Superman Through the Ages! Forum

In the 40's, when the Supes adventures were first published, the man of steel was renamed "Yordi" or also "Marc". Unfortunately, I haven't found excerpts where he's named so.On the other hand, I have found an old french publication where Superman's garment is pink instead of being blue:
(http://batsite29.free.fr/comics/375.jpg)

I have also found the excerpt of a french publication where we saw Batman for the first time. Only, he was renamed "Les Ailes Rouges" (the red wings). Don't ask me why, and Batman's outfit were then red.
(http://batsite29.free.fr/couv/421.jpg)
I'll try to find more curiosities of this kind. Bye!

I love this sort of stuff! I translate a lot of stuff from French and Swedish to English for a living (I've been toying with the idea of providing a French language translation of ESM's Last Son of Krypton), but have no idea why some editor would have considered Yordi or Marc particularly appropriate names for Superman; I understand even less why Superman should have worn a pink costume. "Les ailes rouges" is a curious choice of name for Batman, since it has no obvious bat reference. There was, however, a book of poetry published during World War 1 called Les ailes rouges de la guerre, i.e. The Red Wings of War. I wonder if there's any connection.

In Sweden, Superman was first introduced in 1939 as Titanen från Krypton, which I'm sure you can figure out means "The Titan from Krypton". I rather like this, because titanium and krypton are both elements, though I doubt that the pun was intended. Batman was known as Läderlappen, a fairly obscure Swedish word for bat (the most common term for bat in Swedish is fladdermus, literally "flapping mouse"). It's worth noting that this is probably refers to the Swedish translation of the Johann Strauss opera Die Fledermaus

Hello? Hello?... Merciful Rao! I've bored all these innocent bystanders to death!

What Earth was the Pink Superman from?

Was that just a printing error or was he always like that?

I wonder if it was a case of "oh darn our printers suck so hard we better change some names to suit the colours, everyone knows bats aren't red".

I am glad you appreciated my post. Unfortunately, I haven't so much stuff to show you. What I wanted to show you, it is this kind of picture, but it is not very clear (I have put URLs becuase I am not sure the picture will appear):
(http://home.planet.nl/~duckburg/Afbeeldingen/Jije/Redryderensuperman.jpg)
http://home.planet.nl/~duckburg/Jijetekst1.html
http://home.planet.nl/~duckburg/Afbeeldingen/Jije/Redryderensuperman.jpg
 Before WW2, in Belgium, the "Journal de Spirou" used to publish the adventures of Superman (Marc, Hercule des temps modernes) by J Siegel and Joe Shuster. Then, as you know, germans arrived, invaded France and Belgium, and foreign comics were forbidden. So a belgian drawer named Joseph Gillain (he signed Jijé)took the work over, and drew the adventures of Superman of his own (bot in french and flamish). Unfortunately, the only example of Supes drawn by Jijé I have found is the one above.

As for the pink Supes' garment, I don't know why. At the time, publishers currently changed details like that, maybe to personnalize their magazines. Besides, when Superman was published in France and renamed Yori, they had removed the S from his chest.

Another strange particularity: through the 50's and the 60's, a rather strange law in France forbid to show a masked character in the comics meant for kids. So, when the adventures of Flash (Barry Allen) were published, censors had checked each image and seen to it that Flash's mask was erased. I'll try to find an example to show you, it seems very weird...

Eh! Eh! I have come across another curiosity; a publication of April 1959, at the time, the french publisher (Artima) had not got the right to publish Superman, so they took the original comics and tampered with them so they didn't look alike, and they also changed the names of the characters. In this example I have found, you can see Superman who is renamed "Atomic", his cape has been erased and they have added rockets in his back so he could fly(the original drawer must be Kurt Schaffenberg):
(http://perso.wanadoo.fr/didier.godefroy/atomic.jpg)
If the image doesn't appear, here is the URL:
http://perso.wanadoo.fr/didier.godefroy/flash1a10arti.htm

I have also found french editions of Flash with his mask erased, according the stupid law I mentionned above:
(http://perso.wanadoo.fr/didier.godefroy/flasharti37.jpg)(http://perso.wanadoo.fr/didier.godefroy/flasharti38.jpg)
(http://perso.wanadoo.fr/didier.godefroy/flasharti40.jpg)
again, in case the picture doesn't appear, here is the link to the site:
http://perso.wanadoo.fr/didier.godefroy/flash31a40arti.htm

Fantastic stuff, Kal-L! I had no idea that Jijé had ever drawn Superman or Red Ryder, though as a Franquin fan, I was aware of his work on Spirou and his Western stuff; he was a great cartoonist. Edgar P. Jacobs, of Blake & Mortimer fame, drew Flash Gordon for a while in a similar twist of events.

As for Atomic, I must say the jetpack rather suits Clark. Copyright infringement doesn't seem to have been a great matter of concern to comics publishers back then.

The law forbidding masked characters in children's comics is wonderful. Insane legislation always warms the cockles of my heart. There must be quite an interesting story in how this law came to be passed. Let's not forget that Arsene Lupin and Fantomas, two of France's most famous pulp heroes, are both criminals, and Fantomas especially was extremely cruel (one trick he did was to put acid into perfume bottles). Kids were still reading their stories back then (I certainly was as late as the 1970s), but they couldn't read about masked do-gooders? Weird.

The Flash doesn't half look stupid without his mask, sort of like a frogman on dry land.

Permanus, I congratulate you for your knowledge in comics, wether american or european.

Indeed, Fantomas was masked, and the reason the good doers were forbidden to go masked too were probably for the kids not to mistake them with bad doers. it's just a conjecture, I don't know exactly. Anyway, i'll try to check, and I'll tell you...

Another strange aspect of french law. DC continuity has been shattered in France because of right on copyrights. For instance, "sagedition", the publisher of Superman in France had no copyrigt on JLA, Flash or Green Lantern, so they supressed each story of Superman where they appeared. On the other hand, Artima who had the rights for JLA, GL etc couldn't publish adventures where Superman appeared.

I keep on my research, bye!

wasn't there a flaudermaus in all star squadron?

I could be mistaken, but I thought Fliedermaus was an enemy of the All-Star Squadron.

I had to Google this, but, yes, there was such a guy. It's just German for 'bat'.

 Strauss' weird 1874 operetta is about a guy who, er, goes to a party when he is supposed to go to jail. Don't ask. The party is hosted by a guy who wants revenge for the time the protagonist tricked him into walking across town dressed in a bat costume, but there's no mention of any crimefighting in it. Not to be confused with Dudley Moore's spoof operetta "Die Flabbergast".

that's what i meant.. i remeber him being a batman like character in young all-stars right?
and he had a sidekick too?

Since you bring it up, linguist trivia time:

I know fliedermaus is German for bat.  Does it literally translate into 'flying mouse' (flieder = flying; maus = mouse)?  That kind of makes sense since a bat looks like a flying mouse.

Wasn't one of the characters in the Tick cartoon called fliedermaus ?

Actually, it means "flapping mouse" or "flailing mouse" as far as I know. "flying mouse" wuld be Fliegendmaus.

Cool!  Thanks for the linguistic translation, Permanus.

Usually romance languages have similar words and word origins so I thought I could fake that one.

Again, thanks.

Fliedermaus, Fliegendmaus or so, very exciting...