Gadget Hackwrench (AKA the only Rescue Ranger that fans really, truly, obsessively like) is showing off her inventions to Professor Sniffsnout, one of the scientists on the judging committee for the All-City Technology Competition. Look closely and you’ll see a puff-topped tail on the professor. That’s right, she’s a poodle. A damn poodle in the Rescue Ranger headquarters. Which is in a tree. Which fits the smallest of creatures, like mice, chipmunks, and flies. A fucking poodle. And don’t tell me she’s one of those teacup dogs that old biddies love to collect like Precious Moments figurines.

Anywhoodle, Sniffsnout is quite bored with Gadget’s inventions, disparagingly describing them as “cute” and saying that her fellow scientists will “get quite a giggle out of [Gadget's] tinkerings.” Naturally, Chip is offended that someone would insult his unrequited love interest’s works.

“HOLD IT!” he screams unnecessarily. “What about Gadget’s invisibility machine?” True to her stuffy scientist training, Sniffsnout doesn’t believe that such a thing is possible. Chip invites her into the kitchen where they begin gathering supplies to create Gadget’s wondrous machine.

First a tureen, which is nothing more than an acorn. Then some of Monty’s Limburger cheese sauce. I’m sure ol’ Monty won’t mind. He can always head down to the alley to his cheese dealer and get another shipment–after he’s murdered everyone in a junkie rage.

Then Chip adds some garlic cloves and baby onions. But now he has to touch the “pot” to the ceiling. He innocently wonders aloud how he can ever do that. Professor Sniffsnout, ironically asking if Chip himself is dim, offers to perform the incredible feat. Now all she has to do is turn the pot over and…

Wow! I’m amazed! A pompous, arrogant, educated elitist hoisted by her own petard in an incredibly see-through scheme!

“How can I report to the other scientists like this?” Sniffsnout rages as she stomps away from the headquarters. A brilliant scientist such as yourself can’t go home to take a shower?

Gadget and Chip watch on from the doorway. Gadget thanks Chips, but he shouldn’t have lied. That wasn’t an invisiblity machine, after all.

“Sure it was!” Chip says. “It made Sniffsnout disappear, didn’t it?”

No, Chip, you just made her go away–and stink to high heaven and beyond. Stop trying to be clever. By the way, you’re nowhere closer to getting into Gadget’s jumpsuit.

Let’s get on over to St. Canard and see how DW’s doing.

Not that well. Either Dr. Matronic must have lined the inside of that helmet with Crazy Glue, or the sheer size of Darkwing’s brain created a vacuum. Whatever the cause, that thing isn’t coming off. What else could our heroes do?

DW tries a device that emits a signal strong enough to interfere with Dr. Matronic’s remote signal. It should render the mind-control helmet useless. The signal is pitched so high, only dogs can hear it.

Left no with other option, DW orders Launchpad and Gos to tie him to his bed. (Suddenly I feel the force of a million fangirls shuddering in ecstasy. Brr.) “Without my body, Matronic can’t have my mind!” he reasons. Sounds like a failproof plan. I don’t see how it could possibly go wrong, except, say, Matronic finds out where he lives using some sort of tracking device that’s in the helmet.

Anyway, with DW incapacitated, Gos gets her chance to watch the Senseless Gore & Violence Film Festival on the eleven o’clock movie: Body Count 2000. Reminds me when I used to stay up watching Saturday Night Live–you know, back when it was good. (Mine’s the Bad Boy Era featuring Farley, Spade, Sandler, and Schneider. What’s yours?)

CRASH! Holy crap, what was that? Did DW fall out of the bed? That was some pretty flimsy ropework if that’s the case. But it’s something far more worse…

How the hell did they fit the bed through that window?

I’d worry more about the fact that Dr. Matronic found Drake Mallard’s residence. I think outright destroying her instead of locking her up is a surefire way to eliminate this problem in the future. But my ideas are far too violent for a kiddie comic such as this.

“We’ve got to get him back!” Gos cries obviously. But Launchpad ixnays that: “Drake would never forgive me if I brought you along.” So he hops into the Rat Catcher (DW parked it at his civilian home?) with the declaration that he won’t let anything happen to his best friend and the only person in the Disney universe who will ever put him on a payroll.

But ho ho, dear reader, Launchpad is going to get some much needed assistance after all…

Bless you, you little rule-breaking, snot-beaked rebel. Bless you.

Soon, we’re in Dr. Matronic’s high-rise apartment or wherever the hell she keeps her top secret science-y crap. “Forget the promised crime spree, Darkwing,” she says. “I’ve decided to get rid of you! With you out of way, I can do whatever I want and no one can stop me!”

