After creating his first superhero with Robopap (parody of the famous android from Paul Verhover's film) within "Duck Tales", in 1991 Walt Disney Animation decided to create a new anthropomorphic champion of justice, this time however drawing from universe of real comic heroes.

Cartoonist Tad Stones thus creates Darkwing Duck, a version made in the USA of ours Paperinik.

Characterized by the benevolent irony typical of the animation giant, the series represents an idiotic but very enjoyable work of citations of the internal universe of superheroes, starting from the protagonist.

Drake Mallard aka Darkwing Duck wears a costume identical to that of The Shadow, has origins similar to Superman and with his famous phrase "I am the terror that flutters in the night ..." he would like to be as creepy as Batman and then fail. With the Dark Knight of Finger and Kane he also shares the contraptions, the plane (Darkwing's jet resembles the Bat-wing piloted by Michael Keaton in the Tim Burton film), a hiding place (the tower of the St. , operational base of ours) equipped with computers and high-tech equipment such as the bat-cave and an aggressive futuristic version that recalls the reinterpretation of the character given by Frank Miller in "The Return of the Dark Knight".

Furthermore, his relationship with Morgana Macawber, a witch similar to Elsa Lanchester from "The Bride of Frankenstein", recalls the ambivalent feeling that exists between Batman and Catwoman.

Even the villains recall some famous supervillains of the comic: Negaduck, the evil twin of Darkwing, recalls the evil clones of Flash (Reverse-Flash); Liquidator and Megavolt Idro-Man and Electro from "Spider-Man", Clorofix recalls Poison Ivy (especially in the origins) and Floronic Man from "Swamp Thing", while Quackerjack is a cross between the Joker and Toyman. Together these anthropomorphic characters form the group of the Cynical Five, a parody of the Injustice Gang that gathers the DC Comics villans.

The protagonist of only one episode, the corpulent duck Frigida is identical in skin color and origins to Mr. Freeze described by Akiva Goldsman in the screenplay of the disputed "Batman & Robin" by Joel Schumacher and by Paul Dini in the miniseries entitled to the character.

In the fight against this "rouge gallery" Darkwing Duck can count on the help of Jet MacQuack, former protagonist of "Duck Tales", and his adopted daughter Ocalina, whom he takes care of as Dick Tracy with the orphan "Boy" and Batman with protege Dick Grayson.

A precious help to the protagonist in the crusade against Evil is given by J. Gander Hooter (from the historical director of the FBI J. Edgard Hoover) with his organization SHUSH, of the little Tonnaso Parapiglia, intelligent son of the banal neighbors Mallard, and of the group of the Ducks of Justice. To form this team of heroes inspired by the Justice League are the clumsy Stego, a duck transformed into a dinosaur reminiscent of the Hulk, the Neptune fish that recalls Acquaman and the aforementioned Morgana and Robopap.

The Italian edition of the series was entrusted by the Royfilm company to Renzo Stacchi for the direction and to Luigi Calabrò and Giorgio Tausani for the dialogues.

The voice of Darkwing Duck belonged to an excellent Oliviero Dinelli, voice actor of Rowan Atkinson in "Mr. Bean - The Last Catastrophe" and other significant interpretations and of John M. Jackson-Admiral AJ Chegwidden in the series "JAG - Lawyers in uniform" .

Joining Dinelli's dubbing were Antonella Baldini, her colleague on "JAG" (Nancy Chambers as the hateful Lieutenant Lauren Singer) and future voice of Busy Philipps-Audrey Lidell of "Dawson's Creek", on Ocalina; Laura Boccanera on Morgana, Vittorio Battarra on Clorofix, Fabrizio Manfredi on Megavolt, Oreste Baldini (Antonella's brother) on Quackerjack, Bruno Alessandro on Grizzlycoff, Sonia Scotti on Camilla (homage to the "Spider-Man" Chameleon), Roberto Stocchi and Silvia peptones as dubbers of Beppe and Alice Parapiglia and Ilaria Stagni on the little Tonnaso.

As in the second series of "Duck Tales", Jet MacQuack is voiced by Roberto Pedicini, while Renzo Stacchi voices Stego and Toros Bulba, the villain of the pilot episode of the series who in the original has the voice of Tim Curry.

In one episode Stacchi is the voice of a disturbing duck inspired by Pennywise, the monster disguised as a clown played by the English actor (with the Italian voice of Carlo Reali, the first voice actor of MacQuack) in the miniseries "It", inspired by the novel of the same name by Stephen King.

di Marco Bonardelli

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