"Don't whimper, boy! Flee for your life with dignity! Think of the school's reputation! Oh great gods! Y-You're not scribes from the broad sheets, are you? L-Let me assure you that our traditional education methods are still the best in the world!"
"narg."
"Education?"
"But of course! We're on a nature studies field trip from Hellscabs School of Remedial Satanism."
"blug."
"Obviously, there were more of us earlier. Now there's just me and young Trotter minor."
"Wait a minute... You're saying you brought schoolkids here to Morningbright's realm?"
"Look -- Miss Grimslime from St. Hectate's Coven School for Girls lost her entire class of teenage witches. I've done comparatively well."
"onng."
"But they're kids! They're not ready to handle dragons!"
"nob."
"Madame, these boys studied Dragon Theory just last term! Admittedly, the theory was that dragons are nice and talk in a warm, Scottish brogue. Now, if you'll excuse us, we have performance targets to meet! We're supposed to rendezvous with Mr. Peters' woodword class in the Forest of Murderous Trees, aren't we, Trotter?"
"gnark."
"Hum. Well, anyway, I still say kids have it too easy."
- Alan Moore, "Trip, Trip, to a Dream Dragon..."

"Harry Potter and the Avenger of Crime Alley"
Like every other kid or grown-up in denial of the fact that they're no longer a kid living in countries where starving to death and/or getting blown the fuck up in the name of freedom fighting or oil interests aren't a first concern, I'm reading Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince right now.

I'm not done yet. And honestly, I think there's something vaguely wrong with anyone who is done at this point. (Yes, I'm looking in your direction, Miss Brooks. You, too, Tuttle) But I've got Hogwarts on the mind today, so I want to blog about it, but I don't want to give anything away -- not that much has happened that you didn't see coming about a hundred pages into the second book -- and it'd be really pathetic if I told you about how I was wearing my Azkaban prison shirt on Saturday and some kid told me it was cool, because I'm going to claim that I shouted "Piss off ye bloody wee git, I've done hard time!" when all I really said was "Thanks."

And I'm sick to death of having the usual conversation about Harry Potter. Yes, the series sure gets darker with every book... I guess. I'm not sure what's so dark about several hundred pages of a moody British brat wandering around a big beautiful castle with his friends and going to classes, but I'll go ahead and concede your point. Man o manishevitz, Harry Potter's really getting macabre because maybe somebody dies at the end of each book as an afterthought. I don't know how I sleep at night without red screaming nightmares about bloodthirsty golden snitches flying around whispering You-Know-Who's actual name in my ear, these books have gotten so dark. I'm fucking spooked, let me tell you.

Crack open a Hellblazer, you pussies.

I'm sorry if I sound bitter. I guess I'm just a little put out because I'm half way through this book and I'm really starting to suspect that there will never come a point in the story in which Krypto the Superdog flies to Hogwarts with a note from the Little Black Duck prompting Ron and Harry to dig up the interred remains of Cedric Diggory so they can be hauled to Tibet where the Duck will have him brought back to life in the name of love.

When I told Kate about this concern -- and of course I told Kate, she's my life partner after all -- you know what she said? She said "It's not your story, Clark."

What the hell's that supposed to mean? I was just hoping me and Rowling could share a universe. Is that too much to ask? Comic book writers do it. If Bendis can share a universe with Warren Ellis, I think the two of us should be able to pull it off. It's not like I didn't write her about my plans. Apparantly she only reads the letters from the little terminal kids on their way out.

(Yes. I am a monster. What of it?)

The Little Black Duck meets Harry Potter on the Hogwarts Express in The Unhappy Duckling, and so, Hogwarts makes a few brief appearances in the Little Black Duck series. It was one of the three locations that was a total bitch to draw. The other two were Jesse Hall and Arkham Asylum. I was once going to do a scene near Memorial Union in which the Duck finds a statue dedicated to Albert Einstein nearby, but was so sickened by the thought of rendering the place I ended up putting the statue in an empty field and had the Duck say "Hey, there's Memorial Union about ten feet away."

But oh, yeah. Hogwarts.

The Duck first comes to the school in the final chapter of Duck Days of Summer because Batman wants to consult Sybill Trelawney about the destiny of Baby Bloomsday, and we learn that Batman once broke into the place and is thus on good terms with Dumbledore, which brings us neatly to today's crazy out-there semblence of a point.

I haven't put out a Little Black Duck story in years, and yet, my head is still totally geared for dreaming up new stories. For example, I really wanted to do a tongue-in-cheek send up of Bendis's "King of Hell's Kitchen" where the Little Black Duck declares himself the new emperor of Wonderland in a misguided attempt to keep random guys from asking Erin Turtle out, only it backfires when Batman gets pissed off and assembles every comic book character I can think of to take him down. I actually started work on another one called "Ultimate Awkward Team-Up" in which the Little White Swan breaks the Joker out of Arkham, prompting Batman to team-up with Erin Turtle to track them down, while at the same time, Daisy Sparks is in town chasing the Little White Swan and has the Little Black Duck backing her up, and over the course of one crazy, complicated night these three couples end up swapping partners two or three times until somebody dies.

