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Post by rich on Sept 28, 2024 11:26:18 GMT -5
In the bookshop today I saw a beautiful collection of the whole Blueberry series across ten oversized HCs with matt paper, translated into German and published by Egmont (https://www.egmont-shop.de/comics/klassiker/blueberry/)
Does anyone know what the deal is with these in English? I have a bunch from the 1980s, but they seem to have been out of print ever since. In French and German you can buy them in a variety of editions, but in English there's nothing. Sad.
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Post by rich on Sept 28, 2024 11:30:31 GMT -5
I tried searching for why Dark Horse have printed the absolute bottom of the barrel Moebius stuff but ignore some of the classic works. I found this amusing commentary on Reddit:
As far as I can tell, the strategy is:
(1) reprint none of the iconic material that everyone wants to read (Arzach; Hermetic Garage; Blueberry; Incal is licensed to a different publisher)
(2) print a lot of later books that allude extensively to those other works, which aren't available in English, so much so that you can't properly appreciate them if you don't know those works
Presumably with a third step:
(3) Wonder why they're not selling as well as hoped
Edit: A lot of commentary suggests that Giraud's wife hates English speakers/the English language, and spites us by only allowing translations in every other language known to man. Surely the must be nonsense!?!
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Post by supercat on Sept 28, 2024 13:29:12 GMT -5
I don't know the answer but I totally hear you. I've really had to cobble together my Moebius collection over the years. Arzach I just broke down and got a Humanoides French edition about 13 years ago (not a lot of dialogue in the story and 5 years of French in school helps though I'm hardly fluent overall). For Incal I grabbed a nice English hardcover about 10 years ago. I've picked up some of the old Marvel Epic line stuff too like Airtight Garage (where I first encountered Moebius in the day).
Still want to read Blueberry at some point.
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Post by rich on Sept 28, 2024 15:12:40 GMT -5
I don't know the answer but I totally hear you. I've really had to cobble together my Moebius collection over the years. Arzach I just broke down and got a Humanoides French edition about 13 years ago (not a lot of dialogue in the story and 5 years of French in school helps though I'm hardly fluent overall). For Incal I grabbed a nice English hardcover about 10 years ago. I've picked up some of the old Marvel Epic line stuff too like Airtight Garage (where I first encountered Moebius in the day). Still want to read Blueberry at some point. I have all the Epic Moebius books, except the Horny Goof, as that didn't interest me. Actually I might be missing one of the later ones... I don't remember. They're great! They only reprinted a fraction of Giraud's Blueberry books though, based on the German and French volumes on sale. While the German ones I saw today looked lovely, €400 for the Blueberry set is a tad steep, even for about 1,600 pages. Especially as the paper seemed quite grainy- this seems a popular trend in EU reprints, but it makes the art look less sharp. More muted too, but many would argue that's a good thing. It's such a pity that one of the greatest comics artists of all time is represented so poorly in the English language!! |
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Post by Calidore on Sept 28, 2024 17:47:27 GMT -5
I tried searching for why Dark Horse have printed the absolute bottom of the barrel Moebius stuff but ignore some of the classic works. I found this amusing commentary on Reddit: As far as I can tell, the strategy is: (1) reprint none of the iconic material that everyone wants to read (Arzach; Hermetic Garage; Blueberry; Incal is licensed to a different publisher) (2) print a lot of later books that allude extensively to those other works, which aren't available in English, so much so that you can't properly appreciate them if you don't know those works Presumably with a third step: (3) Wonder why they're not selling as well as hoped Edit: A lot of commentary suggests that Giraud's wife hates English speakers/the English language, and spites us by only allowing translations in every other language known to man. Surely the must be nonsense!?! That kinda sounds like Reddit snark. Wikipedia's entry offers some rationale with their listing.
