JohnnyEnzyme

Above we have a mischievous little "marsu," directing today's parade. Do we know where we're headed, exactly? (Franquin)

René Hausman

Morris!

Mézières

And once again, Franquin.

Fun fact: elephants, along with crows, dolphins, parrots, octopuses, whales, and we naked apes are considered the smartest, cleverest animals on the planet by the body of science.

Elephants even have funerals, graveyards, and go in to mourning for the loss of their loved ones.

I don't know if Chuck was off his meds that day, but the kids don't seem to mind too much. The drivers, however...

I also happened to find a similar pic, and it's the cover of a biographical BD, which unusually included two CD's complimenting Chuck's story & history. Looks rather promising, I'd say.

A theft 17 centuries in the making!

Well, this is in fact Albert Uderzo's fun tribute to the famous painting from 1632, from the series Astérix, specifically tome 19, Asterix and the Soothsayer (1972), made during the classic period when René Goscinny was still alive and plotting the series. I seem to recall that there's a couple more direct tribute pieces like this across the series.

.

Oh... right, The Raft of the Medusa one certainly comes to mind:

Barbe Rouge, in his shock, is punning on the name of the famous painting, exclaiming "I'm stunned!"

This one seems to echo November's local weather. The character is Freddy Lombard, sort of a perpetually-scowling, vagabond version of Tintin. I believe the panel is from La comète de Carthage (1986), arguably the best of the five "Freddy" albums.

Yves Chaland was highly prolific, and there's much to say about his work, and many more samples to share. Unfortunately, like the late Hubert Boulard, he was one of BD's geniuses who suffered a tragic, early death, dying in a car accident at only 33yo.

For now, here's his Lambiek entry.

This atmospheric upper panel from a page in book 2 deserves to stand on it's own, I think.

Set in 11th century Europe, the series concerns the efforts of the wandering noble Sir Aymar de Bois-Maury to reclaim his ancestral home. Less focused on action than the other series of Hermann (like Jeremiah), Les Tours de Bois-Maury deals more with human thoughts and considerations. --WP

So far my personal impression is that the series is a pretty candid look at medieval life, what with its superstitions, ignorance and brutality. Not exactly a 'joy to read,' but nonetheless rather fascinating.

EDIT: Here's a hi-res version with a different color scheme, below.

Yesterday I saw a post on r/Lemmy labelled Reddit Wins, bitterly complaining about how OP had given "Lemmy" their best shot, but unfortunately, kept running in to too many extremist communities across the LV (Lemmyverse). Me, I gave them some props for effort, but also said, basically-- "I'm not convinced; here's what you do for best results."

Funny, and now today, I'm seeing a post over here titled "What's the best way to fuck over sites (like Reddit)." [link], and I similarly get the basis of OP's hatred, and yet... and yet... I'm wondering if there's a sort of middle-ground that might exist between the two poles, so to speak?

Following is one of my 'solutions,' but I'd enjoy it if anyone reading wanted to chime in with their own thoughts & ideas:

Cutting to the chase-- creating our [needed community] has worked surprisingly well for my group in the FV, with the understanding that we need to populate it a bit before it 'soars like an eagle' via it's own accord. But, point is-- our 400+ subscribers in less than four months of existence tends to indicate to me that: 1) our community really *is* appreciated, and 2) niche communities like ours get a vastly outsized, opportunistic share of the "ALL" stream, compared to Reddit, in which a little 'venture' like ours would barely get seen, typically.

Now say what you want about Lemmy, but isn't that a pretty dang cool opportunity, on the whole?

Thoughts..?

This first one could almost be a "wimmelbilder" piece, i.e. a variation on Where's Waldo? (hmm, could be a good theme for a future post)

In any case, Stella's a freelance artist & cartoonist I recently discovered. By her own admission she's still growing as an artist, for example in handling lighting, but I'm liking what I'm seeing already:

Here's her ArtStation and Tumbler.

His birth father died when Brent was less than a year old, so he took his adopted father's name "Mintz" from 1955-1975 before finally reverting back to "Spiner."

AFAIK Spiner wasn't actually a photographer as he claimed, but a stage actor living in NYC at the time. Twelve years after the above appearance, he moved to LA and began playing a recurring character on Night Court, "Bob Wheeler," as well as other roles.

This game show is definitely showing its age, and I do find it amusing that they used not just such an ordinary-looking host, but one who also looked about ready for the retirement home. But he does in fact do a fine job I think, and the show itself has a very interesting premise, one in which a panel must try to pick between two imposters and a genuine person.

Oh, rabbits. This community is coming up on four months now, and if I may say so, we've been a solid community so far, non?

Somehow though, we're *still* not archived via Google. (flip! and double-flip!)

Ah well. Instead of meckern und stöhnen, let's try to do something positive, then. So-- starting with "Lucky Luke," I'll try to convert our Twitter-style links on the sidebar in to useable, clickable search items.

Eh, I guess that's okay for now, but honestly I'm not totally happy about that, since it inherently adds server load to our instance. Hmm, or... is it not, our host @[email protected]?

This is one of those classic BD's that I didn't have much access to as a kid, which is too bad because it seems to speak to the kid in all of us. So then, I'll let Lambiek do most of the talking:

André Franquin's first experiences with gag strips led to the creation of his iconic Gaston Lagaffe character. Drawn like an American beatnik, the character initially created havoc in the magazine's editorial sections. In Spirou #985, 1957, Gaston simply appeared in the pages without any title or explanation. After a few weeks of puzzling readers, Spirou and Fantasio finally noticed the lanky weirdo with his trademark green pullover sweater and casually dangling cigarette. When Spirou finally asked him who he was, Gaston only mumbled that he was sent there to work, but didn't know by whom or why.

XD

"That? It's a pedal bin with a completely new design."

"Oh right, I remember now it has one last design flaw, what was it again?"

Is it vandalism or an improvement? :D

Although the strip ran for over 30 years, Gaston's superiors never managed to get him to do his job-- sorting the mail! Instead of just doing that, Gaston spends most of his time sleeping behind his desk.

(study for a toy figurine)

But at least when asleep he's harmless. When awake, Gaston uses his energy on culinary experiments, amateur chemistry, and crafting mad inventions, of which the extraordinary "Gaffophone" is the most notorious. Whenever the atrocious instrument is touched, windows crack and walls come down. Most of Gaston's other experiments also end in unexpected accidents, explosions or bodily harm.

Setting: the drivers above are all rightfully furious about the massive traffic jam.

"Wow, I can't believe you caused all that."

"Oh, it's just wood, cardboard, and three flashlights. It's for a store display advertisement with the theme 'red lights are costly.' Anyway, I gotta go take it back. See ya!"

For those interested in reading more, Lambiek has a massive article on Franquin, with a big section on Gaston here. As you'll surely notice, he also (currently) serves as the community's icon. ^^