and wants to be, the most “normal” of the group. Questions For Later: The Guild is properly set up for the first time. First Appearance: 21. SMURFS DON’T LAY EGGS.

10. Tag Sale- You’re It! Summary: Hard up for cash Rusty gets the OSI’s help in holding a Yard Sale to sell dangerous stuff his dad left behind, attracting every supervilian under the sun for the social event of the season. As Rusty tries to make a buck, Brock sweats security, Hank starts a grinder empire to make his own cash, Dr. O window shops for an archenemy, 21 wastes a lot of money and the Monarch grapples with difficulty arching and taking a dump. My Thoughts: An all time favorite and the episode that launched easily my favorite type of venture bro episode, which I call the tag sale ep. It’s one where a large amount of the cast gathers in one place to hang out, shenanigans happen, and their easily some of the best in the series. Almost every season has one and the first set the high standard for the others to follow. It also set the standard of their being a plot.. but a lot of the ep just being the characters own subplots going on. Rusty tries to make money, Brock is rightfully antsy this thing is going to explode, 21 and 24 try shopping, The Monarch tries to take a dump before it dovetails into trying to get his mojo back, and Hank enters legend. All fun stuff that comes together for a terrific climax.

Speaking of Hank, Hank is at his peak here. As I mentioned earlier he could’ve jsut sold lemonade or sammichs.. but chose specifically to set up a grinder restraunt, set it up with specific branding and then treat his sandwitch and sugar water stand like a real business. If previous eps poked and prodded at the real hank, this one yanks him all the way out.

Aside from that the episode is packed with classic moments: Dr. O’s self promotion, “Girlie Mags”, “I used to dream of taking a whiz on this”, and 21′s humilating lightsaber incident that gets a great callback later. All in all the ep i’d recommend to get people into the show Rusty Sucks Surprising No One: 22. Just some petty dickery this time of trying to sell Dr. O’s weed wacker and the boys stuff without permission. The Tag Sale is honestly one of his better schemes, only backfiring due to outside forces and even then, the ensuing brawl is no worse than usual. Rusty makes it out of the chaos with a pocket full of money, as do Team Hankco presumibly. And he didn’t have to use an orphan’s heart to do it this time.

Best Moment:Another hard decision, but I have to go with Hankco as a whole. Not really moment but easily one of Hanks finest hours. Hanktastic:Hankco. True hank has emerged from his coocoon. Deantastic: The very reason I went back and added these: Dean playing with his mr. microphone. just that head bob, you can’t help but love it. Questions For Later: Dr. Girlfriend’s history with Phantom Limb is set up for the final two eps and next season, we see St. Cloud LONNNNG before he became an actual charcter, Dr. O’s desire for an arc is seeded, and Hankco first shows up, becoming one of Hank’s running things for the rest o fthe series. First Appearance: Phantom Limb, St. Cloud, Plug Guy, That one ghost dude, and Hankco.

11. Past Tense (Pissed in God’s Eye Award Winner)

Summary: Rusty’s college days are explored as we find out Rusty, White, Brock, Underbeit and even the Monarch all went to school together.. and the former four all tormented the same former friend whose seeking revenge from beyond the dead, kidnapping our “heroes”. It leaves Hank and Dean scrambling for help and turning to the original team venture to set things right. My Thoughts: When I went into the season, I honestly thought Home Insecurity or Brisby would easily take the crown for worst ep. But both ended up being good. No the crown goes to an ep that like those I didn’t like when I was younger.. and unlike those still sucks horribly today. Our inagural pissed in god’s eye winner is just a miserable trek. It start’s okay, with Hank boggling at how interconnected venture’s circle is.. but it slowly becomes a parade of flashbacks to Rusty, Pete and Verner making Mike Soryama, based on Mike Yamagata from fargo down to getting the other mike’s actor, miserable. They give the guy oregano that nearly kills him, Pete talks about mike masturbating to his crush on air (Though it did get his show canceled so.. ther’es some justice nit hew orld), Rusty fucked a golem of her in dad (And somehow for once isn’t the worst one here as Mike making an OP golem of his crush is all kinds of creepy), and Brock beat all of them to hell and gets no commpuance for it, also beating up old team venture. The fact Mike himself is a creepy stalker towards Leslie dosen’t help, having gotten himself a restraining order and built creepy sex bots of her. Even I, a guy whose screwed up plenty coming on too strong to women in the past, am horrified at him.

