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Comment by 2ion | Hacker News Reader

The golden age of Belgo-French comic artists and authors may have been 1960-1990, at least all my favourite series are from this time. They are incredible to this day and always a pleasure to reread. Like Yoko Tsuno by Leloup, Gaston by Franquin, Spirou & Fantasio (esp. the books my Tome and Janry), Valerian and Veronique by Mézières and Christin, Asterix and Obelix, and many more. I'm pretty content that for the length of my childhood, I could read through an entire treasure trove of works that already existed, and wait more the latest ones. Except for the Disney Duck universe, all the other American comic books look very much subpar in quality in direct comparison, regardless of whether in print or as movies, esp. the super hero ones.

Sad to see the industry turn this way.

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Incidentally, Gaston is finally being published in English after several abortive attempts, as Gomer Goof

[EDIT: as an illustration of just how weak the comics market is in the US: Gaston, along with Spirou and Marsupilami, as well as Idées Noires, were all published even in Norwegian - with 5 million Norwegian speakers - pretty much as they were published; Idées Noires was also finally translated to English last year as Franquin's Last Laugh]

There are some gems in American comics too, but part of the problem is that they're often impossible to follow with the incessant cross-overs and re-numbering. Couple that with having the choice of either wafer thin issues or waiting for trade paperback collections, and it's no wonder comics has declined into a niche in the US.

It sounds crazy to me that Franquin's masterworks (Gaston and Idées Noires) were not yet translated in English yet ! For sure it would not appeal to US mass market but certainly there is also a small connoisseur market out there ?

How could you miss Tintin?

We call it "Tim and Struppi" here. Never liked it very much. Though I also forgot e.g. Lucky Luke which I liked very much. There are quite a lot good series.

I'm trying to remember the name of one specific comic or series though: sci-fi theme, floating city in space, many different races live there, there is an elite humanoid alien race with blue skin and 6 eyes in 2 columns, with blue blood wearing skin-tight shiny armor, with psycho-kinetic powers, human male poses as one of them and kills a female alien possibly to steal her power, steals also her space ship, IIRC a chase through the space city ensues.

Maybe somebody knows the book, I absolutely cannot remember if this is from Valerian or something else, any hint would be grately appreciated. I think I read it last 20 years ago. Text was in German. Typical Carlsen/Egmont comic book format.

Edit: It's NOT Yoko Tsuno "City of the Banished Ones". Different series or one-shot.

French here. Your description reminds me a hell of a lot of Valerian and Laureline "Sur les frontières" : https://www.amazon.fr/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?field-keywords=978220...

You should check it out.

(Not sure about the actual translated English title, but a literal translation would be "On the frontiers")

Most Valerian comics are great by the way, and they all have been republished recently, at least in France (and probably also US because of the -rather disappointing- Besson's movie)

YES – that's exactly it, I remember the cover. Thanks!

And Lucky Luke, from the writer of Asterix!

Except for Asterix & Obelix, I haven't come across any of those comics mentioned by you. Are they available in English translation?

It seems so. On Amazon I found Yoko Tsuno, Gomer Goof (English name of Gaston Lagaffe), Spirou & Fantasio, Valerian and Laureline. Personally I would like to add recommendations for stuff like Lucky Luke, Ekho and Blacksad.

Some are: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spirou_et_Fantasio#Translation...

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