Lucy Luke, the Dalton Brothers, and the Gender Change

I would like to share with you a memory that I accidentally discovered by excavating on the spider shelves of a distant corner of my mind, which has been the occasion to cope with some interesting information about one of the most beloved comics in the world.

We all remember Luke Luke, always of course with the right genuine Greek accent that also gave us the maize blossom through the corn flour Morris) And one of the most recognizable Belgian comics in the world, with a plethora of colorful characters and intelligent scenarios, the best of which he put his pen and the late Goscinny (best known for the masterpieces Asterix, Iznogudand Nicolas).

Lucy Luke’s stories were often based on historical events of the American border (best known to all as the “wild” west), such as the construction of first intercontinental telegram in the album The singing thread and the visit of Duke of Alexandrovich of Russia In America on the album The Grand Duke. Of course, the date of the series is a bit in the air. For example, the album Le Daily Star plays somewhere in 1830, as Luke Luke meets a young man Horace Greeleyfuture founder of the New-York Tribune newspaper. On the other hand, in the album Oklahoma rushwe see Luke Luke alive and vibrant near sixty years later, in 1889, at his climax ‘Earth’s fever’ (When pieces of Oklahoma, then the land of the indigenous mascot and seminar, were allocated by the federal government to anyone who was able to apply).

The characters in Luke Luke’s albums and they don’t go back: Numerous memorable characters appeared on their pages, some of which were also based on real faces. The most well known are Dalton, who not It’s caricature of the real Dalton. Members of the actual Dalton gang actually appeared in a row, but only once on the album Outlawwhere they were overthrown by Luke Luke in Coffeyville (where the real Dalton were caught during a bank robbery). The dear to all of us Joe, William, Jack, and Averell made their big appearance later on the album Dalton cousins Presented as Dalton’s cousins, sworn in revenge and thirsty to gain the reputation of their cousins ​​(with the well -known results). And of course we can’t forget Ran-Tan-Plan, the most stupid dog of the West (parodies of the later and true German shepherd Rin believes who became known as an actor in the early Hollywood).

On his trips Luke Luke meets numerous characters, from the greenish graveyard who was always ready with his tape measure to measure Lucy Luke’s opponents, to (wild stereotypically for our time, with huge cutters) always presented as a restaurant or as a wash. These characters are more masks, like some kind of western commanders del Arte, through which the protagonists’ personalities are highlighted. But even the protagonists do not always have fixed characteristics: First of all, Lucy Luke, a well -known pacifist, in the first albums did not hesitate to kill (La Mine d’or de Dick Digger and Outlaw), but then he preferred to throw the pistols out of the hands of his opponents. And as the emblematic of Luke Luke’s cigarette, they say that Morris was forced to replace it with the well -known straw to be able to (what irony!) To penetrate the US market. It is probably a Radio Arvila: He was a smoker himself and tried to cut it (and the WHO awarded him a prize in 1988 for the straw).

Of all the characters, the one who always appears next to Lucy Luke is Dolly, his faithful and clever horse. He accompanies him in every adventure and has saved him countless times from dangerous situations. What you may not know (especially if you haven’t read the issues later by Morris/Goscinny) is that in the original, as well as in all other translations, Lucy Luke’s horse was arsenic. In the Greek edition, from the first and all albums (The robber with one hand), Dolly’s horse’s sex changed, giving birth to Dolry, which we all know and love.

