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TaleSpin Books: The Seeds Of Victory Rant

Reviewed: 03/17/2015
Additional Commentary: 10/07/2025

Welcome To The Wacky World Of TaleSpin Books, Part Two!

Original Release: ??1990-1991??

TaleSpin Cast

Main Characters

Baloo Von Bruinwald XIII: Edmund Gilbert
Kit Cloudkicker: R.J. Williams
Don Karnage: Jim Cummings
Dumptruck: Chuck McCann
Louie L'Amour: Jim Cummings
Rebecca Cunningham: Sally Struthers

Guest Characters

Narrator: William Woodson
Pilot #1: Tony Pope
Pilot #2: Corey Burton
Wacka-Wacka Natives: ??Corey Burton, ??Tony Pope.
Islander Chief: Tony Pope

TaleSpin Crew

Producer: Randy Thorton
Writer: Jymn Magon
Editorial: Ted Kryczko
Audio Engineer Company: AudioVisions
Audio Engineerer: Jeff Sheridan
Artwork: Playhouse Pictures
Art Director: Paul Wenzel

(C) The Walt Disney Company. Printed In The USA.

Special thanks to Brendala for the pictures and video.

All right; it's time for the second and final audio books from Disney and as I mentioned earlier...This one is more problematic than the "Drumming Up Business" audiobook in that savage natives are involved. (2025 Gregory Weagle Says: I have said this before in the additional commentary of previous rants that when it comes to other cultures, they are horrible at it compared to their treatment of women.) The story in this one is that Don Karnage is spying on Baloo to steal his cargo while dressing in drag, or something. (Ah, so I did find one instance where Don Karnage cross-dressed in the series. I mention this because the writers of Ducktales 2017 wanted Don Karnage to cross dress, but was overruled by BS&P since he was a heel and was decieving people. Men crossdressing because they love to is fine. Women doing the same is acceptable. Crossing to decieve people is not acceptable unless it's a babyface who is getting back at the heel for being a bigot in the case of Feminine Air, and Mary Lamb and Rebecca Cunningham were in on it anyway despite Baloo thinking that they weren't.) Which leads to Baloo delivering fertilizer to some native village that almost got engulfed by lava from a volcano. Normally; Jymn Magon is MONEY, MONEY, YEAH, YEAH when it comes to clearly revealing plots; but this one is confusing to me. (The reason was confusing to you former self because you bought into the false notion that this was a slight against nature. Thankfully, you decided to do some digging and smarten up to the fools.) I would like to thank Brendala for posting this on her Tumblr page and the web link is posted right above the first paragraph. How does this audio book measure up? Let's rant on shall we...?!

The Seeds Of Victory is written by Jymn Magon with editorial done by Ted Kryczko. Playhouse Pictures again provides the always very good, but not quite on model artwork for this audio book. Now; if you notice the cast & crew on the very top of this rant, there are no new voices for the tributes, but the late Tony Pope does two guest characters for this audio book; as well as another appearance for Corey Burton.

