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Humanoids is coming to The Lakes Festival!

Award-winning French artist of the anthropomorphic noir District 14 and The Fantastic Voyage of Lady Rozenbilt, Romuald Reutimann, will be making his first UK convention appearance. He will be signing and sketching throughout the weekend at the Humanoids stand (#46, First Floor, Comic Clock Tower) and will be taking part in the live drawing event, In A World Of Their Own, along with Jeff Smith (Bone, RASL) on Sunday 19 October at 16:00.

Tim Pilcher (Humanoids UK Liaison), will be presenting the following panel: Mœbius and More: 40 years of The Humanoids, on Saturday 18 October at 13:45, to celebrate the company’s 40th anniversary.

There will be an opportunity for old and new fans alike to pick up all the very latest releases, including: Before the Incal by Jodorowsky & Zoran Janjetov, Kelly Sue DeConnick’s new adaptation of Jean-Claude Forest’s Barbarella and Igor Baranko’s impressive Shamanism.

Sales are a big part of any convention and we will be offering the following deal all weekend: Buy any book; get a second one half price.* Plus, a chance to win an out of print, limited, slipcase edition of Alexandro Jodorowsky, Jose Ladrönn & Mœbius’s Final Incal, signed by Jodorowsky himself!

More information can be found ath the following link:

http://www.comicartfestival.com/2014/04/humanoids/

*A 50% deduction will be made on the lowest value item.

The Incal

Story by Alexandro Jodorowsky, art by Mœbius

John Difool, a low-class detective in a degenerate dystopian world, finds his life turned upside down when he discovers an ancient, mystical artifact called "The Incal." Difool’s adventures will bring him into conflict with the galaxy’s greatest warrior, the Metabaron, and will pit him against the awesome powers of the Technopope. These encounters and many more make up a tale of comic and cosmic proportions that has Difool fighting for not only his very survival, but also the survival of the entire universe.

Quicks facts about The Incal:

• New edition of the one of the most successful titles from Jodorowsky & Mœbius.

• Features a foreword from Marvel's Brian Michael Bendis.

• Alexandro Jodorowsky & Mœbius worked together on the original production of Frank Herbert's Dune. While the film never came to fruition, Jodorowsky & Mœbius continued to work together in the world of comics.

• Jodorowsky's Dune, a documentary film by Frank Pavich chronicles the tales of Alexandro's original vision for Dune.

Available below is the desktop wallpaper of The Incal. Click the picture to choose your resolution.

The Incal arrives in stores September 24, 2014 with an MSRP of $44.95

Before The Incal

Story by Alexandro Jodorowsky, art by Zoran Janjetov

Alexandro Jodorowsky ("The Metabarons") and artist Zoran Janjetov, with the help of Fred Beltran ("Megalex") on colors, take us way back to the youth of the notorious Class "R" private investigator. We are instantly plunged back into the unique atmosphere of the world of "The Incal," as we witness John Difool's search for his identity and his origins, his first meeting with Deepo, and the appearance of many of the series' key characters, such as the Metabaron or Diavaloo.

Quicks facts about Before The Incal:

• New edition of the sold-out Before The Incall from Jodorowsky & Janjetov

• Features a new interview with artist Zoran Janjetov.

• Zoran Janjetov was chosen by Mœbius to continue The Incal series.

• Influenced at a young age by the works of Walt Disney, Janjetov with the support of his parents started drawing and creating his own comics at just seven years old.

Available below is the desktop wallpaper of Before The Incal. Click the picture to choose your resolution.

Before The Incal arrives in stores September 24, 2014 with an MSRP of $44.95

Final Incal materializes into stores on May 28. We recently had the chance to sit down with one of its co-creators, the one and only Alexandro Jodorowsky.

Here we are: Final Incal is out. How do you feel about ending this great saga?

You know, for me it is anything but a surprise. Writing the story and having it drawn took a lot of time. It has been years of preparation, so I have had the time to get used to it. I feel as if I have once again gone on a nice, long walk with some old friends rather than just leaving them forever.

In the last volume of this new cycle, there is a particular character I loved a lot and that I had always wanted to see again: Gorgo the Foul. He was really important to me and in Final Incal I’ve gotten to develop him some more. I can now say that I am done with him. Others are absent this time around, like the Metabaron. He already has his own story, with his own family. I didn’t want him to be part of Final Incal, it’s not his story.

