Tintin: Flight 714
by Hergé (Methuen, 1968) [first published in Tintin Magazine, 1966-1967]
More so than any of the twenty-one Tintin stories that preceded it, Flight 714 is divorced from a contemporary historical setting. Though seeking (supernatural) isolation, it retains Hergé’s boundless sense of adventure, his exquisite characterisation and his incomparable, most vividly depicted humour.
Lucky Luke: The Bounty Hunter
by Morris & Goscinny, trans. Erica Jeffrey (Cinebook Ltd, 2010)
[from Chasseur de primes, Dargaud Editeur Paris, 1972]
One could argue that Lucky Luke (‘the man who shoots faster than his own shadow’) lacks the personality of Goscinny’s Asterix characters, but there’s no denying the humour derived from pitting his laidback cowboy aplomb against a frontier bounty hunter’s grasping wiles.
The Wicked Wiles of Iznogoud
by Goscinny & Tabary (Cinebook, 2008)
[first published as “Les complots d’Iznogoud”, Dargaud Editeur Paris, 1967]
Six pun-filled tales from ancient Baghdad as the wicked protagonist Iznogoud (think Dick Dastardly) is repeatedly thwarted in his nefarious plans to depose the caliph. Goscinny’s imagination is clearly in evidence but the stories lack the scope of his writing for Asterix.
Celebrating Peanuts: 60 Years
by Charles M. Schulz (Andrews McMeel, 2009)
Beautifully presented, with the Sundays reproduced in full colour, this hefty hardcover exemplifies the droll brilliance of Schulz, devoting 100+ large, glossy pages each to the five decades in which Charlie Brown, Snoopy and the gang ruled the world of comic strips.
Snoopy and Charlie Brown: The Peanuts Movie
dir. Steve Martino (2015)
As a comic strip, Peanuts ran for fifty years and was never bettered. The film’s 3D animation cannot compete with the vibrancy of Schulz’s stills, yet does succeed as a nostalgia piece capturing the greatly beloved world of perennial also-ran Charlie Brown.
Nemesis of the Daleks (Doctor Who graphic novel #15)
(Panini, 2013) [Collecting comics from 1990]
For all that these comics are visually evocative and constitute an impressive editorial achievement when the strips could have been cut altogether, the stories themselves are mediocre, featuring (if at all) a companionless Seventh Doctor as either passive bystander or omnipotent wizard.