The release of Steamboat Willie into the public domain has resulted in numerous Mickey Mouse adjacent projects going into production. Most of these are horror themed, with two horror movies and a video game announced thus far. However, Popeye artist Randy Milholland has released a comedic web comic truer to the spirit of the short.
The new web comic, Mousetrapped, features the versions of Mickey Mouse, Minnie Mouse, and Peg Leg Pete that appeared in Steamboat Willie. While the images of these characters are familiar, no copyrighted names are used in the comics. Indeed, Milholland specifically notes “no claims to any active copyrights or trademarks owned by the Walt Disney Company are made.”
Check out the first Mousetrapped comic below:
New Mickey Mouse Comic a Labor of Love
Milholland first found fame for his dark comedy web comic Something Positive, but he is also a fan of classic animation and comics who dreamed of telling stories in that setting as a child. This led him to take over writing and drawing the Sunday Popeye comic strip in 2022. Millholland noted the irony on X (formerly Twitter), stating “I might be the only person doing a Mickey Mouse anything that’s not, ‘Yeah, now I can twist or mock the character.'”
Thus far, Mousetrapped has remained true to the classic image of Mickey Mouse as a loveable loser. Misfortune may rain upon him, but he remains optimistic in spite of it all. The comic also contains Millholland’s snarky humor while remaining true to the original aesthetic pioneered by Walt Disney.
However, Milholland has promised that Mousetrapped will come to feature some frightening elements. “Old cartoons have a horror to them,” Milholland notes. “And I will slip into some horror cuz it’s me.” He will, however, avoid the slasher horror elements promised by the upcoming Mickey Mouse films, because “I also like I can show this to my daughter.”
Mousetrapped is free to read online.