Opening Moment #1: The front of the book shows the logos, the name of the title as Baloo is dancing with drumsticks and Kit is dancing holding the bongo drum which does play into the story as you will see. They used a red/purple like candy cane stripe border and the characters are encased in banana yellow. The artwork (provided by Playhouse Pictures) is actually really good outside of some off-model quirks (feet for instance; but even the television animator make that same mistake too; so there you go). There is also a message on the bottom of the cover that reads: Includes the "TaleSpin Theme!" Why it is in scare quotes is a question that I don't have an answer for. The inside cover contains the credits on the bottom and I notice that there are two new voice talents to add to the tributes; albeit, it will require a brand new tribute since they don't cover television. One of them is the narrator who is voiced by William Woodson and according to Wikipedia (DANGER! DANGER!): Before becoming a professional actor, he acted in stock theatre for nearly a decade with his first appearance in a 1928 play. In 1943, Bill Woodson made his stage debut as Lowell Denton in Harriet, starring Helen Hayes. He showed versatility as a performer, proving himself equally capable in classical roles such as that of Montano in Shubert Theatre's adaptation of William Shakespeare's Othello with Paul Robeson in the lead role. From 1946-47, the actor played, what is probably his best-known stage role, Le Bret opposite Jose Ferrer as the title character in Cyrano de Bergerac. He also appeared as Tom Mackenzie in The Seven Year Itch, Stephen Douglas in The Rivalry and T. Stedman Harder in A Moon for the Misbegotten. In 1947, he was among the first actors to be accepted to the first class of the newly formed Actors Studio. Woodson served as the narrator for the crime drama series This is Your FBI from 1948-53 on ABC radio. He also voiced multiple characters on episodes of several other radio programs such as Suspense, Inheritance and Family Theater. He had a small live-action appearance in the 1950s sci-fi film The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms as a newscaster.

Another on-screen role was as Sergeant Ed Blankey on the drama television series This Man Dawson. He can be heard in the opening narrative of the 1970s television series The Odd Couple, explaining how it is that Felix and Oscar end up rooming together. He did the narration for the pilot of "The Life and Times of Grizzly Adams". He also did some of the voice-over work on the 1960s series The Invaders. He was a featured (but uncredited) voice-over announcer for WKRP In Cincinnati. It was his voice, inviting the audience to stay tuned for the epilogue for each episode. He also did various voice roles in several episodes, including the pre-recorded announcer of the intro to Les Nessman's newscasts. In 1983, the actor served as the narrator for the miniseries adaptation of Herman Wouk's novel, The Winds of War, and its sequel miniseries, War and Remembrance. In this capacity, he would explain to the television audience the large-scale historical events that provide the context for the storylines of the two miniseries. William Woodson's legacy will be his long association with the Super Friends series, where he served as narrator and sometimes voiced additional characters. He took over the role from Ted Knight. It wasn't the first time Woodson replaced Knight. In 1971, he had a bit part in Series 2, Episode 9 of The Mary Tyler Moore Show as "Big Voice Man", who auditions to be Ted's character's replacement while he takes his first vacation in 4 years. Woodson narrated each subsequent Super Friends episode, narrating over 100 episodes, including the 7-minute short subject episodes produced from 1980 to 1983. Perhaps his most memorable line from the series was the often-used phrase that accompanied a transition to scenes at the Super Friends' headquarters: "Later, at the Hall of Justice..." In a 2011 interview, he explained the reason for his pronunciation of Super Friends as "See-Yoo-per Friends" was that in high school people were criticizing his speech, so he decided to make it sound more sophisticated by channeling Ronald Colman and, among other things, stopped saying "Super" and started saying "See-Yoo-per".

In addition, he also supplied the opening narration and voice for several characters on Battle of the Planets, as well as playing the sinister tanner in Walt Disney's The Small One. In 1981, he did the voice of J. Jonah Jameson in Spider-Man and that same year, he reprised the character on Spider-Man and his Amazing Friends, where he also played Namor the Submariner in the episode "7 Little Superheroes". Woodson later guest-starred on Garfield and Friends, The Jetsons, Tiny Toon Adventures and Duckman and other shows. In 1966, he played the Secretary of War in 3 episodes of F-Troop. He played the reporter in Stan Freberg's parody advertisement of Jacobsen Mowers, which were in actuality sheep grazing. In the satirical ad, he announced: "Jacobsen Mowers. Faster...than sheep!". Bill Woodson is also the narrator of NFL Films' official films of Super Bowl II and he also narrated the 1967 NFL Championship Game, better known as the "Ice Bowl". The longtime voice of NFL Films, John Facenda, had been unavailable. From 2004-2010, Woodson, a California resident, lent his austere deep voice to a series of humorous commercials promoting the Minnesota Twins. The ads had titles such as "The Minnesota Twins - Get to Know 'Em", "Every Fan Counts", and "This is Twins Territory". His voice can also be heard narrating in many Disney read-alongs.He began his career in television as a narrator for Lights Out in 1946 in a cameo role. While he never did a voice on television in any DTVA shows; I'll assume that if there is an audiobook based on The Wuzzles, I mark it as it's DTVA debut. Otherwise; I'll refrain from officially saying that TaleSpin in audio book form was his DTVA debut. His most recent credit is Family Guy as the Super Friends narrator in 2009. He has 98 Acting Credits, 1 Self Credit and 2 Archive Footage credits. Bill is still alive at this point; and might be the only person older than Alan Young. (Nope, Bill died in 2017 at the age of 99.) I also notice that Corey Burton voices at least two characters in this audiobook! Baloo has the drumsticks and he's uncolored againest a white/green background. The inside cover gives us the following information and I quote:

