[HN Gopher] The name's Ford, Alan Ford: how an Italian comic boo...
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The name's Ford, Alan Ford: how an Italian comic book spy became a
Yugoslav hero
Author : riffraff
Score : 91 points
Date : 2021-02-15 09:47 UTC (13 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.calvertjournal.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.calvertjournal.com)
| boomskats wrote:
| Ha! My dad, to this day, makes Alan Ford references on a regular
| basis. I'm pretty sure he even used to make those same references
| when talking to his native British colleagues, using them to
| describe life in the former Yugoslavia & assuming they'd read the
| same comics as kids.
|
| What's funny is that at one point, I realised I reference random
| episodes of South Park in conversation in exactly the same way
| (to people who mostly have no idea what I'm talking about). Those
| comics must have been pretty on point.
| Mediterraneo10 wrote:
| > I'm pretty sure he even used to make those same references
| when talking to his native British colleagues, using them to
| describe life in the former Yugoslavia & assuming they'd read
| the same comics as kids.
|
| Reminds me of the claim - possibly apocryphal - that some
| undercover Soviet spies in the UK were outed because, when the
| conversation turned to Blue Peter (which supposedly every real
| Brit knew from childhood) they had no idea what that was.
| NikolaNovak wrote:
| Read them as a kid; did not enjoy illustrations at the time
| because everything was so... trashy, crappy, make-shift -- which
| as an adult I realize was exactly the point :)
|
| It also caused UNTOLD confusion to my childhood mind. It was
| translated into our language, but they left the honorific "Sir"
| untranslated, as-is.
|
| "Sir" means "Cheese" in my language... :O
|
| As far as I was concerned for several years, whenever the
| characters in the comic spoke to anybody of authority, they would
| speak like:
|
| "Cheese Bob, please Cheese, don't beat us up Cheese!" "Cheese YES
| Cheese!" "I'm terribly sorry Cheese. It will not happen again
| Cheese!"
|
| ... honestly, I missed that dose of surrealism when I put 2 and 2
| together eventually :-D
| majkinetor wrote:
| You can still see some "legendary" quotes from it around Serbia
| such as
|
| - "If you want to win, you must not loose"
|
| - "It is better to live 100 years as a millionaire, than 7 days
| in misery"
|
| - "Never give up, unless you have to"
|
| ...
| tomca32 wrote:
| Oh man, it warms my heart to see this here. I grew up reading
| Alan Ford and had a collection of over 200 comics.
|
| These comics were so massively influential in old Yugoslavia that
| it's common to hear people quote them all the time. Something
| about the dark, cynical humor just made them perfect for the
| Balkans mentality.
|
| I moved to the US around 10 years ago. Seeing this just made me
| feel so incredibly nostalgic.
| grokkedit wrote:
| I'm ~30 and italian and I only know of this comic book because my
| uncle used to read that and gave me his collection.
|
| And I love it: the first 100 issues are the best of the series,
| and among the best italian comic books ever written. Also the
| artist that did the drawings for the first (I think) 75 issues,
| Magnus, was incredible.
|
| I still think that it's criminally undervalued.
| yuchi wrote:
| Italian here too. I had the luck to be have our holidays in a
| place that had near to no attraction for a 10 yo and had a
| ridiculously small bookshop that had one or more comics total.
| One of those was Alan Ford, and I fell in love with it. It's a
| forgotten gem of Italian culture imho
| toyg wrote:
| Italian comics lover here. I've never been an Alan Ford fan, but
| it was a hit for my parents' generation in the '70s. Beyond the
| merits of _Alan Ford_ stories themselves, the series is a
| cornerstone of Italian comicdom for other reasons: writer Luciano
| Secchi ("Max Bunker") was responsible for the arrival of Marvel
| comics in Italy, and artist Roberto Raviola ("Magnus") was one of
| the best talents the art ever produced, an absolute world-class
| master who went on to write and draw several masterpieces.
|
| Secchi's historic publishing house ( _Editoriale Corno_ ) also
| published tons of excellent Italian series like Franco "Bonvi"
| Bonvicini's _Sturmtruppen_ and controversial dark /pulp series
| like _Kriminal_ and _Satanik_ , effectively marking a golden age
| of Italian comics. Reportedly Secchi grew somewhat grumpy and
| disenchanted with age, becoming a bit of a right-winger,
| isolating himself from the world of Italian comics and only
| working on Alan Ford.
