GM - Giovani Marmotte

Since the publication of the first Junior Woodchucks Manual by Mondadori in 1975, Huey, Dewey and Louie and their exciting adventures have become favorites for readers of all ages. Twenty years later, The Walt Disney Company Italy launched a monthly magazine containing new stories starring the Junior Woodchucks.

The Junior Woodchucks magazine targeted readers aged eight to thirteen, and focused on nature and environment. Sixty percent of the magazine was filled with new comic stories created in Italy, while editorials on nature, travel, ecology, astronomy, science, environment and animals filled the remaining 40% of the magazine's 132 pages. The initial print run was 150,000 copies with a cover price of 4000 Lire.

In 1996 Egmont started publishing similar Junior Woodchuck comics in other countries like Germany and Norway (eg. Unternehmen Faehnlein Fieselschweif). These Egmont magazines are exactly the same and clearly based on the Italian Giovani Marmotte. In 1997 one Dutch version of GM was published in the the Netherlands, but it was not a success, so no further issues came out.

In order to emphazie the endearing qualities and good deeds of Italy's Giovani Marmotte, The Accademia Disney artists have created the JW villains. Darkus, the first villain of the lot, appeared in the October issue of 1997. Cunning, bold and ironic, Darkus has a theatrical personality, and is set on destroying the Giovani Marmotte. Professor Zero is less evil than he is clumsy; his scientific experiments always have catastrophic effects that can only be remidied by the Giovanni Marmotte. Likewise, H.J. Trouble is an almost involuntary villain. An incompetent but persistent entrepreneur, his initiatives invariably end up threatening the environment, and it is the Giovani Marmotte's task to try to stop him. The result of one of Professor Zero's botched experiments, Yuri is a nearsighted pterodactyl which has become Professor Yuri's loyal but disastrous right hand, and the center of many funny stories and jokes.

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