The Subplot is fine though, properly introducing old team venture even if Poor Otto barely appears after this. But it can’t save the plot and even with what dicks they turn out to be, brock beating them up is still needelsly mean spirited. Rusty Sucks Surprising No One: 24. Again the DnD thing isn’t that bad, creepy and mean yes but no more creepy than making a golem of someone you have a crush on in a fantasy game. But his laughing at Pete’s bullshit and willingly particpating in the cloves prank, even given how young Doc was at the time, still count. Sucky Sampson: We’re up to 7. His brutal beating of our heroes over his loosing his scholarship after his tragic muder of his deaf teammate Tommy (not counted here or before because it was a genine tragic mistake that still haunts the guy) and in the present of Old Team Venture easily count as some of Brocks Lowest Points. Best Moment: “2 years, 3 months and 17 days” “from what?” “A stroke. Goddamn dr.O. Questions for Later: The Stroke pays off in the last season. First Appearance: Otto Aquarius

12. The Trial of the Monarch

Summary: The Monarch goes on trial for murder with Doc gladly sitting in... but brock notices the guild’s fingerprints all over it as the Monarch airs his messy breakup with dr. girlfriend and Phantom Limb plots to get rid of the competition. My Thoughts: A fan favorite that I think is just fine. That said, I can’t ignore that it’s a watershed episode. The Guild is finally revealed in all it’s shadowy glory, setting up one of the most important part sof the entire series. Phantom Limb makes his move, and we get the start of our first Monarch story arc as the guild sends our villain up the river, Dr. Girlfriend goes back to phantom limb, and the status quo is changed for good. From this point on nothing is set in stone and anything can happen and the show gleefully and slowly progresses, with at least one major shakeup like this at the end of every season. And it’s not the only one but give it a minute. Packed with solid jokes, worldbuilding, and charcter stuff, this is the show finally having crystalized into what it was alwasy meant to be: a show full of parody but taking it’s characters beyond their basic premises into fully fleshed out fully sad indivduals. Best Moment: The Cold Open easy. It’s why I didn’t bring it up sooner. It’s a lovely peak into the boys heads, from the fact Hank, Dean and Brock are suddenly Indiana Jones, Magnum PI and Knight Rider, a treasure filled with craft suplies, the monarch feeding orphans to mutant puppies, and of course Mecha Shiva. The fact the boys apparently GENINELY think that they once turned into a mecha shiva gets me every time. I don’t think it was lies or inetnional embleshiment, that’s just how they saw the world. And honestly, how hank still sees it. Hanktastic: Brock sums up our boy in one perfect line “It’s like he channels dead crazy people”. Hank’s earnest response is what really sells it though. Questions For Later: We get our first mentions of Monstroso, who ill be brought up a lot in the background at this point. The fact they made him a genuinely interesting character later and not only that but made TWO excellent kingpin analogues is fantastic. First Appearance: Watch and Ward, The Strangers

13. Return to Spider-Skull Island

Summary: Doc’s weird dreams all season i’m only bringing up now cumilate in the brother he absorbed in the womb coming back for revenge(Charles Xavier knows how you feel man), the boys thinking he’s pregnant and super running away, and the Monarch giving the best scared straight lecture of all time. My Thoughts: The first finale and while the next 3 would blow it out of the water, it set the foundation of how the series went out each year at it’s best: big stakes, payoffs and a total flipping of the game board for next time. Only seasons 5 and 6 don’t follow this and given their easily the weaker finales, with the following special and season premering three parter functioning as the actual payoff to those seasons, it’s not a GOOD thing. That loose famework is what works here: Doc’s pit up against someone who knows him inside and out, brock’s strapped to a car while dressed as rocky and the boys get blowed up real good. They’ll be fine once ressurectoin protocols kick in. The jokes and character stuff is great here: Joke wise while the boys thinking their dad is pregnant is pretty stupid, the boys going on the run and dr. o following them as their non embarassing guardian angel is nice and leads to Dr. O trapping too rednecks in a homeboy figurine, easily his best line. Character wise Rusty once again shows there’s SOME good in him by refusing to let brock kill JJ. Given how bitter and quick to go for an easy solution the guy is, NOT letting brock hurt someone who already tried to kill him is big and pays off karmically down the road. Add in some truly wonderful prison antics with the monarch and you have a classic that would’ve made a great series finale... but thankfully it was only the beginning.

Best Moment: The Monarch in jail. Everything about that. His endlessly chuckle inducing scared straight rant “your diherrha in a dixie cup” and his frustration when the boys keep taking his attempts to set them straight literally “They’ll chew you up and spit you out.. and I don’t mean mechamouth hank” Questions For Later: We get our first mention of Captain Sunshine and WONDERRR BOYYY. We still don’t know what the hell happened there. First Appearance: Jonas Venture Junior

C. A Very Venture Christmas Summary/Thoughts: Really should’ve got to this by christmas but here we are. Our last ep for this one. The Ventures throw a christmas party for all their friends and the Monarch plans to blow him up with the baby jesus, while the boys unleash the Krampus. Call Adam Scott! It’s not one of the series BEST outings but it’s a passable christmas special with some good moments. It’s also apparently a dream but also canon. I see it as the party happened, doc and fam got called away, the crash happened, and doc was remebering the party minus the krampus and the explosion actually working in the dream. Rusty Sucks Surprising No One: Responding to having personal growth in his dream with ‘Thank god i’m not a pussy” 25 to close us out. Best Moment: “No one wants a dean in the box!” Hanktastic: First Appearance: Tiny Joseph.

In Closing: So that wraps up our first season. Will the boys come back from the dead, will the monarch be stuck in folsom prison, how will doc grapple with a new brother? The answers... are yes, no, and poorly what else is new. Find out how next month!

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