See anything wrong with that sentence? I see three: 1) Why did she suddenly decide to not make DW go on a fantastic crime spree? That would have made up for the uninspired first part. Is Dr. Matronic indecisive? What’s she like in different scenarios? “I’ll have fries. No, forget the fries, I’ll have tater tots!” “Let’s go with the powder blue satin finish. No, forget that shade, my living room needs to be fuschia!” “I do. No, forget matrimony!” 2) “With you out of way.” I can take lazy coloring in a cheap comic, but grammatical errors in a professional publication really grates my cheese. 3) “No one cane stop me!” Is DW the only law enforcement in St. Canard, or has Dr. Matronic never heard of the police?

With Darkwing completely under her control, Dr. Matronic commands him to step out of a window and “plummet to your doom“… in a totally nonchalant way.

What an inspiring gesture. Just sends shivers of fear down my spine.

Launchpad comes running in, screaming for DW to snap out of it. DW mutters something about breakfast, and Dr. Matronic breaks into song: Rock-a-bye Darkwing/My little mind slave/Lis-ten to my voice/Just ig-nore that knave. Sure enough, the nursery rhyme lulls Darkwing right back to sleep–on top of a pillow with a blanket, no less.

Dr. Matronic sics Robo-1, one of her robo-hounds, on Launchpad. The bulky, dim-brained duck grabs the nearest device and shoves it into the metal mutt’s maw. And believe it or not, this action electrocutes the robo-hound and dismantles it in the next panel. What the hell did LP pick up? A mega-remote that fries circuits and loosens bolts? If so, I want one. I have an enemy whose car needs a little fixing up.

With Launchpad suddenly out of action, Dr. Matronic sings another verse: Sleep-walk to the window/This building’s so tall–/Take my troubles with you/When out you fall…

Darkwing is right on the balcony ledge, just inches away from certain doom… clutching a pillow to his sleeping nogging, natch. The obituary writer for the paper is really going to have a ball with this one. As the clocktower bongs in the midnight hour, who should come in but our favorite stowaway?

Gos blows a whistle–the same whistle Drake used to rudely wake her up in part one. This comic may be corny as all hell, but at least the writer had some knowledge of Chekov’s Rule: If a whistle appears in part one of the story, then it needs to appear at a critical time near the very end of the story. Or something like that.

Dr. Matronic seizes Gos, but she won’t let up. She screams for Darkwing to wake up, but he just talks in his sleep. He’s just inches away from certain doom…

Finally, he wakes up, just as he falls over the edge. “Twelve o’clock?! Gosalyn! It is way past your bedtime! What are you still doing… up?”

Quite a lot to say as you’re falling to your doom, huh? By the way, the clocktower rang eight times on the whole page, even if its face did say 12 o’clock. Crappy clocktower or poor page planning? You make the call.

As Gos cries for the loss of her adoptive father, Dr. Matronic cackles with glee. “HA HA HA! At last! Darkwing Duck sleeps eternal!” Which is a really overwrought line that a lame-ass villain like Dr. Matronic really shouldn’t say. I sure hope the writers saved these lines for Negaduck or some other, better villain.

But wait! DW’s alive! And why wouldn’t he be?! He snatches the remote from Dr. Matronic and smashes it on the street below.

Oh, shut the hell up, you half-bit stock villain.

Dr. Matronic has had it! “Fetch with extreme prejudice!” she screams lamely at her two remaining robo-hounds. The mutts launch themselves at a woozy Darkwing, who slumps down to get some much needed rest. Totally missing their target, the robo-hounds go sailing over the balcony. “MY PUPPIES! NO!” Dr. Matronic shrieks, thus securing herself a spot on my People Who Need to Be Burned for Fuel list.

I mean, what self-respecting villain out for blood is going to scream like a banshee about her easily repaired mecha-mutts falling from a high-rise building? Moreover, what fearsome villain is going to call said mecha-mutts “puppies”? Ugh, she reminds me of every middle-aged woman who insists on calling their dog a puppy, no matter how fucking old they are. It doesn’t keep them young, you dumb bitches. Argh.

Yes, I’m assuming those robo-hounds are easily repairable because this is a comic based on a cartoon. Don’t argue with me!

Look at that. She isn’t even putting up a fight. You fail, Dr. Matronic. Cripes, I’d rather see the ineffectual Phantasmic Four again. At least they were fun.

Whee-hee… two issues in. Cripes, it feels like it’s been a month since I’ve started this. Next week, it’s part one of issue #3, crammed with more Flapping Terror than you can possibly fit in your mouth.

Fine, you come up with a better hook. Stay tooned, scuzzbags!