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Pete

Pete is a Disney comics character. Though Pete is recognized as his "official" name, he has used numerous adjectives to modify his name (e.g. "Black Pete," "Pegleg Pete" or "Pistol Pete") as well as numerous completely different names.

About Pete[]

He is Mickey Mouse's first and oldest continuing arch-enemy, Pete's villainous career actually began well before Mickey was even created. His earliest appearance was in Walt Disney's Alice Comedies, a mix of animation and live action from the mid-1920s where he was often Alice's primary menace. His first film role was in "Alice Solves the Puzzle" (1925) where he was known as Bootleg Pete, He was a crossword puzzle collector who tried to steal Alice's puzzle, but Julius comes to the rescue and defeats him. His next major role was as Oswald the Lucky Rabbit's continuing adversary. His truest recognition came as Mickey's constant nemesis ever since Mickey's screen debut in "Steamboat Willie" (1928). Pete has gone on to torment Minnie Mouse, Donald Duck, Goofy, Chip 'n' Dale and nearly every other Disney character, especially in comics.

In comics he has often partnered with the crooked Sylvester Shyster as his right-hand lackey, or with the nebulous Weasel (a.k.a. Catfoot, a.k.a. Swifty, etc., etc.) who usually acts as Pete's own lackey (along with a large ambiguous dogface). Aside form Shyster and Weasel, Pete has teamed with many of Disney's Rogues Gallery, everyone from Eli Squinch, Magica De Spell and the Beagle Boys to Peter Pan's Captain Hook.

In the animated series Goof Troop Pete has a wife, Peg, and two children, P.J. and Pistol, and his Pekingese dog named Chainsaw. Here he is Goofy's annoyingly belligerent neighbor, though Goofy doesn't seem to realize this. This role reprises one that he handle so very well in the cartoon, "The Good Neighbor" (1953) where he was Donald Duck's obnoxious neighbor (a role which probably inspired Bark's Neighbor Jones). Two other classic roles had him starring as the frustrated impresario Sylvester Macaroni in "Symphony Hour" (1942) and as the Ghost of Christmas-Yet-To-Come in "Mickey's Christmas Carol" (1942).

Over the past few decades Pete has lost his two most prominent props, a stogie and his pegged leg, perhaps in an effort to remove stigmatized negatives in a media geared toward children as well as adults. In European comics, Pete is often partnered with a villainous catspaw Trudy who looks and acts very much like a female version of himself named, though she is undoubtedly the more intelligent of the two and is very much his "better half," as well as a (perhaps distant) cousin.

Also in European comics Pete has a villainous cousin named Plottigat and a set of twin nephews named Pierino & Pieretto who first appeared in "Topolini #1879" in a story titled "Topolino e un favore da nulla" ("Mickey Mouse and the Easy Favor"). The story tells how Pete, having been imprisoned by Mickey, sends his two nephews to stay with Mickey, but the two turn out to be much more trouble than Mickey expects. In contemporary animation, Pete made a couple of guest appearances, as a villain, in DuckTales. Like Goofy, Pete is a regular in the cast of Disney's Goof Troop. Pete's most recent role has been as a regular nemesis to Mickey, Donald or Goofy in Mickey's MouseWorks cartoons and as the property owner of the The House of Mouse where he is typically scheming of ways to make Mickey default on his lease in order to lose the club.

Appearances[]

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