Monty/Mortimer

[bats]

Registered to ask about this issue that's been bugging me for some time.

The character Mortimer Mouse was originally created for the 1936 Mickey short Mickey's Rival, and made his first actual appearance in Gottfredson's Sunday trips half a year earlier. Aside from a couple tie-in illustrations to this short and this Sunday sequence and some early appearances in the British Mickey Mouse Weekly, he then disappeared until he was revived in the 70s for a bunch of Disney Studios S stories, and then a bit later got picked up by Brazil and made some appearances there as well throughout the 70s and 80s, plus some more recent ones in France and the Netherlands.

Another character, Montmorency "Monty" Rodent, was created by Gottfredson for his Mickey dailies in 1946, and was never really seen again after this until Egmont's "reboot" of their Mickey universe in the mid 90s, where Monty was one of the several Gottfredson characters they revived and made part of Mickey's new cast of recurring characters. He went on to make a fair shareof appearances in Egmont-produced stories, though apparently hasn't been used since 2012. (shame. He's fun)

What confuses me, though, is that American releases of these Egmont stories rename Monty "Mortimer", which has apparently led Inducks to lump them both together... what's up with that? The characters have SOME similarities, but they have fairly different personalities and vastly different personal fortunes. I'm not sure how they've handled the original Gottfredson story in American reprints, do they keep Monty's name, or do they rename him Mortimer there too? There's also an unrelesed-in-America Egmont story centered around Madeline from Gottfredson's story that contains flashbacks to it where Monty appears, making me wonder how they'd handle THAT in an eventual American publication. But yeah, what's up with this? Any idea why this happened and what any official stances on this is? 

The shared inducks pages for Mortimer/Monty also lists a number of recent Italian stories (2012+) featuring a fairly different-looking character with a mustache - I've never read any of these stories, how is this character treated? Does he share his Italian name with Mortimer, Monty or both? What is his personality like, how rich is he? How do translations handle him?

[LP]

I never knew that Montmorency and Mortimer were in fact different characters! I've seen the Mickey's Rival-character identified as both and never understood why!

I'm not keen on the idea of several characters filling the same role (I'm the kind of guy who likes to think of the War Chief and the Master from Doctor Who as the same character). I wish they wouldn't have kept creating new characters who pursue Minnie every time a story calls for it. There's Mr. Slicker, Montmorency and Mortimer, and all of them are basically the same character. Two of them are just redundant. And I never liked that Mickey's rival is named Mortimer, as there's already a Mortimer Mouse in the Mouse-universe!

[bats]

Sept 3, 2020 11:47:19 GMT LP said:

I'm not keen on the idea of several characters filling the same role

While I agree with that (I'll never understand why Egmont created Doc Static when they already had a genius inventor in Dr. Einmug, a Gottfredson character that was fairly well known to the reader), I really don't think these two fill the same role.

 
Both may be Mickey's rivals for Minnie, but Mortimer was a mean-spirited practical joker while Monty was a snobby upper-class guy, and they mocked Mickey in very different ways. 

The modern Monty may have been slightly retconned in that he's ACTUALLY rich instead of just pretending (maybe he won the lottery off panel) but is otherwise consistent enough with Gottredson's I'm-better-than-you-because-I'm-rich-and-sophisticated Monty rather than any of the comic appearances of Mortimer.

[Ramapith]

Sept 3, 2020 13:08:34 GMT bats said:

Both may be Mickey's rivals for Minnie, but Mortimer was a mean-spirited practical joker while Monty was a snobby upper-class guy, and they mocked Mickey in very different ways. 

The modern Monty may have been slightly retconned in that he's ACTUALLY rich instead of just pretending (maybe he won the lottery off panel) but is otherwise consistent enough with Gottredson's I'm-better-than-you-because-I'm-rich-and-sophisticated Monty rather than any of the comic appearances of Mortimer.

Things are actually a little more complicated than this.

Mortimer's upper-class status is actually a factor in the 1936 cartoon—notice his fancy car and elegant mannerisms—and in a bunch of the TV cartoons: he often mentions being richer than Mickey and shows off fancy items he can afford.

And Montmorency is a mean-spirited practical joker too; for instance with his messy magic tricks.

The overlap comes because we have Gottfredson's own "Word of God" (expressed by him to Byron Erickson, Tom Andrae and others) that Montmorency was intended as the same character as Mortimer—it's just that years after 1936, Gottfredson felt the need to reintroduce him under a new name, due to perceived conflict with Mickey's nephew Morty. As another clue to their being the same character, note that Gottfredson gave Montmorency the same fancy car Mortimer had in the cartoon.

