Television 

Five Thoughts on DuckTales‘ “Jaw$!”

By | June 18th, 2018
Posted in Television | % Comments

DuckTales is back from hiatus to finish out the first season of the reboot, and now it’s made the jump from Saturday mornings on Disney XD, to prime time on the Disney Channel proper. So, let’s dive in! In this week’s episode, Scrooge works on his public image while the rest of the gang tries to survive a “money shark” attack.

1. Some meaningful progress with Lena/Magica

This was our first feature episode for Webby in this back half of the first season, and appropriately also the return of Lena and Magica De Spell. It’s been a while since the show has checked in with Lena, but it seems like the wait was worth it. There was a lot of development for the character, and we finally know what both her and Magica’s motivations are, while not answering all the questions about the pairing. Just like in the original series, Magica is after Scrooge’s number one dime because its sentimental value makes it powerful. Or something. I really hope they develop that reasoning a little more because it’s a little ridiculous even for an all-ages show. The more interesting part of that dynamic is that Lena is revealed to just be trying to break free of her magical Aunt and is constantly trying to balance her obligation to do Magica’s bidding with the desire to be a good person. Also, it looks like she’s a fairly powerful sorceress in her own right after dispersing the money shark with little effort at the end of the episode.

2. What’s next for Lena?

While “Jaw$” answers a lot of questions about Lena and Magica’s unorthodox relationship, there’s still the lingering question of how they became intertwined in the first place. I’m looking forward to seeing that play out, because I’m more interested in the budding friendship between Webby and Lena. That friendship will never be allowed to evolve until Lena breaks free from Magica since Lena can’t be involved in an episode without her. The show has done a good job of pairing Webby up with one of the triplets in various episodes, but she’ll always be somewhat of an outsider (understandably) to their trio. It’s nice to see her make a new friendship where she’s on more even footing, and I’d like to see that explored further.

3. Launchpad and Dewey’s friendship

Speaking of budding friendships, I think this episode finally cements Launchpad and Dewey’s. Launchpad appears out of nowhere to conveniently provide transportation because he senses that Dewey is in trouble. That kind of move would typically be a deus ex machina, but the show has done a lot of work to develop Launchpad’s toddler-like attachment to Dewey, so it works. He also comically refers to Huey and Louie as only “Dewey’s brothers.”

4. You’re gonna need a bigger boat

In truth, the Jaws references are light; it’s basically just the fact that they’re in a boat and there’s a shark. But that doesn’t matter because this was another great creature-of-the-week type setup from the show. Magica’s hunter gem starts gathering gold to became the aforementioned money shark and keeps the rest of the gang busy while Scrooge is trying to repair his image after all his previous adventuring has pretty much wreaked havoc on Duckburg. I really enjoyed everything about the A-plot this week. The setup of Launchpad stealing Donald’s boat (which feels like it was parked in Scrooge’s pool just for this episode), and then dropping it into the money bin via helicopter was a great setup just for the gag of leaving no one to pilot the helicopter as it crashes offscreen. The battle with the shark provided a lot of good tension as it slowly picked off each member of the group, leaving only Webby and Lena.

I thought the way they handled Lena trying to avoid using magic was a great way of developing her character. She obviously didn’t want to reveal how powerful she actually is, or her connection with Magica. Lena’s internal struggle also functioned as a great metaphor for the resistance to her aunt and trying to distance herself from that way of life as much as possible.

5. A solid B-plot

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As great as the money shark plot was, the b-plot of Scrooge needing to do some PR after the citizens of Duckburg start complaining about all the damage his adventures are causing provided some solid entertainment as well. The best part was Mrs. Beakley doing a mock interview with Scrooge and using a spray bottle on him any time he messed up. I wouldn’t have minded if this was the main story of a different episode. I’m always down for some politics in my shows, and this seemed like just a tease. I hope they follow up on it, because even though the end result of this episode was the citizens (and a group of Beagle Boys) getting a good chunk of Scrooge’s gold, the situation is definitely not getting any better.

Afterthoughts:

  • Pinky McHappyBow.
  • Webby is definitely a little twisted. The way she interrogated that stuffed animal was disturbing.
  • “What? I’m really good at charades!”
  • I’m all-in for every single one of Glomgold’s terrible disguises.

//TAGS | DuckTales

Justin Beeson

Justin Beeson is a dad, husband, DevOps engineer, and comic book and Android enthusiast. He covers news, TV, and does the occasional review at Multiversity Comics, and can be found on Twitter at @thisJUSTin816.

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