{"id":31994,"date":"2025-02-12T09:00:22","date_gmt":"2025-02-12T09:00:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/?p=31994"},"modified":"2025-02-11T18:25:33","modified_gmt":"2025-02-11T18:25:33","slug":"lucky-luke-volume-59-bride-of-lucky-luke","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/2025\/02\/12\/lucky-luke-volume-59-bride-of-lucky-luke\/","title":{"rendered":"Lucky Luke volume 59 – Bride of Lucky Luke"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\" \"\"
\nBy Morris & Guy Vidal<\/strong>, translated by Jerome Saincantin<\/strong> (Cinebook)
\nISBN: 978-1-84918-305-5 (Album PB\/Digital edition)<\/p>\n

This book includes Discriminatory Content<\/strong> produced in less enlightened times.<\/em><\/p>\n

Doughty, dashing and dependable cowboy \u201cgood guy\u201d Lucky Luke<\/strong> is a rangy, implacably even-tempered do-gooder able to \u201cdraw faster than his own shadow\u201d. He amiably ambles around the mythic Old West, having light-hearted adventures on his petulant and rather sarcastic wonder-horse Jolly Jumper<\/em>. Over nine decades, his exploits have made him one of the top-ranking comic characters in the world, generating nearly 90 individual albums and spin-off series like Kid Lucky<\/strong> and Ran-Tan-Plan<\/strong>, with sales totalling upwards of 300 million in 30 languages. That renown has translated into a mountain of merchandise, toys, games, animated cartoons, TV shows and live-action movies and even commemorative exhibitions. No theme park yet, but you never know\u2026<\/p>\n

Originally the brainchild of Belgian animator, illustrator and cartoonist Maurice de B\u00e9v\u00e8re (AKA \u201cMorris\u201d) Lucky only truly expanded to global dominance via his 45 volume collaboration with superstar scripter Ren\u00e9<\/strong> Goscinny (from Des rails sur la Prairie<\/em><\/strong>\/Rails on the Prairie<\/strong> beginning August 25th<\/sup> 1955 to La Ballade des Dalton et autres histoires<\/em><\/strong>\/The Ballad Of The Daltons And Other Stories<\/strong> in 1986).<\/p>\n

On Goscinny\u2019s death, Morris worked alone again and with others, founding a posse of legacy creators including Achd\u00e9 & Laurent Gerra, Benacquista & Pennac, Xavier Fauche, Jean L\u00e9turgie, Jacques Pessis and more, all taking their own shots at the venerable vigilante. Morris soldiered on both singly and with these successors before his passing in 2001, having drawn fully 70 adventures, plus numerous sidebar and spin-off sagebrush sagas.<\/p>\n

The taciturn trailblazer draws on western history as much as movie mythology and regularly interacts with historical and legendary figures as well as even odder fictional folk in tales drawn from key themes of classic cowboy films – as well as some uniquely European notions, and interpretations. As previously hinted, the sagebrush star is not averse to being a figure of political change and Weapon of Mass Satire…<\/p>\n

Cinebook\u2019s 59th<\/sup> Lucky Luke<\/strong> album was officially the frontier phenomenon\u2019s 54th <\/sup>individual European exploit, originally seen au continent<\/em> in 1985 as La Fianc\u00e9e de Lucky Luke<\/em><\/strong> by Morris and jobbing scripter Guy Vidal – journalist, screenwriter, Editor-in-Chief of Pilote<\/em><\/strong> and author of books and comics such as Les Gringos<\/em><\/strong>, Une \u00c9ducation alg\u00e9rienne<\/em><\/strong>, M\u00e9decins sans fronti\u00e8res<\/em><\/strong> and many more.<\/p>\n

Regrettably, in many places this yarn is a painfully dated monument to the sexist attitudes of the era it was written in. The book has been translated as Bride of Lucky Luke<\/strong> (occasionally Lucky Luke\u2019s Fianc\u00e9e<\/strong>) and here comes with an apologetic preface from the editors asking for a little understanding and forbearance.<\/p>\n

I suspect these will become increasingly common in future with long-lived stars, as modern sensibilities clash with social and culturally outmoded material crafted for popular consumption over everchanging decades…<\/p>\n

