Previewing ‘Redbeard’ Volume 2: ‘The Sea Wolves’ Concludes The Two-Part Return Of A French BD Classic

by Richard Bruton

The second volume of this modern reinvention of the classic Barbe-Rouge bandes dessinées, we’re back on the high seas with Cinebook and Redbeard…

The Barbe-Rouge was a classic Euro pirate comic created back in 1959 by Jean-Michel Charlier and Victor Hubinon that continued, with various writers and artists involved, until 2004. Indeed, you’ll no doubt have seen the characters from the Barbe-Rouge parodied in Asterix volumes as the unluckiest pirates in the world.

This 2020 reinvention sees Kraehn and Carloni bring back the legendary character of Redbeard, almost managing to live a quiet life of an ex-pirate before being called into service for the King of France as a privateer.

So it’s Barbe-Rouge/Redbeard, his son Éric, and the crew of the Black Falcon sailing into adventure once more, with the town’s governor gives him a new mission, to catch the mystery French pirate who terrorises the Carolinas.

The second and final volume of the tale finds Redbeard’s mission in trouble – he and his ship are now in Spanish hands and his son and crew have been captured by the mysterious Spectre, who turned out to be none other than his nemesis Morgan, eager to get his hands on Redbeard’s treasure.

So, how’s the old pirate going to work his way out of this one? Well, he’s always been a cunning old goat and this is no exception. It’s very classically done Euro comics, definitely getting into the spirit of the original and giving us something that’s suitably dramatic and classy, with Carloni’s art a real beaut to see. I can’t see online whether there’s more in the new series to come rather than just this tw0-volume tale, but I’d like to see more.