Mickey Mouse Actually Had a Personality... In the Comics!

it may seem hard to believe but at one point Mickey Mouse actually had a personality the 1930s Comics by Floyd godfredson did more to establish Mickey as a feisty Adventurer a loudmouth than many of his animated shorts these comic strips came out just two years after Steamboat Willie which as we all know just entered the public domain so let's talk about a time when Mickey was cool the Mickey Mouse comic [Music] comic Tres hello welcome to Comic tropes I'm your host Chris in 1928 Steamboat Willie debut that was an animated short featuring Mickey Mouse and Minnie Mouse it was animated by OB Eyeworks and Walt Disney and and now well it just entered the public domain now let's be clear the only thing that's entered the public domain is the interpretation of Mickey and Minnie that you see in that specific animated short none of the other elements from Mickey Mouse that came later and by the way Disney has an active trademark on Mickey so be very careful on how you use it if you decide to go that route but that got me thinking who even is Mickey Mouse if you look at those early animated shorts how would you define his personality he's generically nice he's got a a high-pitched falsetto voice I don't know what else you'd have to say but then you look at the comic books that he was appearing in starting in 1930 and all of a sudden he's so Dynamic you know he's sarcastic and he has quips and burns for his enemies he's always getting into fights and battles and going to far away exotic places it's amazing just how different it is in 1930 Floyd gotfredson was the writer and artist on Mickey Mouse comics and he remained in that role all the way until 1975 so today I want to tell you about these Comics why they're fun and cool and who Lloyd godfredson was Mickey Mouse's animated shorts were an instant hit and by the early 1930s Mickey Mouse was hugely popular worldwide King features Syndicate Came Calling to Walt Disney early on King features Syndicate was William Randolph hurst's division for Distributing comic strips to newspapers this was an enormously popular feature at the time which led to the creation of comic books comic books were initially reprints of the most popular comic strips from newspapers many of them from the talking animal genre King featur Syndicate published among other well-known strips the Phantom and Popeye over the years in 1930 they convinced Walt Disney to make a Mickey Mouse comic strip and since Walt had initially had ideas and dreams of being a newspaper cartoonist he wrote the first several strips but who would draw it that's where we'll talk about Floyd godfredson Floyd was born in 1905 in a small town about 180 Mi south of Salt Lake City Utah as a youngster he accidentally shot himself in the arm with a hunting rifle there was a prolonged recovery period during which time his mother got him some art supplies to help keep him busy he was unable to get a regular job as he recovered but his art skills continued to grow Floyd also spent this time reading dozens and dozens of young adult novels by Horatio aler tales about boys going on rags to Rich's Journeys godfredson got his first job working as a movie theater projectionist where he ultimately encountered all of the early Walt Disney and OB Eyeworks cartoons he began an art correspondence course in 1926 got son did well won some contests and took a risk moving to Los Angeles in 1928 to try to become a cartoonist initially he had to become a projectionist again but in 1929 someone in the film industry told Floyd about how Walt Disney was about to hire animators for his own company after losing his animators and character Oswald the Lucky Rabbit to Universal Floyd got his art in front of the company and was offered a job Walt had gotfredson study as an ineter in the animation department but Walt ended up needing to hire a regular comic strip artist shortly after the Mickey comic strip started and he decided to assign godfredson as the Artist as of April 1st 1930 by the middle of May Floyd also took over as the writer but the needs of comic strips are much different than that out of Animation the early animated shorts rarely had time to develop a story and certainly not much in the way of character Mickey's first films were all based on the then new gimmick of having sound in Steamboat Willie that meant Mickey used a bunch of animals to play music for [Music] [Applause] instance but the comic strip needed dialogue and being daily developed mickeey and his Supporting Cast by necessity King features Syndicate urged Disney to make the strips focus on serialized Adventure like the then popular strip the gumps by cydney Smith and Floyd godfredson sure could do adventure and Wise Cracks the Mickey Mouse of the early animated shorts barely said more than a couple words before 1936 the Mickey of the comic strips is sarcastic and quick to insult his enemies there's more to his dialogue than just Exposition but he can unload plenty of that too the comic strip version of Mickey gets into Adventures he isn't aggressive but there's plenty of stories where he's backed into a corner and quick to fight back Mickey is a man of action in his early years piloting planes riding horses running from cannibals and shooting guns he's always shooting guns he's constantly getting the drop on kidnappers or gangsters or spies or even just shooting his gun to show that his dog Pluto isn't afraid of them additionally Mickey's early Supporting Cast gets developed there's the scheming Sylvester Shyer a lawyer always out to Swindle someone in the neighborhood and who has no problem hiring henchmen like Peg Leg Pete to be his muscle Horus horse caller is initially Mickey's loyal friend and clarabel cow is sweet but also the town gossip and a total chatter box Floyd godfredson also created some supporting characters along the way but to be fair none is memorable as fellow Disney Comics artist Carl barks created for Donald Duck perhaps the most notable would be Mickey's nephews ferdy and Morty field mouse they first appeared