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| "The Return of the Phantom Blot" was originally printed in 4 parts in Walt Disney's Comics and Stories #284-287 |
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| Walt Disney's Comics and Stories #284-287 and Gemstone's Mickey Mouse #285 reprinting the story |
The Return of the Phantom Blot (1964) was the first new story featuring the Phantom Blot in the American comics since his first appearance in Mickey Mouse Outwits the Phantom Blot (1939). In the meantime, there was a couple of remakes of the daily strip series in the comic book format, and the Italians used the Blot in several stories. But The Return of the Phantom Blot was the first new original story for the American market and re-introduced the character leading up to his own comic book series.
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| The first issue of The Phantom Blot's own comic book series |
At the end of the last part of The Return of the Phantom Blot we get an ad for this new series. When I see ads like this I'm always wondering if the story was created one row short or if the editors had cut something to make space for the ads. I got curious about this story too and wanted to check how the reprint dealt with the missing row. And it turns out Gemstone had done something clever, they actually re-used the ad too! But this time for their own new two-part miniseries with the Phantom Blot.
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| The story ends with an ad in both the original printing and the Gemstone reprint |
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| Ad in Walt Disney's Comics and Stories #287 and Mickey Mouse #285 |
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| The new Gemstone mini-series being advertised |
Another fun thing with the Gemstone reprint is a little coloring goof with Goofy's clothes. I wonder what kind of strange onepice/jumpsuit thing is laying on this armchair...
Checking the original coloring the clothes makes more sense 😄
Edit: Shortly after writing this blogpost, The Return of the Phantom Blot was printed again in Mickey Mouse: The 90th Anniversary Collection. I made a new March 2020 post about this comic.
Woops, there's a typo in the title there —
ReplyDeleteThanks :)
DeleteThis is a really great story actually voted as number one of the Murry stories at inducks. I checked the Danish edition of the story. Here is no commercial in the end. Instead they made each panel a little bit larger. That way the made it fit to a full page. It looks a little bit strange.
ReplyDeleteAbout the coloring I like the original coloring which used warm colors
It's a strange story. The Blot does not actually return at all! He is still locked up tight in State Prison, where he's apparently been (if you ignore his lookalike Italian cousin from TOPOLINO) since 1939... or was it 1949, when "Mickey Mouse Outwits the Phantom Blot!" was retold in a new version with redrawn artwork in WDC&S 101-106? Still, having a copycat running around claiming to be the Phantom Blot must have eventually motivated the incarcerated Blot to break out of State Prison to star in NEW ADVENTURES OF THE PHANTOM BLOT. I guess once he made up his mind to do it, he discovered it was really no problem, because from PHANTOM BLOT #1 to #7 he manages to regularly break out of State Prison every 3 to 6 months for the next two years (1964-1966).
ReplyDeleteAbout the story "The Return of the Phantom Blot", though... interestingly it foreshadows Goofy's role in Mickey's plan to recapture the Blot in PHANTOM BLOT #1.