Whoa, ‘Darkwing Duck’ And ‘DuckTales’ Don’t Exist In The Same Universe
Let’s get dangerous. That’s the tagline uttered by the caped crusader known asDarkwing Duck. The crimefighting mallard hit the airwaves in the early 90s, shortly after Disney’s other duck-centric animated seriesDuckTaleswent off the air and headed into theaters with its own movie,DuckTales: Treasure of the Lost Lamp. Since both the shows hailed from Disney, had anthropomorphic ducks, and shared two characters, many assumed thatDarkwing Duckwas a spin-off ofDuckTales. However, the creator ofDarkwing Duckhas just confirmed that’s not the case.
So why isn’tDarkwing Duckconnected toDuckTales? Find out after the jump.
In a recent interview withThe Hollywood Reporterin honor of the 25th anniversary ofDarkwing Duck, creatorTad Stonesfinally cleared the air about whether or notDarkwing Duckwas a spin-off ofDuckTales. After all, the shows shared the characters Launchpad and Gizmoduck, so why wouldn’t they exist in the same universe? We’ll let Stones explain:
“Because Launchpad appeared inDuckTalesand we used Roboduck as the Superman character, the hero who gets all the glory as opposed to Darkwing, fans try to connect the two realities. They are two different universes in my book. We work in the alternate Duckiverse.”
Stones points out that’s why Launchpad was a rather inept pilot inDuckTales, but was much better at flying inDarkwing Duck. While the character could’ve easily had some training between the two animated series, that’s a pretty clear difference between the two versions of the characters. The reason Stones hadDarkwing Duckexist in a separate universe appears to be tied to his affinity for Silver Age comics that didn’t have much continuity between issues. He explains:
“It drives fans crazy, but I was not a huge fan of continuity. I grew up with Silver Age continuity with the comics. Yeah, I know Lois Lane doesn’t know Clark Kent is Superman. She suspects something. Jimmy Olsen’s his pal. He went to high school with Lana Lang. The basics everybody knew. But there was really no arc or change. Every time you picked up a comic, you knew where you were starting.”
