Asterix and Obelix on a scooter, or rather on a carTo escape from the traffic congestion of the city lutecia (Paris of the future) and I’m trying Unmask Viciovirtus, the personal development guru sent by Caesar. This villain will use the new trend positive thinking -read good vibes and empathy, diet and wellness- to deceive and fascinate both unmotivated Roman legions and residents village of the irreducible Gauls Created in 1959 by Goscinny and Uderzo and they have been sold to this day 393 million albums. This is the axis around cartoonist Didier Conrad and screenwriter Fabcaro (Fabrice Caro) built ‘Madonna lily’ (Salvat), comic Asterix’s number 40, The book that has just arrived in bookstores and has an initial circulation of five million 20 languagesThese include Spanish, Catalan, Asturian, Galician and Basque.
Both speak of Viciovirtus in an interview in Barcelona as merely visually inspired, highlighting the “controversial” figures of French politician Dominique de Villepin and philosopher Bernard-Henri Lévy for their “charisma and influence”. He is Asterix ‘dixit’, a man who “talks wildly to say nothing” and “says beautiful but trivial words”. “Is A manipulative and two-faced villain, Conrad says he’s managing a seemingly sweet but secret strategy. “The comic is not a critique of positive thinking and personal development, it is a critique of gurus who abuse these philosophies and use these messages to trap and manipulate fragile and vulnerable people for their own gain.”
Conrad (1959) and screenwriter Jean Yves Ferri accepted the challenge to continue Asterix’s adventures in 2013, with the approval of Uderzo (1927 – 2020), who lost his legendary comic book friend Goscinny in 1977. After five albums – ‘Asterix and the Picts’, ‘Caesar’s Papyrus’, ‘Asterix in Italy’, ‘Vercingetorix’s Daughter’ and ‘In the Footsteps of the Griffin’ – in ‘Madonna lily’ Ferri’s temporary replacement fabcaro (1973), the grandson of a communist grandfather who was exiled after the Civil War and spent his childhood summers in Santa Coloma de Gramenet, where his mother was born.
To some readers, this may seem like Asterix is advocating confrontation rather than dialogue. “The balance in the village is based on conflict and chaos. They solve everything by fighting. Unlike a place where there is peace and a character comes to sow war and trouble, here the opposite happens. That character comes to calm them down. Calming them down gives them peace, but this destroys the unity of the people – According to the screenwriter – it also upsets their balance, encouraging them to change their diet.” But who tells Obélix, accustomed to feasts of fatty wild boar meat, to be content with some fresh fish and vegetables, or a small portion of ‘nouvelle couisine’ on a giant plate, as in a restaurant? You? macrobiotics.
Conrad believes: “To survive in any environment, you need to have a certain level of resistance to any attack or danger, whether it is plague or animals… There is always violence in a society and you should not protect your child from everything because then you Don’t give him the tools to defend himself.” himself”.
Viciovirtus almost succeeded in making the village lose its rebellion and make the people stop thinking for themselves. “This is a disaster,” the cartoonist shouts. “In order to survive, it is necessary to have a critical spirit. It is not good for all of us to see a movement of thought as the only correct one and follow it without understanding it thoroughly. Decision making is a job. personal responsibility The question is: Do we have free will? Scientist Robert Sapolsky assures in an article in the ‘Los Angeles Times’: Today’s society has no decision-making power This leaves us unable to do anything because, as a society, we do not control anything. “This disaster is depressing.”
One of the characters who “most bought into the white lily philosophy” of Viciovirtus is Karabella, the wife of the chief Abraracúrcix. He sees their relationship as an “old-fashioned couple” in crisis, based on ‘fair distribution’ where the woman is responsible for the housework and the kitchen, and he is responsible for eating and having fun with friends.” “This is a criticism of his machismo,” the screenwriter emphasizes: ” It’s an attempt to open his eyes to his own machismo and patriarchal culture that many people are still unaware of, but fortunately this is slowly changing. This couple has always made Me happy.” “I like it. Even though they fought all the time and he scolded her, I realized there was a lot of love between them. So I wanted to influence that more soulful, emotional tone.”
Fabcaro, who learned to read with Asterix, seeks different reading levels to reach teenagers and adults, sprinkling the comic with “anachronisms like Goscinny does.” There are scooters, RENFE CAVEs (high-speed cars), demonstrations, traffic jams… “We have fun with clichés,” he concludes. “I parody the stereotypes of Paris as the bourgeois bohemian capital, snobs who despise Paris. Therefore, “When Karabella arrives in Lutecia, she is surrounded by pijerías who go to museums with works by Bánksix or Andiguárjolos.”