Dewey's golfing skills start outgrowing his mentor's.
While accompanying Scrooge during his annual Duckburg Billionaires Club Golf Invitational against Glomgold, the gang gets transported to a mystical golf course that they must complete in order to return home.Tropes
- Affably Evil: The kelpies are quite friendly and sweet about openly wanting to drown our heroes.
- All Girls Like Ponies: Webby squees when the group encounters two pink and purple colored talking ponies until she realizes that they're actually kelpies. Dewey actually wonders whether the group is dead and they've gone to Webby's idea of heaven.
- Announcer Chatter: Huey and Launchpad act as commentators for the golf game. Justified because Huey is doing it to earn a Junior Woodchuck merit badge (and since he's required to have a partner Launchpad stepped in).
- Artistic License – Sports: Subverted. When Dewey offers to sub in for Scrooge when the latter is having trouble on the first hole, Scrooge tells him that the rules of golf don't allow that. Briar then informs the group that Druid Golf actually does allow twosomes to compete.
- Berserk Button: Dewey snatching his club to take a wild swing on the penultimate hole proves to be this for Scrooge.Scrooge: You pull a club out of a Scotsman's hand, you best be prepared to KNOCK HIM OUT WITH IT!
- Bizarre and Improbable Golf Game: Made even more so by taking place on a mystical golf course with live obstacles.
- Broken Pedestal: After it's made clear that Scrooge cares more about golfing glory than his own family's safety, Dewey and Webby angrily shun him. It does get rebuilt later, both figuratively and literally, when Scrooge admits he can't make the final shot and instead lets Dewey take it, holding him up on his shoulders to reach it as he and the others are petrified by the mists.
- Buffy Speak: Louie refers to the kelpies that try to lure the group to their deaths as "murder ponies"
- Butt-Monkey: In this episode, Glomgold is pretty much the brunt of any physical violence that can happen in the course.
- Casting Gag: The Kelpies' (A.K.A the "murder ponies") VAs are Tara Strong and Andrea Libman, who respectively voice Twilight Sparkle, Pinkie Pie, and Fluttershy.
- Cultural Posturing: Of both the national and familial variety: Scrooge is very proud of the fact that their ancestor "Black" Donald McDuck both invented golf and got it banned by King James due to his frequent tantrums over losing; lampshaded by Louie asking if that's really something to be proud of.
- Death Glare:
- Webby gives one to Louie when he gestures for payment in exchange for a golf club.
- All the ducks give the kelpies one at the start when they suggest going for a swim, although Glomgold is a bit behind the others.
- Double Meaning:
- Bramble says "It can be awful hard to play once those mists roll in." While mists do make it hard to see while in one, these kind of mists also petrify those who don't finish the game on time.
- When trying to make the final shot, Scrooge tries to scramble up a wall but can't get enough purchase. Webby realizes that they need to support (i.e. raise) Scrooge so he can climb it. Dewey, still sulking over his confrontation with Scrooge, begins whining about how Scrooge hasn't supported (i.e. encouraged) him all day.Webby: No, we need to support Scrooge! Not everything's a life lesson!
- Dumbass Has a Point: Launchpad (of all people) says that a good teacher's pride should be in his student and not himself.
- Epic Fail: Glomgold flips a Two-Headed Coin in order to go first in golf. He ends up calling for tails. And to top it off, he fails at tossing it into the ocean in anger.
- Everybody Knew Already: The ducks figure out what the mystical golf course is and how it came to be, much to the kelpies' annoyance. The kelpies also show up to gloat that the Fog of Doom the course is surrounded in turns anyone unlucky enough to be caught in it into stone mere seconds after the ducks already discovered that.
- Exposition Already Covered: After Scrooge and his family, along with Glomgold, are transported to a mystical golf course, they meet two kelpies, Briar and Bramble. When Bramble asks them if they wonder where they are, they already figured out where they are and the purpose of the golf course by observing their surrounding, which annoys the kelpies.Bramble: Bet you're all wondering what this place is?
Louie: It's a mystical golf course, right?
Huey: Did ancient Scottish Druids build a secret course so they could keep playing golf, even after Black Donald got it banned?
Briar: (annoyed) Uh, yep. That's all correct. - Fate Worse than Death: The kelpies imply being turned to stone is this, offering again to drown everyone and claiming they'd be better off that way.
- Fog of Doom: At first it only seems like an Ominous Fog, but as they reach the last hole, they realize that it turns people to stone.
- Foreshadowing:
- While talking about the family's golf history, Scrooge offhandedly mentions that King James temporarily banned golf in Scotland as a result of Black Donald's temper tantrums. It later turns out that the course the groups get transported to was built by the Scottish druids as a way to continue playing the game in secret.
- After Glomgold bribes Louie to be his caddy, and Louie casually agrees since he figures he might as well get paid while being bored, Glomgold gloats to Scrooge that his own nephews are abandoning him and soon there will be no one left to support him. How right he was.