Mœbius collection (1996)
Having added the 0-volume to the Collected Fantasies series in 1990, Dark Horse Comics too decided to release a Mœbius specific – meaning without his Western work – collection themselves, this time executed in the standard US comic book-sized format and soliciting the editorial input from Jean-Marc Lofficier who had already done so for the previous efforts. Though much of the contents was essentially a recapitulation of the Marvel/Epic publications, Lofficier made use of the opportunity to add work Mœbius had created after the Marvel/Epic publications had run its course, such as the story The Man from the Ciguri (a sequel to The Airtight Garage) and the first two outings of the Madwomen of the sacred Heart series.
Arzach (80 pages, Dark Horse Comics, February 1996, ISBN 1569711321)
Exotics (80 pages, Dark Horse Comics, April 1996, ISBN 1569711348)[269]
The Man from the Ciguri (80 pages, Dark Horse Comics, May 1996, ISBN 1569711356), collecting the episodes as originally serialized in black & white in the publisher's Cheval Noir (French for Dark Horse) magazine (issues 26–30, 33–37, 40–41, and 50, 1992–1994).
H.P.'s Rock City (80 pages, Dark Horse Comics, June 1996, ISBN 156971133X)[270]
Madwomen of the sacred Heart (144 pages, Dark Horse Comics, August 1996, ISBN 1569711364); black & white, collecting the first volume as serialized in their 1993 Dark Horse Presents magazine, augmented with volume 2.
Mœbius Library (2016-)
Twenty years later, in April 2016, Dark Horse announced an ambitious project called the "Mœbius Library" to be released by its book division in American graphic novel hardcover format[271] – even though the later added Doctor Moebius and Mister Gir title became executed as a softcover release. The stated intent was to predominantly publish latter day work by Mœbius in conjunction with, and originally published under the auspices of, his own publishing house "Mœbius Production", headed after his death in 2012 by second wife Isabelle. The first title was released in October 2016, which promptly won an Eisner Award.
Mœbius Library 1 - The World of Edena (360 pages, Dark Horse Books, October 2016, ISBN 9781506702162); featuring the first time English language version of the last installment Sra, thereby completing The World of Edena series in English. Recipient of a 2017 Eisner Award in the category "Best U.S. Edition of International Material".[237]
Mœbius Library 2 - Inside Moebius, Part 1 (216 pages, Dark Horse Books, February 2018, ISBN 9781506703206); collects the first two volumes of the French source publication
Mœbius Library 3 - The Art of Edena (208 pages, Dark Horse Books, April 2018, ISBN 9781506703213); art/comic book hybrid, collects the Edena short stories as well as Edena associated art.
Mœbius Library 4 - Inside Moebius, Part 2 (264 pages, Dark Horse Books, June 2018, ISBN 9781506704968); collects the middle two volumes of the French source publication
Mœbius Library 5 - Inside Moebius, Part 3 (280 pages, Dark Horse Books, October 2018, ISBN 9781506706047); collects the last two volumes of the French source publication
Mœbius Library 6 - The Major (184 pages, Dark Horse Books, July 2024, ISBN 9781506719511); edited translation of the 2011 French source publication
Mœbius Library Special 1 - Doctor Moebius and Mister Gir (288 pages, Dark Horse Books, 16 December 2023, ISBN 9781506713434; faithful translation of the 2015 French source publication, but with minute editorial differences such as the omission of some accompanying art and the addition of the postscript editorial glossary.
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Post by Icctrombone on Sept 28, 2024 18:00:23 GMT -5
I was never a Möbius fan because he never drew Hawkeye.  |
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Post by rich on Sept 28, 2024 18:12:48 GMT -5
I tried searching for why Dark Horse have printed the absolute bottom of the barrel Moebius stuff but ignore some of the classic works. I found this amusing commentary on Reddit: As far as I can tell, the strategy is: (1) reprint none of the iconic material that everyone wants to read (Arzach; Hermetic Garage; Blueberry; Incal is licensed to a different publisher) (2) print a lot of later books that allude extensively to those other works, which aren't available in English, so much so that you can't properly appreciate them if you don't know those works Presumably with a third step: (3) Wonder why they're not selling as well as hoped Edit: A lot of commentary suggests that Giraud's wife hates English speakers/the English language, and spites us by only allowing translations in every other language known to man. Surely the must be nonsense!?! That kinda sounds like Reddit snark. Wikipedia's entry offers some rationale with their listing.