Narrator: This is the story of SEEDS OF VICTORY! You can read along with me in your book. You will know it is time to turn the page when you hear the chimes ring like this...{chime ringing}... Let's begin now...

We begin at Louie's with crowd noises and non-Christopher L. Stone music playing in the background. The narrator tells us that Louie's was a ramshackle, tumble-down restaurant with flimsy walls and hefty prices. Yes folks; Louie's is not a bar, it's a restaurant in the audio books because only small children under the age of eight read these books. Which makes no sense because Al Khan says that kids don't read and therefore they would shun this audio book outright, am I right? (Ummm, yeah and Al Khan is dumb, you see. Besides, he likes censoring anime and this is a pre-school children's book, so he don't care anyway.) Still; the cargo pilots love it and Baloo most of all as Baloo wants a Krackatoa Special. (Krackatoa is a play on breaking your toe by the way.); Kit wants to share with two spoons as his tongue is hanging out of his mouth. (Wow, Kit got a blood thirst for ice cream. Hey, I have seen worse than this.) Louie slid the mountain of ice cream to Baloo; which is basically a lot of black cherry ice cream (without the cherries) in a coconut bowl topped with a sparkler. Louie gives Baloo and Kit two spoons that look like ice cream scoops. Well; Baloo's is one anyway. Louie proclaims that this is a sundae fit for a king. Wrong! The one Molly ate in Plunder and Lightning Part Two was much, much better than this. (No lies detected even if that would make Rebecca cringe since Louie used his feet to kiss Molly's hand if I recall correctly.) Baloo is so cocky about how he is the king of the cargo pilots that he unintentionally flings a scoop of ice cream backwards and it spirals sideways landing on top of a wolf's blond hair wig which looks like something from Penny Gadget.. Oh wait; it's Don Karnage dressed in drag along with Mad Dog and Dumptruck as Dumptruck is dressed like an old lady, Mad Dog is dressed like Raggedy Ann and Don Karnage is dressed like Sally if she was wearing a pink dress. Just to show you that Baloo doesn't have a monopoly while dressing in drag. (Sigh. Baloo loves to cross dress because he's a real drag queen and doesn't intend to use deception.)

