Berlin: Go ahead, miracle! 10 Eurocomics That Are Ready for Adaptation

As Hollywood's superhero pipeline begins to dry up, 'Tinton,' 'Black and Mortimer' and other comedies offer a wealth of material from across the pond.

Historically, the relationship between Hollywood and European comic books has been fraught with mutual distrust and cultural disharmony. No disrespect to Steven Spielberg — one of our national treasures — but his 2011 adaptation of The Adventures of Tintin was a disaster. And when La Femme Nikita director Luc Besson fulfilled a childhood fantasy by bankrolling Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets out of his own pocket in 2017, the most expensive independent film of all time bombed at the global box office. Landed with a bang.

But there is hope on the horizon. European comic books – in particular, the Franco-Belgian school led by the Tintin character and its creator Hergé – are both a multi-million euro industry and a prolific art form with dozens of successful franchises waiting to be developed. . N

Oh that Marvel and DC's offerings are starting to feel tired, at least this might be the perfect moment for Hollywood to tap into this treasure trove of fresh stories and memorable characters.

Here are the 10 candidates:

Blake and Mortimer - Belgium

Captain Blake is an officer in the British Army. Professor Mortimer is a physicist with a notorious knack for dabbling in international conspiracies that occasionally veer towards science fiction. His adventures mostly take place during the 40s and 50s, which is close to the Tintin canon - which makes sense, since his creator, Belgian artist Edgar P. Jacobs, collaborated with Herji. , before they get out on their own. The Blake and Mortimer franchise boasts panoramic vistas straight from David Lean's epic and densely layered dialogue. Originally published in 1950, the two-volume collection The Mystery of the Great Pyramid is a brilliant archaeological yarn involving lost treasures, hieroglyphics and nefarious villains. After Jacobs' death in 1987, a number of notable writers and artists kept the heroes alive with new installments.

Alex - France/Belgium

Not only did Herji single-handedly create 23 Tintin books, he also founded a comic journal in 1946—Le Journal Tintin—where friends and colleagues contributed a weekly page to each ongoing story. One of them was Jacques Martin, an incredibly talented writer and illustrator whose greatest work was Alex, about a young wandering hero at the end of the Roman Empire. Protected by Julius Caesar and persecuted by Pompey, Alex and his allies travel across the Mediterranean, Africa, and beyond. Following the precise, carefully documented style of Hergé (known in French as "ligne claire" - "clear line"), Alix books boast drawings with a rich palette of primary colors and lighting effects. Martin created 20 volumes of his own, but the series continued after his death in 2010, spawning the spin-off franchise Alex, the Senator.

Lucky Luke - Belgium

After Hergé, the most prolific creator of French-language comics was scriptwriter René Goscinny, whose three main series - Asterix, Lucky Luke and Iznogoud - sold millions of copies. Rich in Morris's sprightly, almost cartoonish drawings, Lucky Luke is a comedic Western in the vein of Desperate Rides Again and El Dorado, with occasional glimpses of Sergio Leone's spaghetti-asstic. The franchise lives on, but the best books came out between 1957 and 1977, when Gosney wrote the stories, peppering them with his witty dialogue. An eccentric, good-natured - and very lonely - cowboy with exceptional gun skills, Luke rides the prairies of the Old West with his horse, Jolly Jumper, alongside real-life characters like Billy the Kid, Calamity Jane and the Dalton Brothers. The characters have to face. Here as four criminal nutjobs who are always looking for new ways to get out of jail.

Iznogoud - France

In ancient Baghdad, its benevolent but foolish Caliph has no idea that his Machiavellian Grand Vizier Aznogod spends his days planning the perfect assassination to seize the throne. Sadly for Iznogoud, his diabolical endeavors are destined to fail. The set-up may seem pedestrian, but in the hands of writers Gosny and Jeanne Tabri's rough, impressionistic drawings, the trick becomes a surreal existential maze that seems to have sprung from a Jorge Luis Borges short story. Gosquini's poking fun at every Arabian Nights trope is hilarious - but his fate and his review of his design create some profound inconsistencies.