in comics on September 18th 193 2 Donald Duck's far more popular nephews huy Dewey and Louie didn't appear until October 17th 1937 over 5 years later Floyd created a world for Mickey that was light-hearted and gag driven but it was also one that mirrored the world that he lived in America was fighting its way out of the depression and a lot of stories have Mickey hunting for Treasure or getting into new short-term jobs like boxing or making a golf course in his backyard this was also the era of prohibition where alcohol was outlawed but Mickey does come across a character cat nip who seems to be Brewing moonshine with a very strong proof the short version is that mickeey Mouse and the comics would go on adventures that would take anywhere from 2 to 6 months went on all sorts of different adventures and it was tremendously popular for instance in these reprint books that Fanta Graphics publishes editor David gin has tons of supplemental material articles by other people uh history pieces all sorts of extra artwork and they show one example for instance where Mickey Mouse Comics got over 20,000 pieces of fan mail for a contest they were running that's a lot of response from little kids also Mickey was not just popular here in America Mickey Mouse com strips were so popular worldwide that there was a point in time where they were the only American Import into Italy until the very very final days of World War II in 1932 the comic strips were exported to Italy where they were named Topolino in 1938 melini's fascist government banned American literature with the exception of the popular Mickey Mouse comic they were finally banned in February of 1942 but resumed in December of 1945 as the war ended by 1932 Floyd godfredson began using a lot of Mickey's animated shorts as inspiration for expanded adventure stories for instance the cartoon Mickey's meler drummer is about Mickey and his friends trying to Stage a Play version of Uncle Tom's Cabin the comic strip started a story on January 11th of 1932 where these same characters are putting on a play but they have a reason for it they're trying to raise funds to benefit an orphanage Sylvester Shyer and pegle Pete end up stealing the funds which turns into a Chase to get the money back 1933's blackard Castle strips are a highlight of the early comic strips for Mickey Mouse Floyd godfredson Loosely based it off of the cartoon the Mad Doctor featuring The the villain Dr trip X who is clearly inspired by the 1931 movie Frankenstein godfredson turned Dr Tri XX into three villainous scientists named X double X and Triplex they use a hipno rate to turn Horus horsecollar into a potential killer so Mickey is forced to battle his best friend there are real emotional Stakes to the stories by January of 1933 Mickey began hanging around more often with dippy dog who in 1936 began to be called goofy goofy was less of a friend and more of a completely unreliable companion in dippy's first adventure with Mickey mickeey has to be a detective but can't count on anything sensible from dippy Horus appeared a lot less frequently after the blackard castle strips which is when Mickey began hanging out with dippy more often the addition of dippy or goofy was an example of how the comic strip told its own stories but would modify itself to mirror whatever the animation was doing for instance in 1938 Mickey's design changed from the pie-shaped eyes to cartoony eyeballs with black irises godfredson brought on various inkor and writers to work with him but continued to plot the book up through 1943 Bill Walsh was the first writer to take over and in his first two stories he had Mickey Mouse literally battle the Axis powers according to the book Disney Comics the whole story by Alberto beatini this irritated Adolf Hitler so much that he forced musolini to stop printing Topolino Comics Walsh's era is also noted for a lot of sci-fi types of stories sci-fi was a growing genre moving into the the 50s by the middle of 1945 perhaps due to America refocusing its energies on itself and home life in general the comic strip went to simple gag a day type strips but Walsh returned to the Sci-Fi stuff in 1947 introducing the humanoid from the future EAB biva who became Mickey's main supporting character for the next few years in mid 1955 King features Syndicate asked for the strip to focus on daily gags instead of a serialized continuity your mileage may vary on how much you enjoy those comic strips for me I preferred the adventur stuff in the 1930s 40s and 50s although godfredson remained on the Strip as the artist until his retirement in October of 1975 so here's the thing I have to address I personally find these Comics really enjoyable the art is Con consistent it's energetic it's Dynamic and engaging these stories are full of action they're legit funny I laugh at a bunch of the gags but it has not all aged perfectly uh and I'll give credit to fantagraphics in their reprints they have not edited the artwork they present it exactly as it was back in the day and by today's standards a lot of that stuff just has not aged well uh so we're going to get into that but it's really going to blow your mind some of this stuff cuz some of the stuff Mickey does is just not stuff you would expect Mickey Mouse to be engaged with for example there is a stretch of comics where Mickey Mouse tries to and I'm going to try to be careful not to get demonetized here Mickey tries to un alive himself in September of 1930 a storyline begins where a rat named Mr Slicker tries to steal mini a from Mickey Mickey becomes so dejected that he tries to end things with a gun jumping off a bridge inhaling poisonous gas and more fortunately it does end on a positive note with Mickey declaring that he was foolish to think like that but for about a week kids got the darkest Mickey Mouse stories ever and of course there are some caricatures that play on racist tropes there are several stories where Mickey encounters dark natives that turn out to be cannibals every time he goes to Africa is unfortunate Native Americans are barely able to say