Don Karnage dressing in a pink dress is many buys by the way. (And a lot of angry letters from the progessives out there.) Baloo apologizes for the ice cream flinging as Don Karnage blows him off and threatens violence causing Mad Dog and Dumptruck to restrain Don Karnage from lunging towards Baloo according to the narrator. Logic break: The narrator claims that the ice cream landed on the dress when it is clearly shown in the artwork that it landed on the blond wig. DUMB! (That line should have been redubbed. Wonder if Disney forgot to coordinate the art with the voice on that one?) Chuck McCann seems to be channeling R.J. Williams at this point in acting; which is great, thank you very much. Yes; shattering glass noises ensued during this scene. We do a closeup at the table with the pirates playing dress up as they collect themselves and the ice cream scoop on top of the blond wig of Don Karnage vanishes and is never seen again. (Sorry, but since it's not a pre-school show despite written like one here, the SUZY SHEEP~ joke is not in evidence.) Dumptruck tells him to take it easy because taking it hard is going to blow their cover. Sadly; Dumptruck has lost his Swedish accent in the audio book. Don claims that he's calm and wants Dumptruck and Mad Dog to spy on Baloo on cargo to steal while he adjusts his stocking. Baloo turns around and wonders about that lady; when suddenly an angry brown bear wearing a bomber jacket, Mickey Mouse gloves and a green version of Baloo's pilot hat appears out of nowhere. He looks like angry Pop-A-Bear now that I think about. He is carrying a painting which looks like Mickey Mouse that had it's face vandalized and the artist thought he was doing good post-modern art. Oooookkkkaaayyyyy. (Wonder when the "We cannot use Mickey Mouse because he's a corporate shill" and thus must be protected at all times from artists actually started?! More to the point, why?! I'll leave this as an excerise to the reader.)

Of course this pilot interrupts Kit Cloudkicker (Kit: Yawn! I'm over this dumb burial of me now Mr. Weagle.) and this pilot is voiced by the late Tony Pope. Audiobooks is a specialty of Tony as he voiced various character for the Teddy Ruxpin dolls. AWESOME! No, not really. (The Adventures Of Teddy Ruxpin wasn't too terrible or anything, it's just that the episodic culture of animation caused it to be a mess a lot of times.) The pilot slaps Baloo in the back and then calls Baloo out on his title of "king of the cargo pilots" which is like calling out the entire US Forces. Nothing good can come out of this. (Nowadays, it would be considered a benevolent king and everyone would take that over the second coming of King George III! Donald Trump, everyone.) Apparently there is a gallery in Jakshamasch. Again; this show just like to flaunt it's own world doesn't it? Apparently; flying expensive paintings to a gallery makes you "King of The Cargo Pilots". To quote Rebecca from The Idol Rich: "Now who's full of fertilizer?!" (Not really Rebecca, thanks to you wanting to run a tight ship, you basically forced Baloo into that title.) Anyhow; off-screen, Dumptruck nearly fell out of his seat and then whispers to Don about this valuable art. Kit of course goes back to finishing his ice cream which we never actually see because the artwork has him listening to the radio. (Another logic break. Rushed television series equals rushed merch.) Then a wolf furry with a beard wearing an orange bomber jacket shows off a jeweled encursted bronze mask -- which looks like something you wear during a stage show -- to Baloo explaining that he is going to Nose-and-Beak to deliver it to a prince, claiming they will treat him like a king. The dress up Air Pirates are oooing and awwing this because it's better than the painting. Don Karnage bites his knuckles. No, not really, but close enough. Baloo shakes his fist, which we also don't see, claims that he flies expensive stuff too.

The pilot (Corey Burton) blows him off because Baloo delivers sewer covers and chicken feed in the last seven days. This makes Baloo feel like he got punched in the family jewels, so to speak. (I removed the term "butt hurt" because Baloo was not sexually assaulted. He simply saw that as a low blow, so a punch to the family jewels makes more sense as an analogy.) Then the radio fizzles and we discover that on the radio is Rebecca Cunningham. Rebecca has solved the puzzle of making Baloo do his job correctly as she tells Baloo to return to Higher..For...Hire because she has an important job for him to do. Of course! Baloo asks if it's chicken feed again and Rebecca assures him that it is not. By the way; the sound engineer deserves props for having the radio noises and Rebecca's voice sound like a reasonable version of a real radio. Anime dubbers would never notice that nuance, because they are dumb. (Or their publishers are cheap and money hoarding dragons. Either way, bad!) Also of note: Even though this audio book is for very small children; you can still say heaven at this point; even as profanity. (Dumb question: Why can "Hell" be a location, but not "heaven" in the real world?!) Anyway; she assures Baloo that this is cargo is so top secret that an entire island is waiting for it. Baloo should get his tail section back here on the double, proving that "Your tail section is mine" is in fact a time cut in Plunder and Lightning. Baloo feels great as he and Kit walk out; because this means that he's the king of the cargo pilots with such a cargo. (If only he knew....) They head out the door; and the dressed up pirates also head out to their CT-37's; with only Don Karnage being shown. Dumptruck throws his wig away and claims to Mad Dog (who doesn't speak in this audio book) that he's glad his mother didn't see this. Don wants to turn in his high heels for high flying to get top secret cargo worth as much as his greedy self. He is going to regret that comment big time.

