Asterix, Obelix and Netflix: US streamer embraces Gallic heroes
The plucky Gallic rebels, created by illustrator Albert Uderzo and writer Rene Goscinny in 1959, have a vast following thanks to the original comic books that have sold around 400 million copies.
A series of big-budget French films -- the latest in 2023 took them to China in "Asterix & Obelix: The Middle Kingdom" -- has also helped expand their reach.
But warrior Asterix and his powerful but dim-witted sidekick Obelix are yet to conquer viewers in the United States and Britain, which have their own comic book and animated hero characters from Marvel, Disney and other stables.
"Often unfortunately in these markets the Asterix films tend to be released in arthouse cinemas," said Celeste Surugue, head of the Editions Albert Rene publishing company that owns the rights to the original comics.
Although the tales of Roman-era adventure have a following in Australia and New Zealand, Asia also remains a global weak spot for the potion-swigging Gallic underdogs.
"The strength of a streaming platform is that access to viewers isn't limited by distribution," Surugue said.
Netflix is set to release the new five-part animated mini-series based on the 1966 book "Asterix and the Big Fight" in 190 countries, with 38 different language versions including Mandarin, Korean and Arabic.
It is directed by Alain Chabat, 23 years after his success with the "Asterix & Obelix: Mission Cleopatra" film starring Gerard Depardieu and Monica Bellucci, which remains one of the best-selling films in France of all time.
'Great job'
Netflix has past form with Asterix, having experimented with streaming rights for "The Middle Kingdom" film in 2023, which featured French A-listers Marion Cotillard and Vincent Cassel but suffered from generally poor reviews.
The platform has also helped bring other French productions to a global audience, overcoming the traditional aversion of English speakers to subtitles with hit shows such as "Lupin" and "Call My Agent".
While creating the dubbing for the new Asterix series, it was able to rely on the 120 different translations of the original French comics as well as the foreign-language versions of the previous films.
"They've done a great job," Surugue said.
"Asterix and the Big Fight" is set in the year 50 BC with Asterix and Obelix's indomitable village still the last Gallic holdout against Roman occupation.
The duo oversee the resistance, including a fight between their chief Vitalstatistix and a local Roman-backed rival, while struggling with the loss of the recipe for the magic potion that gives the villagers their super-human strength.
"I always liked 'The Big Fight' for the dynamic with the Gallo-Romans. Here, there are truly invaders, resistance fighters and collaborators," director Chabat told reporters in March.
The 41st Asterix album, "Asterix in Lusitania", will be released in October in 18 languages and is set in Portugal.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
LeMonde
3 hours ago
- LeMonde
'A guy like him, sinking into that? So fast?': How the manosphere is destroying relationships
On Tinder, Marc's (name changed) photo was typical, and his bio said little. During the Covid-19 lockdown, Sarah (name changed), a bit bored, swiped right. Like her, Marc, a sales manager, was in his 40s, and, as a bonus, lived just 500 meters from her apartment. Very soon, Marc moved in with Sarah. Between Netflix evenings and shared meals, together with their respective children, the first months spent in close quarters with each other went by smoothly. "Normally, I would never have stopped for him," admitted Sarah, an academic. "But then, I was amused to debate with him; he was very different from me and from the progressive men I know." Marc was chauvinistic and openly displayed sexist tendencies, but nothing that seemed insurmountable to Sarah. She saw it, rather, as a form of spicy otherness. Despite this, her friends warned her: They found Marc bad-tempered and aggressive when contradicted – and this impression was confirmed. The man Sarah had once considered, with some amusement, as a " boubour" (a portmanteau of " bourgeois" and " bourrin," meaning a "rough bourgeois," a kind of antithesis of the " bobo" or hipster-style "bourgeois bohemian"), soon turned into a domestic tyrant. When Sarah began a promotion tour for her latest book, Marc soon couldn't bear her increasing unavailability, and, as she spoke at more conferences and gave more interviews, he started to envy her social success. "That's when it all went off the rails," she said.