A new artist draws each cycle of The Incal. Zoran Janjetov after Mœbius, and now Ladrönn. Why all these changes?

It’s not something that came from me; I did not necessarily want to change every time. It’s Mœbius who made that decision. I asked him to do Before The Incal but he refused, he didn’t have time. He didn’t believe we could make a new story as incredible as the first. But I believed it was possible! So I searched for someone who was influenced by Mœbius and I found Zoran Janjetov. With time, he eventually came into his own style, but in Before The Incal, he was imitating Mœbius’s style.

Then, when Mœbius decided to tackle After The Incal, he was tired and ill. After The Incal did not have the same style as The Incal. He drew it more like a cartoon. So I began the process again because I was not satisfied with what we had started out with. So, with Final Incal, I started over for Ladrönn. He was an absolute fan of Mœbius’s style and it seemed to me that with him we could tell the story of Final Incal and remain in the same graphic universe.

How did you meet Ladrönn?

Fabrice Giger, Humanoids’ publisher, introduced him to me. A few years ago, Fabrice asked me to do a book for young, up-and-coming artists (Alexandro Jodorowsky’s Screaming Planet). He would show me an artist and his work and I would write a story according to that artist’s style. The process was very interesting as I adapted my scripts to the respective strengths of these emerging artists. For the one who knew how to draw characters but not backgrounds, I wrote a story in a desert. For another who knew only how to draw machines, I provided a story full of robots.

And among this crop of artists, there was Ladrönn. His drawing technique was good but it was lacking of human feelings. To push him to go beyond his limitations, I decided to create a story that was full of feelings. It was titled Tears of Gold and in the end it was formidable, he did exactly what was needed. That’s how our collaboration begun. He has become even more formidable and now we work very well together.

How do you work with Ladrönn, in spite of the physical distance between you being in Paris, he in Los Angeles?

We work via Skype. It’s proof that technology can be useful. Whether he is in Beijing or Los Angeles, wherever he is, we exchange thoughts and comments via Skype, and it’s free! Every night, we speak for an hour, we talk about everything we want. I, of course, get to see his drawings. He shows me his pages as they come along, and we get to change things “live,” here we add, there we erase, etc. I sometimes even mime for him! I move in front of the camera. I act. It’s really quite fantastic.

Your stories often bring life and technology into conflict. This theme is also present in Final Incal. Do you have a specific message to convey?

The questions that must be asked from Final Incal are: what society is at the heart of Final Incal? Why this meca-prez? Why does he want to destroy not only life, but also the techno-technos and the Emperoress, that is to say religion, economy, and politics? And we musk also ask ourselves why will LOVE save the world?

In the search for happiness, machines and technology are useful, and so is money. But they cannot bring you happiness. Glasses enable you to see, that’s technology. But happiness is not that, it’s not your glasses. It’s what you are able to see. If you have wonderful glasses but don’t know how to see what’s in front of you, then that technological tool is useless.

I developed this theme in The Technopriests. I also discussed religion, one of the biggest calamities of humanity. Politics, economics, and warfare are the diseases of humanity. And it’s all mixed together nowadays. Look at the world you are living. Do you believe in politics? Do you believe in religion? The Pope is nothing but a guy dressed up like the Pope. Who still believes in their own country’s economy, with the banks and everything? Patriotism, war heroism, everything is just business.

It’s the horrors of the world we live in today. Even food. When I ate a fruit before, it was tasty. Not anymore, it’s all industrial now. And you can find all that in Final Incal. Even though we have been working on it for a long time, everything relevant made it in there.

Gorgo the Foul represents the biggest part of humanity, the part that is poor and living in misery. Mutants, who live on the fringes of society, minorities of all kinds. Final Incal’s society is ours.

Then, is Final Incal a cry for revolt?

Yes it is, exactly. And it really provides internal relief. You liberate yourself because you organize your life in a different way. You somehow learn to give, that others exist. Every person is part of a larger community. Even your body is a community of cells! Humanity is a cosmic community. We live together, we meet and we learn that there is continuity, that we are part of humanity as a whole. As an individual, we are mortal but as humanity itself we are immortal. We are only a part. And the part has to accept that it constitutes a whole. We are reaching humanity’s decline right now. We are like an atomic bomb ready to explode. You can see it beginning in Ukraine or Venezuela. Everywhere things are about to blow.