We head to the docks of Higher...For...Hire as Baloo, Kit and Wildcat are loading up the TOP SECRET VANILLA BOX OF DEATH into the Seaduck while Rebecca Cunningham is writing on her clipboard as she explains to us that the cargo is going to the people of Wacka-Wacka. Baloo asks what the cargo is and throwing out jewels, gold and baseball cards. (I wanted to do some digging on baseball card prices in TaleSpin's time period and I got nothing of note. Mostly what the 1937 cards would be worth in 2025.) Rebecca refuses to spill the beans because it's top secret. I wonder how many times Sally said Wacka-Wacka and wondered if Jymn Magon was playing a cruel rib on her. (Ummmm, maybe once since Sally Struthers is a very talented actress.) Sadly; Wildcat never speaks in his appearance. (Well, Pat Fraley wasn't available it seems, and WildCat Puma did his job without saying a word. If only Baloo actually had the same forethought more often.) We head into the skies as Baloo is in the lazy "let my feet drive the SeaDuck" spot; only with one foot this time. Kit actually gets to back up Baloo in flying as navigator this time, which you almost never see in the television series. (We cannot have kids backing up adults in flying, that's problematic. Except that one time in Captains Outrageous...) Baloo is pondering what is inside the package and proclaims that Rebecca might have given him the cred he needs to be the king of the cargo pilots. (Surrreee, Pop-A-Bear, sure.) Baloo also states that the people of Wacka-Wacka will throw him a King Of The Cargo Pilots Party or something like that. Kit tells him not to get cocky because the cargo is for the islanders, not Higher...For...Hire. Wacka-Wacka is really TaleSpin's answer to Long Island, New York. Woo-woo! (No they are not former self, now you are being cocky.) Baloo assures Kit that he knows that and here comes the bullets! (I wonder what the point will come when Kit Cloudkicker becomes a gun control advocate due to all the times he had to deal with these NRA-fetish weapons?)

Yes folks; a audio book for children less than eight years old still allows machine gun bullets to be spoken. Sadly; we never see any, though we hear them loud and clear. (I'm doing the books out of order, that's twice this has happened, first time with audio. Comical.!) Baloo realizes that it's Air Pirates right away. Never mind that Khan's planes also use bullets as per in Baloo Thunder. Baloo uses this as evidence that this is important cargo. Of course! (I don't think Don Karnage cares that much because he'll literally steal anything just to justify his bloodlust as a pirate....and justify his terroristic tendences...) Let's hang on to our shinbones as Baloo does a steep turn with the SeaDuck and dodges the Air Pirates easily. Don shouts to send more planes as the narrator claims that they are outnumbered ten to one; even though we never see the six reinforcements at all. It's still 4-on-1 advantage heels. (Logic break #3 for this story.) Baloo proclaims that he doesn't know if he can keep this going any longer, which is the signal for Kit Cloudkicker to go to the back and find the SMELLY WORK BOOT OF DEATH. Off-screen; he gets the tow rope and goes out of the back of the SeaDuck with the airfoil underneath his feet. He zips over to Mad Dog and he stuffs the boot right into Mad Dog's mouth and nose. (Narrator claims that it's on his head; but he's a crappy narrator so...) Then, to complete the tri-fecta of awesomeness from the miracle worker, Kit says the following line:

Kit: Try this on for size, you heel!!

