The Lost Cargo of Kit Cloudkicker! is the twentieth episode of Season 3 and the 67th episode overall of DuckTales 2017. It aired on March 1, 2021 on Disney XD.
Synopsis[]
Della, Dewey and Huey recruit a showboating pilot to take them to an island full of monsters in search of a missing mystery, unaware that Don Karnage is hot on their tails.
Summary[]
Cargo pilot Kit Cloudkicker is transporting a crate for F.O.W.L. when he is attacked by Don Karnage and his Air Pirates. He manages to escape with tricky flying, but in the process the crate is broken open. Upon being confronted by a horrific goat-chicken creature made from animals he was also carrying, Kit opens the plane’s cargo door to get rid of it. In the process, he also loses all his cargo, including the strange stone that was inside the crate.
Some years later, Dewey flies the Sunchaser into Cape Suzette under Della’s supervision. Della is thrilled to see Dewey following in her footsteps, but Dewey himself is less than impressed with the routine flight. Huey, nervous to have his brother at the controls, identifies the Stone lost by Kit as the Stone of What Was, another of Isabella Finch’s Missing Mysteries. Thanks to a F.O.W.L. transmission intercepted some time previously, the Ducks know that the Stone was in enemy hands but lost in transit.
After a showboating Dewey makes a rough landing, the three approach the office of Higher for Hire, Kit’s company. Della notes that the business seems to be failing, but Dewey is awestruck by footage of a young Kit performing his namesake feat of cloudkicking. The Ducks find Kit sleeping next to his plane, the Sea Duck, and Kit proves to be an old acquaintance of Della’s from flight school. Kit assures them that he is now an “ace pilot” comparable to their fellow classmate Molly Cunningham, whom Della recalls as a talented student pilot.
Huey and Della try to find out from Kit where the Stone of What Was fell, but he insists on flying them there himself and being paid for the service. When Dewey expresses interest in learning to cloudkick, much to Della’s chagrin, Kit eagerly accepts the young Duck as his sidekick. During the flight, Della soon evicts the irresponsible Kit from the cockpit after finding a map with the Stone’s drop site marked on it. Kit then decides to begin Dewey’s training, but the young Duck finds cloudkicking to be more than he bargained for.
The Sea Duck is spotted by Don Karnage and his pirates, whom F.O.W.L. have hired to recover the Stone. Peg Leg Meg is able to dissuade Karnage from going after Kit, but upon spotting Dewey trailing behind the Sea Duck the Pirate giddily goes on the attack. Fortunately, Kit jumps out to Dewey’s rescue, and they are able to land safely in the sea near the island.
After Kit is both thanked and berated by Della, the four head inland. Strange tracks prove to belong to a strange gorilla-rhinoceros creature, whom the four narrowly escape. They then find the pirates attempting to secure the Stone, which proves to be the source of the unusual animals after it merges several pirates and animals into bizarre creatures. Della begins to climb down to reach the Stone, only to get stuck on a large sticky patch on the side of the cliff.
Impatient, Dewey decides to jump into action, tasking Kit with hijacking a pirate plane to carry off the Stone. This attempt goes badly, and the situation is further complicated when Della’s sticky patch turns out to be a cocoon. A large butterfly-bear hybrid emerges from it, and soon ends up flying through the air with Della atop it and the Stone being dragged along behind it on ropes. The pirates pursue Della as her companions head back to the Sea Duck, and Huey snaps at Kit and Dewey for persisting in attempting tasks that they clearly have very little skill for. Kit submits to this wisdom, and mounts his airfoil to launch a cloudkicking attack on the pirates while Dewey flies the plane.
Kit manages to disable most of the pirate planes before taking on Don Karnage. Della, meanwhile, is able to cut the Stone of What Was free, allowing Dewey to catch it. She then lands on the Sea Duck, bidding farewell to her unusual ride and praising Dewey’s piloting. Kit then crippled Karnage’s plane, leaving him to plummet into the sea.
Back at Higher for Hire, Kit loads the crated Stone aboard the Sunchaser while Dewey expresses his newfound resolve to become a pilot. Kit then broaches the subject of his service fee, desperate to pay his bank before they sell the Sea Duck. However, the plane’s new owner, Molly Cunningham, informs him that the sale has already gone through. She then offers him a chance to bring his cloudkicking skills to her Danger Woman's Death-Defying Sky Circus, an offer he accepts with some prodding from the Ducks. Karnage, floating on his wrecked plane, bemoans his defeat-until he spots and recovers a fragment of the Stone of What Was torn away by one of his harpoons...
Cast[]
- Danny Pudi as Huey Duck
- Ben Schwartz as Dewey Duck
- Paget Brewster as Della Duck
- Adam Pally as Kit Cloudkicker
- Jaime Camil as Don Karnage
- Eliza Coupe as Molly Cunningham
- Kimberly D. Brooks as Peg Leg Meg, Hard Tack Hattie
- Sam Riegel as Pirates
Trivia[]
- Character absence: Scrooge, Louie, Webby, Launchpad, Mrs. Beakley, Donald
- This is the last episode to use the full theme song.
- An instrumental version of the TaleSpin Spin It theme song is played during the Higher For Hire commercial. Baloo also makes a cameo in the commercial, similar to the show's opening sequence.
- So this is the only episode to feature a character from a Disney animated feature, The Jungle Book (though Baloo has never appeared in person).
- Baloo's fullname from the episode "The Balooest of the Bluebloods", "Baloo von Bruinwald XIII", is mentioned in this episode.
- Like her mother, Molly claims ownership of the Sea Duck.
- Like Baloo, Kit refers to Dewey as "Little Britches".
- There were three references to the Disney show "The Wuzzles
- The plot device for the episode: The Stone of What Was, depicted Bumblelion.
- One of the creations the gang encountered was a nod to Rhinokey.
- The other was a nod to Butterbear.
- When encountering the Rhinokey for the first time, Della's short briefly appears to be white in one shot.
- When running from the Rhinokey, Della switches legs in one shot again since The Trickening!.