Isaac ASIMOV's famous LUCKY STARR juvenile space opera series (originally published under the pseudonym of Paul FRENCH) is comprised of six volumes:

1. David Starr, Space Ranger (1952)
2. Lucky Starr and the Pirates of the Asteroids (1953)
3. Lucky Starr and the Oceans of Venus (1954)
4. Lucky Starr and the Big Sun of Mercury (1956)
5. Lucky Starr and the Moons of Jupiter (1957)
6. Lucky Starr and the Rings of Saturn (1958)

The first volume was translated and published in French in 1954 by the renowned "Anticipation" imprint of Editions Fleuve Noir as No. 44, under the title "Sur la Planère Rouge" (On the Red Planet) -- cover art by Brantonne.

In the mid-1960s, Fleuve Noir was taken over by the giant publishing group Presses de la Cité, which soon after, also acquired the Tourcoing-based comic-book publisher Artima, renamed Aredit.

Because of corporate synergy, numerous novels published by Fleuve Noir were then adapted in comic-book form by unidentified French, Spanish, and Italian artists, and then published by Aredit in their various titles. These novels were taken mostly from the science fiction, horror, and espionage imprints of Fleuve Noir.

 

For other such adaptations, see MADAME ATOMOS, FRANKENSTEIN and MEPHISTA.

"Sur la Planète Rouge" became the subject of such an adaptation in SIDERAL # 46, published in 1975. (The number of the spine is 45, but that is a mistake and it really is #46.) The artist is, of course, not identified, but one guesses that it is the brothers Raoul & Robert Giordan of Meteor fame.

The adaptation credits "Paul French" -- no one seemed aware that this was not a French novel (like most of Fleuve Noir's) but a translated one, and that "Paul French" was, in reality, Isaac Asimov!

The adaptation is extremely faithful, if somewhat pedestrian.

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Curiously, the same book was adapted in comic-book form again, this time in 1992 in the traditional graphic novel hardcover format by short-lived Belgian publisher, Claude Lefrancq.

This time, the name of Isaac Asimov was prominently displayed on the cover. For whatever reasons, the title was changed to Les Poisons de Mars (The Poisons of Mars). The writer of the adaptation was well-known comic writer Jacques Stoquart; the artist was E. Loutte.

The same book was reprinted with a different cover (right).

In 1991, the publisher Vaisseau d'Argent released a graphic novel adaptation of Lucky Starr and the Oceans of Venus by Fernando Fernandez, simply entitled Les Océans de Venus.


Thanks to Marcel Pfefferlé and Franck Pissotte.