Can you imagine the drops for this?! Songs could be made about Kit calling crappy characters like Ken Izumi a heel. Also of note; Don Karnage says Nincompirates here; thus proving that promo in Plunder and Lightning was also a time cut. Kit pulls himself back into the SeaDuck and Baloo flies the SeaDuck in the clouds, which is a stupid move because that is usually the setup to reveal the Iron Vulture and..Holy crap! Don really needs to repaint the beak portion of it. And whose idea was it to fly into the clouds?! If you said Kit Cloudkicker, you win the no prize. POW! OUCH! Ummm... Now that's the spirit Kit! Let a real hand to my kisser... We cut to inside as Baloo is held at sword point by Don Karnage. No "several moments later" from the narrator. (Another mistake from this book...) Baloo asks how he knew he had valuable cargo and Don Karnage admits that he was the lady whom Baloo unintentionally flung ice cream on his head. He demands Baloo surrender his knickety knacks for him and orders Mad Dog and Dumptruck to open the crate. They open the BIG STINKY WHITE BOX OF DOOM and it contains...wait for it...fertilizer. Like I said; Don Karnage was going to regret those words. I'm SHOCKED that the box was able to contain the smell so well considering Baloo and Kit didn't even notice it until the pirates opened the box. (Wow, those boxes were sure robust in 1937. Much more than the boxes of today. Baloo Von Bruinwald XIII is our GEEK OF THE WEEK~!) Don Karnage and the air pirates laugh in his face as Don Karnage mocks Baloo for being worthy of delivering a plane of bad smell. I love real comments that aren't supposed to be real comments. Sadly; this audio book is intended for small children and thus Don Karnage decides to break air pirate protocol and allows Baloo to leave and deliver his box of fertilizer -- because we all know Baloo can be full of it sometimes -- without incident. (No lies detected.)

This is exactly why character-based shows never get over and why they do toy shows instead. In TaleSpin; Don Karnage NEVER lets anyone go. Even the hardcover version of Captains Outrageous had a more accurate Don Karnage than this. (Well to be fair, the cargo currently is useless and Don Karnage needs Baloo to make himself look good, since Kit can also outsmart him.) Baloo frowns and proclaims that Rebecca let him down again; which is apporos payback for the times Baloo has let her down for not doing his job properly. Now THAT is karma. The pirates leave Baloo to sulk in the cockpit while Kit just watches Baloo wondering "Stop being such a sooky baby Baloo! If you would do your job properly, maybe Miz Cunningham would give us higher stake cargo than this!". Okay; he didn't think that in the audio book; but he would in the television series. Baloo grumblesm, blows off Rebecca for giving him "useless" cargo and proclaims that he cannot show his face at Louie's again.

Rebecca: BWHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! (Yeah, that'll show Baloo for being friends with a perverted, crude ball of fur!)

Yeah; like that. Baloo claims that he has sunk to a new low now. Full of fertilizer indeed. Kit hands Baloo an empty soda bottle -- despite the narrator claiming that the bottle contains soda pop -- and tells Baloo to relax and is certain Rebecca knows what she is doing. Kit; can you not hear Rebecca laughing all the way to the bank just now?! (That is the definition ofBaloo blows it off because he hates worthless cargo runs and declares that once this trip is done; he is returning to Higher...For...Hire and telling Miss Cunningham that he quits. Oh sure you will Pop-A-Bear; and forget that in storyline, Rebecca owns the SeaDuck. (Yeah, he's daring Rebecca to fire him now and Baloo's life will be miserable if she succeeds.) The rest of the flight was in silence. If this made television; Kit would have pointed out that inconvenient little fact about Rebecca's ownership of the SeaDuck. (And I would laugh with him on that one, too.) They land off-screen in the island of Wacka-Wacka as Baloo is depressed saying that he'll be lucky if the assistant to the Chief's assistant turns out to greet him. In reality; everyone on the island rushed to the off-screen beach and greeted the plane with welcomes. Surprisely; this ADR group was never credited in the book for some odd reason. Baloo and Kit are placed on a stretcher like device and carried to the village as the bears look confused. All the natives are panthers with white hair, tails on the top of the hair, red feather and all wear green skirts with an upside down four leaf clover in the front. Oh; and there's a volcano in the background. Geez; I wonder if this will play into the storyline.

