He is probably the laziest, most chaotic, most anarchic office boy in the world – and certainly the most lovable: from 1957 until his death in 1997, André Franquin drew his famous character Gaston Lagaffe, known as Gaston in Germany. Along with Spirou, Asterix, Tintin and Lucky Luke, the series is one of the classics of Franco-Belgian comics. Gaston, as a subversive, creative, obsessed hippie and office worker, was to a certain extent the counterpart to the patriotic, adventurous Asterix. Franquin delighted generations of readers with his defiant wit.
25 years after the death of the comic artist, his character is now to be revived. Stéphane Beaujean, head of the French Dupuis publishing house, announced this at this year’s comic festival in Angoulême. The new edition of “Le Retour des Lagaffe” was taken over by Canadian Delaf (real name: Marc Delafontaine), whose drawing style is similar to Franquin’s. Volume 22 of the series was planned as a classic 48-page comic book album and was scheduled for release on October 19 with an initial print run of 1.2 million copies.
The continuation of classic series after the death of the creators is a delicate matter: fans do not forgive everything
Isabelle Franquin, daughter and heiress of the Belgian illustrator, is now fighting back. She decided to assert her moral right against “Gaston’s plagiarism” in court. That’s the way it is in the Belgian daily newspaper Le Soir to read. Throughout his life, her father had repeatedly spoken out against his character Gaston surviving him through the pen of another artist. Isabelle Franquin has therefore urgently appealed to the court in Brussels to suspend any pre-release or advertising for the new Gaston album.
Classic sequel dilemma. In the end, it’s not much different with comics than in the cinema: Successful series, whether “Star Wars”, “Asterix” or “Gaston”, should not die. That’s what distributors and publishers want, and that’s what many fans want too. Comics also have the advantage that their heroes do not age and do not demand a higher fee if the series pleases the public.
However, the continuation of classic series after the death of their creators is often a tricky matter: some fans of the series have never forgiven the fact that the adventures of Asterix and Obelix are no longer conceived by René Goscinny and Albert Uderzo. “Gaston is the greatest catastrophe since comics existed,” advertises Carlsen Verlag, which publishes the comic series in Germany, for its clumsy hero. It is to be hoped that the continuation of the series will not be as chaotic as the everyday life of its hero.