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So, when Immacar 2002 read the Dalton Ballad & Other Stories (The 55th album and the last one worked by Goscinny), I was somewhat stunned by the preamble to mini-story A love for Dolis (to the right of the above image). Why, I thought, the creator had not built a stallion for Dolly’s Amore instead of creating a parallel universe? I didn’t think much more (I had more important things to do, such as playing GTA: VICE CITY secretly than my parents) but recently, reading some old Asterix issues brought it back to mind (who knows how). I searched for a while to find the original (or at least one English translation), and here: on the left of the image the preamble is missing, because of course it is not necessary: ​​non-Greek readers know Dolly as the male Jolly Jumper. And the answer to the question of my little self is this: The creator never downloaded any crazy idea. Just the sex of Lucy Luke’s horse had never had an impact on history until then, and the translator had never imagined that the innocent gender change he made in the first issue would never affect a scenario … until that was exactly what happened. And it was not possible for the Flower mare with which Jolly Jumper bit the sheet metal to become a male horse without changing the sketches … Certainly not when wearing a pink ribbon and in the end it is revealed to be paired with another (male) horse!

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Well all this, but one question remains: What is the change? The answer is both pedestrian and sweet: The first publisher just wanted to give the horse the name of his daughter (The article does not mention whether this publisher is Panos Koutroularis or George Tsitsovic, founders of Mammoth Comix). However, when a great story (and not minion like A love for Dolis) Returned Jolly Jumper’s courtesy in 2004 (The beautiful province), the younger translators did not want to reuse the trick on crazy crazy artists, and decided to solve the misunderstanding one and good: they brought Dolis back to the male Doli Jaber (as if Dolis the butterfly) Fine skillet in 2009. In his interview with Vima, Achdé (the most recent designer of the series) found the whole situation quite a bit:

However, I assure you: Lucy Luke is not gay! ” Assel explained us. And in order not to let any trace of suspicion, he painted on the last page of the controversial issue an angry Jolie Jaber declaring: “I’m a male! $%#& ».

Who would expect a father’s affectionate move to end up discussing the sexual orientation of the faster west’s pistol? The butterfly phenomenon in front of the horse’s phenomenon.

These. I hope I didn’t tire again, and the posting was a little joy in the loss of the last few months. I let Pat Woods say goodbye to us.

Edit: Thanks all for the positive comments. Some notes made by careful commentators:

• As the rightly pointed out U / thrasymachus91the u/Beneficial-Rush-1021and the u/ilia_volyova“Luke Luke” is quite good adapting the French pronunciation of “Lucky Luke”. Indeed, our own pronunciation /ˈluc̠i luk /is closer to the Belgian-French /ˈlyc̠i Lyk /in spite of the English /ˈlʌki luːk /, since the distance in Voice Table of International Voice Alphabet Between the closed rounded anterior /y /and the closed rounded back /U /is less measured in steps compared to the distance between /u /and the open-medium-sized back /ʌ /. So since we do not have / y / in Greek phonology, “Luke Luke”, scientifically. Thanks again Thrasymachus91, Beneficial-Rush-1021, and Ilia_volyova, because now I have enriched my repertoire with another trivia. Joy my friends will make. To emphasize here that as the u/SubmarineConvertiblethe performance of “Hulk” as “Hulk” is unacceptable, as Amazing Hulk is an American creation, and “Halk” is much closer to the right pronunciation.
• The u/kitsos-0, u/HelloThere-88and U/Baggos12345 They mentioned the movies/cartoon, in some of which were Jolly Jumper/Dolis and in some of which were Dolly. I believe this was because the compliants are simply in the age of confusion, or if you prefer POP. (Beautiful Plot), they had no bullshit, and either they wanted to follow the comics, or they didn’t know the comics and they simply translated what they saw/listen to, or (who knows) they had Knowledge of comics and wanted to correct a big mistake. I can only make cases here. It does not help that the cartoon/comics were not published in Greek in the same order published in the original. However, in the original at some point Lucy stopped smoking (early 80s), and after 2009 his horse officially became male in Greek. For the story, I think the movie mentioned by Baggos12345 is the Daisy Town But I am not sure (I completely remember the Soviet -style compilation with the original voices heard from behind because the studio obviously did not have access to the different sound stems).
• I don’t think I forgot the Chaidion. Apology u/actinross And thank you. I hope I escaped the bullet thanks to the Bible I always keep in my vest’s front pocket …