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Mystery BD album

John Sewell
Member
#1 · Posted: 7 Dec 2004 17:00
I'm hoping someone here with a knowledge of BD can possibly help me answer a mystery that's been bothering me for the last 21 years or so! Back in 1984, I went on a school exchange visit to the South of France, and the kid I was staying with had a stack of BD albums. Mostly things like Lucky Luke, Gaston Lagaffe, Asterix, and of course, Tintin (he had one of the Archives volumes, which was the first hint I ever had about the early B&W versions!)

One stuck in my mind, as I've never been able to identify it. Things are a little sketchy, after so long, but it seemed to be some sort of detective thriller, set in London, with a youngish chap investigating various horrible murders. The two which I remember were a raddled old actress getting impaled on a spear onstage, and an old man being decapitated, and having his head replaced by a stag's head. I think the man's head ended up mounted on a shield stuck to the wall. Gruesome stuff! It was drawn in ligne-claire style, and I may be wrong, but I think some sort of time travel element was in there too! Unfortunately, my schoolboy French wasn't really good enough at the time to work out exactly what was going on, but if any of you good people have got any clues as to what it was, I'd be very grateful!

Edited to add: I've just remembered that there was also a nightmare sequence which had the stag-headed man in it, and the ending was very cryptic - I think it had something to do with the main character finding some secret out (I think an old book was involved), crying out "Aaaaah!", collapsing and then seeming to vanish (time travel again? Or maybe he found that he was a ghost or something?) That's probably hideously confused, but it's what I seem to remember. The only other thing about that I do remember is that the album's endpapers featured drawings of London landmarks, including Westminster Abbey!
Mikael Uhlin
Member
#2 · Posted: 7 Dec 2004 21:43
Sounds a bit like the albums by Jacques Tardi about Adele Blanc-Sec (http://bd.casterman.com/serie/castadel/?open=1) or maybe one of the creations of Pierre Wininger (http://www.bdcouvertes.com/collection/victorbilletdoux.html)
John Sewell
Member
#3 · Posted: 13 Dec 2004 18:42
Thanks for that, Mikael, but neither of them rings a bell. I had a good trawl through Casterman's BD website as well - I never realised there were so many of the flippin' things! I didn't turn anything up there, so if it was one of theirs (and I'm by no means certain) it must be out of print.

I just wish the details weren't so sketchy - whether it was a one-off or part of a series! I can't even remember what the cover was like, only that it was hardback, and seemed to have roughly the same amount of pages as a Tintin book.
jock123
Moderator
#4 · Posted: 4 Feb 2005 21:01
Could it possibly have been one of the Albany books by François Rivière (story) and Floc'h (drawings)? They date from around 1984, although they actually were printed in Pilote in the late 70’s. Just a thought.
John Sewell
Member
#5 · Posted: 22 Feb 2005 17:32
Cheers Jock - one of those covers seems strangely familiar, though it's hard to say without having a look at the contents.

I remember finding the high level of graphic murder in the book quite disconcerting! It was drawn in a very Herge-like style, so all the severed heads, shootings and impalements seemed very out of place in what I saw as a childrens' book at the time!

The chap I stayed with also had a large pile of Metal Hurlant magazines, parts of which I found rather, er, interesting ;) 2000AD it certainly wasn't (though a few issues had a French translation of Judge Dredd)!
jock123
Moderator
#6 · Posted: 22 Feb 2005 22:59
Glad to be of help, John. That thing about a stag’s head is niggling at the back of my mind: I don’t own any of the Albany books to check, but I think I’ve seen that sort of image somewhere...

No doubt you read Metal Hurlant for the in-depth articles...
John Sewell
Member
#7 · Posted: 23 Feb 2005 13:22
Well, I was supposed to be there to improve my French, and I certainly picked up one or two "useful" words and phrases from them ;)

There was even a special 3-D issue in amongst them, with a pair of those coloured specs tucked inside. Experiencing the likes of Thelma Ironthighs (?) in full steroscopic vision was a bit of an eye-opener, if you get my drift...
jock123
Moderator
#8 · Posted: 23 Feb 2005 16:19
Ahem! We’ll draw a veil quickly over the doings of you and the lovely Thelma, shall we...? We don’t want you getting all un-necessary before the nurse brings you your medicine, do we?

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