Containment is back.
The editorial staff of
Figaro
presents a selection of essential albums to brighten up and make more exciting the weeks to come.
Carbon & Silicon
By Arthur Bayon
Every year, countless sci-fi comics flood the market.
If we had to retain only one in 2020, it would be without hesitation that of Mathieu Bablet (
Shangri-La
).
Scattered to the four corners of the planet and stretched over 300 years, the story features two androids who oppose each other in their conception of a world that is gradually sinking into chaos.
Graphically superb, this graphic novel takes on the appearance of a philosophical fable when it questions the value of sensory experiences and social relationships.
With its ups and downs, its reunion and its farewells, the relationship between Carbon and Silicium will also move you.
A must for any SF enthusiast and highly recommended for others.
Carbone & Silicium
, by Mathieu Bablet.
Ankama editions
Carbone & Silicium
, by Mathieu Bablet, Ankama editions, 22.90 euros.
Lucky Luke: a cowboy in cotton
By Olivier Delcroix
Among the essential readings of this reconfinement, it is appropriate to cease business of procuring the new
Lucky Luke
.
Signed by Jul and Achdé,
Un cow-boy dans le coton
puts the character of Morris and Goscinny back into the spotlight ... The story takes place in Louisiana.
Lucky Luke inherited a cotton plantation.
Welcomed by the white planters as one of their own, he will have to fight to redistribute his inheritance to black farmers.
He will be helped by the Daltons and a certain Bass Reeves, an authentic character who was the first black deputy sheriff.
In this story, Jul and Achdé slalom brilliantly between all the pitfalls of “political correctness”.
This comic also echoes the American elections and racism (which rebounded after the death of George Floyd with the rise of the
Black Lives Matter
movement
).
By its rhythm and its incessant gags, this album is one of the best
Lucky Luke
of recent years.
According to the first sales figures, the public was not mistaken ...
A cowboy in cotton
, by Jul and Achdé.
Lucky Comics
Un cowboy dans le coton
, by Jul et Achdé, Lucky Comics, 48 p., € 10.95.
A fucking bastard,
volume 2:
O Maneta
By Paul Carcenac
The title is a bit provocative.
But the local fauna that reigns supreme in this Amazon of the 1970s, without faith or law, does not encourage measurement.
Régis Loisel (
The Quest for the Bird of Time
) and Olivier Pont lead the reader into the dampness of isolated Brazilian villages, for a breathless chase.
A somewhat idealistic young man, Max, had just come in the hope of finding his unknown father, with only two photos.
If he had known ...
We will dive into volume 1 (
Isabel
) while waiting for volume 2 (
O maneta
), on November 11.
This second album lifts the veil on part of the mystery.
But the jungle and its share of magic remain impenetrable.
An initiatory journey.
A fucking bastard,
volume 2
- O Maneta
, by Régis Loisel and Olivier Pont.
Rue de Sèvre
A fucking bastard,
volume 2
- O Maneta
, by Régis Loisel and Olivier Pont, rue de Sèvre editions, 88 pages, 18 euros.
The Killer - Affairs of State
, Volume 2:
Short Circuit
By Olivier Delcroix
From the release of the first album
, Long Feu
(2000), signed Jacamon (drawing) and Matz (screenplay), the
Le Tueur
series
has established itself as a classic of the black novel in comics.
This series in the form of an autobiography of a professional killer philosopher has won over a large audience thanks to its racy design, graphic clarity and eloquent cinema cutouts.
In the second volume of this "affair of state", the killer finds himself recruited by the French secret services, forced to go back on a mission under cover.
The Jacamon and Matz tandem returns to the murky atmosphere, shrouded in 50 shades of gray (at least ...) of political circles mingled too closely with the local underworld.
In this port city plagued by crime and corruption, our hero finds himself infiltrated in the heart of a trendy start-up.
He plays dynamic executives, pretending to enjoy office life.
The flashes of violence appear sparingly.
But when they do, they are a formidable graphic efficiency.
