Rebo


 * This article is about the Italian comics character. For the physics model, see Reactive empirical bond order. For the Star Wars character, see Max Rebo. For the fictional comedy group Rebo and Zooty, see Day of the Dead (Babylon 5).

Rebo is an Italian comics character, created by Cesare Zavattini (plot), Federico Pedrocchi (script) and Giovanni Scolari (art) in 1936.

He is the dictator of Saturn and he wants to conquer Earth but his plans fail thanks to Dr. Marcus and Ciro. In the 1960s Carlo Chendi and Luciano Bottaro decided to reuse the character in Disney stories: Rebo made his debut in Disney stories in Paperino e il razzo interplanetario (literally Donald Duck and the interplanetary rocket, 1960) in which he tries to conquer Jupiter but his plans fail thanks to Donald. Luciano Bottaro created in the 1990s other three stories about Rebo and his attempts to conquer Earth and Jupiter.

Saturn against the Earth
Saturn against the Earth (Saturno contro la Terra) was a comics series created by Zavattini, Pedrocchi and Scolari. This saga was published in installments in the weeklies I tre porcellini (1936–1937) and Topolino (1937–1946). In 1940 the first episodes of the saga were published in the USA in the comic book Future Comics. It was the first Italian comics story published in the USA.

In this saga Rebo, the dictator of Saturn, is a cruel leader, an outright representation of the evil, whose crest resembles the feared dragons of antiquity. He allied with the earthling Ledducq in order to conquer Earth but his invasion fails thanks to earthling scientists Ciro and Dr. Marcus.

Disney stories
In 1960 Italian Disney artists Carlo Chendi (script) and Luciano Bottaro (art) created a story, Paperino e il razzo interplanetario (literally Donald Duck and the interplanetary rocket), in which Rebo made his debut in Disney comics. In this story Rebo is the farcical dictator of Saturn, whose population was reduced (because of war) to a total of three (Rebo and his two helpers). Rebo wants to conquer Jupiter. When he finds out that the famous inventor Gyro Gearloose is on Jupiter with Donald Duck, Scrooge McDuck and Huey, Dewey and Louie, he decides to kidnap him to force him to create fighting robots. Unfortunately his helpers mistake Donald Duck for Gyro, so they kidnap him. Donald Duck is forced by Rebo to create fighting robots, but thanks to Donald's inability, they are ineffective so the invasion of Jupiter fails. Donald escapes and returns to Jupiter where he is celebrated as a hero by Jupiter's inhabitants.

In 1995, Luciano Bottaro decided to create new adventures about Rebo. In 1995 he created Paperino e il ritorno di Rebo (literally Donald Duck and the return of Rebo) in which Rebo tries to conquer Earth but his plans fail thanks to Donald and Scrooge. Bottaro made other two stories about Rebo, Alla ricerca del papero virtuale (literally Finding the virtual duck, 1995) and Paperino e l'invasione di Giove (literally Donald Duck and the invasion of Jupiter, 1997). In the Invasion of Jupiter, Bottaro reused Zantaf, a mad scientist appeared in the 1970s in some MIA (McDuck Intelligence Agency, in Italian PIA) stories. In this story Zantaf allied with Rebo.

In 2010 the four Disney stories about Rebo were republished in the volume Tesori #7: Paperino contro Saturno (literally Treasures #7: Donald Duck against Saturn). In the USA none of the stories about Rebo (excluding Saturn against the Earth) have been published yet.