|
| Raviola went on to create several masterpieces (Lo Sconosciuto,
| Femmine Incantate, Le 110 Pillole, Milady nel 3000, La compagnia
| della forca, and a famous Tex Willer special episode) before
| sadly dying of cancer way too early (56). He was a reference for
| generations of Italian comic artists, and a character in his own
| right with his remarkable moustaches and his jovial attitude.
|
| I wish more of classic Italian comics could be translated
| properly for the English-speaking market, there is a lot of
| excellent material and spectacular artists like Magnus and Andrea
| Pazienza.
| drno123 wrote:
| I grew up with Alan Ford (in Zagreb, early nineties) and I have
| always preferred the later episodes (Pifarrerio not Magnus),
| which is a blasphemy among hardcore Alan Ford fans. Other than
| that, Alan Ford was definitely a phenomenon in Yugoslavia for a
| period of over 20 years.
| kungito wrote:
| I have to add that many of us were lucky to "inherit" the
| collections from our parents in the late 90s, early 2000s and
| the comic was and is still very relevant. The later versions
| which were coming out when I was a kid in the 2000s never
| clicked with me. I personally prefered the first 600 episodes
| the most having reread the most of them. I possibly liked even
| more the Maxmagnus comic which had a bit more bizarre vibe to a
| yound me. I wonder where the youger kids are supposed to learn
| the cinism and criticism in such levels. Is there a modern
| medium for the zoomers with the same tone?
| zhrvoj wrote:
| You're right.. and You're strange :))
| themodelplumber wrote:
| Is Alan Ford the one that had a story that claimed the moon
| landings were faked? An Italian friend was talking my ear off
| about the idea, then on my way through the airport in Italy I
| picked up a secret agent comic book that looked intriguing, and
| it had that story in it.
|
| I had to wonder if this comic book had raised the idea to his
| awareness, but couldn't be sure...
| zhrvoj wrote:
| Not in the first edition, as I remember... [edit: this was
| other comic with "fake" moon landing - Martin Mystere, nothing
| to do with Alan Ford]
| themodelplumber wrote:
| You are right, it was Martin Mystere...as soon as I read the
| name I knew that was the one. Thanks.
| toyg wrote:
| Martin Mystere! Basically X-Files before X-Files even
| existed. Incredibly well-researched series, always walking a
| tight rope between truth and fiction. The writer Alfredo
| Castelli is a living encyclopaedia of "strange tales" and
| esoteric lore. I'm not a fan of the comics (the actual
| stories are often too descriptive and verbose), but the
| topics it touches are fascinating.
| Keyframe wrote:
| Both Alan Ford and Martin Mystere shaped me up. Alan Ford
| is extremely useful in business settings. They've described
| it all, business world operates on its principles. Martin
| Mystere sparked a sense of wonder in me that never left.
| Italian comics were (are) the best!
| zhrvoj wrote:
| Fantastic comic! I remember episode "Don't vote for Notax". Now I
| see Notax was like Trump :) Basically it was irony of american
| society, that's why it was not forbidden by yugoslav regime.
| Character No.1 and his short stories about his happenings with
| Homer during their travel through old Greece were short version
| of Iliad. I learned Iliad from this . This was surrealistic, and
| just because of that, acceptable.
| I-M-S wrote:
| Superhik for president!
| benakiba wrote:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Only_Fools_and_Horses is another
| phenomenon that was extremely popular in former Yugoslavia (and
| it still is). I'm not surprised when I find out that my USA
| friends don't know about it, but I am a bit surprised by the fact
| that none of my UK friends know about it.
| deagle50 wrote:
| I lived in Yugoslavia until Bosnia broke off in 92. My uncle had
| a chest full of these haha.
| twic wrote:
| It intrigues me that an Italian writer would choose to make his
| main character American. Particularly given that a Belgian
| writer, Edgar Jacobs, chose to make his at least equally famous
| characters Blake and Mortimer British. Is there a pattern of
| continental writers creating Anglophone characters for adventure
| stories? Or is it just these two cases?
| zhrvoj wrote:
| Other Italian comics from 70' were also all american
| characters. Comandante Mark, Zagor, Blek... Americans and Brits
| are interesting characters for comics :) And what about
| legendary spaghetti western movies?
| Mediterraneo10 wrote:
| The German author Karl May wrote Westerns - which ended up
| being among the world's most bestselling - without ever having
| visited the West. Also, while the Lemmy Caution character was
| created by an actual Anglophone, he is far more better known
| from the films that the French made about him.
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