The Three Mouseketeers is the name of two separate talking animal comic series published by DC Comics.
The original Three Mouseketeers were published in DC's humor series Funny Stuff, first appearing in Funny Stuff #1 (Summer 1944). [1] The strip was drawn by Ronald Santi. [2]
The series was a loose parody of the classic 1844 Alexander Dumas novel The Three Musketeers . In this case, the lead swordsmice were named Aramouse, Amouse, and Porterhouse (with young accomplice D'Artagmouse), and had various adventures while serving King Looey XIV. Their arch-enemy is Duke Bazook. [3]
The series ran in Funny Stuff until early 1948, after which the characters remained unseen for years. [4] The Mouseketeers were revisited in a 1982 Captain Carrot and His Amazing Zoo Crew time-travel storyline in which it is revealed the Mouseketeers are historical figures in Earth-C's version of France during the 17th century. [5]
The second Three Mouseketeers series appeared in a comic title of the same name, which ran from 1956 to 1960 for 26 issues. [6] They were created by Sheldon Mayer, though most of the work was done by Rube Grossman after the first few issues. [7]
Though the title was clearly inspired by Alexandre Dumas' novel The Three Musketeers , nothing else about the characters was, with no similarities to the earlier Golden Age series. The stories revolved around three mice, all members of a club. There was the pompous, self-styled leader, Fatsy, who was obese and wore a sailor's uniform similar to Donald Duck's, then Patsy, tall and dim-witted (also the only Mouseketeer to go without clothing), and last of all Minus, short, dressed in oversized t-shirt and baseball cap with the bill pointing to one side. Of the group, Minus was the most likely to get into trouble (a running gag had him getting many demerits from Fatsy) though this was usually not of a malicious nature. The mice met at a clubhouse, which was an old tin can with the open mouth covered by a leaf. The mice rarely used this entrance, preferring an underground secret entrance. Their adventures involved dealing with humans (whom they referred to as the Bigfoots), neighborhood cats, and a particularly nasty hawk named Hamilton.
The series ended its initial run when DC decided to concentrate on its line of superhero comics. The series did get a revival when it was reprinted for seven issues from 1970 to 1971; [8] later, in the 1980s, Mouseketeers stories were reprinted in digest format along with other classic DC talking-animal characters under the Funny Stuff banner.
All-American Comics was a comics anthology and the flagship title of comic book publisher All-American Publications, one of the forerunners of DC Comics. It ran for 102 issues from 1939 to 1948. Characters created for the title, including Green Lantern, the Atom, the Red Tornado, Doctor Mid-Nite, and Sargon the Sorcerer, later became mainstays of the DC Comics line.
Captain Carrot and His Amazing Zoo Crew! is a DC Comics series about a team of talking animal superheroes called the Zoo Crew. The characters first appeared in a 16-page special insert in The New Teen Titans #16, followed by a series published from 1982 to 1983. The Zoo Crew characters were created by Roy Thomas and Scott Shaw Although the series, which was the last original funny animal property to be created by DC Comics, proved short-lived, it is still fondly remembered by many comic fans of its generation, and the characters appear occasionally in cameos in the mainstream DC Universe.
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The Two Mouseketeers is a 1952 American one-reel animated cartoon and is the 65th Tom and Jerry short, produced in Technicolor and released to theatres on March 15, 1952 by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. It was produced by Fred Quimby and directed by William Hanna and Joseph Barbera. The short is a spoof of Alexandre Dumas' 1844 novel The Three Musketeers and its film adaptations, featuring the mice Jerry and his best friend, Nibbles as the "Mouseketeers" trying to raid the French king's banquet table, which is protected by Tom as a guard. Three years after the cartoon's release, the term "Mousketeer" was also used to refer to the child cast members of the television show, The Mickey Mouse Club.
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