Jean Michel Charlier

Jean-Michel Charlier (Liège, October 30, 1924 - Paris, July 10, 1989) was a prolific Belgian comics writer, one of the most important Franco-Belgian comics, creator of a multitude of adventure series, among which Barbarroja and Lieutenant Blueberry stand out. He was also a co-founder of the famous magazine Pilote.

Biography

In 1945 he began working as a draftsman in Brussels with World Press, under Georges Troisfontaines, who worked mainly for Spirou magazine. The following year, and together with the artist Victor Hubinon, he created the four-page comic L & # 39; Agonie du Bismarck , where Charlier, in addition to the script, also drew the ships and planes. In 1947 Charlier and Hubinon began their long collaboration on the aerial adventure comic Buck Danny. After a few years, Charlier gave up all his work as a cartoonist and concentrated solely on the scripts on the advice of Jijé, Spirou's then-senior cartoonist.

Because he was unable to support himself on the money he made from his scripts, at a time when Dupuis was mainly focused on publishing magazines and a few albums, Charlier obtained a pilot's license and worked for a short time. with Sabena airline.

A year later, Charlier returned to comics, collaborating with Hubinon again, to create Tiger Joe for La Libre Junior, the newspaper's weekly comics supplement. The Free Belguique. Charlier continued writing scripts for Spirou magazine, collaborating with Eddy Paape on Valhardi and, in 1955, with Albert Uderzo on Belloy. Together with Hubinon, he also created some biographical comics like Jean Mermoz and Surcouf .

Charlier, Hubinon, Uderzo, and writer René Goscinny founded the Edifrance comics agency and Pistolin magazine in 1955, as well as the influential Pilote magazine in 1959. Charlier served as editor-in-chief and also scripted two stories for the first issue: Barbarossa with Hubinon and Tanguy and Laverdure with Uderzo - these characters starred in their own TV series, Les chavaliers du ciel, produced by ORTF between 1967 and 1969

In 1963, Charlier visited the US, where a visit to the American West inspired him to create Fort Navajo, a western for Pilote. He chose Jean Giraud (Moebius), then a commercial illustrator, who had worked with Jijé on Jerry Spring, a popular European western. Fort Navajo was renamed Blueberry or Lieutenant Blueberry, after its main character, and is considered one of the masterpieces of European comics.

In 1972, the tense staff situation at Pilote led to Charlier's resignation from his editorial position, to go on to work for French television until 1976. He later worked as editor-in-chief of Tintin magazine. He continued to write Blueberry and Buck Danny stories. He also made two episodes of Los Gringos , in 1979, for the magazine Súper As , with a markedly children's character.

Jean Michel Charlier died in Saint-Cloud, France in 1989. His main series were continued by other writers, chosen by Charlier.

Assessment

Jean-Michel Charlier is considered the greatest representative of action comics from the classic era of European comics, as Goscinny is of humor. He dominated it with a huge number of comics, which stood out for their the ingenuity of its plots and its solid documentation. Some of its series, such as Barbarroja or Lieutenant Blueberry are considered the best of their respective genres.

With such a volume of work, Charlier sometimes fell into plot repetitions and "raccord" failures. to highlight its irregularity,

not for lack of sense of responsibility, but precisely because it was overwhelmed by the amount of work it did. At the time he made "The Gringos" he had fourteen or fifteen different series, he had to nourish all the drawers that he had around him and therefore he lacked time to write, and above all to imagine.

Representation at Janson's light metro station in Charleroi.

Work

• Buck. (1947), with the artist Victor Hubinon.
• Tarawa, bleeding atoll (1948), with the artist Victor Hubinon.
• Surcouf, roi des corsaires (1949), with the artist Victor Hubinon.
• Tiger Joe (1950), with the artist Victor Hubinon.
• Les Histoires de l ́oncle Paul (1951), with the sketch artist Eddie Paape.
• La Patrouille des Castors (1954), with the sketch artist Mitaq.
• Barbecue (1959), with the artist Victor Hubinon.
• Michel Tanguy (1959), with the sketch artist Uderzo
• Lieutenant Blueberry (1963), with the artist Jean Giraud.
• Jim Cutlass Mississippi River (1981), with the artist Jean Giraud.