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"Back to the Klondike" is the 33rd episode of DuckTales, and the first episode in production order. It is a loose adaptation of the Uncle Scrooge comic story of the same name by Carl Barks, and as such, it also marks Glittering Goldie's first appearance in animation.

Synopsis[]

One mid-February evening, Huey, Dewey, Louie, Webby and Mrs. Beakley are making valentines. Scrooge tells them that he could care less about valentines, but the kids soon discover him obsessing over an old valentine in a closet. Scrooge explains that it's from an old flame from his days as a prospector in the Klondike Gold Rush and tells them the story.

One night during his time as a prospector at White Agony Creek, Scrooge brought his earnings to Dangerous Dan's honky-tonk, where he met Glittering Goldie as she sang for a crowd. Dangerous Dan taunted Scrooge, saying that he couldn’t afford a mint soda, but Scrooge impressed everyone by display his earnings: the Goose Egg Nugget. Goldie and Dan forced Scrooge into playing poker, with his nugget at stake, but Goldie rigged the deck in order to win. She hid the nugget in a piano, but Scrooge and Dan quickly got into a fight, causing Dan to get knocked onto the piano as he rolled outside, and he soon discovered the nugget. When Scrooge was unable to get his nugget back from Goldie, he demanded that she dig him up another one. Despite their initial dislike towards each other, Scrooge and Goldie grew to like each other as they dug for more gold. When Scrooge got ready to return to Duckburg with Goldie, he hid his gold under a rock, and received a valentine and a kiss from Goldie. Unfortunately, the gold was then stolen, and Dan told Scrooge that Goldie made off with it. Depressed, Scrooge instead dug for gold by himself at Red Agony Creek.

As Scrooge finishes his flashback, Dewey asks if there’s any gold still left in White Agony Creek. Scrooge admits that he only took a small amount to start with, but fortunately he still owns the claim.

Scrooge and the boys head up to the Klondike on Scrooge’s train, and are quickly spotted by Dan and his partner. Scrooge returns to his claim, only to discover that a claim jumper has taken up residence in his cabin. To avoid being shot at, Scrooge waits until nightfall to approach the cabin, but is chased around by a bear. After a while, the claim jumper calls off the bear and returns to the cabin.

While Dan concludes that Scrooge returned just because there was more gold on the claim, Scrooge and the boys try to set up a bear trap. The bear easily breaks through the trap and chases Scrooge some more, while the nephews use a rope to pull the claim jumper’s shotgun out of her hands. At this point the boys tell the claim jumper to call off her bear, whose name is Blackjack, from attacking Scrooge. Surprised to learn that Scrooge is here, the claim jumper quickly freshens up, thus revealing to the nephews that she's Glittering Goldie, and comes after Scrooge with a revolver. She explains to Scrooge that she’s living on his property because she had no place else to go. Scrooge apologizes to Goldie, telling her that he thinks of her every day. Scrooge and Goldie then make up and go for a walk, but their harmony ends when they get into an argument over what happened to Scrooge’s stolen gold. Goldie fires at Scrooge, but hits a rock, blasting open a small cache of gold within. When Scrooge tells Goldie she can pay him back with some of the gold she just discovered, she gets mad and heads to town with Blackjack.

Scrooge and the boys mine some gold, and later leave the Klondike by train. Dan tries to convince Goldie to help him rob the train, but she declines his offer. When Dan and his partner catch up to the train on horseback, they start shooting, and Dan climbs onto the roof. Scrooge manages to subdue and tie up Dan, but then gets knocked off the roof by a branch, while Dan's partner forces the engineer to stop the train.

Dan gloats to Scrooge that he was the one who originally stole the gold in the first place. Suddenly, Goldie rides up to the train on Blackjack, shooting at Dan and his partner, scaring them off. Now that they know the truth, Scrooge and Goldie properly apologize to each other. Although Goldie declines Scrooge’s offer to come back to Duckburg with him, Scrooge gives her the deed to his claim, saying that while she didn’t steal his gold, she did steal his heart.

