The Three Mouseketeers

The Three Mouseketeers were comic book characters appearing in their own series of comics for DC Comics from 1956 to 1960, for 26 issues. They were created by Sheldon Mayer, though most of the work was done by Rube Grossman after the first issues.

Though the title was clearly inspired by Alexandre Dumas' novel "The Three Musketeers", nothing else about the characters was, and the name "Mouseketeer" bears no relation to Walt Disney's Mickey Mouse Club members either. The stories revolved around three mice, all members of a club. There was the pompous, self-styled leader, Fatsy, who was obese and wore a sailor's uniform similar to Donald Duck's, then Patsy, tall and dim-witted (also the only Mouseketeer to go without clothing), and last of all Minus, short, dressed in oversized t-shirt and baseball cap with the bill pointing to one side, which gave him a sort of proto-hip hop look. Of the group, Minus was the most likely to get into trouble (a running gag had him getting many demerits from Fatsy) though this was usually not of a malicious nature. The mice met at a clubhouse, which was an old tin can with the open mouth covered by a leaf. The mice rarely used this entrance, preferring an underground secret entrance. Their adventures involved dealing with humans (whom they referred to as the Bigfoots) neighborood cats and a particularly nasty hawk named Hamilton.

The series ended its initial run when DC decided to concentrate on its line of superhero comics. The series did get a revival when it was reprinted for 7 issues from 1970 to 1971; later, in the 1980s, "Mouseketeers" stories were reprinted in digest format along with other classic DC funny animal characters under the "Funny Stuff" banner.

The 1982-1983 DC series "Captain Carrot and his Amazing Zoo Crew" featured a time-travel story where the Three Mouseketeers were re-imagined as direct parodies of Dumas' "Musketeer" characters, existing as historical figures on Earth-C, a world populated by anthropomorphic animals of various species rather than human beings. Though altered in personality and costume, these Mousketeers kept the same disparate body types as the original characters.