LeMonde
15 hours ago
- LeMonde
How an American mom is now part of my (French mom's) life
The more I think about it, the more I realize one of Instagram's unique features is the way it brings public figures into our private lives. Not just as celebrities gracing glossy magazine covers. Of course, I remember historic paparazzi moments: François Hollande on his scooter date, Jacques Chirac naked on the balcony of the Brégançon presidential summer residence, Kate Middleton sunbathing topless on another balcony, Britney Spears with her shaved head. Those were all glimpses into the private lives of public figures, obviously, but they were rare instances. And the private sphere was blown into the public by the media, in the traditionnal sense of the term, as an intermediary. Instagram people are a bit different. They really are with us. For one thing, they live inside our phones, so they're here all the time. For another, because of the way the Meta platform algorithm works, when you scroll through the app, you get an endless feed of close friends, strangers with whom you have much in common, ads and, of course, public figures. All these people are part of our daily lives, creating a strange mirror effect that erases the media as an intermediary: they reveal their own private and sometimes mundane moments as we sit in our living rooms, in bed or even in the bathroom. These recurring characters can quickly create a kind of artificial familiarity. This is how, the other night, while brushing my teeth, I told my partner, almost as if I were talking about a coworker or a friend, "Hey, Isabelle Bertolami is pregnant!" He asked how old her eldest was and where she would give birth. In short, a typical parent conversation, except for one small detail: neither of us has ever met Isabelle Bertolami. She's an American living in Aix-en-Provence with her husband and daughter, documenting her family life for her 242,000 followers. The American myth of the French mom Bertolami is what we call an Instagram American mom: mothers who praise the French parenting model, without too much concern with avoiding generalizations or ensuring accuracy. It's a way of feeding the American myth of the French mom: the mother who is both gentle and strict, attentive but not indulgent with a tyrannical child, fulfilled in her career, always impeccably dressed and manicured (she writes, typing with chipped nails).
Fashion Network
21 hours ago
- Fashion Network
Casablanca opens first Paris store, plans spaces in LA, London, and skiwear line
Casablanca has taken a step it describes as 'decisive' by opening its first brick-and-mortar store. The French label, launched in 2018 by French-Moroccan designer Charaf Tajer, has set up shop in Paris, where it has been showing since January 2019, and where it has managed to establish itself as one of the up-and-coming names in ready-to-wear. Casablanca's first store is located in the French capital's luxury shopping district, on rue du Faubourg-Saint-Honoré. Casablanca has opened its flagship almost at one end of the prestigious thoroughfare, at number 62, on the corner with rue d'Aguesseau. The premises extend over nearly 460 square metres on three levels, and were previously home to an art gallery. The interiors are the brainchild of designer Charaf Tajer and the label's creative director Steve Grimes, working in collaboration with London-based design agency Counterfeit Studio and Moroccan architecture studio Elements Lab. The décor reflects 'a fusion between the past and the future, between Parisian elegance, cinema references and a bold, forward-looking vision,' said Casablanca in a press release. Originally, Casablanca focused on menswear, and made a name for itself with uber-chic looks featuring vibrant prints and fine fabrics, borrowing both from the sporting world, notably tennis, and from retro glamour. Soon the label added women's ready-to-wear, broadening its assortment by introducing a range of accessories, including leather goods, footwear and sneakers, scarves, socks and hats. The label's Parisian store showcases all these categories, spread out across each level within Casablanca's various collections. The atmosphere inside the store is decidedly cheerful and warm, with an almost pop-art feel. The furnishings are characterised by rounded and geometric shapes and by Casablanca's signature sunny palette — red, green and Mediterranean blue. The décor combines different styles and materials, using various types of marble, metal, lacquered wood, walls in white wood and others with mouldings and arched niches, velvet, mosaic, and metal and glass tinted in multiple shades for the display cabinets. After Paris, Casablanca will open in July in Los Angeles, at 469 North Canon Drive, Beverly Hills. The label, which has dropped several collaborations in recent years, with Bulgari, Caviar Kaspia, ST Dupont and Nordstrom among others, is distributed via its e-shop and 350 multibrand retailers worldwide. It has recently opened shop-in-shops at Harvey Nichols and Bloomingdale's in Dubai, and at KaDeWe in Berlin, and further shop-in-shops are on the cards in London, at Selfridges in September and Harrods in November. Casablanca also operates seasonal pop-up stores, like the space open for two months at Le Bon Marché in Paris, decked out like a beach club. This season, the label has established a presence also at the Mandarin Oriental in Bodrum (Turkey), and will open temporary stores at Tahiti Beach on the French Riviera in July, at the Fashion Clinic Comporta store in Cavalhal, Portugal, in August, and at the Atlantis The Royal hotel in Dubai, in partnership with the Ounass e-shop. Another project Casablanca is busy on is the autumn launch of a first skiwear capsule collection, produced in partnership with Swiss brand Faction Skis. It will be presented in November via pop-up spaces at Harrods in London and Galeries Lafayette Haussmann in Paris, as well as in top Alpine resorts such as Verbier and Gstaad in Switzerland. Casablanca is backed by an investor and has moved its headquarters to London. In 2024, it generated a revenue of €45 million, and is expecting to reach €60 million for 2025, growing by more than 30%. Casablanca has been led since 2023 by Frederick Lukoff, and employs 140 people. The label has been posting double-digit annual growth on a regular basis. Sales for its e-shop have notably soared, recording a triple-digit rise this year. With this first Paris opening, Tajer is relishing Casablanca's success. 'When my parents arrived in France, my mother was working as a housekeeper, so me setting up a fashion house was the last thing that could be expected. Then, five or six years ago, I said: 'I want a corner in this street', and everyone told me it was impossible, because all the locations were taken by the top labels. Opening this store is a huge achievement for us: It feels like coming home.'