While we\u2019re carping there\u2019s an odd frisson of campaigning change throughout reviving a barely cooled hot button of the era. From inception, Luke laconically puffed on a trademark roll-up cigarette which hung insouciantly and almost permanently from his lip. However, in 1983 Morris – amidst pained howls and muted mutterings of \u201cpolitical correctness gone mad\u201d – \u00a0substituted a piece of straw for the much-travelled dog-end, thereby garnering for himself an official tip of the hat from the World Health Organisation. Here however, although Lucky still chaws that barley stalk, most other characters still abuse tobacco in its assorted forms, drawing pointed remarks from one of the tale\u2019s most powerful characters, primly dragging her reformist civilising nonsense into the land of unreconstructed, unsavoury he-men…
\n\"\"
\nIn scenes reminiscent of the Navy\u2019s pleas in South Pacific, the tale opens in typical frontier town Purgatory where they ain\u2019t got dames<\/span> women are absent and pioneers are reverting to loutish, unwashed barbarism.<\/p>\n

In St Louis – where US civilisation officially ends – the situation is exacerbated by an oversupply of single, marriageable women, compelling civic authorities to organise wedding wagon trains to ship willing wives-to-be to eager, not particularly picky bachelors. The process is fraught with peril and takes a terrible toll on wagon-masters and guides, so these powers that be want Lucky Luke to lead the next trek out…
\n\"\"
\nTeaming up with old pal Hank Bully<\/em> (The Stagecoach<\/strong>), Luke eventually agrees: ferrying fifteen spinsters of variable vintage – one of whom is not what they seem – across the prairies: overcoming natural hazards, the country\u2019s previous occupants, freshly-imported villainy and a multitude of stereotypical him-versus-her cliches (especially about cooking, clothes, \u201cqueer fear\u201d and driving) before some moments of novelty appear.<\/p>\n

Strident Jenny O\u2019Sullivan<\/em> might want a husband, but she also has ironclad principles and spends much time lecturing anyone who can\u2019t get away on the perils of strong drink and tobacco. That zeal even persists after she\u2019s kidnapped by the nefarious Daltons. However, when the wagons arrive in Purgatory, one of the prospective husbands is unavailable – having been arrested – and Lucky is gulled\/compelled to step in and agree to wed her. It\u2019s that or take her back to St Louis…<\/p>\n

Grasping the wrong end of the stick, Averell<\/em>, Jack<\/em>, William <\/em>and devious, diminutive yet dominant Joe <\/em>swoop and snatch, but soon learn they have saved their greatest enemy from a life of domestic drudgery, startling cooking and daily uplifting lectures. Happily for them, Lucky always puts duty before everything and rescues the most vicious and feared outlaws in America before finding a solution to his own dilemma and reuniting Jenny and her contracted spouse\/consort\u2026
\n\"\"
\nThen he can go back to being as lonesome a cowboy as humanely possible…<\/p>\n

Happily Lucky Luke also cherishes the old ways and is ready to set things right his way\u2026<\/p>\n

Augmented by a reproduction of an actual certificate of Holy Matrimony stemming from the widespread historical practise of catalogue weddings, Bride of Lucky Luke vacillates between being a<\/strong> wickedly wry exploration of the battle of the sexes and cheap misogyny, which can work for most readers but isn\u2019t ideal for young readers to absorb unquestioningly. Nevertheless, the art and many of the gags do work on more mature levels so bear in mind that in Europe, this series is not strictly kids\u2019 stuff. The yarn revels in classic set-piece slapstick and witty wordplay: poking fun at the fundamental components of the genre and relationships, whilst successfully embracing tradition with wild action.<\/p>\n

Fine for older kids possessing some perspective and social understanding – and probably still safer than most Laurel and Hardy<\/strong> films or whatever TikTok clip the waifs of the coming generation can still access, these early exploits follow the grand old tradition of Destry Rides Again<\/strong> or Cat Ballou<\/strong>, superbly executed by a master visualist, commemorating the romantic allure of a Wild West that never was\u2026
\n\u00a9 Dargaud Editeur Paris 1985 by Morris & Vidal. \u00a9 Lucky Comics. English translation \u00a9 2016 Cinebook Ltd.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Morris & Guy Vidal, translated by Jerome Saincantin (Cinebook) ISBN: 978-1-84918-305-5 (Album PB\/Digital edition) This book includes Discriminatory Content produced in less enlightened times. Doughty, dashing and dependable cowboy \u201cgood guy\u201d Lucky Luke is a rangy, implacably even-tempered do-gooder able to \u201cdraw faster than his own shadow\u201d. He amiably ambles around the mythic Old … <\/p>\n

Continue reading “Lucky Luke volume 59 – Bride of Lucky Luke”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[191,113,299,122,125,192,111,99],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-31994","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-adventure","category-comedy","category-feminism-sexual-politics","category-historical","category-humour","category-lucky-luke","category-satirepolitics","category-westerns"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4AFj-8k2","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31994","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=31994"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31994\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":32000,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31994\/revisions\/32000"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=31994"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=31994"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=31994"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}