Friday, April 20, 2007

The Flying Furies

'The Flying Furies' appeared in Lion in April to September 1966 at a time when Fleetway Publications were experimenting with reprints of European strips. Indeed, Champion, the latest Fleetway release from that period, was full of reprints including 'Jet Jordan', a reprint of 'Dan Cooper' by Albert Weimberg from Tintin.

'The Flying Furies' was almost certainly rescripted rather than given a straight translation, making identification a little more difficult. I'd love to know where this strip originally appeared -- possibly Pilote -- and what it was originally called. The copyright is to Dargoud SA.
Update:

And the answer, from Johns around the world, is 'Tanguy et Laverdure'. My thanks to John Wigmans and John Adcock for the information.

John A. tells me "The answer to your question comes from Huib Van Opstal, author of the magnificent graphic work Essay RG. Het fenomeen Hergé (1994):

The strip is from France, 'Tanguy et Laverdure' by Albert Uderzo (art) and Jean-Michel Charlier (text), a world famous do that did successful comics in all genres. A fine strip, with suspense and humour, started in 1959 in the French magazine Pilote. In the early 1960s it appeared in translation in the Dutch comics weekly Pep, one of my favourites as a young kid. (Uderzo's other collaboration with René Goscinny produced the even more famous comic strip 'Asterix and Obelix'.)

Nice to see the translated names in the example you just e-mailed, unknown to me. This page seems to be drawn by Jijé, it seems.

From 1959 on in Pilote magazine, the first batch was by Uderzo & Charlier team:

1 L'
école des Aigles (in album by Dargaud 1961)
2 Pour l'Honneur des cocardes (1962)
3 Danger dans le ciel (1963)
4 Escadrille des cigognes (1964)
5 Mirage sur l'Orient (1965)
6 Canon bleu ne r
éspond plus (1966)
7 Cap Z
éro (1967)
8 Pirates du ciel (1967), assisted by Marcel Uderzo & Jean Giraud

After that, other artists took over while J. M. Charlier kept on doing the text. The second batch was drawn by the Belgian comic artist Jij
é:

9 Les anges noirs (1968)
10 Mission sp
éciale (1968), pp.1-16 by Albert Uderzo
11 Destination Pacifique (1969), assisted by Daniel Chauvin
12 Menace sur Mururoa (1969), assisted by Daniel Chauvin
13 Lieutenant Double Bang (1970), assisted by Daniel Chauvin
14 Baroud sur le d
ésert (1970), assisted by Daniel Chauvin
15 Les vampires attaquent la nuit (1971), assisted by Daniel Chauvin
16 La terreur vient du ciel (1971), assisted by Daniel Chauvin
17 Mission derni
èr chance (1972)
18 Un DC8 a diparu (1973), assisted by Patrice Serres
19 La mystérieuse escadre delta (1979)
20 Op
ération tonnerre (1981), assisted by Patrice Serres
21 Premi
ères missions (1981), assisted by Daniel Chauvin
22 Station brouillard (1982), assisted by Daniel Chauvin

23 Plan de vol pour l'enfer (1982), art by Patrice Serres
24 L'espion venu du ciel (1984), art by Patrice Serres
25 Suvol interdit (1988), art by Al Coutelis

Me again: I've added a number of titles to Huib's original list. It seems that Jijé (Joseph Gillain) was the artist for the series between 1966-70, drawing 17 adventures. The series was subsequently relaunched by Jean-Claude Laidin (writer) as Les Nouvelles Aventures de Tanguy et Laverdure:

26 Prisonniers des serbes (2002), art by Yvan Fernandez
27 Opération opium (2005), art by Renaud Garreta

George (see Comments) has identified the published story as the very first, 'L'école des Aigles', which began serialisation in the debut issue of Pilote dated 22 October 1959.

You can find more information on the series here and at Wikipedia France.

4 comments:

  1. Hi Steve,

    I think it is Tanguy&Laverdure, a French comic by Albert Uderzo and Jean-Michel Charlier. Take a look at the following site: http://www.bedetheque.com/serie-137-BD-Tanguy-et-Laverdure.html. I do not know which of the original stories were reprinted in Lion.
    Hope this helps.

    John

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  2. This comment has been removed by the author.

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  3. Interesting to see that Tanguy and Lavadure got a reprint in a British weekly. It always surprises me how (relatively) little cross-over there is between the European and British weeklies. I imagine publishers would be crying out for quality product, and on the other side of the water there's a raft of work just needing a simple translation and a licensing deal.

    A few years later there was a straight translation of T&G put out in an annual by World Publishers. There's actually a copy on Ebay right now. It gathers together two Franco-Belgian volumes with both characters using their original names. A few pages have been cut, otherwise it's all there.

    This is actually a reprint of the very first story, L'école des Aigles, and is drawn by Uderzo. I think the art has been rejigged for Lion - the rocket you see taking off is from the bottom part of page 21 of the European book reprint of the strip.

    Oh, and Jijé and Jean Giraud are two different people.

    George

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  4. Thanks, George. A mix up between my Girs and my Jijes... I've now corrected the text just in case nobody gets as far as reading the comments.

    The eBay link refers to The Aeronauts Annual 1973, published by World Distributors in 1972.

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