- When Dewey does surprisingly well on his stroke and Webby excitedly predicts that someday he might be better than Scrooge, Scrooge soaks up their praise over him being a good teacher but downplays the idea that Dewey might surpass him, insisting that it'll take years of practice and hard work to be nearly as good as him. Later, Scrooge becomes openly jealous of Dewey's natural talent over him, and Dewey calls Scrooge out on never supporting him.
- Generation Xerox: He's never seen, but the inventor of Golf and one of Scrooge's ancestors, Black Donald McDuck, had a horrible temper that resulted in such constant tantrums that lead to King James banning the game, not unlike the present day's Donald Duck.
- Go-Karting with Bowser: Scrooge is willing to participate in a friendly golf game against his mortal enemy Flintheart Glomgold.
- Graceful Loser: The kelpies are actually impressed that Dewey managed to win the golf game and turn everyone back to normal and even congratulate him and present him with a trophy, though it was put together at the last second as they believed nobody could ever complete the course.
- Green-Eyed Monster: Scrooge soon gets jealous of Dewey's golf ability once the latter starts to perform better than him.
- Gretzky Has the Ball: While doing commentary with Huey, Launchpad rattles off a bunch of random sports jibberish. Huey flat out asks him if he knows what's happening, to which Launchpad blithely responds "One heck of a game!".
- Hypocrite: During their fight, Scrooge tells Dewey that the stakes of the competition are too high for Dewey's "showboating". Dewey angrily yells back that practically every word out of Scrooge's mouth in the episode has revolved around what a brilliant golfer he is, and that Scrooge is by and far more guilty of showboating than Dewey has been.
- Incredibly Lame Fun: Louie's opinion of golf."It's a sport where you try not to score points to make it end sooner. Hard pass."
- Ineffectual Sympathetic Villain: The kelpies are really bad at getting people to ride them, and even the one time it does work with Launchpad, Huey saves him before they can reach the water.
- It Runs in the Family: Apparently golf was invented by Black Donald McDuck and so all of his descendants, including Scrooge and Dewey are naturals at it. Also Black Donald's temper appears to run in the family too, just ask Donald. Also his tantrums over losing, as Scrooge demonstrates.
- Jerkass Realization: After Scrooge's jealousy of Dewey's natural talents boils over into a shouting match, he realizes he was being petty and obviously feels guilty about it.
- Leaning on the Fourth Wall: Webby is excited to see "talking animals wearing clothes." While in-universe that may be the case since sapient bipedal talking animals (especially ducks and dogs) are this universe's equivalent to people (since "hyper-intelligent hairless apes" like humans aren't present), we the audience know that's exactly what they are.
- Literally Shattered Lives: As Scrooge realizes that the statues around the eighteenth hole are golfers turned to stone by the mists, one of the statues is shown to have fallen apart.
- Meaningful Name: Briars and brambles are forms of dense, thorny brush that tend to appear in places that have been abandoned or neglected for a very long time, often making progress through such areas difficult, if not dangerous.
- Ms. Exposition: Briar and Bramble's job is to explain the rules and dangers of the course.
- My Little Phony: Briar and Bramble are an extensive Shout-Out / parody of My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic, complete with two of the lead voice actors from that show.
- Mythology Gag:
- Just like in the original comics, Black Donald McDuck (named for his foul temper) was the inventor of golf.
- The end of the episode recalls the original series' Grand Finale, "The Golden Goose". Both involve the cast rushing to stop a force that will turn everyone into a statue (golden there; stone here) and end with the curse just barely being broken at the very last second right as the last member of the party has been transformed into a statue.
- Noodle Incident: Apparently, Glomgold caught fire before while playing golf.
- No Social Skills: Webby, having never been to a golf match before, cheers and does distracting stunts like an overzealous sports fanatic, which is the exact opposite of how golf spectators should act.
- Obliviously Evil: The kelpies are cute and amiable, but seem endlessly driven to try to get people to ride them so they can drown them. To them it's just what they do.
- O.O.C. Is Serious Business: When the kelpies mention the treasure at the end of the course, Louie of all people says they should ignore them and go home.
- Plot-Irrelevant Villain: Glomgold doesn't do anything antagonistic in this episode aside from trash talking Scrooge during their match and hiring Louie to be his caddie to spite him. In fact, he's on the heroes' side as both parties want to escape the mystic realm and return home.
- Portal Cut: Huey and Launchpad's golf cart is cut in half when partially transported to the other golf course. This results in Launchpad carrying the front around until the kelpies carry it into the river when they attempt to drown him.
- Portmanteau Couple Name: An In-Universe non-romantic one: Webby refers to the golfing team consisting of Scrooge and Dewey as "Team Screwey". "Screwy" is a word meaning "damaged" or "not right", which perfectly describes Scrooge and Dewey's relationship as it continues to sour throughout the episode.
- Pun-Based Title: The episode's title is a play on the term "missing link" and on the word "links", a traditional Scottish golf course.
