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Asterix rules!

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  1. jake Silver badge

    Asterix rules!

    Need I say more?

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  2. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Nope

    If your comparing your European cartoons that became big selling books, then the body of work would put Asterix well behind Tintin. Have you read Asterix and the Vikings or Asterix and Cleopatra? Tintin was significantly more consistent.

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    1. jake Silver badge
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      Tintin always bored me.

      Asterix was never supposed to be historically accurate, just funny.

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    2. Anonymous Coward
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      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Nope

      Brought the Tintin boxed set when it came out. Will buy the Asterix one if they ever do one.

      Enjoyed both in my youth (and even now). Different stories, different characters, different genres.

      Never seen the point of these "my X is better than your X" attitudes.

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  3. Sean Timarco Baggaley
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    Tintin bored me to tears.

    Took itself far too seriously.

    The Asterix translations by Anthea Bell and Derek Hockridge were top-notch—it's very difficult to translate humour at the best of times and they really went that extra mile to nail the spirit of the original French. (In one interview, Uderzo even goes so far as to admit that some of the character names Bell and Hockridge came up with were better than the originals, which were usually puns that rarely had anything to do with the characters.)

    There's no contest, really. Tintin is just a straightforward "Boys Own Adventure"-type serial, with Tintin a very obvious precursor to the "Indiana Jones" character that Harrison Ford would make famous some decades later. Except it's very po-faced. There's a little humour, but mostly, it's played very straight.

    Asterix, on the other hand, is parodic and satirical in nature. It is, to the comic medium, what Terry Pratchett has become in the world of fantasy novels. Unlike Tintin, which has dated badly, the Asterix stories have remained timeless. They're as funny today as they were when they were first published.

    Asterix > Tintin. The end. Cue the traditional banquet under the stars, with Cacofonix tied to a tree in the foreground.

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  4. Not That Andrew

    I'll agree with you that Tintin takes itself far too seriously, but IMHO the only ones that have dated badly are the early ones - Tintin in the Land of the Soviets, Tintin in America and of course the ridiculously offensive Tintin in the Congo

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  5. SiempreTuna

    Asterix v TinTin? No Contest!

    .. Asterix knocks him clean out of .. Gaul (with the help of the magic potion, of course)

    Don't know how good the English translations are, but even with my very flaky French, the originals are absolutely hilarious. And they haven't dated one iota - I've been a fan since I lived in Bxl (home of TinTin) as a kid. TinTin, on the other hand is so dated it's hard to take sometimes - that sort of casual racism just doesnt' wash these days.

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  6. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Asterix is a riot. Me and Dad laughing out loud, over 20 years difference. Portuguese translation in the comics (and dubbing in the movies) were impeccable. Some names were changed too, but didnt lose one inch to the originals. When Dad went to France couldn't find any of the original comics, while back in Brazil we had plenty in the bookstores, to our dismay.

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  7. Beamerboy

    Asterix has a whole theme park just outside Paris - loved the books as a kid and still do I found out as we rediscovered them in the parents loft, cue a wasted afternoon reading through a few of them!

    Never really liked TinTin and I still drink the English version of Magic Potion thanks to Getafix!

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