New DuckTales Animated Series

Right, it's similar to Twilight getting her wings at the end of season 3. It fundamentally changed the status quo, and then the show went on for six more seasons.

MLP was very lucky, clearly.

In terms of Merlock in the show, Frank Angones recently said Merlock will not appear since while he tried to think of an idea with him, he said, "we felt there wasn’t much we could do with Merlock that we wouldn’t rather do with Magica."

Also expect Glomgold, Gyro, Lena, BOYD, Gosalyn, Panchito, Jose, Daisy, and Magica to be making more appearances in the final episodes.

Well yeah, that's no surprise. I expect most of them to not make more than a token appearance in a crowd shot.

And it's a shame Merlock didn't show up, he was pretty damn fun to watch in the movie.

If left to me, I'd make Magica the kind of villain who takes it personal with the heroes, while Merlock would be basically the kind of magical force of nature,a juggernaut who really doesn't care about his enemies, they just happen to be gnats standing on his way. Magica's the kind who would make a point of learning as much as possible about Scrooge and infiltrating his domains, Merlock would just try and stomp over them like a man stomping on an anthill.

He wouldn't even be bothered to learn Scrooge's name correctly, like that'd be beneath him, while with Magica It's Personal.

They can be differenced easily enough, frankly this just sounds like Angones making excuses.

Edited by AmazingSpiderHam on Feb 4th 2021 at 2:31:05 AM

That's a good point. That's kinda how it was in his debut. Merlock just rolls over anyone in his way, and takes what he wants. He didn't change Scrooge's money bin into his old castle because he wanted to me with Scrooge. He did it because he wanted his old stomping grounds back and he was standing right there.

Him being a magical force of nature also adds to why the Genie was so scared of him (he did sink Atlantis in that universe after all).

It can't be helped though. You can't ask every writer to look that deeply. Some have it in them. some don't.

Yeah, and these writers just don't look very deep into the lore.

And it's not like they're doing a lot with Magica, either. They depowered her at the end of season one, and after that she basically became a joke villain apart from the occasional Lena episodes, and those weren't even about Scrooge any more.

Don't worry, Frank has said in terms of Magica, she will get a big role in one of the upcoming final episodes (potentially showing the conflict between her and Scrooge like he teased when asked months ago).

And maybe the whole Magica and Merlock both being magic users is what Angones meant by Magica being more interesting to use since Magica has more personal ties with Scrooge and this series even adds an abusive parent angle to her with her relationship with Lena while Merlock kinda lacks personal ties in a more character driven show like this.

I don't really buy that, either. Magica and Scrooge haven't even been in the same episode since the end of season one, I think. It's pretty clear they wanted to do the "steal the dime" story once, and never again.

That seems to be a theme for this show. For some reason, the writers seem to really dislike recurring villains with variants on the same basic plot line: the Beagles trying to break into the Bin, Magica trying to steal Scrooge's dime, Glomgold trying to one-up Scrooge as the richest duck in the world or beat him to a treasure. They really don't like the idea of reusing a basic plot idea.

It's not a bad thing, IMO. Gives them a bit more of chances to do different things since this show is not entirely episodic with all episodes being complete stand-alones except for 2-3

I agree in theory, but in practice it has meant using Magica very sparsely and quite apart from Scrooge, and not really using the Beagles at all.

Since her plot with Lena is pretty definitively done, if she appears again her being in an episode with Scrooge seems fairly likely. Especially since she only wanted her powers back to fuck with Scrooge in the first place.

My mind went to all the wrong places with the "fuck" part. :p

Anyways, I kind of expect her to have a last hurrah, possibly getting one over FOWL or trying to get revenge once more

Oh yes, Scrooge having an affair with Magica, that would definitely take the cake.

As for Lena, it's not all that clear cut her story with Magica is done to me. Especially since she explicitly got her powers back from Lena. I think it is very likely the fight on that front will be between Lena and Magica, not Scrooge, because Magica is now Lena's personal enemy.

Scrooge will be fighting Glomgold, most likely.

Okay about the whole recurring villains with variants on the same basic plot line thing, we still get Glomgold trying to defeat and one up Scrooge and he appears a lot (Especially in season 2 with the bet arc). Plus maybe the writers don't wanna get repetitive since this is a story and character driven show in the modern age.

To everyone: And one interesting thing Frank has said regarding Magica in some posts is that Magica will interact with Scrooge this season (and they didn't interact in Phantom and the Sorceress so there's still hope for some more animated Scrooge and Magica moments in the series). When asked if Magica would get a backstory on why she hates Clan Mc Duck, Frank merely said spoilers so there's a potential backstory right there (though that post was from December 2018 though it's not like the episodes since then really answer the question).

When someone recently asked about Magica yesterday and if she would appear, Frank said "Magica has a kinda big appearance in an episode. Its my favorite performance from Catherine."

https://suspendersofdisbelief.tumblr.com/post/181143243211/will-magica-have-any-backstory-like-glomgold-did

https://suspendersofdisbelief.tumblr.com/post/642168053741862912/hey-frank-im-happy-to-see-youre-back-and-i

https://suspendersofdisbelief.tumblr.com/post/190776562426/will-there-be-any-magica-and-scrooge-moments-in

Yeah, this Magica can be pretty fun, I just wish the writers had given her more to do in the series. She spent way too long without any powers.

Someday I want to see that awesome Sampo story in animation. Unfortunately it's not going to be this show doing it.

Edited by Redmess on Feb 5th 2021 at 12:03:15 PM

I do kinda wish that they didn't cast so many big-name actors.

The side effect is that they're either too expensive to be regular characters or they might be too busy to keep playing their part, and I kinda feel like a lot of the reason characters like Magica are so sparse is due to that stuff.

I suspect thats what the execs probably demanded,Star Power is a thing that brings in good ratings sometimes

TBF doesn't every Disney cartoon these days rely on big name actors like Gravity Falls with Jason Ritter, Kristen Schaal, JK Simmons, and Linda Cardelini for Gravity Falls, Eden Sher, Alan Tudyk, Rider Strong, Abby Elliot, Jenny Slate, and Esme Blanco for Star vs the Forces of Evil, Weird Al for Milo Murphy's Law, the entire main casts for both Rapunzel's Tangled Adventure and Big Hero 6 The Series (minus Khary Payton), Arthemis Pedsbani in Big City Greens, and Brenda Song for Amphibia so nothing new for Disney.

Besides, David Tennant is a big name actor yet he still appears in most episodes and pretty sure voice acting can be done remotely and anywhere in less time than on camrea work so I doubt Catherine Tate being a big name has anything to do with Magica not appearing more.

Edited by SpongeGuy11 on Feb 5th 2021 at 3:21:08 PM

In the covid 19 era, voice acting is actually more efficient and less of a hassle than live filming anyway.

Yes, and it's very annoying. I don't care what star is voicing a character, as long as they do a good job.

Yeah, the reason big names do more voice roles than they would live action shows of the same standard is because of time constraints. That's why every animated movie has every celebrity ever in it, because they all have time to do it.

I'm not sure that VA constraints are the reason for no Magica, though. That's a writing move.

I agree it seems to be a writing move for Magica. The way the season one finale was set up, she was clearly supposed to be just an arc villain, and then her role on the show was basically over. After that, she only really existed for the sake of Lena's plot arc.

Magica was in GlomTales and that didn't have Lena at all.

I remember when it was a Thing that The Magic School Bus did all their cast recordings in the same (I assume California) studio, except for Lily Tomlin, who recorded her lines from a studio near her home in Canada. Now it's just how the industry be.

True, but that was also a massive multiplayer villain team-up. It wasn't Magica on her own.