Pour en finir avec le cinéma

What is cinema? What is its effect on us? Why do we love it so much? These are all questions to which Blutch seeks the answers in his considered and humble way, drawing on his prodigious cultural knowledge and his gift for the comic book form. He references Burt Lancaster, Jean Gabin, Michel Piccoli, Luchino Visconti, Claudia Cardinale, Tarzan, Psychose, and many more. As much comic book as graphic essay, this reverie on the narrative art of image marks the advent of one of today’s masters of the 9th art.

Allow us to introduce Olympia, an exquisite young woman living in post-First-World-War Berlin, a time when the town was continually shaken up by internal revolutions and cultural turbulence. Olympia is beautiful. Louise Brooks-style beautiful. She is the archetype of that generation of war-women, the likes of which we’ll never see again. Her father, Count Van Den Golzt, sends his daughter to Berlin following the Bolsheviks’ establishment in Courlande, a move that he knew was a threat to the safety of his family. She soon becomes a fascinating character, with lovers from all walks of life, from bespectacled Communist intellectuals, to pimps. Alongside her decadent lifestyle, she fights passionately for the Socialist cause. Nihilistic, but driven, she ends up in the arms of the most unlikely suitor.

How does a little wood elf become a master thief? How did he come to possess Nepher and Bepher, his two magical swords, one devoted to the light and the other the shadows? Where did his inordinate love for dragons come from? The mysteries of the life of Heads-or-Tails are finally revealed as we learn of the events that shaped him before the winds of destiny carried him into The Black Moon Chronicles.

This first volume of the Ken Games series gives us a profile of Peter Fermat (aka Rock), a young man who, like each of the three main characters, is leading a double life. His story opens with a boxing match which has a nasty ending for the up-and-coming boxer, despite his victory. It’s not long before we discover that Rock is not only striving to make it in the boxing world, but is also something of a mathematical genius, which is how he met his best friend, TJ. For the first time in all their years of friendship, TJ introduces Rock to a girlfriend, the lovely Anne. Anne and Rock soon establish a bond of trust when Rock discovers that Anne too is living a double life, even though Anne’s secret is not exactly what she leads Rock to believe. This is just the beginning of the tangled web of lies and deception that gets ever more convoluted as the series goes on…

Pablo Escobar is widely considered to have been the most successful criminal in history and to have invented modern-day drug trafficking. At the height of his career, the Colombian kingpin was making a million dollars a day smuggling cocaine into the United States. Here is the tale of the final days of “El Patrón,” folk hero to some, public enemy number one to others, doting father and family man, ruthless murderer and an outlaw like no other.

Abandoned in a hostile wilderness, Paul has been rescued by a biologist, Mr. Amid. The scientist is studying the pearls that are Altair’s true wealth – and more particularly the plants that produce them and that appear to be dying off. Amid offers to take on Paul as his assistant, but the young man is still looking for his father. As he follows the trail, Paul becomes tougher and more inured to life on his new planet – and to human nature.

Alexandre, the victim of a financial conspiracy, has taken on a new identity, and now living as the wealthy Dantès continues on his path for revenge. However, new events threaten both his plans and his life: not only are the Russian mafia prepared to do anything to recover their money, but his real identity is no longer a secret to the Machiavellian Jean Saint-Hubert, the man behind his downfall. And with the extreme-right party “French Nation” seemingly financed by this plot that ruined him, he and his loved ones find themselves under attack from all sides…

The unique and truly French super hero is back, like a phoenix from the ashes, to save France once again and to restore it to greatness in a world going to the dogs.
Superdupont’s reboot gets a kick-start with the birth of his son who, astonishingly, has inherited the supernatural powers of his father. Perhaps together they can finally bring down the enemies of their wonderful homeland!

At the center of the empire was the Oracle… The Oracle announced the coming of the one who would change the world. This is his story. One day, when Heads-or-Tails was out roaming the forest, he comes across a nameless man. He christens him Wismerhill, and from that day forth, the pair are inseparable. They start out on the road of adventure, and sooner or later end up joining a gang of amiable war dogs, feared throughout the land. Wismerhill soon proves his worth, and begins to demonstrate some surprising powers. But just as everything is going well, the light comes, bringing darkness in its wake…