Talk:Achille Talon

Rewrite of Device Section
I was going to tackle Murgh's request to rewrite this section in encyclopedic style, but after browsing a few Achille Talon albums, the comment that Greg "used everything as fodder" seems offbase. Greg occasionally packs three or four jokes into a panel, but in his graphics his usual habit is let several panels go by before a visual gag. It's true the *language* in Achille Talon is dense and constantly amusing, but that doesn't seem to be the point being made in this section. There are examples of humorists who keep up a practically constant barrage of verbal and graphic humor and asides (Gotlib, Don Rosa, Walt Kelly), but Greg's style is not that way. This isn't to say that Greg wasn't capable of constant joking -- it's just that it wasn't his style.

More characteristic of Achille Talon is the dense, inflated language. But that's something a native French speaker should comment upon. Pas moi.Alpha Ralpha Boulevard 22:19, 31 October 2007 (UTC)


 * Moi non plus. It's the kind of section that can only be written with the help of a decent academic analysis source. Otherwise it's difficult to shape anything meaningful from that premise without it being OR. M URGH   disc.  23:06, 31 October 2007 (UTC)

Something a little wrong with story about how Achille Talon started
I'm not on incredibly firm ground, here (and it's really not that big a deal), but this article statement, as it stands, may either be an urban legend, or lost something in translation:

"The figure was conceived by Greg when, due to a clerical error, some pages of Pilote were blank and none of the other authors were available."

In Album 30, "Achille Talon a un gros nez!", pages 12 and 13 appear to show the first Achille Talon gags (numbers 1-8). On pages 24 and 25, numbers 9-16 appear. Most of the rest of the album has full page gags, numbered in the hundreds. The change in style is quite noticable, and the numbering in the other albums is quite consistent, so it's reasonable to assume that these gags are the first 16 that appeared.

Ok. Whew. Given that, since these gags are all 1/4 page each, and not a full page, it's unlikely (although not impossible) that several "blank Pilote pages" were filled with such small piecemeal strips? Wouldn't a typical Pilote ploy when caught short for material to use a full page gag, or a character sketch, etc.? Anybody have the 1963 Pilote?

This page seems to suggest that only one gag appeared per issue... http://www.bdoubliees.com/journalpilote/series1/achilletalon.htmAlpha Ralpha Boulevard 23:34, 26 October 2007 (UTC)


 * This type of anectote needs the backing of a source at any rate, but as is, the story seems a bit thin (quite possibly from a translation). I'm certainly no expert either, but I don't think Pilote realising they're in need 1/2 or 1/4 page fillers close to going to press is so inconceivable in the crazy lives of hebdo-publishers. That's the sort of gap left after untrustworthy advertisers pull out, not so unlike the holes that led to the first Gaston Lagaffe panels. There ought to be good sources for this material. M URGH   disc.  01:00, 27 October 2007 (UTC)

Quality of Achille Talon Cover
Does anybody have an idea why the photo for this page -- which is pretty fair quality at its uploaded full size -- becomes pixelated in the red letters in the title? I redid it so the same shade of red is used throughout the red lettering, but the only thing which seems to make a difference is to display it at higher resolution, say 350 pixels instead of 250 pixels. I've looked through a few other covers and don't seen this effect happening. What's going on? Are those non-pixelated photos using "Web-safe" colors or something? Alpha Ralpha Boulevard 04:05, 1 November 2007 (UTC)

Achille Talon's workplace?
I seem to recall Achille Talon actually worked at the magazine "Polite", a parody of PILOTE, the French comic-strip compilation magazine I knew as a boy. 99.254.36.133 (talk) 21:43, 23 May 2010 (UTC)
 * You are right. Kleuske (talk) 11:05, 8 January 2012 (UTC)

Vincent

 * ... Vincent Poursan, which in French, sounds like "Vingt-Cinq Pourcent" ("twenty-five percent").

It sounds even more like vingt cents pour cent (twenty hundreds per hundred). —Tamfang (talk) 05:02, 11 September 2010 (UTC)


 * I restored the previous version. Vincent is a pun on vingt-cent (2000), not vingt-cinq (25).Pkoppenb (talk) 12:50, 5 January 2012 (UTC)


 * The question is, and was, where did you get that. As it seems the french wiki does not know the term vingt-cent, they know cent quatre-vingt (180), and even cent quatre-vingt-dix-neuf (199), but AFAIK, AFAICS, it does not mean 2000. You are making stuff up. Kleuske (talk) 18:37, 7 January 2012 (UTC)


 * Since cent and cinq do not have the same vowel, interpreting Vincent as vingt-cinq is also making stuff up. —Tamfang (talk) 05:42, 26 May 2012 (UTC)
 * They _sound_ the same in french. I know... Ils sont foux ces Francais... Kleuske (talk) 08:54, 26 May 2012 (UTC)
 * No they do not. Vincent is /vɛ̃sɑ̃/, vingt-cinq is /vɛ̃sɛ̃/.  I know that many foreigners cannot hear the difference between '5' and '100', but the strip's primary target market can. (By the way, you misspelled fous and Français.) —Tamfang (talk) 17:56, 26 May 2012 (UTC)
 * How very sloppy. Still, and in spite of phonetics which seem to support my point, '25%' makes sense as a pun, while 'twenty-hundred' does not. Kleuske (talk) 19:24, 26 May 2012 (UTC)
 * Sure it does. It's several times more usurious than, say, five hundred, and the nonstandard wording makes it stand out that much more. —Tamfang (talk) 20:18, 26 May 2012 (UTC)
 * Only in your imagination. Kleuske (talk) 08:12, 27 May 2012 (UTC)
 * Your imagination is wilder than mine if you think the author can't hear a difference between '5' and '100'. —Tamfang (talk) 18:12, 27 May 2012 (UTC)
 * How in the world do you imagine that the phonetics, which demonstrates that you're WRONG, supports your point? Again, do you think the target market can't hear a difference between 5 and 100? —Tamfang (talk) 18:12, 27 May 2012 (UTC)


