| "Land Beneath the Ground!" | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Story code | W US 13-02 |
| Story | Carl Barks |
| Ink | Carl Barks |
| Date | August 18, 1955 |
| Hero | Scrooge McDuck |
| Pages | 27 (29) |
| Layout | 4 rows per page |
| Appearances | Scrooge McDuck Donald Duck Huey, Dewey and Louie Terries and Fermies |
| First publication | Uncle Scrooge #13 March 1956 |
"Land Beneath the Ground!" is a Scrooge McDuck comic book story that appeared in 1956 in the comic book Uncle Scrooge , written by Carl Barks.
Worried about earthquakes damaging his money bin, Scrooge McDuck is determined to find out what causes them. Upon a suggestion by Donald, Scrooge has a shaft dug beneath his money bin to search for faults which might get cracked open by a tremor, but the miners are suddenly frightened away by voices coming from a gigantic cave. The next day, Scrooge, Donald, and his three grandnephews find strangely round, colorful rocks scattered around the mineshaft. They prepare to descend, but all of a sudden their minecarts are sabotaged, stranding them deep beneath the ground.
In the caverns below Duckburg, Scrooge and his nephews soon discover that the smooth "rocks" are really subterranean beings calling themselves Terries and Fermies who look like bowling balls with arms and a head, but no legs, and move around by rolling on the ground. The Terries and Fermies can hear radio broadcasts through certain magnetic rocks, which allowed them to learn English - with a southern accent - from listening to country music radio stations.
Terries cause earthquakes by rolling in massive groups of thousands against the giant pillars that support the land on the surface of the Earth, while Fermies cause earthquakes by gathering together in massive numbers and lifting up pieces of the Earth's crust. They treat this as a sports competition: Whichever group causes the biggest earthquake (as revealed by intercepted radio transmissions) wins the contest and gets the prize, a piece of Ancient Greek pottery that fell down a crevice in Ancient Roman times in the year zero (i.e., the year 1 BCE translated into astronomical year numbering, which includes a year zero). However, now the Terries and Fermies have assembled for a large-scale bout which would result in Duckburg getting destroyed.
In an attempt to stop the earthquakes, Scrooge steals the trophy, but is forced to discard his top hat during the subsequent escape. The Terries and Fermies pursue in an attempt to stop them, before they can tell the upper world of their existence and thus stall their competition. When that fails, they trigger a series of powerful tremors in order to shake the Ducks back down the shaft. This accidentally causes Scrooge's money bin to dislodge, slide across the shaft, and crack open, spilling all his money into the underground. However, since they think of money as worthless garbage ("We all know what the above-grounders think of money--they try to give it away on their radio quiz shows!"), the Terries and Fermies unite for a massive clean-up. Proclaiming Scrooge's hat as their new trophy, they push the money back into the money bin and then seal the shaft to prevent more money from getting dumped on them.
The story ends with a professor visiting Scrooge to assure him that there will be no more quakes. But when Scrooge asks him what triggered the tremors, and the professor answers that it was "gas that builds up in fissures as the Earth shrinks", Scrooge slyly winks at his nephews with the words (in Southern accent) "He shore ain't been around, has he, podners?"
In a 1975 interview, Barks said, "When you've got a mysterious place, then you develop something out of whole cloth. It's a mysterious place down under the earth. We don't know what's under the crust. Scientists tell us it's a big molten core, but Uncle Scrooge thought that there was a hole down under there, and he was gonna be darn sure that he knew where that hole was. So once I got down to this mysterious hole, why I'd people it with imaginary little characters." [1]
In Carl Barks and the Disney Comic Book: Unmasking the Myth of Modernity, Thomas Andrae notes this story's return to the theme of people living in a hidden, preindustrial utopia which began in Barks' 1949 Lost in the Andes! "However," Andrae writes, "the story differs from its predecessors in situating its fairy world in a realm that is tied to and affects the everyday one. The geologic realm in literature has come to represent the psychologic, and this story deals with the repressed longings that underlie the civilized psyche." He goes on to say that "the Terries and Fermies represent the repressed desires that undergird the Protestant ethic, fusing work and play and functioning as emblems of unalienated labor." [2]
Don Rosa wrote a sequel (of sorts) called The Universal Solvent .
Carl Barks was an American cartoonist, author, and painter. He is best known for his work in Disney comic books, as the writer and artist of the first Donald Duck stories and as the creator of Scrooge McDuck. He worked anonymously until late in his career; fans dubbed him The Duck Man and The Good Duck Artist. In 1987, Barks was one of the three inaugural inductees of the Will Eisner Comic Book Hall of Fame.
Huey, Dewey, and Louie are triplet cartoon characters created by writer Ted Osborne and cartoonist Al Taliaferro, and are owned by The Walt Disney Company. Huey, Dewey, and Louie are the nephews of Donald Duck, sons of Della Duck, the grand-nephews of Scrooge McDuck, and the friends of Webby Vanderquack. Like their maternal uncles, the brothers are anthropomorphic white ducks with yellow-orange bills and feet. They typically wear shirts and colorful baseball caps, which are sometimes used to distinguish them, since Louie always wears green, Huey wears red, and Dewey wears blue. Huey, Dewey, and Louie have made several animated appearances in both films and television, but comics remain their primary medium. The trio are collectively the 11th most published comic book characters in the world, and outside of the superhero genre, second only to their uncle Donald.