An album that is right on target.
The Killer - Affairs of State, volume 2: Circuit court,
by Jacamon and Matz.
Casterman
The Killer - Affairs of State, volume 2: Circuit court,
by Jacamon and Matz, Casterman, 56 p., € 11.50.
Blackout
By Arthur Bayon
The dark rooms have closed their doors but fans of the seventh art will be able to console themselves with
Black-out,
a dive into the arcana of American cinema from the 1930s to the 1950s. Its protagonist?
A mixed-race actor of black, Chinese and Native American descent, capable of playing all the “ethnic” roles, imbued with racist prejudices, in major Hollywood productions.
And if this Maximus Wyld is an invention, all the films in which he participated have indeed existed!
Written by Loo Hui Phang (
The Scent of Hungry Boys
) and drawn by Hugues Micol sometimes realistic, sometimes phantasmagorical,
Black-out
questions the power of images, as well as Hollywood's ideologies and mythologies.
Problems that resonate with current thinking on the representation of minorities.
A major work.
Black-out
, by Loo Hui Phang (script) and Hugues Micol (drawing).
Futuropolis
Black-out
, by Loo Hui Phang (script) and Hugues Micol (drawing), Futuropolis, 28 euros.
Léo Loden,
volume 27:
Sète à oyres
By Paul Carcenac
Marseille private detective Loden and his uncle Loco are back in a new investigation.
This time, Sète and the country of Brassens, on the edge of the Thau lagoon, serve as the backdrop.
The designer Serge Carrère and the screenwriter Loïc Nicoloff, always master “leaping humor” to perfection, between wit and action.
But this time, the album is part of a documentary process, tackling the subject of the shenanigans of the local oyster industry.
The authors take up the theme of the triploid oyster, genetically modified in order to provide a better yield.
The
most committed
Leo Loden
of this series born 25 years ago.
Léo Loden tome 27: Sète à oytres
, Serge Carrere and Loïc Nicoloff.
Sun
Léo Loden volume 27: Sète à oytres
, Serge Carrere and Loïc Nicoloff, Soleil editions, 48 pages, 10.95 euros.
Nevertheless
By Valentin Paquot
Jordi Lafebre signs one of the best albums of the year by addressing a simple question: how does a love begin that takes 40 years to blossom.
The reader goes back in time, with a pure, powerful and impossible love… Ana is just retired from her post as mayor, a happy bride and a vibrant grandmother.
Deep in her heart, she always kept a place for her first love: Zeno.
For his part, Zeno has the charisma of an adventurer, worthy of a Harrison Ford.
He was a sailor, a little bookseller and eventually became a doctor in physics.
They no longer have excuses to deny fate this love that has united them for decades.
A gentle reading, which allows you to escape.
Love, melancholy, humor, passion, all the necessary ingredients are united and skilfully dosed to make the hearts of readers vibrate.
Despite everything
, by Jordi Lafebre.
Dargaud
Despite everything
, by Jordi Lafebre, Dargaud editions, 160 pages, 22.50 euros.
Bombs and Men
By Aurélia Vertaldi
In
Des Bombes et des Hommes
, Estelle Dumas features the young Isabelle, 24, a young humanitarian, on a mission in Sarajevo in 1995. She takes part in the first food convoy to Gorazde, besieged for more than three years.
The population asks him to bring back films for his neighborhood cinema instead.
Deprived, the village left to itself for more than three years is full of people hungry for culture, firmly disposed to show the attackers
"that they are still alive".
The album is based on the true story of the screenwriter, who signs here her first comic book.
Tensions between ethnic groups, streets of Sarajevo strewn with corpses ... Between fiction and reality, the book is both intimate story and reportage and illustrates human dignity in all its splendor.
Des Bombes et des Hommes,
Estelle Dumas, Julie Ricossé and Loïc Godart.
Futuropolis
Of Bombs and Men,
Estelle Dumas, Julie Ricossé and Loïc Godart, Futuropolis, 21 euros.