Mœbius collection (1996)
Having added the 0-volume to the Collected Fantasies series in 1990, Dark Horse Comics too decided to release a Mœbius specific – meaning without his Western work – collection themselves, this time executed in the standard US comic book-sized format and soliciting the editorial input from Jean-Marc Lofficier who had already done so for the previous efforts. Though much of the contents was essentially a recapitulation of the Marvel/Epic publications, Lofficier made use of the opportunity to add work Mœbius had created after the Marvel/Epic publications had run its course, such as the story The Man from the Ciguri (a sequel to The Airtight Garage) and the first two outings of the Madwomen of the sacred Heart series.
Arzach (80 pages, Dark Horse Comics, February 1996, ISBN 1569711321)
Exotics (80 pages, Dark Horse Comics, April 1996, ISBN 1569711348)[269]
The Man from the Ciguri (80 pages, Dark Horse Comics, May 1996, ISBN 1569711356), collecting the episodes as originally serialized in black & white in the publisher's Cheval Noir (French for Dark Horse) magazine (issues 26–30, 33–37, 40–41, and 50, 1992–1994).
H.P.'s Rock City (80 pages, Dark Horse Comics, June 1996, ISBN 156971133X)[270]
Madwomen of the sacred Heart (144 pages, Dark Horse Comics, August 1996, ISBN 1569711364); black & white, collecting the first volume as serialized in their 1993 Dark Horse Presents magazine, augmented with volume 2.
Mœbius Library (2016-)
Twenty years later, in April 2016, Dark Horse announced an ambitious project called the "Mœbius Library" to be released by its book division in American graphic novel hardcover format[271] – even though the later added Doctor Moebius and Mister Gir title became executed as a softcover release. The stated intent was to predominantly publish latter day work by Mœbius in conjunction with, and originally published under the auspices of, his own publishing house "Mœbius Production", headed after his death in 2012 by second wife Isabelle. The first title was released in October 2016, which promptly won an Eisner Award.
Mœbius Library 1 - The World of Edena (360 pages, Dark Horse Books, October 2016, ISBN 9781506702162); featuring the first time English language version of the last installment Sra, thereby completing The World of Edena series in English. Recipient of a 2017 Eisner Award in the category "Best U.S. Edition of International Material".[237]
Mœbius Library 2 - Inside Moebius, Part 1 (216 pages, Dark Horse Books, February 2018, ISBN 9781506703206); collects the first two volumes of the French source publication
Mœbius Library 3 - The Art of Edena (208 pages, Dark Horse Books, April 2018, ISBN 9781506703213); art/comic book hybrid, collects the Edena short stories as well as Edena associated art.
Mœbius Library 4 - Inside Moebius, Part 2 (264 pages, Dark Horse Books, June 2018, ISBN 9781506704968); collects the middle two volumes of the French source publication
Mœbius Library 5 - Inside Moebius, Part 3 (280 pages, Dark Horse Books, October 2018, ISBN 9781506706047); collects the last two volumes of the French source publication
Mœbius Library 6 - The Major (184 pages, Dark Horse Books, July 2024, ISBN 9781506719511); edited translation of the 2011 French source publication
Mœbius Library Special 1 - Doctor Moebius and Mister Gir (288 pages, Dark Horse Books, 16 December 2023, ISBN 9781506713434; faithful translation of the 2015 French source publication, but with minute editorial differences such as the omission of some accompanying art and the addition of the postscript editorial glossary.
I own the lot... and some really aren't terribly good. The majority of his best stuff isn't currently in print. The Incal is in and out of print quite frequently, at least, but we're missing lots of the Epic stuff that has been in print in English, and tons of Blueberry comics that have never seen print in English as far as I'm aware. You say what you quoted offers a rationale for what is going on... but I don't see it? Why omit half (or more) of his great stuff but print plenty of his weakest work? What's the rationale? |
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Post by commond on Sept 28, 2024 18:39:31 GMT -5
From what I gather, the royalties that US publishers are willing to pay the Moebius estate are substantially less than the estate expects. Rumor has it that the Moebius estate is difficult to work with. On the other hand, US publishers reportedly offer far worse royalties than European publishers hence why you see editions being published in foreign languages but not in English. The US publishers would argue that the royalties they're being asked to pay make the work not worth publishing. As far as I'm aware, most of the Blueberry content that's never been published in English are the stories that Giraud did after Charlier died, which took the story in a different direction than Charlier had planned.
