Tad Stones

Edward Thaddeus "Tad" Stones is an American animator, screenwriter, producer, director, and storyboard artist who is best known for his work for The Walt Disney Company, where he worked from 1974 to 2003. His most notable credits for Disney include creating, writing, and producing the animated series Darkwing Duck, as well as producing Chip 'n Dale Rescue Rangers, Adventures of the Gummi Bears, Aladdin, and Buzz Lightyear of Star Command.

Career biography[]

Born in Burbank, California, Stones started with Disney training under animation veteran Eric Larson. He entered the Feature Animation training program three days after his college graduation in 1974. After animating a scene in The Rescuers, Stones moved into the story department on The Fox and the Hound. A brief stint at Walt Disney Imagineering followed, where he worked on Epcot's World of Motion and Journey Into Imagination.

Stones worked at Walt Disney Television Animation since its formation in 1984. He was one of the creative forces behind many of the Disney Afternoon shows of the late 1980s and early 1990s. He was a writer for the cartoon Sport Goofy in Soccermania, Stones would continue to work with Walt Disney Animation Studios, turning the pairing of Scrooge McDuck and Donald Duck's nephews into the animated TV series, DuckTales. He was one of the writers and producers of Chip 'n Dale Rescue Rangers and the third season of Adventures of the Gummi Bears.

In 1990, Stones was asked to develop an original concept inspired by two episodes of DuckTales; he illustrated what would eventually become known as Darkwing Duck. He wrote and produced the pilot film for the show, Darkly Dawns the Duck, which premiered in April 1991. After the success of the pilot, he served as writer and producer of the show until the end of its run in late 1992. According to an interview, the character of Gosalyn Mallard was partly based on what he believed his then two-year-old daughter would be like when she grew older.

After Darkwing Duck, Stones served as executive producer, story editor, and director for the Aladdin TV series. In 1994, he co-wrote, produced, and directed The Return of Jafar. He also directed and produced a second sequel to Aladdin in 1996, Aladdin and the King of Thieves, which served as the series finale.

In 1998, Stones served as executive producer of Hercules: The Animated Series. Two years later, he directed the direct-to-video film, Buzz Lightyear of Star Command: The Adventure Begins. The film served as pilot episode to the 2000 television series Buzz Lightyear of Star Command, which Stones also produced. In 2003, he directed Atlantis: Milo's Return, the direct-to-video sequel to the film, Atlantis: The Lost Empire. He worked at Disney for almost three decades before leaving the company in 2003.

Stones returned to Disney in 2011 to write "The Timely Terror of the Time Turtle" for Boom! Studios' Darkwing Duck revival comic, and would later have a vocal cameo voicing a security guard in "The Duck Knight Returns!" episode of the DuckTales reboot, which prominently featured Darkwing. In a 2022 interview, he mentioned that he will be serving as a creative consultant for the Darkwing Duck reboot.^[1]

Disney Role[]

Trivia[]

He regrets putting Negaduck in the Fearsome Five, as the character tended to steal the spotlight; Tad later admitted he would've instead used Splatter Phoenix instead to balance out the group (as Quackerjack and Liquidator were equally lesser known villains).