*Season 2 spoilers.*
Though not as much of a departure as “Whatever Happened to Della Duck?!”, this is another episode that spends most of its time away from the main cast. This time around, we do check in periodically on McDuck Manor, but the brunt of the action is on the moon with Della.
At the end of her first featured episode, Della discovered a civilization on the moon, and she’s been living with the moon folk while she attempts to finally repair her rocket and get home. While their leader is warm and welcoming to her, one of their warriors is deeply suspicious of the earthling. Meanwhile, back in Duckburg, Donald’s attempts to avoid stress are continually thwarted by, well, everyone in his family.
“Whatever Happened to Della Duck?!” was a nice feat for a family show to pull her, spending nearly an entire episode on just one character. But Della has friends on the moon now, along with at least one enemy (though that’s not how she sees it.) After appreciating Della’s upbeat, intrepid spirit in her first episode, I can see how the moon warrior Penumbra would find her attitude blithely annoying. She’s irritatingly cheerful with Penumbra, acting as though they’re the best of pals when Penumbra is openly seething at her. When the leader, Lunaris, points out that Penumbra is “a warrior with no war to fight,” Della simply enthuses, “Look who’s got an extended vacay, huh?”
I should mention the guest stars voicing these moon characters. Lunaris is played by Lance Reddick, who I saw first as Matthew Abbadon on Lost but who I know best as Lt. Daniels on The Wire. Meanwhile, Julie Bowen, of Modern Family fame, plays Penumbra.
Like I said, the main cast only makes brief appearances here, little snapshots of various adventures that Donald keeps getting unwillingly dragged into. We have a cursed VHS tape, a netherworld goat that opens a portal in Scrooge’s closet, and one of the triplets proudly announcing, “Guess who’s a god now?” Through it all, Donald is both exhausted and exasperated, flung from one dangerous situation to another by his relatives.
Each adventure is its own vignette, one or two scenes with one or two characters each coming to interrupt Donald’s attempts to relax. As such, Scrooge only pops up very briefly, during the nethergoat portion of the story. So, while David Tennant does his usual good job, there’s not much to say about it.
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