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Post by rich on Sept 28, 2024 18:53:25 GMT -5
From what I gather, the royalties that US publishers are willing to pay the Moebius estate are substantially less than the estate expects. Rumor has it that the Moebius estate is difficult to work with. On the other hand, US publishers reportedly offer far worse royalties than European publishers hence why you see editions being published in foreign languages but not in English. The US publishers would argue that the royalties they're being asked to pay make the work not worth publishing. Surely not just US but UK/Canada/South Africa/Australia/NZ/etc also can't catch a break- perhaps the estate have unrealistic ideas due to the number of English language speakers in the world? Incredibly stubborn for them to hold out for decade after decade after decade!! It's also shitting on the memory of the artist, by depriving a huge swathe of the world of his art. Going by the covers I saw today, Egmont are attributing about 1,000 extra pages of Blueberry material to Charlier and Giraud than I've ever seen printed in English before! Maybe the names on the covers are disingenuous? I'm not sure. It's the same in French- there's a LOT of material advertised by Giraud that I've not seen in English. |
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Post by rich on Sept 28, 2024 19:00:18 GMT -5
Anyone discovering Moebius now I feel sorry for, with the Epic books going for such silly prices. I was able to pick up the whole lot for about £70 in ~2006, but now they frequently sell for 20x as much individually. There was a big influx of the books on the market that year, thanks to a few pallets of the books being discovered in a warehouse. They looked damn near as good as new when I got them, but 18 years later they now look their true age.
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Post by codystarbuck on Sept 28, 2024 19:04:17 GMT -5
I think we are forgetting that Moebius was a collaborator, on Blueberry and Jean-Michel Charlier was involved in the conception and wrote the stories and his rights passed onto his son, Philippe. So, the wife blocking things is unlikely and more likely is the complexity of the complete rights. They set up a company, JMC Adventures, to administer their joint ownership.
According to the wikipedia article, the original Epic albums had print runs of about 20,000 and were slow sellers, which is believable, given how few westerns have succeeded in comics, since the 60s (apart from Jonah Hex) and took years to sell their print runs. The Mojo Press book didn't do huge business, either.
I'm willing to bet a combination of complex publishing rights and low historical sales have largely prevented Blueberry from getting a more thorough English release. His Moebius stuff (Giraud worked on Blueberry under the pen name Gir, before using the Moebius name for sci-fi and fantasy-oriented material and later started using it for Blueberry, too) is closer to superhero stuff, especially The Incal.
