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In addition to the mini-Smurf Albums (in this case both the books and the characters are mini) 'Papercutz' will soon be bringing us Peyo's Benoît Brisefer (AKA Steven Strong/Tammy Tuff) under the ugly name of Benni Breakiron.

It appears that the character has had a small amount of exposure to English-speaking audiences before, but this looks to be the first time anyone has attempted a systematic album-by-album translation. The publishers start with 'The Red Taxis' and follow with 'Madame Adolfine'.

Incidentally, for those of us (i.e., me...) wondering how such a seemingly small publisher got hold of the Smurfs, a relatively big fish in euro-album-recognition-in-the-US-terms, then it is likely because they are owned by Macmillan, one of the largest publishing concerns in the world.

George

And I suppose a better choice was "Tammy Tuff"(!)

I read some of his stories from French to English to a couple of kids and used the name "Benny" because I thought it suited him. They liked it.


There have been claims that he was translated into English as "Steven Strong" but I haven't been able to find any evidence of this. He was translated as "Tammy Tuff" in the British comic "Giggle" in the late 1960s but that appears to be it. Does anyone know if there were "Steven Strong" books or in comics?


Which is the order in which they were published in the original French. That is good to know. It's nice to see publishers are sticking to the original chronological order of books, that way, if they are successful, you get to learn the characters and storylines the same way as they did when the stories were originally published.

Moderator Note: This blog article on the Forbidden Planet International site contains information about, and examples of, the Tammy Tuff incarnation in Giggle.

I have to give you that one - even as I wrote I reflected on the idiocy of Tammy Tuff! I assumed no one would read this so left it in...


You know, I have seen that so often that I have taken it to be true but after extensive research (5 minutes on Google) l see nothing either other than this trueism.

What Google did turn up is an interview with Jesse Post, Marketing Director at Papercutz, which touches on this naming controversy (if I can get all tabloid for a second). And great news for us obsessives - proper sized Smurf albums are on the way.

George

I'm not certain why "Tammy Tuff" is causing such exception - it's a plausible British name!
"Tam" or "Tammy" may have fallen out of fashion, but they certainly had currency in the North of England and Scotland (as local variants of "Tom" and "Tommy") until fairly recently (and still do in places today!) - Sean Connery was/ is known as Tam or Tammy by his family (because his first name is actually Thomas, which was used around the family, and Sean is his middle name, which he adopted for professional reasons); "Tammy Troot" was a very popular chilren's book and radio character for many years. While the latter may only be an anthropomorphic fish, it's hard to suggest that the former couldn't be regarded as a tough guy...
Tuff is just a variant of the surname Tough, which is not uncommon, although the Tuff name is apparently most common in Kent and the south of England.
It certainly conveys as much about the character as "Benny Breakiron" does (and yes, there are people called "Breakiron"), although they both miss that the name isn't really to denote that the character is strong, in spite of what the Papercutz guy seems to suggest, so much that he is clumsy, or incapable of using something without breaking it (which is what the word brise-fer means in French, and which Peyo presumably meant to emphasise in the boy being unable to play with toys without breaking them)...

...And could this be the reason that the relatively unknown Benoît Brisefer is suddenly coming to English?

It's just been announced that there is to be a big screen adaptaton of The Red Taxis, with international film star Jean Reno as Poilonez, the villain of the piece, and distribution by Disney France. Benoît is yet to be cast, although the search is under way to find the actor to portray him...

I recently came across a short Benoît Brisefer CGI cartoon. It shows him trying to get his ball back when it goes under a red taxi. I wonder if that was a pilot for the film or if the actual film will be with live actors?

Interesting casting: Jean Reno is usually in thrillers like Léon with Natalie Portman, Mission: Impossible, and Ronin, while Gérard Jugnot is mainly comedy.

Moderator Note: You walked a fine line there, saying where to locate it; it's a student film (the IIM - as mentioned at the end of the credits - is the Internet and Multimedia Institute in Paris). As there is no copyright information given, and we know it is a copyright property, we'll err on the side of caution, and edit out where you found it.
It is also implied in the article that the film will be live-action: it's the team which made Le Petit Nicolas, and there's also the lengthy period indicated for digital effects to be added in post-production.
The Tintinologist Team

For those that care about Franco-Belgian comics in English we, and fantagraphics, have lost a true champion.

George

Cinebook have just released "Alone", an English translation of "Seuls", an award-winning comic series written by Fabien Vehlmann and drawn by Bruno Gazzotti. The first album, "The Vanishing", is available on Amazon.

The story tells of a group of children who wake up one morning to find their city completely deserted! Everyone else, every adult, including their parents, neighbours, siblings and other children, have completely disappeared with no apparent explanation! As they adapt to living and surviving on their own, they meet others who have also survived the "Vanishing". These include other children but also animals who, while once domesticated, have now turned wild and feral!

I very much recommend this series especially to fans of William Golding's "Lord of the Flies". Vehlmann has said in interviews that it was a major influence, though in this case he has set the action in an urban setting.

The second instalment, "The Master of Knives", is expected to be out later this year.

In answer to my own question, it is with live actors and is due out in France a week before Christmas (pure coincidence, I'll bet not!)

The scenes from the trailer indicate that they appear to have faithful to the original book, which makes a change.

The trailer can be seen here.

Moderator note: There's a short "making of" featurette (in French) available too.

An interesting article of note to Franco-Belgian BD enthusiasts has appeared on the DowntheTubes website.

I'd been talking to John Freeman who runs the site about the fact that the only appearance in English I knew of for the Uderzo-Charlier series featuring the characters Tanguy et Laverdure was an annual from 1973 which was released in conjunction with the series The Aeronauts (an English dub of the live-action TV series Les Chevaliers du Ciel, based on the books), which contained translations of some albums in a single volume.

Now he's done some research, John has written an article which reveals an earlier translation, which turned Tanguy and Laverdure into "Jet" Power and Terry Madden, and the strip into The Flying Furies, which serialized the first album, L'Ecole des Aigles, in weekly parts, throughout 1966 in the Lion comic.

You can read John's article here.