The British Face Of French Comics ( November 17, 2010)

 

Over the last few years both myself and Captain Storm,creator of two great Adam Eterno sites,have by accident and hard searching,found that a great many characters from British weekly comics appeared under various names in Finland,Germany,France,Spain and further afield.  The reason we came to a stop is that we really needed comic fans in other countries who could identify the reprints in their own language.

 

 

I mentioned this reprinting to Mike Western,John Cooper and others and most seemed very surprised.  They had been paid and that was it.   Even into the late 1980s,despite Creators Rights,UK companies were selling off foreign rights -the last with OINK! which got three issues in German -none of the creators were told about this.

 

 

Don Lawrence,of course,realised the money being made and asked for a fair share. We all know what happened after that!

 

 

All those artists who were kicked out could have done with that revenue.  One more reason why IPC ought to watch what it claims to own.

 

 

That quintessential British action hero,Battler Britton featured in the Petits BD -I guess we’d say pocket picture library- and was published between July 1958 and June 1986 (n°471).  Not a bad run at all!



Britton seems to still be quite popular considering all the sites discussing his French incarnation.

King Kong anyone?  Or,as we knew it in the UK -Mytek The Mighty.  Yes,that giant robot gorilla got into French editions.

 

And that famous escapologist Janus Stark?  Well,he appeared in Mon Journal as..Janus Stark!  There was a special and even a continuation of the series featuring his son.




And Adam Eterno,that eternally cursed wanderer through time and space.  Yup,he appeared in a French edition also.

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/adameternoforever/
http://adameternoforever.tripod.com/





Edmund Blake from Death Wish -the terribly scarred race driver with a,uh,death wish?  Oh,yeah.  He appeared in French editions -another 1980s export to Europe that creators were not paid for.

And lastly,for now,The Leopard From Lime Street drawn by the late great Mike Western!  Yes. Another export to France.


Representatives from all the old companies would meet at all the European book fairs and just as Amalgamated Press/Fleetway/IPC picked up strips such as Asterix and met with European artists who worked for less money than British creators but still gave us some incredible strips,so it seems that European company reps met with British reps and purchased rights to UK characters.

It might take a book to eventually record which character was published in which country and under what name.  Captain Storm via his groups and I via Britcomics and Eurocomics have catalogued quite a few so far.

I think the good Captain,like myself,were surprised at what we uncovered but I’ve no doubt there are more discoveries to make.

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