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Post by commond on Sept 28, 2024 19:16:26 GMT -5
From what I gather, the royalties that US publishers are willing to pay the Moebius estate are substantially less than the estate expects. Rumor has it that the Moebius estate is difficult to work with. On the other hand, US publishers reportedly offer far worse royalties than European publishers hence why you see editions being published in foreign languages but not in English. The US publishers would argue that the royalties they're being asked to pay make the work not worth publishing. Surely not just US but UK/Canada/South Africa/Australia/NZ/etc also can't catch a break- perhaps the estate have unrealistic ideas due to the number of English language speakers in the world? Incredibly stubborn for them to hold out for decade after decade after decade!! It's also shitting on the memory of the artist, by depriving a huge swathe of the world of his art. Going by the covers I saw today, Egmont are attributing about 1,000 extra pages of Blueberry material to Charlier and Giraud than I've ever seen printed in English before! Maybe the names on the covers are disingenuous? I'm not sure. It's the same in French- there's a LOT of material advertised by Giraud that I've not seen in English. 1,000 pages seems too high. That would have to include the albums done by Giraud after Charlier's death and presumably spinoffs like Young Blueberry. |
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Post by rich on Sept 28, 2024 19:22:27 GMT -5
I think we are forgetting that Moebius was a collaborator, on Blueberry and Jean-Michel Charlier was involved in the conception and wrote the stories and his rights passed onto his son, Philippe. So, the wife blocking things is unlikely and more likely is the complexity of the complete rights. They set up a company, JMC Adventures, to administer their joint ownership. According to the wikipedia article, the original Epic albums had print runs of about 20,000 and were slow sellers, which is believable, given how few westerns have succeeded in comics, since the 60s (apart from Jonah Hex) and took years to sell their print runs. The Mojo Press book didn't do huge business, either. I'm willing to bet a combination of complex publishing rights and low historical sales have largely prevented Blueberry from getting a more thorough English release. His Moebius stuff (Giraud worked on Blueberry under the pen name Gir, before using the Moebius name for sci-fi and fantasy-oriented material and later started using it for Blueberry, too) is closer to superhero stuff, especially The Incal. You'd still think that earning zero for forty years on reprints is worse for the rights holders (whoever they may be) than earning something? Who knows, maybe their stubbornness will last until their final breaths... Maybe if Jean Giroud's best books had all been kept in print for the last half century in English then there'd be more of a market for his work now? He's hard to discover properly as it is. I was blown away by the variety of his books (two versions of most) even in German in the bookstore today. Cheaper, smaller ones, and fancier, larger ones. There's no way he has a larger German market worldwide than an English market. |
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Post by commond on Sept 28, 2024 19:22:50 GMT -5
This list on reddit might help you -- www.reddit.com/r/Moebius/comments/j277bg/a_complete_guide_to_moebius_collected_editions/?share_id=TN0WsJAkctwKcdyL6HLL3&utm_content=2&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=ioscss&utm_source=share&utm_term=1There's also this from Wiki: "In 2020, the entirety of the main (including "Trail of the Navajo" and "Three Black Birds"), Young Blueberry, and Mister Blueberry series, saw an English language softcover album release by the independent micro publisher "Tom Is Jerry Books". A non-profit organization based out of Munich, Germany. The publisher publishes since 2020 the triannual Pingo Magazine that specializes in contemporary art and mindfulness,[105] with European comics, including Blueberry, as recent Pingo Magazine "special edition" additions of interest. German and English are chosen as lingua franca for the (print-on-demand-only) albums, but are exclusively sold on an extremely limited basis through some online, museum, and art bookstores in a few selected western European cities with the single New York City, US, bookstore Printed Matter, Inc., as the only one located in an English-language territory." I'm surprised there aren't fan-subs of this stuff. |
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Post by rich on Sept 28, 2024 19:30:58 GMT -5
This list on reddit might help you -- www.reddit.com/r/Moebius/comments/j277bg/a_complete_guide_to_moebius_collected_editions/?share_id=TN0WsJAkctwKcdyL6HLL3&utm_content=2&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=ioscss&utm_source=share&utm_term=1There's also this from Wiki: "In 2020, the entirety of the main (including "Trail of the Navajo" and "Three Black Birds"), Young Blueberry, and Mister Blueberry series, saw an English language softcover album release by the independent micro publisher "Tom Is Jerry Books". A non-profit organization based out of Munich, Germany. The publisher publishes since 2020 the triannual Pingo Magazine that specializes in contemporary art and mindfulness,[105] with European comics, including Blueberry, as recent Pingo Magazine "special edition" additions of interest. German and English are chosen as lingua franca for the (print-on-demand-only) albums, but are exclusively sold on an extremely limited basis through some online, museum, and art bookstores in a few selected western European cities with the single New York City, US, bookstore Printed Matter, Inc., as the only one located in an English-language territory." I'm surprised there aren't fan-subs of this stuff. I'm in Munich and I can't find a word about these mysterious editions, searching in English or German. Google is utterly stumped, other than the page you quoted. Maybe we need some magic keyword to find it? The publisher's website looks like it hasn't been updated since the 1990s. Edit: Thanks for the link at the top! |
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