European Graphic Novels+

Looks a bit dangerous, but I guess they know what they're doing.

Album of the whole short comic.

Above we have a mischievous little "marsu," directing today's parade. Do we know where we're headed, exactly? (Franquin)

René Hausman

Morris!

Mézières

And once again, Franquin.

Fun fact: elephants, along with crows, dolphins, parrots, octopuses, whales, and we naked apes are considered the smartest, cleverest animals on the planet by the body of science.

Elephants even have funerals, graveyards, and go in to mourning for the loss of their loved ones.

I don't know if Chuck was off his meds that day, but the kids don't seem to mind too much. The drivers, however...

I also happened to find a similar pic, and it's the cover of a biographical BD, which unusually included two CD's complimenting Chuck's story & history. Looks rather promising, I'd say.

A theft 17 centuries in the making!

Well, this is in fact Albert Uderzo's fun tribute to the famous painting from 1632, from the series Astérix, specifically tome 19, Asterix and the Soothsayer (1972), made during the classic period when René Goscinny was still alive and plotting the series. I seem to recall that there's a couple more direct tribute pieces like this across the series.

.

Oh... right, The Raft of the Medusa one certainly comes to mind:

Barbe Rouge, in his shock, is punning on the name of the famous painting, exclaiming "I'm stunned!"

This one seems to echo November's local weather. The character is Freddy Lombard, sort of a perpetually-scowling, vagabond version of Tintin. I believe the panel is from La comète de Carthage (1986), arguably the best of the five "Freddy" albums.

Yves Chaland was highly prolific, and there's much to say about his work, and many more samples to share. Unfortunately, like the late Hubert Boulard, he was one of BD's geniuses who suffered a tragic, early death, dying in a car accident at only 33yo.

For now, here's his Lambiek entry.

Inspired by the master :-)

This atmospheric upper panel from a page in book 2 deserves to stand on it's own, I think.

Set in 11th century Europe, the series concerns the efforts of the wandering noble Sir Aymar de Bois-Maury to reclaim his ancestral home. Less focused on action than the other series of Hermann (like Jeremiah), Les Tours de Bois-Maury deals more with human thoughts and considerations. --WP

So far my personal impression is that the series is a pretty candid look at medieval life, what with its superstitions, ignorance and brutality. Not exactly a 'joy to read,' but nonetheless rather fascinating.

EDIT: Here's a hi-res version with a different color scheme, below.

Trying out cross posting from my mobile :-)

This first one could almost be a "wimmelbilder" piece, i.e. a variation on Where's Waldo? (hmm, could be a good theme for a future post)

In any case, Stella's a freelance artist & cartoonist I recently discovered. By her own admission she's still growing as an artist, for example in handling lighting, but I'm liking what I'm seeing already:

Here's her ArtStation and Tumbler.

Oh, rabbits. This community is coming up on four months now, and if I may say so, we've been a solid community so far, non?

Somehow though, we're *still* not archived via Google. (flip! and double-flip!)

Ah well. Instead of meckern und stöhnen, let's try to do something positive, then. So-- starting with "Lucky Luke," I'll try to convert our Twitter-style links on the sidebar in to useable, clickable search items.

Eh, I guess that's okay for now, but honestly I'm not totally happy about that, since it inherently adds server load to our instance. Hmm, or... is it not, our host @sunaurus@lemm.ee?

This is one of those classic BD's that I didn't have much access to as a kid, which is too bad because it seems to speak to the kid in all of us. So then, I'll let Lambiek do most of the talking:

André Franquin's first experiences with gag strips led to the creation of his iconic Gaston Lagaffe character. Drawn like an American beatnik, the character initially created havoc in the magazine's editorial sections. In Spirou #985, 1957, Gaston simply appeared in the pages without any title or explanation. After a few weeks of puzzling readers, Spirou and Fantasio finally noticed the lanky weirdo with his trademark green pullover sweater and casually dangling cigarette. When Spirou finally asked him who he was, Gaston only mumbled that he was sent there to work, but didn't know by whom or why.

XD

"That? It's a pedal bin with a completely new design."

"Oh right, I remember now it has one last design flaw, what was it again?"

Is it vandalism or an improvement? :D

Although the strip ran for over 30 years, Gaston's superiors never managed to get him to do his job-- sorting the mail! Instead of just doing that, Gaston spends most of his time sleeping behind his desk.

(study for a toy figurine)

But at least when asleep he's harmless. When awake, Gaston uses his energy on culinary experiments, amateur chemistry, and crafting mad inventions, of which the extraordinary "Gaffophone" is the most notorious. Whenever the atrocious instrument is touched, windows crack and walls come down. Most of Gaston's other experiments also end in unexpected accidents, explosions or bodily harm.

Setting: the drivers above are all rightfully furious about the massive traffic jam.

"Wow, I can't believe you caused all that."

"Oh, it's just wood, cardboard, and three flashlights. It's for a store display advertisement with the theme 'red lights are costly.' Anyway, I gotta go take it back. See ya!"

For those interested in reading more, Lambiek has a massive article on Franquin, with a big section on Gaston here. As you'll surely notice, he also (currently) serves as the community's icon. ^^

This ligne claire piece isn't connected to any particular story I'm aware of, but does have a companion view.

More stuff on the artist's Instagram. He also goes by "D.E.C." and "Dec-Art."

While looking up work for Manfred Deix, I chanced across this guy. Funny, they seem to share a rather acid commenting style upon modern life. oO

I'm not completely sure what this last one references. Maybe the fossil fuel industry and wasteful suburbanite living, haha. Actually it reminded me of a fold-in by Lithuanian-American humorist, Al Jaffee. See cartoon #2 here.