Corto Maltese - Italy

Why Corto Maltese's character wasn't turned into a huge movie franchise in America remains a mystery. A six-episode series with Frank Miller writing and executive producing has been announced for late 2022, but it remains to be seen if the team can capture the charm of their hero. Think of Corto the same way.

Pratt had an unrealistic ego. The beautiful drawings and watercolor works are dreamy and evocative. The characters of the women in Corto are so unforgettable - brilliant, defiant, stubbornly independent - that they inspired an entire book dedicated to them, The Women of Corto Maltese.

India Dreams - France

Maryse and Jean-François Charles make a strong and criminally underrated team. She writes the script, and her husband takes care of the art in a wide-ranging series of historical adventures that travel from the Congo and Egypt to China, and US India Dreams is their best effort - a story that is about the conflict between India and the British colonialists during The reign that led to David Lane's passage to India and the classic British miniseries The Jewel in the Crown. With its delicate erotic scenes, pervasive sense of dread and occasional bursts of violence – every frame here is a sublime tableau – it would make a great Netflix series.

Torpedo 1936 - Spain

Veteran American artist Alex Toth contributed to the first installments of this groundbreaking series by Spanish scriptwriter Enrique Sánchez Aboli. Toth was reportedly put off by the story's vulgarity and darkly tinted cosmovision, and refused to continue. His replacement, Jordy Burnett, enhanced Torpedo's aesthetic with black and white images and normal shadows and light textures. Torpedo is a sociopathic Sicilian mobster who plies his trade in Depression-era New York, aided by his hapless sidekick Rascal. Abuli's short stories - at times, they work almost like comic puns - create a depressing mosaic of gratuitous violence, excessive sexuality and gleeful political incorrectness. Their corny dialogues, dark plot twists and careless morals are every bit as wrong as possible, making Torpedo addictive fun in trainwreck style.

Amours Fragiles — France/Belgium

The Franco-Belgian comic book format is well-suited to a wide-ranging milieu spanning several decades. One of the best is the nine-volume series Amours Fragiles, written by Philippe Richelle with art by Jean-Michel Beuriot, which began in 2001 and concluded last September. It begins in 1932, when Martin Mahner, a highly sensitive and painfully shy college student and German national, is swept up in the turmoil of World War II and falls in love with a Jewish girl. While the suspense is there, this incredibly sophisticated tour de force focuses mostly on watching its characters from afar, as well as the pivotal events that transform and shock their lives. It is ready for maximum adaptation.

Les 4 As — Belgium

Shades of Scooby-Doo in this charming series about the adventures of four friends in the 1960s and 70s France: Lastik, the athletic team leader; Dina, cosmopolitan but always too easily intimidated; The Doctor, a bookish nerd obsessed with quoting as much Latin as possible; Buffy, a gourmet cook and bon vivant; and their dog, Oscar. More than 40 books were published, but the first 10 are the best, including Sea Serpents at a Summer Resort, A Haunted Mansion, and Journey to India. This down-to-earth series gets points for its laid-back imagery and bubbly character interactions.

Tinton - Belgium

Tintin is to European comics what The Beatles were to pop: the core spirit around which everything else revolves. This means that the Tintin franchise - known for its blend of non-stop action, mystery, quirky characters and a delightful sense of humor - is officially set for a major reboot. One must finally realize that computer animation isn't just the right medium to capture Tintin's rich visual zeitgeist (Tinton and sidekick Captain Haddock both look a little creepy in the 2011 version.) If one is to capture So a wider visual canvas and more POVs are needed. The Tintin books in all their glory. Perhaps the most unusual entry in the series, The Castafire Emerald – a vivid, intriguing mystery set in the Belgian countryside of the 60s could, in the right hands, have been a wonderful film.