more than how it's unfortunate but it was very unlikely that it was intentional on Floyd Gordon's part to be cruel he was drawing in what was the style at the time and many other great artists including will Eisner were known to use that imagery it was cartoon shorthand it would not be done today but the comics are presented as they were here without alterations so you may not be able to enjoy the strips depending on how you feel about stuff like that uh I feel like it's a pretty small portion of these overall comics and that it was passive racism which was just using the techniques of the time I don't think that there was anything cruel or mean-spirited but again that's just my take on it let's move on to talk about what Floyd godfredson did well to make these Comics cool first of all the stories are engaging and they move fast that takes some talent because when you're writing a daily strip you have limitations you can't do much to play with the height or the length of a strip you have to somewhat recap what's happened so far with the first panel godfredson doeses this in a way that doesn't really slow things down every story moves at a good clip one of the first Adventures is Race To Death Valley and it's fantastic on top of good pacing the panel art itself seems to move there are cartooning tricks with motion lines or beads of sweat leaping off a character but when I look at it I can absolutely Envision the motion it definitely reminds me of the animated shorts in the way possible godfredson also has nice World building and twists and turns to keep the stories moving at a good Pace Mickey's dialogue is legit funny most of the time for instance here's Mickey frustrated with a lazy Sheriff the only thing that sheriff uses his head for is to keep his ears apart actually got a laugh out of me godson's biggest strength is probably the consistent art and the pacing he isn't quite the same at World building as someone like Carl barks who invented all sorts of important characters in the world of Donald Duck like Uncle Scrooge but that doesn't mean that the comic strips aren't fun when the comic strip first started it was initially drawn by the great OB Eyeworks the artist who designed Mickey Mouse and while the strips look great they pretty much all ended with the characters looking at the reader in the final panel and smiling it was kind of repetitious in June of 1930 artist Jack King filled in for godfredson for almost 2 weeks it's certainly energetic but the penciling is a little rougher and less refined than godson's fine brush Strokes beauty is in the eye of the beholder but my favorite art is definitely godfredson if you've ever thought that Mickey Mouse was dull or Bland I definitely don't blame you but I would point you to the comic strips by Floyd godfredson and thank goodness Fanta Graphics has reprinted all of them in these great editions these great volumes printed as is and tons of supplementary material to give you some context for the history and the creators and the creative process really really fantastic I mean the first two volumes came out in a set that won the Eisner Award for best reprints uh so that definitely says something speaks to how well done these volumes are I love them I think that they're great I read through them so fast um what else do I want to say about the Mickey Mouse strips just that my favorite era is definitely the 1930s and 1940s strips I mean that's two solid Decades of cool action adventure strips with comedy uh and there were seemingly no limits on what kind of story you could tell you know Mickey's going to the clondike he's going on pirate ships he's going to the desert all sorts of crazy stories and then there was sci-fi stuff as we moved out of the 40s into the 50s really really interesting the later strips that become gag aay are mostly sort of suburban humor just stuff happening around town and it's not bad it just doesn't interest me as much but I welcome you to check these strips out and let me know in the comments down below if you have read any Mickey Mouse comics and if so what are some of your favorites I would love to know thank you so much for joining me I'm going to be back very soon and we're going to be staying in the Golden Age of comics next time but with probably the most bizarre Golden Age hero I've ever come across and that is absolutely saying something you guys know I love to find weird stuff from the Golden Age there's a good one coming there's a good one coming thank you so much for joining me I'll see you real soon and until that time keep reading comics hey team thanks so much for watching this episode I really appreciate it and a super thanks to all my wonderful patrons and supporters on YouTube could not make this show without you so tell you what I say hello to everybody but to you I'm going to pay you a compliment you have good taste that's the compliment that this week uh I have been wanting to do this for quite a while covering comic strips is a little more intensive in terms of the research than comic books just because there can be so many to go through there's a lot of history a lot of the time you know I'd love to cover as well things like uh popey Calvin and Hobs uh the comic strips about Donald Duck by Carl barks maybe someday Don Rose there's a lot in terms of comic strips that are important because that is what became comic books the first comic books they were talking animal stuff these books were so ridiculously popular I don't know how much more popular I can like really put it into context than talking about that crazy stuff that was happening in Italy that they were actually still importing Mickey Mouse as the war went on I just wild to me but anyway I love comic strips uh I'd also be curious to hear your recommendations are there any other important comic strips that you'd like to hear me analyze discuss maybe put into a a historical context I'll see you real soon take [Music] care [Music] [Music] oh [Music] I

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Length: 23min 44sec (1424 seconds)

Published: Sun Jan 14 2024