True: he was called Mortimer again (and drawn in a more 1936 style) in the 1970s S-coded stories, but I can't help that... different decision makers.

Anyhow, when we began to use him at Egmont—in 1994—Byron said something like this to me: "Let's call him Montmorency as Gottfredson later called him, and draw him in a 1941 style, because 'Love Trouble' is commonly reprinted in Egmont's market, while the cartoon and the 1970s S-code stories are seldom seen here by comparison. Our calling him Montmorency internally at Egmont ensures that our translators will connect him to the version our readers have most recently seen." 

That made absolute sense—in 1994.

And yet: when I was bringing those same Egmont stories to the US ten years later, at Gemstone, Disney asked us to call him Mortimer, and that made sense too—in 2004. As he was Mortimer in the then-new TV cartoons, and the TV crew also concatenated the two Gottfredson incarnations: Mortimer in his "House of Mouse" overcoat was based in part on the 1941 Montmorency design.

To be fair, it's not the only example of slightly messy continuity in Gottfredson—consider Captain Doberman first working for the airmail service, and later the Air Force, with no explanation for the switch—or Friday first being a local Mouseton actor playing an island native, and then later being an actual island native.

[bats]

Huh, that's interesting, thanks. I'll admit to not being particularly familiar with his more modern cartoon appearances, the only one I've seen is that Christmas one where he plays a fairly minimal role.

Any idea why it was decided to make him ACTUALLY rich in the Egmont stories, though? Love Trouble ends with him being exposed as a chaffeur borrowing his employer's stuff, but this clearly isn't the case in Egmont's stories. Was it just because his role in the Gottfredson story was so heavily centered around him showing off how rich and upper class he was? And is there a reason he hasn't been used by Egmont for nearly 10 years now, or is it just because nobody's happened to write a story about him for a while?

[Ramapith]

We decided that since Gottfredson himself had played a little fast and loose with continuity, so could we. Mortimer/Monty being permanently rich is a nice in-universe explanation of how he can have his fancy car—not to mention giving him a means of outdoing Mickey with class, style, and education as well as just with traditional rival-style bragging and pranking.

After all, Gladstone can brag and prank, too—and he does. But he has his luck as an extra "power" for outdoing Donald as well. In the same way, Mortimer/Monty can have class and style as his own extra "power" for outdoing Mickey. It makes sense from a storytelling perspective, as well as providing an instant means of making Mickey's "rival" stories different from Donald's.

One could argue that the modern Mortimer isn't entirely consistent with both past versions, but Barks himself was capable of making a character as major as Daisy inconsistent: sometimes she views Gladstone quite romantically, and other times she acts repulsed by him from the start.

As for Mortimer's more modern cartoon appearances, try these:

• Mickey's Rival Returns

• Mickey and the Goat Man

• Mickey's Mixup

• A Pete Scorned

While these aren't necessarily what I'd do with the character in animation, they certainly show plenty of potential (and I can't not like them!). Mickey's Rival Returns, in particular, starts right off the bat with a nice little demo of the richer, better-off Mortimer always having a larger, higher-tech version of whatever Mickey has.

And as for why Egmont hasn't used Mortimer much lately—I suspect it's as you say: nobody's happened to write a story about him for a while. (On the other hand, as has been noted, he's more prominent in Italian production lately.)

[bats]

Very interesting, thanks.

That makes me curious though, how was that inconsistency handled in this story, which directly references Love Trouble? I've never read it, so I don't know how big a role Monty and the events of Love Trouble play in the plot.

[That Duckfan]

There's another character that strongly reminds me of Mortimer/Montmorency: Dick Doublejoke, a character from a number of Casty-written stories in the 2000s. His posture, fondness for practical jokes, and attempts to one-up Mickey are clearly based on Mortimer, but he lacks the distinctive mouse ears Gottfredson and the animators gave him.

[Scroogerello]

I think it’s a case of the same basic design (tall, villanous rat) being used for several different characters, just like the Pig Villain from Barks’ stories. I believe Mortimer was also called Mr. Slicker in one of his earliest comic strip appearances, and also something like Rough-house Rodent in another (the one where he boxes against Mickey).

(Off-topic: What a great voice they found for Mortimer in those 1990s-2000s cartoons ramapith linked to! That would be a good voice for Gladstone Gander, too, should he ever appear in animation again.).

[Ramapith]

Sept 6, 2020 16:03:01 GMT That Duckfan said:

There's another character that strongly reminds me of Mortimer/Montmorency: Dick Doublejoke, a character from a number of Casty-written stories in the 2000s. His posture, fondness for practical jokes, and attempts to one-up Mickey are clearly based on Mortimer, but he lacks the distinctive mouse ears Gottfredson and the animators gave him.