Notes[]

  • Because the original story was written in 1953, it was possible for Scrooge to have been alive back in the 1890s, when the gold rush took place. An artistic license had to be used for this episode, or else Scrooge couldn't have been alive back then at the time of the show.
  • When Scrooge and the nephews are setting up the bear trap, the boys suddenly appear on one of the branches without appearing to have climbed the tree.
  • When this episode was shown in syndicated reruns (such as on Toon Disney), two brief scenes involving gunplay were cut. The first edit occurs in the flashback; at one point, Dangerous Dan shoots a pistol across the room and knocks the cork out of a bottle of whiskey on the bar, then blows the smoke from the gun into Scrooge's face, causing him to cough. As a result of this edit, Scrooge appears to be having a inexplicable coughing fit. The second edit completely eliminated Goldie's line, "Nah, I'm gonna try to take another shot at him!" while holding up her gun (in response to the nephews asking "Are you going to help Unca Scrooge?"). These scenes were reinstated on the episode's DVD release and on Disney+, but are missing from the iTunes and Amazon Instant Video releases.

Differences from the original comic[]

Back to the Klondike original cover

Uncle Scrooge #2 (originally printed as Four Color #456) contained the original printing of the story that this episode is based on.

Besides the obvious "Donald's not in this version."
  • In the original comic, the plot gets underway when Scrooge is suffering memory lapses and starts taking pills to recover his memory, and as a result, he remembers the cargo of gold he left buried in the Klondike.
  • In the original story, Scrooge is suggested to call the police and he says that since he stopped paying property taxes on his claim since the old days, he no longer holds legal rights on the property.
  • The character of Dangerous Dan did not exist in the original story.
  • Red Agony Creek was not mentioned in the original story (or any other comic).
  • The Goose Egg Nugget is much smaller here than in the comic (nor actually referred to by that name).

Voice cast[]

External links[]

DuckTales episodes
Season 1 "The Treasure of the Golden Suns" • "Send in the Clones" • "Sphinx for the Memories" • "Where No Duck Has Gone Before" • "Armstrong" • "Robot Robbers" • "Magica's Shadow War" • "Master of the Djinni" • "Hotel Strangeduck" • "Lost Crown of Genghis Khan" • "Duckman of Aquatraz" • "The Money Vanishes" • "Sir Gyro de Gearloose" • "Dinosaur Ducks" • "Hero for Hire" • "Superdoo!" • "Maid of the Myth" • "Down and Out in Duckburg" • "Much Ado About Scrooge" • "Top Duck" • "Pearl of Wisdom" • "The Curse of Castle McDuck" • "Launchpad's Civil War" • "Sweet Duck of Youth" • "Earth Quack" • "Home Sweet Homer" • "Bermuda Triangle Tangle" • "Micro Ducks from Outer Space" • "Back to the Klondike" • "Horse Scents" • "Scrooge's Pet" • "Catch as Cash Can" • "Merit-Time Adventure" • "The Golden Fleecing" • "Ducks of the West" • "Time Teasers" • "Back Out in the Outback" • "Raiders of the Lost Harp" • "The Right Duck" • "Scroogerello" • "Double-O-Duck" • "Luck o' the Ducks" • "Duckworth's Revolt" • "Magica's Magic Mirror" / "Take Me Out of the Ballgame" • "Duck to the Future" • "Jungle Duck" • "Launchpad's First Crash" • "Dime Enough for Luck" • "Duck in the Iron Mask" • "The Uncrashable Hindentanic" • "The Status Seekers" • "Nothing to Fear" • "Dr. Jekyll & Mr. McDuck" • "Once Upon a Dime" • "Spies in Their Eyes" • "All Ducks on Deck" • "Ducky Horror Picture Show" • "Till Nephews Do Us Part"
Season 2 "Time is Money" • "Super DuckTales"
Season 3 "The Land of Trala La" • "Allowance Day" • "Bubbeo & Juliet" • "The Good Muddahs" • "My Mother the Psychic" • "Metal Attraction" • "Dough Ray Me" • "Bubba's Big Brainstorm" • "The Big Flub" • "A Case of Mistaken Secret Identity" • "Blue Collar Scrooge" • "Beaglemania" • "Yuppy Ducks" • "The Bride Wore Stripes" • "The Unbreakable Bin" • "Attack of the Fifty-Foot Webby" • "The Masked Mallard" • "A DuckTales Valentine"
Season 4 "Ducky Mountain High" • "Attack of the Metal Mites" • "The Duck Who Knew Too Much" • "New Gizmo-Kids on the Block" • "Scrooge's Last Adventure" • "The Golden Goose"
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