Superdupont

Superdupont, with a Gallic rooster, in a position spoofing a classic Superman pose

Superdupont is a French comic strip created in 1972 by Marcel Gotlib and Jacques Lob, with the collaboration of Alexis. It is a parody of both Superman and French national attitudes (or, rather, their caricatural perception outside and inside France).

Publication history

Superdupont was initially published in the Franco-Belgian comics magazine Pilote on September 21, 1972.^[1] The series was continued in Fluide Glacial in 1975, and following the sudden death of Alexis, the artwork was created by Jean Solé. Steadily published through the 80s and 90s, the series main author, Lob died in 1990. The series resumed publication in Fluide Glacial in October 2006.^[2]

The character

Superdupont is the son of the unknown soldier buried under the Arc de Triomphe. He is very patriotic, sometimes chauvinist, and empowered by superpowers that help him to defend his country against a secret organization called '"Anti-France", a sectist and terrorist organization that wants to destroy France. "Anti-France" was originally a pejorative term used by the nationalist intellectual Charles Maurras.

Anti-France agents are all foreigners (non-French) and thus speak the fictional language Anti-Français, a mishmash of English, Spanish, Italian, Russian, and German. This movement is intended to ridicule the paranoia of certain French people who consider the foreign and unfamiliar as a threat against France.

The physical appearance of Superdupont is a superhero version of a caricatural Frenchman (specially, as seen by the Anglophone world): he wears a beret, a striped jersey, charentaises, a baguette of bread under the arm, a tricolour belt held by a safety pin, a long blue cape. He also supports economic patriotism, as he smokes Gauloises cigarettes, he drinks red wine, he eats French cheese and refuses to be painted using China ink.

Like Superman, Superdupont is able to fly but seems less superpowered than Superman. By luck Superdupont is a master in the savate also known as boxe française ("French boxing"), which gives some superiority over his opponents.

Publications

• Tome 1 : Superdupont (by Jacques Lob, Gotlib and Alexis)
• Tome 2 : Amour et forfaiture (by Jacques Lob, Gotlib and Solé)
• Tome 3 : Opération Camembert (by Jacques Lob, Gotlib and Solé)
• Tome 4 : Oui nide Iou (by Jacques Lob, Gotlib, Alexis, Solé, Daniel Goossens, Neal Adams and Coutelis)
• Tome 5 : Les âmes noires (by Jacques Lob, Gotlib, Alexis, Solé)
• Tome 6 : Superdupont pourchasse l'ignoble (by Marcel Gotlib, Lefred-Thouron, Solé)

Sources

• Superdupont publications in Pilote and Fluide Glacial BDoubliées (French)
• Superdupont albums Bedethque (French)

Footnotes

1. BDoubliées. "Pilote année 1972" (in French).
2. "Superdupont maakt onverwachte terugkeer". Stripgids. 2 (2): 6. December 2006.