Darkwing Duck (animation)/Headscratchers

Why did the other members of the Fearsome Five take orders from Negaduck?

All the guy had was a chainsaw...

• Because I said.
• Same reason why even superpowered villains don't want to mess with The Joker. Negaduck's such a psychopath the rest of the Five know to give him a wide berth.
• He tended to plan more often and was a better strategist, they usually had a better measure of success following him..aside from the psycho aspect.
• The same reason all the villains were fearful of Darkwing in the same way the metahumans are scared of Batman The Joker....they know what he's capable of.
• But why should The Liquidator fear him?
  • If DW can beat Liquidator then so can Negaduck and Negaduck is willing to kill him. Negaduck might not know how yet but i'm betting he'd find a way if Liquidator pissed him off.
• Basically the chainsaw wasn't so much a direct threat as a demonstration that he was willing to use painful and heinous amounts of force to insure his place as top dog.

How does Drake Mallard pay his bills?

• He has a vast fortune hidden somewhere. Now, how did he get it, I don't know that wasn't the question
• I think it's his connection to SHUSH. Alongside asking him for help against FOWL, they also seem to have him test their latest tech among other things. I wouldn't be surprised that they're payrolling him under the table to make sure he remains the ace up their sleeve.
• I actually like the Epileptic Tree that explains this, although it's hard to reconcile with my inner Scrooge/Goldie shipper.
• A line in issue #3 of the new comic series indicates the SHUSH theory is correct, as DW mentions having to get a job "when [his] SHUSH stipend vanished."
  • The old Disney Adventures digest books hinted that Darkwing was a multi-millionaire, which would go a long way to explaining the technology he had prior to Shush popping up in the series.
    • Well, the most advanced piece of tech he really has is the Thunderquack, and Launchpad built that. (Got the parts from Gyro? Embezzled from Scrooge? Who knows.) Most of the rest of it is just simple machines, some basic equipment, the Ratcatcher, and his gas gun. Also I think we're supposed to assume that SHUSH has been around for quite awhile, before they're actually highlighted in the show. The simplest answer: Drake Mallard had a modest fortune that would allow him to buy a handful of gadgets while having a fair bit of other money on hand, then spent most of that money buying a house for himself and Gosalyn. He probably had enough to get by for awhile after that, but then began relying on his SHUSH paycheck once it ran out, since by that time he was an actual agent. (Grislykopf insisted.)

Does appearing out of nowhere count as a superpower?

I know it's a cartoon, but the stuff DW pulls with the help of "smoke pellets" is way beyond Batman's habit of disappearing in the middle of conversations. He seems to be able to teleport anywhere he likes, even if he'd have no way of seeing, let alone getting to, where he's supposed to be.

• Batman demonstrated Offscreen Teleportation multiple times (in the animated series, at least). They both have the rare (and possibly not recognized) superpower of being able to vanish and reappear anywhere whenever: they are in no one's line of sight, and it's dark. They're at least subconsciously aware of this power's connection to darkness, hence their preference for the night.
• In "All's Fahrenheit in Love and War" Darkwing blatantly teleports backwards a few feet to escape a wrestling hold. That's not a smoke pellet trick. Of course, that episode verges on Fan Discontinuity ...
  • When did he do that? At one point he slips out of Vanderchill's hug, but that wasn't even with smoke. He just slipped out with a cartoony effect.

Why does tossing a net onto someone constitute a capture, even if that someone is The Liquidator? (As seen in the quick ending to "Jail Bird".)

• The net could've been made out of an absorbent material. And while he may have been able to keep himself from being absorbed in his "normal" form, liquefying himself might have made that tricky or impossible.

Why doesn't Negaduck just bomb Drake Mallard's house?

It was Moviebob who pointed out that in the Negaverse, Negaduck apparently owns the counterpart of the Mallard house, because Nega-Gosalyn lives there. So he must know, or at least suspect, where Darkwing lives. So why not do something about it? Are you telling me that Negaduck of all people would hold back from flattening a suburban home just because his arch-nemesis might not live there?