Of course, I can't waste my time actually writing all of this! I don't know if you've heard, but I'm well on my way to becoming a big time comic book writer. Stan Lee's gonna call any day now and offer me Ultimate Beta Ray Bill. I just know it. But I swear to god, the temptation to pull out those uni-balls is almost overwhelming.

For example, I always wanted to do a Batman spin-off story -- the only thing that stopped me was the realization that if I wanted to do a Batman solo story, I should really just pitch something to DC. But you know what? I'm under the impression that we really need a Batman Begins for the world's greatest stick-figure detective. How did Brent Wayne begin his caped crusade to defend the streets of Wonderland?

I can see it now.

We open in the present day. Batman stands under a broken street lamp in Crime Alley. He bends down and drops his customary two roses saying, "Mother. Father. I'm sorry. I haven't changed."

Then we flashback to the night the Waynes were killed. I don't think I need to rehash the whole thing. A single image of an eight-year-old Brent crouched down and weeping over the bloodied bodies of his parents a la the cover of Batman #404 oughta do the trick.

Then we move on to Hogwarts. The year is 1993. After three hours of trying, Brent Wayne, eleven-years-old, finally makes the jump over the enchanted gates only to find Severus Snape waiting for him. Wayne compliments his cape and Snape hauls Brent up into the castle and seats him outside Dumbledore's office next to a green-skinned girl roughly Wayne's age.

The two of them chat for a moment, then Dumbledore comes out and invites Wayne in. As they go into his office, Dumbledore turns and says "I'll be with you in a moment, Miss Turtle," concluding the earliest chronological appearance of her character in Little Black Duck history.

There's also a bit where Wayne sits down saying, "She seemed nice," to which Albus responds "She's one of the worst students we've got," in a little nudge nudge wink wink to all you Wes Anderson fans out there.

Then something happens that stands at the heart of what I always loved about writing and drawing the Little Black Duck as well as exists as the main reason why I needed to stop doing them. The Little Black Duck is all about stealing scenes from comic books I've read. The first chapter of The Unhappy Duckling is really about how much I wish I'd written Superboy #84. The scene where the Little Black Duck meets Clarky Clarkington III is basically the scene where Wesley Dodds meets Morpheus in Sandman Midnight Theatre. I'm a hack, and in the Little Black Duck, I felt no guilt about it.

And in my little Batman scene in Hogwarts, I would do it again, because Dumbledore's whole conversation with Wayne, in which he explains to Brent that despite his best efforts, he can't attend classes at Hogwarts because he's a muggle, would really be empty build-up to the moment when Wayne says the following:

"There's - I've done my research. I've heard about some of your amazing adventures. You've done unbelievable things... with your magics... and I, again, I mean no disrespect by asking you something like this. But I know that a lot of the things in this school have -- I don't know what the proper term is... But in all of these magics of yours... is there -- is there anything you can do... a spell, a potion... is there anything you can do to take things back?"

"Take things back?" Dumbledore asks, puzzled.

"To make things go back... to how they were."

Then Dumbledore says "No," with a look of sorrow on his face few artists could convey with stick figures, but what can I say, I'm a god.

Then little Wayne says "Guess this is it then. This is my life." And that's when a bat smashes through the window.

And of course, the rest of the story writes itself. We flash forward a couple more years to find a teenaged Brent Wayne training with the Priest of the Panther Clan -- which is all too fitting since the Priest is based on Priest who came up with the whole Bruce Wayne trains in Tibet in his youth thing during his time at DC Comics -- and there's this great moment where Brent completes his training and the Priest says, "You have proved yourself worthy. You could take up the mantle of the Black Panther with honor... You know, if you weren't a filthy white devil," and Wayne smiles (another hard feat to pull off with faceless stick-figures, but again, I'm a god) and says, "That's okay. I have another totem in mind."

Then we cut to his first outing as Batman, his first encounter with the Joker, the works. You wanna talk about twists and turns you wouldn't see coming? Try this on for size: Sirius Black is Commissioner Gordon. Think about it.

Eventually, we make it all the way back to that opening scene in Crime Alley. And then the Dark Knight delivers a moving speech to the departed spirits of his parents about how he's still just a scared little boy who wants his mommy, and no sooner does he finish his tender words then he turns and finds that his entire rogues gallery has broken out of Arkham and teamed up to finally murder him. And he takes a moment to collect himself, then surges toward them and we go out on the "Is this the fall of the Caped Crusader?" note... kinda like Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid.




...

But yeah, I'm reading Harry Potter. And before I hear a litany about how I've got no right to suggest that Rowling needs to throw me a bone from all you rabid Harry Potheads, let's get something straight. Let's lay all the cards out on the table. The Boy Who Lived is a weak, pale imitation of Neil Gaiman's Timothy Hunter that's been dumbed down for mass consumption and phenomenally successfully at that, but that's it.

Crack open a Books of Magic, you pussies.