Don Rosa - Lo$, The King of the Klondike - Page 2

Although chapter 8 of The Life and Times of Scrooge contains many great pages, this was one that especially interested me. I mainly collect original comic art by Tex Willer artists, so purchasing a page where Scrooge engages in some gunslinging (or coinslinging) with Wyatt Earp seemed like a perfect Western-themed addition to my collection. Scrooge slinging his first dime is also a memorable visual gag that neatly captures his character. Another key reason for desiring this page was that it sums up the previous chapters of The Life and Times of Scrooge as Wyatt and Scrooge list the diverse nicknames Scrooge has previously been ascribed. One of The panels of this page was consequently also used in the marketing of Lo$ in Finland, as shown in the additional images.

Being a big movie buff, this page also has a nice cinematic quality to it with eg. a shot over the shoulder of Wyatt and continuous panels with the same framing. Wyatt, of course, has been portrayed in numerous classic Westerns like Tombstone (1993), one of my favorites, and the biographical film Wyatt Earp (1994) by actors such as Kurt Russell and Kevin Costner. As you could expect, Don didn't just place Earp in the story out of love for old movies, but Earp actually really did partake in the gold rush and even owned a successful saloon, the Dexter Saloon, in Nome, Alaska. I also like how this exchange between these two legends makes up one whole scene with Scrooge entering it in the first panels and exiting in the last - a storytelling method that Don Rosa often employs (see also the next story page after this one).

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The original lettering has been printed on a piece of clear 1 mm polystyrene plastic with the speech bubbles thus "floating" 2 mm on top of the page. Todd Klein always lettered Don Rosa's art on vellum overlays so the OA is without lettering. I experimented with several techniques and overlay materials to reach the best optical and protective result. There is, for example, an extra sheet of 99% UV-protective conservation glass layered on top of the plastic. I'm not sure if this method of displaying original comic art with "floating speech bubbles" has been used before so I may have been a pioneer in this endeavor. Feel free to ask me for more detailed information. :)