Scrooge McDuck is a cartoon character created in 1947 by Carl Barks for The Walt Disney Company. Appearing in Disney comics, Scrooge is a Scottish-American anthropomorphic Pekin duck. Like his nephew Donald Duck, he has a yellow-orange bill, legs, and feet. He typically wears a red or blue frock coat, top hat, pince-nez glasses, and spats. He is portrayed in animation as speaking with a Scottish accent. Originally intended to be used only once, Scrooge became one of the most popular characters in Disney comics, and Barks's signature work. Scrooge lives in the city of Duckburg in the fictional US state of Calisota, whose claimed location is in California in the real-world United States.
Gyro Gearloose is a cartoon character created in 1952 by Carl Barks for Disney comics. An anthropomorphic chicken, he is part of the Donald Duck universe, appearing in comic book stories as a friend of Donald Duck, Scrooge McDuck, and anyone who is associated with them. He was also a heroic creator star of the animated DuckTales. He first appeared in the Carl Barks comic "Gladstone's Terrible Secret", and was the regular lead character in 4-page backup stories in Barks' issues of Uncle Scrooge, starting with issue #13 and continuing through #41.
Flintheart Glomgold is a cartoon character created in 1956 by Carl Barks. He is a South African American Pekin Duck and the business rival of Scrooge McDuck, usually portrayed as an ambitious, ruthless, and manipulative businessman who shares many of the same qualities as Scrooge—the drive for massive wealth, and the cunning and creativity to obtain the same—but he lacks any of Scrooge's tendencies towards generosity and compassion. In Don Rosa's The Life and Times of Scrooge McDuck, he is said to be a Boer.
The Donald Duck universe is a fictional shared universe which is the setting of stories involving Disney cartoon character Donald Duck, as well as Daisy Duck, Huey, Dewey, and Louie, Scrooge McDuck, and many other characters. It is a part of the larger Mickey Mouse universe. Life in the Donald Duck universe centers on the city of Duckburg and Little Golden Books, television series such as DuckTales (1987–1991), Darkwing Duck (1991–1992), and the DuckTales reboot (2017–2021), and video games such as QuackShot (1991), Goin' Quackers (2000), and DuckTales: Remastered (2013).
The Beagle Boys are a group of cartoon characters created in 1951 by Carl Barks for the Donald Duck universe. They are a family clan of organized criminals who constantly try to rob Scrooge McDuck. Their introduction and first appearance was in "Terror of the Beagle Boys", although in this story they only appear in the last frame and have no lines. They appear again in the next issue in a similar fashion, in The Big Bin on Killmotor Hill.
The Duck family is a fictional family of cartoon ducks related to Disney character Donald Duck. The family is also related to the Coot, Goose, and Gander families, as well as the Scottish Clan McDuck. Besides Donald, the best-known members of the Duck family are Huey, Dewey, and Louie, Donald's three triplet nephews.
The Junior Woodchucks of the World is a fictional scouting organization appearing in Disney comics and the DuckTales animated television franchise, most notably in adventures featuring Disney characters Huey, Dewey, and Louie as members.
Uncle Scrooge Adventures is a 1987-1997 Disney comic book series published by Gladstone Publishing under license from the Walt Disney Company. It features the adventures of Scrooge McDuck and his nephews Donald, Huey, Dewey, and Louie. It was usually distinguished from the main Uncle Scrooge title in its focus on longer, full-length stories, often in the pulp adventure style.
"Lost in the Andes!" is a Donald Duck story written by Carl Barks and published in Dell Comics' Four Color Comics #223 in April 1949. Donald and his nephews go to South America to find the mythical chickens that lay square eggs.
"A Christmas for Shacktown" is a 32-page Disney comics story written, drawn, and lettered by Carl Barks. The story was first published in Four Color #367, and tells of Donald Duck's attempts to raise money for a Christmas party for the poor children of Shacktown.
"Christmas on Bear Mountain" (1947) is a Donald Duck story by Carl Barks, first published in Dell Comics Four Color Comics #178. It was the first appearance of Scrooge McDuck, a character who became a comic-book icon throughout the world.
Donald Duck, a cartoon character created by the Walt Disney Company, is today the star of dozens of comic-book and comic-strip stories published each month around the world. In many European countries, Donald is considered the lead character in Disney comics, more important and beloved than Mickey Mouse.
"Only a Poor Old Man" is a 32-page Disney comics story written, drawn, and lettered by Carl Barks. It was published in Four Color #386 as the first issue of Uncle Scrooge. Scrooge McDuck had already made his debut as a supporting character in the 1947 Donald Duck story "Christmas on Bear Mountain", and made several other appearances in Donald Duck stories in Walt Disney's Comics and Stories, but "Poor Old Man" was the first comic book story with Scrooge as the main character.
"The Universal Solvent" is a 1995 Donald Duck story by Don Rosa. The story was inspired by the novel A Journey to the Center of the Earth and was based on a Pertwillaby Papers adventure titled Vortex. It was also likely a partial sequel of the classic Carl Barks story, "Land Beneath the Ground!". Don Rosa wrote two sequels to this story, called "The Black Knight" and "The Black Knight Glorps Again".
"A Little Something Special" is a 1997 Disney comics story created by Don Rosa to celebrate the 50th anniversary of Scrooge McDuck's first appearance in Carl Barks's "Christmas on Bear Mountain" in 1947.
"The Money Champ" was originally published in Uncle Scrooge #27 in September, 1959 and is the second of three stories written and drawn by Carl Barks in which Scrooge's rival Flintheart Glomgold appears. Glomgold first appeared in "The Second-Richest Duck" in Uncle Scrooge #15.