We head to the middle of the village as off-screen; the Wacka-Wacka residents fit Baloo with a tiara of red feathers which the narrator calls a crown of flowers. This narrator sucks and I want my three hours of ranting back. (Compared to the other errors in this book, this one is fine to me former self.) We see straw roof clay huts in the background as a golden lion like furry with white hair and a large white beard sit on a straw like throne. Baloo is confused because he only bought a box of fertilizer and this was some kind of mistake. The golden lion is referred as the Chief of Wacka-Wacka as he motion to Baloo to listen. He explains via the power of the CHILD CORRUPTING BALLOON OF DEATH showing the Wacka-Wacka residents running away from a erupting volcano which the Chief (Tony Pope) calls Mount Hotcha. He explains that recently; the volcano erupted and forced the villagers away causing the farmlands in the region to burn to ashes. There was no good soil available at this time to grow their food and they might have to leave Wacka-Wacka forever. Since BS&P is tighter in the children's books than on television, this is a nice way of saying that they would be dead from starvation. This is an important implication key to the story by the way. (And leads to one of my favorite beatdowns on critics you will ever witness...) The chief slaps Baloo in the back for no reason as he points out that he bought fertilizer to the island and this will help them start over again; calling him a hero to the island. Aw! My heart melted...

Critics: WAIT A MINUTE! THIS MAKES NO SENSE! Lava rock contains a lot of nutrients and the villagers could use that instead of fertilizer. They bashed Mother Nature! Disney should be sued out of existence for promoting this terrible slight at nature...!! (Wow, this is John Enter level of stereotype there, former self.)

Me: HOLD IT! You are right that lava, when hardened makes great soil! However; YOU are conveniently leaving out something much like Baloo leaving out the fact that if he quits; he loses the SeaDuck to Rebecca. The volcano erupted not too long ago, which is very recently. Maybe even a few days before Baloo delivered the fertilizer to them. Lava doesn't harden instantly. Sure; the outside takes a day or two; but the whole soil doesn't harden all at once. You know how long lava would completely harden into usable soil? YEARS! And for life to live on it; it might even take DECADES! (Actually, it would ultimately take millions of years and there is no assurances that you can get usable soil from it. You ultimate point is valid former self, but accurancy counts you know.) Time the villagers DON'T FUCKING HAVE! Remember that when the chief says that they have to leave Wacka-Wacka forever, they are implying that they are going to starve to death due to Disney's avoidance of the word death in this audio book due to their target audience. (BINGO! It's like then the founders of the USA wrote "endowed by their creator". They were not talking about the Christian God nor "Nature's God" nor any deity. They were literally talking about themselves as masters of their own destiny to give middle fingers to King George III. They could have removed that line and it would have not made any difference.) They cannot leave the island on their own alive unless they offer to Baloo to fly them out. The fertilizer is an EMERGENCY STOP GAP! (Bravo Lezard Valeth reference from Valkyrie Profile: Lenneth.) It's designed to let the islanders live on the island to grow food until the soil becomes good enough on it's own years down the road. What Jymn Magon wrote makes perfect sense! Oh; and fertilizer is basically poop and waste from grass clipping and other stuff that is dried out and combined. Naturally as nature intended! You critics are so woo-ish; it isn't funny!

Kit: You showed them Mr. Weagle! (Even former self was way too generous there, Kit.)

