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Jo, Zette & Jocko: Le ThermoZéro

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jock123
Moderator
#11 · Posted: 3 Jul 2004 12:50
The book is tremendously interesting (I bet you didn't know that Bob's dad invented a machine for drilling square holes, now did you? It's true!), and is filled with sketches, preparatory work, model-sheets and photographs etc. for the work he did with Hergé, as well as his solo work and collaborations with Jacques Martin and others.

There are nice pics from both the trip on the boat to Sweden, and Bob in the UK for the Black Island re-write.

The JZ&J material is on pp 94-5, with reproductions of one page of rough for the book drawn to approx size, one sheet with four pages roughed out in thumbnail, two sheets showing notes and background, including a map of some roads and a forest (this is the one which has the note about "zero absolut" on it) and a couple of character thumb-nails of Jo, Jo's dad, and two faces I don't recognize.

The notes also show someone parascending on a large kite behind a speed-boat, and make reference to "la S.G.A.D - la Société Général d'Agents Doubles" (The General Society of Double Agents) and other variations on that theme - including something that seems so wildly up-to-date that it is spooky: Les Espions Réuni - Spys Reunited!! No doubt they have a web-page!

Another spooky prediction shows a bomb being dropped down a heat-vent, in a manner not dissimilar to the end of Star Wars and the destruction of the first Death Star!

"ThermoZéro" is given an abbreviation of "tZO" (the "t" is super-script), and is described as releasing an incredibly intense cold. An aerosol can with the word "Sproyt" written down it suggests that it might be the means of deploying tZO, and there is a cut-away sketch of what might be the same can, showing a central section containing spheres running down through a double-sided container like a vacuum flask.

A separate box on that page makes reference to a silent explosive, and has a sketch of what might be a car blowing up.

The De Moor biography is well worth a look; I'm glad to see the book is available, because I thought it had gone out of print.
jockosjungle
Member
#12 · Posted: 3 Jul 2004 18:54
Cheers for the info on the book Jock123, I've gone for a copy! Good excuse to buy some other French Hergé stuff as well and save on shipping!

Rik

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