Even if the world-famous Gaul seems a bit tired: The latest adventure is highly entertaining – not only because of its successful references to the present.
The problem with the cold is: First, the magic potion freezes, making it ineffective. This takes revenge in the Wild East, where the druid Miraculix rushes to the aid of a friendly shaman. And secondly, the frost makes the Romans “very stiff”, as Obelix complains. Since our Gauls friends have now reached the 39th volume, the brawls no longer need to be carried out: A picture of a bunch of Romans full of violets, dented helmets and broken lances is enough to know whose path the Romans have crossed again.
Correct: Asterix, born in 1959 and yet forever young, is back on the road. His latest adventure, which appears today, Thursday, in 17 languages and with a circulation of five million, actually bears a mourning ribbon: It is the first Gaul epic without the illustrator and later author Albert Uderzo, to whom the fan base had to say goodbye forever last year . Copywriter René Goscinny had died in 1977.
Asterix and the Griffin: In the spirit of Goscinny and Uderzo
The successors Jean-Yves Ferri and Didier Conrad, who have already reached their fifth album as a duo, did not feel Uderzo’s watchful eye over their work for the first time. “The pressure is lower,” admitted copywriter Ferri at the Paris presentation of “Asterix and the Griffin”. “But don’t worry, we’ll stay true to the spirit of Goscinny and Uderzo.” Everything is there in the new story as well: slapstick and running gags (“A wolf!” – “Can you eat wolves?”), Latin proverbs and witty references to the present : A password is no longer required to enter the Roman camp.
The plot is good and effective. As is often the case with Ferri, it seems a bit overloaded when you compare it with Goscinny’s congenial simplicity, which is simply based on the wit of language. This time Caesar’s legionaries and the Gauls committee set off independently of one another to the east, into the “icy, endless steppe, shrouded in thick fog”, as the first completely white picture of the Asterix era is called.
Both parties are looking for the same thing: the terrible griffin. “Half eagle, half lion, with horse ears – a real legend,” describes a Roman connoisseur. “Just like me,” says Caesar and sends the geographer Globulus, who, apart from his thinning hair, resembles the French star author Michel Houellebecq. With his buddies, Brudercus and Ausdiemaus, he is supposed to find the new attraction for the Circus Maximus in the deep eastern winter. Also part of the party is Fakenius, the conspiracy theorist, who finds it suspicious that the sun always rises in the east. The Romans consider themselves the masters of civilization, but are afraid of falling outside the box on their journey to the mythical steppe people of the Sarmatians.
Ecological stuff and woman power
But who the Teutates are the Sarmatians? A forgotten people who drink fermented mare’s milk, which Obelix gets sour, and who otherwise live in harmony with nature in their yurts. The women wear their trousers, especially the warriors Matryoshkova, Supernova and Kalashnikova. The men are allowed to do the dishes. And of course the fiery Casanowa immediately grabs Obelix, who turns purple not only because of the monkey cold.
Shamans, eco and female power: so much zeitgeist sometimes seems almost artificial. Maybe Ferri and Conrad are reacting to a book burning in Canada: Woke and Inuit activists there also threw Asterix works into the flames this year because an Indian girl was wearing a “sexist” mini skirt in them. Goscinny’s daughter Anne, who comes from a Jewish family of printers who had been persecuted by Parisian fascists, raged in Paris this week: “The fact that books are still burned in the 21st century would have made my father insane.” Heft does not threaten such a thing. Without revealing the Hollywood-style ending: The good win, the bad lose. Including the gold nuggets that Globulus had picked up on the way.
Asterix and the Griffin: Asterix does not have its strongest appearance
Unlike the major Parisian publisher Hachette, to which Uderzo had ceded the Asterix rights in 2008. Issue 39 will probably bring in a few sesterces with its monster edition. The latest Asterix feature film, “The Middle Kingdom”, which will cost 65 million euros, is planned for 2022. It is minted on the Chinese market, as a princess from Shanghai is visiting the Gauls village. Oh well. And with Netflix – nomen est omen – the publisher has decided to produce an elaborate cartoon series. In the north of Paris, Asterix Park has also resumed operations after a long Covid break.
Asterix doesn’t have much to say about that. The little Gaul doesn’t have his strongest appearance in the new volume anyway. Without a magic potion, it hardly gives the new story any impetus. Can the hero without age, who has lasted for several generations, still keep up today? For years, if not decades, nostalgic people have been complaining that Asterix is “no longer the same” without its inventors, that it lacks lightness. The new authors, however, cannot be blamed. They are full professionals with inspiration. Whereby Ferri actually remains as impersonal as Asterix himself. The draftsman Conrad creates a trademark for himself with large, half-page drawings.
Asterix and the Griffin: The Goldessel is not retiring yet
And hand on heart: The Gauls stories are still good. Better than Squid Game or other blockbusters. The question is not whether Issue 39 is up to par (it does!). But one may wonder what Goscinny would do today with a series that he had born in fifteen minutes and that has now enjoyed global success for 62 years. On the other hand, it is also clear: Hachette will not send the Gallic donkey into retirement anytime soon – even if he looks a little tired. (Stefan Brändle)
