Darkwing Duck Classics Vol. 1 by Brian Swenlin

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


This book collects the first and sadly only volume of Boom Studios' archived Darkwing Duck comics from the 1990s.

The first 100 pages collects the Darkwing Duck comic mini-series that is essentially the first two episodes of the TV show in Comic Book form. It's a really good adaptation of the TV episode, I'd almost go as far as to say it works better than the TV show. The plot finds Darkwing trying to make a name for himself and needs to battle a big supervillain and he collides with he bovine villainy of Taurus Bulba.

The comic explains how Darkwing met Goslin and Launchpad and just generally sets up the series. It's a faithful adaptation with only one detail changed that I could see. It's an intelligent adaptation because they find a way to translate some things which worked on TV that don't always easily translate to comics.

The rest of the book contains four Darkwing Duck strips from Disney Adventures magazine. These strips could be of varying lengths depending on whether they were the main story or a back up story. The quality of these varies quite a bit.

The first story, "Let's Get Fiscal" is about a FOWL accountant who has defected to SHUSH with a calculator that allows him to perform real-life calculations, multiplying, subtracting or dividing. The story is dumb and non-sensical, but thankfully only eight pages long.

Next is, "Liquid Diet" which finds the Liquidator released from prison and claiming to have gone straight while offering the public a popular new sports drink. Everyone thinks he's reformed, but Darkwing things otherwise. My favorite of these four stories. At 24 pages long, it feels like a lost episode.

In, "Turnabout is F.O.W.L. Play," Steelbeak has a ray that will turn Darkwing evil and it works, but Steelbeak learns the hard way to be careful what you wish for. Overall, a fun story even if the end is a bit of a copout.

In the final eight-pager, Darkwing is forced into a vacation when St. Canard goes through a bout of low crime. As is usual when Launchpad is flying, they fall out of the plane and find themselves in a mysterious jungle. A nice twist ending and a cute story.

Overall, this book is a lot of fun and it's a shame there's no plan to collect the other 31 Disney Adventures tales



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