Austrian superheroes

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Comic
title Austrian superheroes
author Harald Havas et al.
publishing company Content merchant → Indiekator
First publication December 2016 - ...
expenditure 17th

Austrian Superheroes (ASH) is an Austrian superhero - Comic , which has been published since 2016th In 2017 the publication was awarded an ICOM Independent Comic Prize . The heroes of the series experience their adventures in Vienna and take up typical Viennese places and stereotypes with their characters and heroic powers.

content

In Vienna there are repeated attacks on young women who are seriously wounded and only barely survive. Student Kurt Kogler, who watches over the city as Captain Austria , wants to get to the bottom of the incidents. And soon he meets the culprit: a basilisk . It is too strong for Captain Austria, who almost perishes in the fight and is only saved by the intervention of the Danube female , another superhero. For the renewed fight against the monster, Captain Austria calls next to her also the extraordinarily strong Lady Heumarkt to a meeting. Lady H brings another hero, the bureaucrat . Now they are trying to join forces to defeat the basilisk, which now also employs the police. But even four of them only manage to drive him away.

Vienna is not only loved by the basilisk, but soon also by Dr. Phobos threatened. He robs his victims after putting them in a state of anxiety. In the fight against the villain, Captain Austria can convince his father, the former captain, to give him access to the headquarters of the old Viennese guards . This - housed in the Danube Tower - is from now on the basis for their heroic deeds. In addition, the team will find all the technology here that helped the old guards. An emergency call immediately leads them to Graz, where the basilisk attacks again. The common fight there is more successful this time. But Lady Heumarkt breaks off her attack when the opponent turns out to be her mutated brother. Both of them ate contaminated strawberries as children. Anna soon mutated to her fat stature, but in which she is incredibly strong and made a career as Lady Heumarkt. Her brother Peter disappeared, as did the basilisk again. In order to defeat him, the heroes reactivate the Viennese town hall man , who used to stand by the guards' side, causing a lot of damage with his strength and nonsense. When Lady H overcomes herself and helps them, the basilisk is defeated and the unconscious Peter, who has returned to his human form, is taken into custody. It is to be examined to clarify the background. Because during its attacks, the basilisk responded to cell phones that the victims had previously won in a competition.

When trying to repair the town hall man after the fight, nanorobots from headquarters take over his body completely. They direct him through the city, always looking for new material, and then to the steel mill in Linz . There they finally try to stop the nanorobots while the steel mill is destroyed. A Linz hero in the form of a little angel comes to your aid. He succeeds in changing the robot's program and restoring the town hall man back to his original form. To be on the safe side, it is then brought back to the Vienna City Hall and deactivated.

Creation and publication

A team of Austrian cartoonists is behind the series. The scenario and text are by Harald Havas . The story was designed by Thomas Aigelsraiter, Andi Paar, Lenny Grosskopf, Michael Liberatore and Jörg Vogeltanz, the coloring is largely from Frans Stummer. In addition, the side stories contained in the booklet come from Lenny Grosskopf and Verena Loisel. Mahmud Asrar was also involved in the cover design.

The aim of the production was to create an originally Austrian superhero series that is not a parody but as serious as the American role models. The heroes were not only provided with different superpowers, but also with personal mistakes and problems. Local peculiarities such as wrestling at the Heumarkt or legendary characters such as the Danube woman were consciously taken up and developed as superheroes. During the graphic implementation, efforts were made to achieve a realistic and dynamic representation. The financing was initially carried out through crowdfunding via the Bank Austria Art Prize, which was concluded with double the amount hoped for. This was followed by advertising and sales through comic events, subscriptions, specialist shops and, in Austria, kiosks.

The first issue, “Wiener Blut”, was published in December 2016 by Contentkaufmann in Vienna in a first edition of 7,000 copies, which were followed by further editions. Further issues followed, up to now a total of sixteen. All issues appeared in three cover variations: While the standard cover is available in stores, the variant cover can only be purchased directly from the publisher and the "Art Edition" cover only for supporters of the crowdfunding campaign. In 2019, Austrian Superheroes started their fourth year with issue # 17; the issues are now being published by Indiekator-Verlag.

Since autumn 2017, the same team has been bringing out another series with German superheroes under the title League of German Heroes . A No. 0 of this series with an excerpt from the story as a teaser appeared in May 2017.

reception

The Austrian Superheroes caused a lot of media coverage for comics, especially in Austria. The Kleine Zeitung reported several times on the success of the comic series, which was preprogrammed by the mixture of a tried and tested American concept and local reference. The magazines Wiener and The Gap highlight the original to “crazy” main characters with a local connection, but “if you think the whole thing is a half-funny parody, you're really wrong. Far too much quality and passion has gone into the project for that ”, says Jakob Hübner in Wiener . Andreas Platthaus from the FAZ even writes of a "freak league" in the style of the unstable superheroes of Stan Lee and Jack Kirby . References to well-known superhero stories by Alan Moore are also recognizable, for example to Watchmen in the bonus story of the second issue. The series is drawn rock solid, even if a little cramped at first. Given the underlying irony of the heroic quartet, this can also be understood with a wink. Judith Dauwalter at Bayerischer Rundfunk not only recognizes, like other critics, "loving swipes at Austria", but also highlights the characters' background stories, which belong to a superhero story that was originally intended. Therefore, the series has "still a lot of potential", because the "detailed scenario and the lovingly characterized heroes make you want much more". The success is explained, among other things, by the general, contemporary popularity of superheroes, who repeatedly arouse attention for the entire genre, especially in the form of movies.

In 2017, the series was awarded the ICOM Independent Comic Prize for a remarkable comic publication at the comic festival in Munich . The jury's reasoning not only praised the successful implementation of superheroes in “local areas”, which is not easy and is quite serious and not just a parody, but also the successful work in a large team and the use of various financing and Marketing channels such as comic-cons, crowdfunding and variant covers highlighted.

In 2018, a multimedia comic performance by the Austrian Superheroes was shown at the Rabenhof Theater in Vienna with Magda Kropiunig , Christian Strasser and Randolf Destaller.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b "Seriously like Superman": New comic series "Austrian Superheroes" . In: www.kleinezeitung.at . ( kleinezeitung.at [accessed on July 10, 2017]).
  2. ↑ a b Comics renaissance: Superheroes: expanding the combat zone . In: www.kleinezeitung.at . ( kleinezeitung.at [accessed on July 10, 2017]).
  3. ↑ Comics high -flyer: Now we have new heroes . In: www.kleinezeitung.at . ( kleinezeitung.at [accessed on July 10, 2017]).
  4. ↑ Interview with the creator of "Austrian Superheroes" . In: The Gap . August 29, 2016 ( thegap.at [accessed July 10, 2017]).
  5. ↑ Super Heroes. In: Wiener Online. May 4, 2016. Retrieved July 10, 2017 .
  6. ^ The Freak League from Austria - Comic . In: Comic . July 4, 2016 ( faz.net [accessed July 10, 2017]).
  7. ↑ Judith Dauwalter, Bayerischer Rundfunk: Comic // Austrian Super Heroes: The ski surfaces superheroes from the Alpine republic | BR.de . July 11, 2016 ( br.de [accessed July 12, 2017]).
  8. ↑ Regionalmedien Austria: Austrian Superheroes: Vienna now has its own superheroes (3 issues to be won) . In: mein district.at . ( mein district.at [accessed on July 10, 2017]).
  9. ↑ ICOM - The Comic Association. Accessed on May 27, 2017 .
  10. ↑ derStandard.at: "Austrian Superheroes": The Viennese basilisk gets one on the eye . Article dated April 8, 2018, accessed April 10, 2018.