7 May 1915, the First World War is in full swing. On board the Lusitania, a spy trusts a folder of secret documents to a woman. Then the Lusitania goes down and the man drowns. It's 1918 and the war is over and the documents seem to be forgotten until a woman disappears without a trace. Tommy and Tuppence start snooping around.
I must honestly say that I did not know the Tommy and Tuppence detectives from Agatha Christie until I came across this album in 1996. I had totally forgotten about it until I saw Partners in crime on television last year (2015). And remembered the comic when I saw that the main characters were Tommy and Tuppence. The first story, which consisted of three episodes, was also called The Secret Adversary. After seeing this series I read the comic again. All known names and the same offender had done it. But there is a world of difference between the television series and the comic strip and so I suspect the original book. I will not list all the differences because that’ll take a while, but I will limit myself to the biggest differences (without explaining too much of the story). To begin with, the television series is set in the 1950s and the comic strip in the late 1910s. The original book was first published in 1922. In the series Tommy and Tuppence are married and have a son, in the comic strip they are clearly not (yet) married, let alone have a child. In the series, it's about a film rather than a document. Do not get me wrong I certainly enjoyed the television series, but I suspect the strip is more faithful to the book. And I should like to pay tribute to scenario writer François Rivière who has done a great job at turning this complicated story to a comic. The story and the plot twists are easy to understand.
The beautiful realistic drawings are from Frank Leclercq. He has given each character his own characteristics and has an eye for detail, which is reflected in the decors.
All in all, I think this is a successful album.
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Detective
Links:
Frank Leclercq wikipedia
Frank Leclercq comiclopedia
François Rivière wikipedia
