How powerful is Magica?

[Orora]

In her first story, Magica was shown as barely having magical powers herself, using special items to create effects, such as her smoke bombs. Heck, she returned to Italy by plane.
Now, she is commonly shown flying on a broom.

In fact, Magica's powers seem to fluctuate a lot in stories, whether they are Italian, Danish, Spanish, American...

Sometimes, it makes you wonder why she doesn't just teleport the Number One Dime in her own house. Or have her teleport herself in and out the Dime's room in a flash, like Goku did with Master Roshi's sunglasses.

I remember reading a story where Donald accidentally gets a hold of Magica's magic wand that is revealed to do anything, including mind-controlling people.
Donald asks a hypnotized Magica about its powers: "You can make it do anything! The only thing that would break the spell is a splash of cold water!"
So Donald turns Magica into an eagle, tells her to fly to the Gobi desert, mind-controls Uncle Scrooge, Huey, Dewey and Louie and basically makes them his servants!

Of course, the spell eventually breaks and they are NOT happy (it's actually quite a good scene, as they are shown dealing with Donald without a single word).

Of course, it makes you wonder: if Magica's wand can do anything, why is she still struggling... well, you know.

(by the way, if you can help me identify this story, thank you very much)

[Scrooge MacDuck]

Don Rosa's take is that Magica is only as powerful as whatever wand she more-or-less-fraudulously manages to get a hold of. When she gets such a powerful wand as Circe's (as per Barks), which was presumably the case during that story you describe, she spells trouble, but she invariably loses all such wands shortly, and it's "back to the old drawing board", as Marvin the Martian would put it.

[Hector]

There are stories where Magica really seems omnipotent. Why she doesn't transport the dime?
My explanations are...
-The lucky dime has an anti magic barrier, either made by Gyro or because the good luck it
brings to Scrooge naturally blocks Magica's spells.
-Magica is too stupid and psychotic to think of it.
-Deep inside, Magica views this as a challenge and does not want to do it the easy way.
Or maybe this has turned into the meaning of her life, so she actually wants to never
succeed.

[Minotaur]

Aug 2, 2017 23:10:21 GMT Hector said:

-The lucky dime has an anti magic barrier, either made by Gyro or because the good luck it
brings to Scrooge naturally blocks Magica's spells.
-Magica is too stupid and psychotic to think of it.
-Deep inside, Magica views this as a challenge and does not want to do it the easy way.
Or maybe this has turned into the meaning of her life, so she actually wants to never
succeed.

Personally, I really can't take the idea of No.1 dime being a lucky dime seriously. That does not sound logical: if it truly is a lucky dime, how could it bring him so much trouble? Scrooge has suffered a lot in his fights with Magica.

Allowing Magica to be too powerful only creates problem for the script writer him/herself. Because we know she has to fail at the very end of the story, the creator must provide a reason for her failure. Sometimes the twist is so forced that doesn't even make sense.

[RobbK1]

I never liked the idea of "magic", anyway, because I am a scientist, and like to know The world as it really is. THAT'S why I like Barks. His scenarios are almost always realistic, or based on enough core of realism to be, at least, plausible when not thought about too deeply. I didn't like magic in "The Magic Hourglass". And I didn't like magic used by Magica from Circe's wand. I don't like pure fantasy in any form. I didn't like any of The Star Wars films, nor any so-called "science fiction", if it lacks real science, and is really, totally made up of fantasy elements. I like Magica better as a not-so-competent magician, who uses tricks, deception and physical "foof bombs", but has no real "magical powers, and only can succeed in doing what she does through slight-of-hand, and taking things when people are stunned, not looking, or watching a diversion.

I also don't like Scrooge's "lucky dime" being the real cause for his success, but rather, only a sentimental symbol to him.  That's also the way Barks explained what he had intended.

[Scrooge MacDuck]

Aug 4, 2017 11:11:34 GMT RobbK1 said:

I also don't like Scrooge's "lucky dime" being the real cause for his success, but rather, only a sentimental symbol to him.  That's also the way Barks explained what he had intended.

Hm. I'm something of a middle-grounder, myself; in my headcanon, the Dime gained magic powers because it is the first coin he ever earned, which is also why it is useful to Magica; it encourages his present-day success but had nothing to do with how he got rich in the first place.