Actually, Doublejoke's first name in English is Charlie, not Dick.

But while Doublejoke, with his pranks and prankish mood, reminds me a little of Mortimer—while Mortimer is "just" a jerk, Doublejoke is a lawbreaking crook; ultimately, a character who has directly threatened Mickey's life. For me that's a major difference.

Sept 4, 2020 6:09:32 GMT bats said:

That makes me curious though, how was that inconsistency handled in this story, which directly references Love Trouble? I've never read it, so I don't know how big a role Monty and the events of Love Trouble play in the plot.

Mickey simply refers to Madeline having helped him embarrass Montmorency in the past, with a flashback image of an embarrassed Monty running away. The story doesn't mention any details.

[Scrooge MacDuck]

Could it be Monty/Mortimer was named his heir by his wealthy boss, thus coming to own everything he'd been mooching off of?

[TheMidgetMoose]

Sept 6, 2020 19:27:39 GMT Scrooge MacDuck said:

Could it be Monty/Mortimer was named his heir by his wealthy boss, thus coming to own everything he'd been mooching off of?

While we're on the subject, I'll mention a thought that has crossed my mind before but one that probably doesn't hold up. I once considered that Mickey's rival Mortimer is actually Mortimer Mouse, Jr., the son of Minnie's uncle, Mortimer Mouse. In Mickey Mouse in Death Valley, Horace, or "Horse Collar" as Mickey calls him, says that, "I understand Old Mortimer's son got away with most of it before Old Sylvester Shyster got a hand in it!!!" "Old Mortimer" here is Minnie's uncle. I figured that Uncle Mortimer must have a son, and the son must have some wealth in order for Horace to speculate that he got most of it from his father. I thus guessed that rival Mortimer, based on the implication of him leading a wealthier lifestyle than Mickey in the Mickey's Rival cartoon, is Uncle Mortimer's wealthy son.

However, this idea did not take Montmorency Rodent into account at all, and I believe that his backstory of being not-actually-wealthy debunks the whole hypothesis. Oh well. Figured I'd bring the not well-thought theory now that we have a thread discussing the differences and similarities between Mortimer and Monty and whether or not they are the same character in-universe.

[Scrooge MacDuck]

Sept 7, 2020 21:09:18 GMT TheMidgetMoose said:

While we're on the subject, I'll mention a thought that has crossed my mind before but one that probably doesn't hold up. I once considered that Mickey's rival Mortimer is actually Mortimer Mouse, Jr., the son of Minnie's uncle, Mortimer Mouse. In Mickey Mouse in Death Valley, Horace, or "Horse Collar" as Mickey calls him, says that, "I understand Old Mortimer's son got away with most of it before Old Sylvester Shyster got a hand in it!!!" "Old Mortimer" here is Minnie's uncle. I figured that Uncle Mortimer must have a son, and the son must have some wealth in order for Horace to speculate that he got most of it from his father. I thus guessed that rival Mortimer, based on the implication of him leading a wealthier lifestyle than Mickey in the Mickey's Rival cartoon, is Uncle Mortimer's wealthy son.

While a fun thought, I feel like the other, non-continuity-based issue with that theory is that it would make Mortimer and Minnie first cousins. Now, I happen not to find it too squicky when stories posit that Donald and Daisy are cousins, but all the same, we might want to keep that sort of thing to a minimum. Of course, alternatively, you might argue that there is value in hindering "Mickey/Minnie/Mortimer love triangle” stories because they don't do anything that "Donald/Daisy/Gladstone love triangle" stories wouldn't do better. But still.

[Dr Ivo G Bombastus]

I like to interpret the character as someome who reinvents himself multiple times in order to seduce Minnie. Minnie was middle class in Mortimer's first comic appearance, but she became rich after the Jungle Treasure story (and managed to stay so even after Mickey lost his own fortune in the stock market crash, as she discusses with him in The Plumber's Helper), so he concocted the Monty persona in order to mask the fact that he was no longer her social equal.

Later after he was able to become wealthy for real he simply abandoned the Montmorency identity and approached Minnie under his real name, who never suspected he was the two were the same person.

[Spectrus]

Sept 6, 2020 16:03:01 GMT That Duckfan said:

There's another character that strongly reminds me of Mortimer/Montmorency: Dick Doublejoke, a character from a number of Casty-written stories in the 2000s. His posture, fondness for practical jokes, and attempts to one-up Mickey are clearly based on Mortimer, but he lacks the distinctive mouse ears Gottfredson and the animators gave him.

It doesn't help that when Casty revived Monty in his stories, he drew him quite similarly to his own invention Charlie Doublejoke...