- Running Gag:
- Louie, whom Glomgold hired to be his caddie, refusing to do anything that is asked unless Glomgold gives him money first. This is Played for Laughs when Scrooge asks Louie to hand up a club to him, Louie expects to be paid first.
- The kelpies being Obviously Evil as they continue asking the cast if they wanna go swimming, and the quick No’s they’re given in response.
- The kelpies also tend to show up to gloatingly reveal various dangers of the golf course... seconds after the ducks have already worked out said dangers.
- Screw This, I'm Outta Here: Louie tries to leave when he realizes what the adventure is.Louie: Oh, no. Oh, no, no, no, no, no. Guys, it's golf. It's still golf! Okay, that's it, I'm going home. ...Where did home go?
- Shout-Out:
- Many eagle-eyed fans will notice this when they see the kelpies. Even their voice actors are dead giveaways, even if they are color-swapped note .
- The "greatest golfer in the world" (that Glomgold refuses to listen to and fires) is a tiger
. - Huey and Launchpad's announcer outfits are based on the famous yellow blazers worn by ABC Sports personnel in the 1960s and 70s; Launchpad's is complete with a badge resembling the logo of Wide World Of Sports, which aired many golf events over the years. (And of course, Disney owns ABC.)
- Shown Their Work:
- The episode avoids Artistic License – Sports by depicting the rules of golf accurately, particularly when Scrooge forgoes taking a stroke penalty by playing his ball that was hit in the woods.
- The ring of stones that serves as the portal to the druish golf course resemble Pictish standing stones, one of which (the Maiden Stone) is believed to be one of the earliest known depictions of kelpies.
- King James II of Scotland really did ban golf!
- Sitcom Archnemesis: This is among the few times Glomgold is just a typical rival without plotting to murder Scrooge in any way.
- Skewed Priorities:
- Scrooge initially places his need to be the best at golf over the safety of his own family. Dewey and Webby call him out on this.
- Louie is hired as Glomgold's caddie. He immediately proceeds to charge Glomgold for every gesture of assistance. Not exactly skewed yet, but this behaviour reaches mind-blowing levels at the climax, where even though the curse has started turning everyone to stone, he still tries to charge money for handing out golf clubs - to his own family.
- Spotting the Thread: Webby immediately recognizes the talking colorful ponies as kelpies upon noticing their wet manes (which is a key way to identify them in mythology as well). The kelpies try to pass this off as having just showered, to no avail.
- Super Ringer: Glomgold hired the best golfer in the world (the Disneyverse counterpart to Tiger Woods, apparently) just to be his caddie. He then fires the man for offering basic golfing advice.
- Sure, Let's Go with That: Despite Glomgold nakedly trying to cheat at the coin toss by rigging it with a double-headed coin, failing to cheat at the coin toss by guessing the coin toss incorrectly, and then failing to throw the coin into the ocean, Scrooge decides to just concede that Glomgold "won" the coin toss because it's quicker than indulging his tantrum.
- Taken for Granite: Golfers who don't finish the game fast enough are cursed to an eternal fate of being stone statues. The main cast actually suffer this fate too, until Dewey manages to complete the game right as he finishes turning to stone.
- Technician vs. Performer: Part of Scrooge's jealousy towards Dewey's golf skills is that he spent years perfecting his swing technique while Dewey just randomly hits the ball and manages to place the ball better.
- Treants: One purple tree-giant lives on the magical golf course. Glomgold enrages it by hitting its head with a golf ball.
- Two-Headed Coin: Glomgold uses one for the starting coin flip. Unfortunately, he called tails by mistake.
- Unusual Euphemism: In keeping with his usual alliterative minced oaths, when Scrooge sees the standing stone circle activate, he mutters in awe "heavenly Hollyhock".
- Unwitting Instigator of Doom: Louie's indifference (and impatience) toward the game of golf results in him heckling at Scrooge to hurry up while he is taking his inital tee-off, causing Scrooge to slice the ball wide into the rough, necessitating the group entering the woods to find it and discovering the standing stone teleportation circle in the process.
- Likewise, Scrooge is so fixated on his unbroken winning streak that he claims to Glomgold that it was on purpose, and then, rather than accept a stroke and distance penalty so they can return to the fairway, he insists that "a Scotsman plays it where it lands", activating the stone circle and transporting the whole party to the mystical golf course dimension.
- Visual Pun: Glomgold hired the best golfer in the world to be his caddie. Said golfer is an anthropomorphic tiger, an obvious reference to Tiger Woods.
- Voice Changeling: One of the kelpies try to trick the cast by replicating Webby's voice. She apparently didn't notice Webby also happened to be in front of her and is fully aware her lips were not moving.
- What the Hell, Hero?: Dewey eventually grows sick of Scrooge trying to hog all the glory of being the best at golf, at the expense of his family's wellbeing.
- You Were Trying Too Hard: Glomgold's game immediately improves after Louie advises him to just hit the ball in the hole - apparently, he had been overthinking it this whole time.Glomgold: Holy haggis! It went forward! It stayed on the field! I'm not on fire! Have I been overthinking it this whole time?
