WARNING: The following contains spoilers for the DuckTales Season 3, Episode 21, "The Life and Crimes of Scrooge McDuck!," which aired on March 8 on Disney XD
Scrooge McDuck's list of enemies in DuckTales is truly massive. While most of those villains have proven vile to the core, the latest episode of the series "The Life and Crimes of Scrooge McDuck" reveals the true reason Magica De Spell despises Scrooge McDuck -- and the scary part is, she might not be wrong to feel negatively about him.
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"The Life and Crimes of Scrooge McDuck!" focuses on a collection of major villains from across the course of the series -- Glomgold, Ma Beagle and Magica De Spell -- being called upon as witnesses to Scrooge's crimes. Although all three are unrepentant villains, they blame Scrooge for their darker sides. With Louie as his defense attorney, Scrooge is able to prove he's not solely to blame for their vendettas, as they already had an inner darkness when he first confronted them. Soon, Magica is revealed to have been the worst of the bunch -- spending years with her brother Poe in a small village, tormenting the citizens, demanding their treasure and turning them to animals for laughs.
An attempt to claim more treasure dragged Scrooge into their lives, with the seasoned adventurer forced to fight to keep his precious Number One Dime. Scrooge's quick-thinking and fast reflexes keep him ahead of Magica's attacks -- and he reflects one of her blasts back at her with a piece of metal. However, Poe takes the blast to save his sister. As a result, he's turned into a raven.
Unfortunately, as Poe was the one who perfected changing people back from their new basic animal forms, Magica was unable to simply undo the spell. As the raven Poe moved towards an open window, Magica begged Scrooge for his help in rescuing her brother. But Scrooge refuses and instead claims the treasure for himself. Soon, Poe flies away into the night, as Magica is unable to stop him. In the present, Magica admits she spent years searching for Poe and failed -- resulting in her passionate hate for Scrooge.
Scrooge's confrontation with Magica is an incredibly dark story beat that paints him in a surprisingly ruthless light. Although he didn't start the fight and was only defending himself in the magical duel itself, Scrooge's choice to not help Magica was clearly a cruel and selfish act -- especially as he casually mocked her for it. Even in the present, Scrooge can't defend his actions when speaking to a horrified Louie. Scrooge reveals he didn't give the treasure back to the townspeople he'd inadvertently rescued, instead keeping it for himself. His treasure hunting took priority. Unlike his other two chief villains, Magica never claimed he made her evil -- only that Scrooge gave her plenty of reason to hate him.
By the end of "The Life and Crimes of Scrooge McDuck," Scrooge has at least taken the important step of accepting and acknowledging his mistake, even apologizing to all three villains for his part in enraging them. However, while Ma Beagle and Glomgold just bicker over Scrooge's eventual innocent verdict, Magica's rage leads her to almost murder everyone in attendance with a powerful magic blast.
Still, Scrooge may not have owed Magica anything, but in refusing to even try and help rescue Poe, the treasure hunter set himself up for an enemy that at times threatened not just his family but the entire world. Scrooge's greatest foe is pointed at DuckBurg specifically because of him. It's even more painful when one recognizes that Scrooge effectively cost Magica the one person she saw as a family -- setting up her eventual crusade to destroy the McDuck family. In the end, this act pains Scrooge in a much darker light and shows the massive impact of his mistakes.
Based on the 1987 series of the same name, DuckTales stars the voices of David Tennant, Danny Pudi, Ben Schwartz, Bobby Moynihan, Kate Micucci, Beck Bennett, Toks Olagundoye, Tony Anselmo and Paget Brewster. All current seasons are available to stream on Disney+ and there are no current plans to remove the series from the platform.