Belgian and French kids' comics

[STARBOY]

I'd like to mention the Thompson Twins !

[philcom55]

Funnily enough I picked up this unusual graphic novel a couple of weeks ago at a local book fair. It appears to be set in the late 1980s where Tintin himself is English and on the dole (though goodness knows how it ever made it into print without the publisher being sued to bits!).



- Phil R.

[paw broon]

Couple of sites covering Pif and Spirou.
http://tout.spirou.pagesperso-orange.fr/index.htm
www.pif-collection.com/

Mon Journal continued into the 80's, I think, and I'm now looking at Mon Journal Sunny Sun #23, 1979. This series is pocket sized (same size as a picture library). A number of stories and characters revolved through the run. There is a huge history of French and Belgian comics in many different formats and I'm intrigued by the subject.

[philcom55]

You could well be right about Mon Journal continuing in some form Paw. At the moment this is the only piece I've been able to find about it:

http://www.bibliotheque.toulouse.fr/titres-pg03.html

Compared to the British story papers I'd say it was aimed at a slightly younger audience, though some of the illustrations (and particularly the covers) are quite outstanding.

- Phil Rushton

[Robbie Moubert]

I'm not sure that Thompson and Thomson (or Dupond and Dupont in the originals) were meant to be English. Is there a source for this theory?

We've discussed the Asterix reprints here before. The Valiant reprints came first. The first book, Asterix the Gaul, began in the issue dated 16th November 1963. It started as "Little Fred and Big Ed" and later, when Obelix is absent from the action, became "Little Fred, the Ancient Brit with Bags of Grit". After Ranger/Look and Learn's "Britons Never, Never, Never Shall be Slaves" (Asterix and the Big Fight), Look and Learn reprinted Asterix and Cleopatra as "In the Days of Good Queen Cleo."

[dishes]

Thompson and Thomson (who are emphatically NOT twins- I blame that dodgy '80s pop group for popularising that misconception! I mean they have different surnames), were not British, no. As R Moubert points out above, their original names are Dupont and Dupond. Though admittedly they look and act British.

Phil, I've seen that anarchist Tintin pastiche. The printing press must have been beneath the radar of the copyright holders. Or sometimes it's just not worth while suing someone if they clearly don't have any money.

[paw broon]

More on Mon Journal:-
http://bdmonjournal.free.fr/sunny/index.htm
http://bdmonjournal.free.fr/index.htm
And, just found this - a page on Leopard of Lime Street, in French. Haven't read it all yet but here is the link:-
http://www.pimpf.org/mjm/articles/limes ... opard.html

[David McDonald]

Interesting thread, Im not overly familiar with mainland comics, beyond the excellent Astrix and bits by Mobius and Bilal. Would love to search out more. Any recommended english translations?
I know that Robot Archie, Janus Stark and possibly Adam Eterno continued their adventures beyond their British end in European comics, thank god for the translate function!

David

[philcom55]

This book which I picked up at a local book fair a couple of years ago gives a fascinating glimpse of the rich history of comics in the French-speaking world:



Sadly the publishers failed to include an automatic 'translate' function.

- Phil Rushton

[paw broon]

Phoenix, I remember the En Route book and I'm sure we used it here. I regret to admit that I don't recall the benjamin bit. However, in my French class a couple of weeks ago, we came across the phrase,"l'age de raison", which also seems to refer to a child of 13 or 14 (can't quite remember). I'd never heard or seen this phrase. C'est marrant.

[Phoenix]

Phoenix, I remember the En Route book and I'm sure we used it here. I regret to admit that I don't recall the benjamin bit. However, in my French class a couple of weeks ago, we came across the phrase,"l'age de raison", which also seems to refer to a child of 13 or 14 (can't quite remember). I'd never heard or seen this phrase. C'est marrant.

Here are the relevant pages, Paw. As for l'age de raison in your context, it is obviously referring to the period during which children learn to think for themselves and act responsibly, although it must be accepted that this period could be quite a long one, given that plenty of adults in the news and gossip columns haven't quite managed yet to come to terms with its implications.

[paw broon]

Thank you, Phoenix. That took me back!

[dishes]

Here are the characters I recognise from the cover of Philcom's book:


Tail at top: Marsupilami
1: ?
2: Alfred (from Zig et Puce
3: Lucky Luke
4: ?
5: ?
6: Iznogoud
7: Bécassine
8: Blake
9: Mortimer
10: ?
11: A Stroumpf (or Smurf)
12: Gaston Lagaffe
13: Astérix
14: Tintin
15: Spirou
16: ?
17: Milou (Snowy)

David McDonald, if you are an Asterix fan you might try Iznogoud which was intially by the same writer (Goscinny) and drawn by an artist with a very similar style to Asterix's artist Uderzo. Though it's short stories rather than the long adventures of Asterix and with more outlandish use of magic plot devices. Some volumes were translated by the Asterix translators Bell and Hockridge in the 1960s (I found one in a charity shop the other week- they'll retain the same number of puns by hook or by crook!) but new translations by Cinebooks have now been released.

[Phoenix]

David McDonald, if you are an Asterix fan you might try Iznogoud which was intially by the same writer (Goscinny) and drawn by an artist with a very similar style to Asterix's artist Uderzo.

Weren't this character's adventures turned into cartoons for TV? I never watched any but I'm sure I recall the name Iznogoud from TV listings in the Radio Times.

[Digifiend]

Yes it was, I remember it. Used to be on Fox Kids (must've been around 1996-7, the cartoon was made in 1995). Here's the OP.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SIM5Kd-lK1s