Me: Well; that is why Orac was completely right about the importance of basic chemistry and geography and science. And using claims that are based on actual peered reviewed evidence. (These shitheads who bashed this conveniently forgot to ask "How long does it take for lava to harden into usable soil?!" I at least decided to do some digging because I knew it was coming.)

We cut to a large scale as Kit and Baloo toast on the scale which the right side is filled with Pop-A-Bear and the left side is filled with rubies which is their reward. Baloo is in disbelief about the value of the fertilizer; but it's doesn't matter what Baloo's value of fertilizer is compared to the village. And they cannot eat rubies in it's place anyway. Kit is now wearing the goofy tiara of feathers as he sums this cargo up with ease causing Baloo to admit that Kit was right all along. The villagers are so happy! (Yeah, they don't have to become settlers in another land and can live on.) The bears reenter the SeaDuck and Baloo invokes the transmitter of doom to call Louie's. He tells Baloo that he is now an honorary prince of Wacka-Wacka and was given Baloo's weight in rubies; thus justifying the need for that scale in the previous shot. That is a great payoff actually, and not just the rubies either. Louie is in shock and wants Baloo to explain what the cargo was that they delivered to Wacka-Wacka and Baloo repeats his promo at the end of Jolly Molly Christmas. Also, the artists actually remembered to have flowers in the tiaras. If you are going to call it a crown of flowers, at least draw flowers on the far shots instead of red feathers. We return to Louie's as Louie has a scoop of ice cream on retainer as we see Don Karnage, Mad Dog and Dumptruck in the background dressed up as women again as Don Karnage blows this whole thing off. Like I said; he was going to regret those comments.

Don Karnage bangs on the table claiming that this stinks. (Irony.) Louie is at the microphone as he informs Baloo that he is getting a Krackatoa Special for the King of The Pilots! Apparently; this delivery didn't just make him king of the cargo pilots, but all pilots in general. Enjoy your reign while it lasts Baloo; because your little partner is going to be the God of Pilots when he gets his pilot's license. (King is a six dollar term for God anyway. Also, I think Ducktales 2017 might change your tune former self. At least in theory.) Baloo smiles and basically tells Louie to tell Don Karnage, Dumptruck and Mad Dog that he thanks them for breaking their "let them live" protocol because that made him a rich man. See; that's why Don never let's anyone live. Although I wonder how Baloo knew that Don Karnage and company had returned to Louie's?! They never mentioned it in the audio book. That ends the audio book at 11:20. This was more of the same in that we saw the major spots; but all the connecting stuff was off-screen. The narrator had a really off day in this one and the artwork didn't exactly help him either. That said; the voice actors were good and the storyline, while still fluffy, was better and wasn't as problematic as I thought it was. Plus; the finish and ending made perfect sense. Call it *** 1/4 (65%); because the writing was better in this one at least. Sadly; no new trading cards were from Brendala's set and all the promos are the same as in Drumming Up Business; so that's about it.

THE REVIEW LINE

So, that ends the audio books for TaleSpin. As you can see; the narrow target audience for these books really hurt the dynamics of the show as Shere Khan couldn't help but be a heel, avoiding the word death altogether and having mostly fluffy fetch quests. (Avoiding the word "death" was a problem because without the word, everyone got confused and walked right into the outrage machine claiming that this was bashing the real world, when it didn't. This is why implications matter because they give context of what was really said due to masking like BS&P often does.) It felt like what one of my friends claims in what was Ducktales' major failing (Scrooge wants treasure, Scrooge looks for treasure, Scrooge finds treasure, the end). Sadly; this was unavoidable due to the way Disney markets these books. (Ducktales could get away with it because it was written by the lens of rich, white doods. TaleSpin is supposed to be written with the lens of everyone else.) Anyhow; there is one picture book story left that is not an audio book which is Ghost Ship from Golden Books. Hopefully; I'll get to that story in the near future. So... So...

Thumbs in the middle for this audio story and I'll see you all next time.

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