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Five Thoughts on DuckTales‘ “The Golden Lagoon of White Agony Plains!”

By | June 25th, 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 teams up with his ex, voiced by Allison Janney, to find the long-lost Golden Lagoon.

1. Allison Janney is gold

I went into this episode completely forgetting that Allison Janney was guest-starring, and what a guest appearance it was. No offense to the many other excellent guest-stars, but Janney has been the best by far. As soon as Goldie O’Gilt started speaking, it was apparent that she was a commanding presence. It also helped that the writers gave a supporting character some depth and nuance for once. As is evident by the end of the episode, Goldie is a complex character, and a true rival to Scrooge. She inspires Scrooge to show a side of him that hasn’t been seen yet. He’s lovable, yes, but also extremely narcissistic—his family still comes after his reputation, adventuring, and treasure. We get to see how he acts when confronted with a relationship where he’s at the other end of that power balance. Goldie has feelings for him but chooses the adventure and treasure over him every time. There aren’t any other characters yet on the show where Scrooge is not at least on equal footing, power-wise. So far, Goldie is my favorite side character in this new series. Hopefully Allison Janney’s schedule allows her to make more appearances and we get more of her Goldie O’Gilt in the future.

2. Pop Art Ducktales

One of the highlights of the episode was Glomgold recounting how him and Goldie met. Besides the comedy in the ridiculous way Glomgold depicts himself, the segment was done in an excellent Roy Lichtenstein Pop Art style. They did something similar in “Beware the B.U.D.D.Y. System,” where they used a 90’s Disney animation style for the Darkwing Duck segment to great effect. I love when animated shows find a way to depict their characters in other styles. Adventure Time does this regularly for whole episodes when they invite guest storyboard artists in, and they are some of the most interesting episodes of the series. I know that DuckTales will probably never go that route, but I won’t complain if they keep working these segments in.

3. “If you haven’t seen C.J. do ‘The Jackal,’ then you haven’t seen Shakespeare the way it’s meant to be done.”

This may be a bit of a stretch, but I think the writers were doing a bit of an homage to the 1988 Michael Caine and Steve Martin film, Dirty Rotten Scoundrels. In that film Caine and Martin’s characters are competing for the affections of Glenne Headly, so they can take her money. She turns out to be a notorious con artist herself called The Jackal and ends up taking their money instead. Sound familiar? That premise is almost generic enough, but Dirty Rotten Scoundrels ends with Headly showing up on a cruise liner, similar to how Goldie makes her getaway. And “The Jackal” should be familiar to anyone who was a fan of Janney’s breakout role as C.J. Cregg in The West Wing, where she performed a song of the same name in what was clearly an inside joke that did not translate but is now one of the series’ most well-known scenes.

4. Glomgold’s unacceptable behavior

I’ve professed my love of Glomgold in previous write-ups, but it’s finally gotten to the point that I’m ready for another antagonist to get some love. Glomgold is great and all, but it is now the fourth straight episode with him in it. This is another casualty of Disney messing with the show’s schedule. There’s still a lot of Glomgold no matter how the episodes are ordered, but at least they would have alternated episodes with him, according to the production codes. The other reason that Glomgold’s role in this episode didn’t work is that his behavior is incredibly problematic. Glomgold keeps insisting that he’s in a romantic relationship with Goldie, with no indication from her that that is even remotely true. Yes, Glomgold is a villain and will show problematic behavior, but none of the characters actually address the behavior itself, they just keep telling him he’s wrong and brushing him off. That’s a kind of toxic mindset that if not corrected leads to all the terrible things that have been highlighted by the #metoo and #timesup movements. It’s not the kind of thing that should be casually dismissed, especially in a show aimed at kids.

Continued below

5. More than just a great theme song

The music in this episode was especially great. There were a lot of emotional twists and turns, and the score was right there to accentuate them. The music was sensual when Scrooge and Goldie were dancing, and somber when Goldie fell into the Golden Lagoon. There was also some very cinematic sounding orchestral music when Scrooge and Goldie were exploring, and some appropriately villainous sounding music when Glomgold was monologuing.

Afterthoughts:

  • This show keeps casually dropping crazy backstory elements like it’s no big deal. This episode reveals that apparently Scrooge is over 100 years old from spending time in a timeless dimension. And I’m still waiting for the show to follow up on Launchpad’s ninja ex-girlfriend and Mrs. Beakley’s special ops training.
  • “I’ll have a virgin peach julep in your fanciest glass, thank you.”
  • “I’ll need some buck skin waterproof spats.”

//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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