Comic Book DB - Carl Barks

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Carl Barks
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Bio:
After a rather difficult coming-of-age in the Depression era, Barks landed a job with Walt Disney Studios in 1935--on the strength of a few test drawings. He was originally assigned to the script department, but after he sold a few ideas to the comic strip department, Disney himself ordered him put in the storyboard department. There he stayed, influencing the production of 35 now-classic short cartoons. He grew tired of the work by the early 40s, however, and thought he was leaving the business entirely in 1942 to raise chickens on the farm he and his second wife owned.

But ducks were his real future.

Having done a Donald Duck comic for Gold Key just prior to his departure from Disney Studios, he had, perhaps accidentally, embarked on a career that would dominate the rest of his life.

In mid-1943, he began regularly producing Donald Duck comic books. Along the way he would create an entire, intricately backgrounded world--now generally called the "Scrooge McDuck universe"--that would lay the foundation for the world's most successful comic playground. Worldwide, no one--not DC, not Marvel--has ever been able to project their vision of a particular fictional continuity to as many people as Carl Barks did with his vision of Duckburg, Calisota (the home of Donald and Uncle Scrooge).

Virtually every single notion about the Ducks--other than the simple "look" of Donald and Daisy Duck--at some point or another was addressed by Barks (or people dedicated to upholding his vision). He took characters that were little more than icons and turned them into a universe that was exciting. The reason that Duck Tales was the only really successful Disney Cartoon in modern broadcast syndication has everything to do with the fact that it tries to follow the basic structure that Barks gave to storytelling in Duckburg. Treat the Ducks like real people, with all that that entails: personalities, jobs, families, a home town, the works. Then send them off on adventures, and let them respond to what they encounter as their characters actually would, and there'll probably be something interesting to watch there. (Many serious students of Duck comic books--Donaldists, as they're called--would say the reason that Duck Tales is no longer on the air is that it never achieved the level of detail or clever irony that marked the Barks original.)

In any case, it would not be inappropriate to call Carl Barks "the Walt Disney of Walt Disney comics".

Date of Birth: 27 March 1901
Birthplace: Merill, OR USA
Date of death: 24 August 2000

Favorite Creators:
Carl Barks is a favorite creator of 22 users
Notes:
Due to tight control by Disney, Barks was never able to sign any of his comic work. Most of his work went out without acknowledgement of any kind that he was writing and drawing it. However, following Walt Disney's death and Barks' retirement, he did receive public credit by the Walt Disney Company, and is now actively acknowledged by Company historians.

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