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(Updated with a better image of the cover and the publication program download) The next Spirou & Fantasio adventure is almost upon us, as La Colère du Marsupilami (Spirou & Fantasio #55, “Wrath of the Marsupilami”) begins its serialization in the 2. December issue of the Journal de Spirou. Ahead of that, Dupuis has sent out their program of upcoming publications to a number of interested web sites (sadly not to Spirou Reporter, but can be downloaded here), which includes the cover of the upcoming album (above), a preview of two pages, and a plot summary. (SPOILERS!)
Faced with the photos of the Marsupilami handed over by Don Contralto (at the end of album #54), Spirou has to admit that he has no memory of this adventure. And neither does Fantasio. As for the Count of Champignac, he goes into a terrible rage whenever anyone mentions the little animal with the nimble and powerful tail. There’s only one possible explanation: They have been hypnotized with the zorg-ray to make them forget that they were ever friends with the Marsupilami!
Also note that the entry confirms that the album will be 64 pages.
Separately, Yoann has posted another little excerpt on Facebook:
And from next week’s issue of the Journal (#4050), a teaser for the upcoming adventure, featuring Ninon:
Finally, the album will no doubt appear in most of the usual languages over the course of 2016 (or later), but Cobolt is the first to announce a translated edition, saying that the album will come out in Danish in “February or March” of 2016. (It would be surprising if it comes out before the French edition, so let’s say March.)
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Looks good! I’m not too sure about this whole ‘forgotten they ever knew the Marsupilami’ though. How likely is that? Surely, in-universe, Spirou and Fantasio should at least have pictures of the Marsupilami? They are reporters, for heaven’s sake! Also, during the creature’s long absence, there was at least one moment when Spirou reminisced about the creature: in ‘Vallée des bannis’, he hopes that the familiar sound of a creature in the valley is that of the Marsupilami. It is not mentioned by name, but it is there so clearly Spirou of the main series remembers the beast, at least in the timeline of Tomé and Janry, which Y&V are likely to consider canon, since they used their character Vito Cortizone. If we want to go very far, we could even include the deleted appearance of the Marsupilami in ‘Aux sources du Z’, which may or may not be considered canon by Y&V. That’s opening up a biiiiiiig can of worms though.
Another thing about using the zorglonde as an explanation is that this might bring Zorglub back into the series. Given that ‘La face cachée du Z’ ends with Zorglub going into deep space and Y&V telling us he won’t reappear for ‘for quite some albums’, it seems rather early for him to reappear in the next one. Whether three albums sans Zorglub count as ‘quite some’ is not clear.
Where do you stand on all this, Spirou Reporter?
I don’t think these are necessarily contradictions, depending on exactly what they’ve been hypnotized to not think of or remember. The blurb says “forget”, but that could be a simplification. It could for example be that they’ve been conditioned to not question what has happened to it, or even think about it at all unless directly reminded, without them really having lost the memories (except for of that final adventure). The zorg-ray was once able to make them not recognize Zorglub, even when they were sitting face to face with him and talking [i]about[/i] him (though the effect was only temporary), so this kind of manipulation doesn’t seem impossible.
And according to everything we’ve been told the adventure won’t bring back Zorglub. On the other hand, it will definitely [url=http://www.inedispirou.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=2758&start=60#p68240]feature Zantafio[/url], who has been known to use the zorg-ray in the past…
Since it’s only three or four days until I receive the first installment, I will wait and see. 🙂
Hopefully it will also be published in Norwegian. If not, I will buy it in Danish or Swedish.