In The Incal, John Difool searches for love. In the end, you’re a pacifist and a romantic at heart, aren’t you?

I have become one, yes. In Final Incal, Difool finally finds love! I also have needed a lifetime to find it. I met my ideal woman 10 years ago, when I was 74 years old! I am now 85. I have discovered that love exists, that it’s not just an invention.

Coming from Chile, in South America, I initially saw the world with a male perspective. My movie El Topo was very chauvinistic, wasn’t it?

When you become fully conscious, you realize that women represent half of our world. The problem is that the mother goddess figure has been erased. The father figure has been killed off, but the mother goddess was never really given life. To be, women have to copy men. It’s a problem, even nowadays. And a problem that has to be solved. Intellectual and sophisticated people have understood it. But many, who constitute the main part of humanity, have not yet. They are Earth’s destructors, murderers in the making. Because they destroy our world with their bullshit and blind acceptance, they are public dangers. And our goal is to spread consciousness. Because otherwise the human race will soon be over.

Are your stories a way for you to do it, to be part of this change?

Yes, they are. I always have a character who is a thoughtless idiot, like Difool. But gradually, his conscience grows. And in Final Incal he ends up finding absolute humanity. He became useful to humanity. I am so tired of anti-heroes and decadence. It has been done too much. I am tired of superheroes or Hollywood cinema. It’s an awful reality, as if we human beings are awful beings. Even the superheros are awful now. But the real human being is not, he is a wonder. Except that society reduces us to slavery.

You are occasionally quite harsh with your characters. How do you approach them?

Indeed, I am hard with them. Sometimes they even die. They suffer, they are happy. They are like any of you, like everybody. There are neither good nor bad. Life is not black and white. You can’t define or label someone. We don’t have limits, but we create some for ourselves, and we call that the ego, which is shaped by family, society, culture. They tell us who we are supposed to be and we learn to become just that.

But every one of us has much more inside, limitless facets. And I have always wanted to explore what is beyond my own limits. Difool is a character that can really be several characters. We don’t know who he is. Even he doesn’t know who he is! Throughout the Incal cycles, he is constantly growing. Human brains are like galaxies, rapidly expanding. Until they implode. And then it begins again. That’s just what the Incal is all about.

Final Incal

Story by Alexandro Jodorowsky, Art by Ladrönn & Mœbius

Lowly class ‘R’ detective John Difool and his faithful companion, Deepo, are unwillingly hurled into yet another universe-saving mission, as their world is faced with the threat of an all-devouring metallic virus. Visionary storyteller Jodorowsky returns to the epic mythology he created with the late Mœbius in the early 80s. John DiFool travels on an epic journey, both spiritually and physically as he attempts to save the world of Terra 2014 one last time. For the conclusion of the legendary spiritual space adventure series, he partners with Eisner-winning artist Ladrönn ("Cable," "Hip Flask," "Elephantmen").

Quicks facts about Final Incal:

• Available in two distinct formats. An Oversized deluxe edition exactly like The Incal & Before The Incal were both released as. The 2nd is a Ultra Deluxe Coffee Table Edition (12 x 16 inches) which includes a signed book plate by Ladrönn & Jodorowsky, and three loose prints designed by Ladrönn, and limited to ONLY 200 copies. For detailed information on each edition, please read our Facebook post where we outlined all the details.
• This is not the first time that Eisner Award-winning Mexican artist, José Ladrönn has drawn John DiFool. Ladrönn drew several covers for the previously released single issues of THE INCAL. We will show some of these covers in an upcoming blog post.
• Both editions include the original Mœbius-drawn pages known as AFTER THE INCAL. This is the first time these pages are available in English.

Available below are two desktop wallpapers for Final Incal. Click the desired picture to choose your resolution.

Final Incal arrives in stores May 28, 2014 with two editions. The Oversized Deluxe Edition has an MSRP of $99.95 and The Ultra-Deluxe Coffee Table Edition has an MSRP of $590.00

THE WHITE LAMA is coming to a bookshelf near you in just a few short weeks (May 7, 2014). This series marks Alexandro Jodorowsky's first collaboration with Georges Bess. The pair would later team up again, this time on SON OF THE GUN, a new edition of which will be released in the fall. Today we offer you a look at some of Bess's concept art at various stages of The White Lama's development. Enjoy!

The White Lama arrives in stores May 7, 2014 with an MSRP of $39.95