• Negaduck is a classic cartoon villain. He must never take the easy way, that's too simple and doesn't make for good television. No, he must set up elaborate, easily-escapable traps so that he can get his rear handed to him later on. Because everyone loves it when the good guys win. Oh, and bombing a suburban neighborhood and possibly destroying a city, taking out millions of innocent lives, would have gotten the show canceled before the first commercial.
• Perhaps the Nega-house is where Negaduck and Nega-LP merely keep Nega-Gosalyn, as they don't want her running around the Nega-lair on the Nega-bridge. Plus, Negaduck has no need for a secret identity in the Negaverse since he pretty much rules everything, so maybe he simply didn't put two and two together while in the regular universe.
• See the recent comic series.
• Not having read the spoiler above ... maybe Negaduck's Wrong Genre Savvy. After all, why would Darkwing live in the same house that he does? Besides, bombing the whole city is more his style anyway.
• Yeah, but once Darkwing drops into the Negaverse, he almost immediately heads straight for the house he lives in. Which is where Nega-Gosalyn lives, and where Nega-Launchpad arrives, obviously thinking Darkwing is Negaduck. Plus, the fact that Negaduck also has a hideout of his own in Audobon Bay Bridge's towers, which is where Darkwing's secret hideout is...seriously, even as a kid, the gigantic plot hole bugged me. I just came to the conclusion that he just never bothered to think about it, since he was too busy playing in his new universe and wreaking havoc.

How come nobody ever notices that Launchpad McQuack is DW's sidekick in civilian life? He doesn't wear a mask.

• Same reason why people never seem to notice that Clark Kent is Superman.
• Notice, yes. Care, highly doubt. Same with the kids--basically, targets of convenience if it ever comes up, but unless they're directly targeting Darkwing, there's no real point in getting his attention. After all, what's easier for a crook--robbing a bank, or robbing the bank while trying to control a hero's sidekick and while hoping the hero actually stays out of your way?
• It's simple, one villain referred to them as Darkwing's Fan Club, so people think they just follow him around. Considering DW's a bit of a glory hound It's not surprising.
• Someone finally did put two and two together in the comic book: Negaduck.
  • Though the comic book indicates that he always knew. It wasn't until the upteenth time Darkwing kicked his ass that he decided to do something about it. He even says it himself:

Negaduck:"This wasn't about eliminating one Darkwing Duck. This was about eliminating ALL OF THEM!"

Why would Liquidator be used as a water supply?

• In the new comics, apparently Liqui got a job as Quackwerk's water supply. Alright, I can see drinking him as not being gross when you consider he's just pure water, but I ask why? First, he mentions being in all of the water coolers. Does he have a split conscience or something? Now here's the bigger problem; he's not made of infinite water. How can he be a supply if he's only human sized?
• Quackwerks probably used his control over water as a substitute for a water treatment plant/pumping station. If you've got someone who can make water defy gravity and change state at will, why bother having machines do the work? Plus, it would go along with the mind-numbing, psycho-sedation that Taurus Bulba was trying to implement. What better way to control the Liquidator than have him doing the same thing over and over?

Did Bushroot really kill Dr. Gary and Dr. Larson?

• Sure they were never seen again, but all the other new characters from "Beauty and the Beet" were Put on a Bus right after this episode and we know they're alive. I mean it's a kids cartoon, but they have done better to imply that someone died in cartoons. Also, the called in DW, the police, the feds and the Gardeners Association. Didn't hear anything about a cornier or mortician.
  • The plants left behind in their wake in the exact shape of their bodies and wearing their glasses, not to mention the reactions of everyone after the implied murder would seem to infer that yes, he did kill them, but the deaths happened offscreen as he turned them into those plants. Don't forget, Batman: The Animated Series saw Poison Ivy attempting to do something disturbingly similar, but Batman stopped her. The implication here is that Bushroot succeeded where she failed.
  • Yes, in the Darkwing Duck show people could die. Hell, in the Twin Beaks episode we saw Bushroot's corpse. Albeit it was a failed clone, still as a child seeing a corpse on a kid's show was terrifying for me.

Are Drake and Launchpad posing as a gay couple?

No.