By Morris & Goscinny, translated by Frederick W Nolan (Cinebook)
ISBN: 978-1-905460-65-6
Lucky Luke is a rangy, good-natured, cowboy able to “draw faster than his own shadowâ€. He amiably roams the fabulously mythic Old West, having action-packed, light-hearted adventures with his sarcastic horse Jolly Jumper, whilst interacting with a host of historical and legendary figures.
His continuing exploits over seventy years have made him one of the best-selling comic characters in Europe (more than 83 individual albums, sales totalling in excess of 300 million in 30 languages… so far…), with the usual spin-off toys, computer games, animated cartoons and a plethora of TV shows and live-action movies.
First seen in the 1947 Annual (L’Almanach Spirou 1947) of Le Journal de Spirou, Lucky was created by Belgian animator, illustrator and cartoonist Maurice de Bévère (AKA “Morrisâ€), before ambling into his first weekly adventure ‘Arizona 1880’ on December 7th 1946.
Working solo until 1955, Morris produced nine albums of affectionate sagebrush spoofery before teaming with old pal and fellow trans-American tourist Rene Goscinny, who became regular wordsmith as Luke attained the dizzying heights of legend, commencing with ‘Des rails sur la Prairie’ (Rails on the Prairie), which began serialisation in Spirou on August 25th 1955.
In 1967, the six-gun straight-shooter switched sides, joining Goscinny’s own magazine Pilote with ‘La Diligence’ (The Stagecoach). Before his untimely death in 1977, Goscinny went on to co-author 45 graphic albums with Morris, after which Morris soldiered on both singly and with fresh collaborators.
Morris died in 2001 having drawn fully 70 adventures, plus spin-off sagas crafted with Achdé, Laurent Gerra, Benacquista & Pennac, Xavier Fauche, Jean Léturgie, Jacques Pessis and others, all taking their own shot at the venerable vigilante…
Lucky Luke first amused British readers during the late 1950s, syndicated to weekly anthology Film Fun, and later rode back into comics-town again in 1967, using the nom de plume Buck Bingo in UK weekly Giggle.
In all these venues – as well as in numerous attempts to follow the English-language album successes of Tintin and Asterix – Luke sported a trademark cigarette hanging insouciantly from his lip. However, in 1983 Morris – amidst both pained howls and muted mutterings of “political correctness gone mad†– deftly substituted a piece of straw for the much-travelled dog-end, which garnered him an official tip of the hat from the World Health Organization.
The most recent and magnificently successful attempt to bring Lucky Luke to our shores and shelves comes from Cinebook (who have rightly restored the foul weed to his lips on the interior pages, if not the covers…), and it’s clearly no big deal for today’s readership as we’re approaching 70 translated volumes and still going strong.
Lucky Luke – Le pied-tendre was the Dynamite Duo’s 23rd collaboration (available in English on paper and as an e-book as The Tenderfoot): first published in Europe in 1968.
The wryly silly saga details how the “harmless†western tradition of ruthlessly hazing and bullying newcomers for their supposed lack of manliness, strange customs, fancy clothes and good manners is threatened after the fine folk of Dry Gulch bury crusty compadre Ol’ Baddy.
The beloved, centenarian old coot seemed to be truly one of them but when his heir arrives to inherit the spread, the town has to accept that the aged landowner was not only a British émigré named Harold Lucius Badmington but was also shamefully aligned to the snooty, snobbish nobility…
The fun-loving straight-shooters and right-thinkers are appalled at politely unflappable greenhorn toff Waldo Badmington: none more so than saloon owner Jack Ready who had devised his own wicked plans for Baddy’s vacant lands.
When the usual cruel welcoming tactics fail to get a rise out of Waldo, Jack renews his efforts to seize the spread by force, but Baddy’s old Indian retainer Sam and interfering do-gooder Lucky Luke have their own ideas about that…
What neither Waldo nor his own devoted manservant Jasper know is that the wandering troubleshooter has been secretly commissioned by Baddy in a deathbed request to ensure the newcomer keeps hold of his inheritance… but only if Luke judges him worthy of it…
The doughty young worthy certainly seems to cut the mustard at first sight. He manfully ignores being tossed in a blanket, disdainfully accepts being a human target, drinks like a native and joins in with the traditional and frequent bar-brawls. Better yet, he refuses to give in to Jack’s far from subtle pressure to sell up and go back where he came from…
With his greedy plans frustrated, Jack piles on the pressure, hiring gunmen and attacking the Badmington spread, and when that fails, plays his last card: craftily disappearing whilst framing Waldo for his “murderâ€â€¦
However, the blackguard has not reckoned on Lucky’s determination and detective skills, and when the frame-up is exposed Jack is forced to settle the matter of impugned honour the English way…
Dry, sly and cruelly satirical, The Tenderfoot is a deviously-devised lampoon of classic cowboy movies with plenty of action, lots of laughs and barrel-loads of buffoonery superbly crafted by comics masters: proffering a potent peek into a unique and timeless genre to today’s readers who might well have missed the romantic allure of an all-pervasive Wild West that never was…
© Dargaud Editeur Paris 1968 by Goscinny & Morris. © Lucky Comics. English translation © 2008 Cinebook Ltd.