The hunting accident
By Arthur Bayon
When his mother dies, young Charlie Rizzo moves in with his father, a writer who claims to have lost his sight in a hunting accident.
The reality is different.
His father will eventually deliver his incredible story in which he shares a cell with Nathan Leopold, a famous assassin.
Based on real events, this graphic novel by David L. Carlson shows how literature can save a man's life.
And maybe even his soul?
The Hunting Accident
shows the daily life of a panoptic American prison, particularly painful for a man stricken with blindness.
The challenge of representing the world perceived by a blind man, haunted by his reading of
Dante's
Hell
, is taken up hands down and sublimated by Landis Blair's atypical drawing, made up of a multitude of hatching.
The Hunting Accident
, by David L. Carlson (screenplay) and Landis Blair (sketch).
Sonatine Editions
The Hunting Accident
, by David L. Carlson (screenplay) and Landis Blair (drawing), Sonatine Éditions, 29 euros.
Blitz
, volume 2
By Olivier Delcroix
Blitz
has the merit of making the young generation rediscover the fascinating mysteries of the game of chess.
Admirably (and classically) drawn by the mangaka Daitaro Nishihara, the series scripted by the French Cédric Biscay features Tom, a turbulent young schoolboy who joined a chess club because he fell in love with Harmony, the young girl of his school that swears by this puzzle game.
As he visualizes part of the famous Garry Kasparov with a mysterious VR headset, he is struck by lightning.
Which leaves him with strange consequences ...
This second volume keeps its promises.
We can compare this educational series to another didactic saga,
Les Gouttes de Dieu
, which introduced readers with finesse to the heart of the world of wine and viticulture.
As for the title of the series itself, it does justice to one of the most spectacular variations of the game of chess.
So, on your marks, get set, think!
Blitz,
volume 2, by Cédric Biscay (screenplay) and Daitarou Nishihara (designer).
Shibuya editions
Blitz,
volume 2, by Cédric Biscay (screenplay) and Daitarou Nishihara (designer), published by Shibuya.
€ 7.95.
Brain Leak
By Olivier Delcroix
The Leak of the Brain
, by Pierre-Henry Gomont.
Dargaud
After two sumptuous graphic novels borrowing from gravity, Pierre-Henry Gomont, the author of
Malaterre
and
Pereira claims
, felt that it was necessary to change the register.
He delivers
a model of its kind
with
La Fuite du Brain
.
A light, American-style comedy, wacky and breathless, which starts from a proven fact: the death of Albert Einstein on April 18, 1955, and the theft of his brain by the doctor in charge of his autopsy, a certain Thomas Stolz who wishes to study it.
If he pierces his mysteries, he will know the glory.
It remains to find a laboratory out of sight ...
Gomont has fun with this disheveled and funny road movie.
His hero has the fake airs of comedian Eliott Gould, known to have played in Robert Altman's films, be it
MASH
or
Le Privé
.
The innovative and surprising design is perfectly burlesque.
The album, carried out on the hats of wheels in the manner of the masterpieces of Billy Wilder, allows an escape in the appreciable imagination in these times of reconfinement ...
La Fuite du Brain
, by Pierre-Henry Gomont, published by Dargaud, 192p., 25 €.
Space Brothers
, volume 31
By Valentin Paquot
Japan, summer 2006. Mutta and his little brother Hibito see a UFO heading for the Moon.
They then promise to go to space one day.
In 2025, Hibito became an astronaut and is about to take off for the moon.
Mutta, on the other hand, just lost his job as a car designer.
Pushed by his brother, the flame of space is rekindled.
But at 31, can we chase away a childhood dream again?
Chûya Koyama tenderly tells the story of these two brothers who pursue their dreams, far from the clichés of science fiction.
The dynamics of the duo never run out of steam, even after 31 volumes, and the reader develops a particular empathy for the sincere slice of life of these two brothers.
Space Brothers.
Pika editions
Space Brothers,
Pika edition, 208 pages, 8.20 euros.
