Asterix the gladiator

Personally an important book for me as it was the first Asterix book i ever read and introduced me to the amazing world of European comics. This is one of the earlier Asterix stories and while the artwork was still in the process of refinement, the storyline and Asterix universe was starting to come together. The meme of the pirate ship which (usually) gets sunk during the story starts here as does Obelix's habit of keeping the helmets of Romans he bashes.

Cacofonix is captured by the Romans and taken to Rome to be presented to Caesar. The great man for some reason does not really want a Gaulish bard with Cacofonix's "unique" voice so sends him off to the arena to be eaten by lions. Asterix and Obelix travel to Rome to rescue their friend and find the best way to do that is to become gladiators and enter the arena themselves...

While not one of the best Asterix volumes it certainly packs a punch so to speak. The plot is pretty good with plenty of fun at the expense of the Romans.

Agatha Christie's And Then There Were None

Ten people, previously unknown from each other, and from various walks of life are invited to a mysterious private island where they are all accused of having a guilty secret and are murdered one by one by an unseen hand. The murders also seem to parallel the fate of the ten little soldiers as written on a poem in every guest's room...

Beautifully recreated as a graphic novel this was Agatha Christie's masterpiece and her best-selling novel (and indeed the best selling mystery novel of all time) so the graphic novel edition has a lot to live up to. Does it succeed?

Not quite. Its an enjoyable read but is lacking in something. Maybe its lacking in atmosphere though the artwork is pretty gorgeous. There is also not much in the way of suspense, despite people dying left right and centre the murders.

Overall its a glossy experience but lacks enough substance to be truly recommended.

Iznogoud - the Caliph's vacation

I'm still not 100% sold on Iznogoud yet, it has lots of trademark Goscinny humour, satire and charm and is well drawn by Tabary but the stories are all rather short and follow the same formula : Iznogoud wants to get rid of the Caliph but his schemes fail miserably.

Its all fine and often funny but compared to a comic series like Asterix with its full length stories it does tend to suffer in comparison. Although you could argue all Asterix stories are the same (the village or the 2 main characters face peril but the magic potion saves the day) the longer format allows for a greater variety of story whereas i find Iznogoud can get a little samey after awhile.

(Though in fact after Goscinny died Tabary took over the writing as well as the artwork (as Uderzo has done with Asterix) and moved Iznogoud to full-length stories so those will be interesting to see one day when Cinebook translate them.)

All this criticism may seem a bit unfair of course, most comic stories suffer in comparison to the indomitable Gaul and i am not saying Iznogoud is bad by any means. Its an enjoyable and often very funny read. But it just lacks that little something to yet make it one of my favourites. Yet!

This collection of stories, Iznogoud Vol.2: The Caliph's Vacation revolve around a holiday theme. Iznogoud sees holidays as very dangerous so naturally is keen to get the Caliph to collect his bucket and spade and don some flip-flops!

Asterix and the chieftain's shield

Delving deeper into the pseudo-history (though there is a basis in historical fact behind much of it) of Asterix than any other book in series, Julius Caesar wishes to have a triumph in front of the Gauls carried aloft on the shield of Vercingetorix the chief of the Gauls during the Roman-Gaul wars. Unfortunately the shield wasn't kept after the Gaulish defeat at Alesia and the Roman hunt for this shield of course involves our heroes Asterix and Obelix who are in the area after accompanying their chief to a health spa...

There was a Vercingetorix infact and Caesar existed of course, the historical existence of Asterix et al has yet to be fully established of course.

I like this story a lot though it is maybe not amongst the very best adventures by Goscinny and Uderzo. There is a lot to enjoy with the storyline, the humour is often subtle and builds on earlier events.

The fact it fills in a fair bit of backstory behind one of the Asterix universe's main characters is also very welcome (and i won't spoilt it here...)

Blake & Mortimer (4) : The Francis Blake Affair

The fourth story as published in English by Cinebook but the thirteenth overall and the first completely new story after the death of the series' creator Edgar P. Jacobs, instead being created by the team of Jean Van Hamme and Ted Benoit. This story is quite different from the stories of Jacobs which heavily featured science fiction being a well plotted espionage drama however in appearance it shares the beautiful clear line artwork of Jacob's books and is joy to behold.

At the time of its publication the Francis Blake Affair gained some criticism for being spy drama and not science fiction focussed though was still successful enough to ensure that no fewer than seven further volumes have been written since.

In this story there is a high level mole at the heart of British intelligence and Francis Blake of MI5 is tasked to root the traitor out. However when it appears it is Blake himself who is the traitor he flees. Professor Mortimer of course cannot believe his friend would be a traitor and tries to find his friend. What follows is a well paced and taut spy thriller.