 * Achille talon isn't a valid French phrase either ... —Tamfang (talk) 17:51, 26 May 2012 (UTC)
 * Talon d'Achille is. Kleuske (talk) 19:24, 26 May 2012 (UTC)
 * So's cent-vingt. —Tamfang (talk) 20:18, 26 May 2012 (UTC)
 * Yes. But 120% makes no sense. 25% margin does. Kleuske (talk) 17:58, 27 May 2012 (UTC)
 * Poursan's whole function is to be an exaggeration of a sharp and greedy merchant, demanding prices many times higher than what he offers. In your universe are there no rates higher than 100%? —Tamfang (talk) 18:12, 27 May 2012 (UTC)
 * Yes, you can sensibly say "2000%" and "120%". No. 120% does not make any sense as a pun. You're making stuff up and straining yourself to make it sound plausible. Kleuske (talk) 12:58, 28 May 2012 (UTC)
 * My point was that if the existence of the phrase talon d'Achille makes Achille Talon a valid pun, then the existence of the phrase cent-vingt makes vingt cents a valid pun. Don't talk to me about "straining" until you stop insisting that the author can't hear the difference between 100 and 5. —Tamfang (talk) 17:37, 28 May 2012 (UTC)
 * Puns, like many forms of humour, do not lend themselves to "logic" of this kind. The 't' in cent is mute, the 'q' in cinq is almost mute. Hence they sound very much alike. You should, however, try to make up your mind on what alternative you wish to defend. So far, you're all over the place. Kleuske (talk) 19:33, 28 May 2012 (UTC)


 * Apropos Virgule de Guillemets... Do you know on _what_ that is a pun? It is a good example, but without that context, your addition is worse than useless. Kleuske (talk) 18:00, 27 May 2012 (UTC)
 * Good example and worse than useless? Interesting. —Tamfang (talk) 18:12, 27 May 2012 (UTC)
 * It's a good example an sich, but the way you failed to explain the clou made it worse than useless, since it leaves the reader confused. You don't get it, obviously. Virgule the guillemets is the editor of a very chique ladies magazine. De Guillemets, in turn, suggests a aristocratic heritage, 'De' in this case being comparable to the german 'von' (and meaning exactly the same).
 * So far, all your arguments have amounted to nothing, "Vincent Poursan" is still a pun on "25%" and the pun "Virgule de Guillements" went over your head. Please stop this behavior. Kleuske (talk) 09:41, 28 May 2012 (UTC)
 * Forgive me for thinking it was too obvious to need explaining. —Tamfang (talk) 17:37, 28 May 2012 (UTC)

I'll summarize my key assertions: I'm not aware of having contradicted myself or strayed much from these points, but Kleuske says I am "all over the place," and Kleuske is an honorable man or woman. —Tamfang (talk) 21:04, 28 May 2012 (UTC)
 * That the word /sɑ̃/ does not sound like the word /sɛ̃/, and the presence of both words in the same semantic domain – numbers – means that the difference cannot be ignored in inferring what word in that domain (if any) is meant. If the candidate words were not in the same domain (e.g. sang vs saint), I might be more forgiving.  I'd be interested to see an example of French dialogue in which a pun unambiguously relies on confusing /ɑ̃/ with /ɛ̃/ (and not because of a foreign or provincial accent).
 * That "twenty hundred", though not standard in French (or English), has a transparent meaning appropriate to the character and to the strip's habitude of comic exaggeration. (In English, "twenty-one hundred" is standard, though in the most formal contexts we'd say "two thousand one hundred".  In French, dix-neuf cents [nineteen hundred] is interchangeable with mil neuf cents [one thousand nine hundred] at least for calendar years; I don't know about otherwise.)
 * (Implied by one or two of my edits:) It's better that the article say nothing than to say something false.

gentleman or bourgeois
which one is he, he can't be both. Tinynanorobots (talk) 04:06, 26 May 2012 (UTC)
 * Why not? Most classic English gentlemen are _deeply_ bourgeois. The latter epithet, however is much more fitting than the former, since Achille Talon tends to loose his temper (a lot) and lacks the distinctive aloofness that typifies the true gentleman. Kleuske (talk) 13:34, 26 May 2012 (UTC)
 * He probably fits Oscar Wilde's definition of a gentleman: "one who never insults anyone unintentionally." —Tamfang (talk) 00:52, 21 May 2023 (UTC)

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character arc?
Reading the earliest strips (1966), I find Achille distinctly more foolish than he was even five years later. (I have L'indispensable, 1971; Le Roi des Zotres, 1977; Viva Papa, 1978.) Anyone else noticing changes? —Tamfang (talk) 17:45, 28 June 2024 (UTC)