An update on my Black Coat Press and Tales of The Shadowmen interests

Been a while since I said much specifically on that subject.  It'll be awhile before I can contribute to the Tales of The Shadowmen anthology series since the story ideas I've been having lately haven't been on that subject, Anime has taken over my imagination.  And of course I always have trouble getting my stories actually written down anyway, having an explicit deadline helped motivate me when I was writing TOTS stories.

I also feel bad that I still haven't finished The Companions of Silence, I bought the book early this year and started it, I like it as much as I do most Paul Feval stuff, but my mind has been fixating on other things.  This February The White Wolf is being released, it has had English versions before but they're rare and hard to find.  I hope they follow that up with The She Wolf.

I spent a good deal of time last year recommending Princess Principal to fellow Shadowmen fans.  It's set in an alternate Steam Punk version of Victorian England, but a lot of it's themes feel more appropriate for post-Revolutionary France.  But regardless plenty of the French novels we like used Britain as a setting, from The Mysteries of London to the last three Rocambole novels to John Devil.

I bring it up again now because it's Dub has finally dropped.  Now I haven't watched said Dub yet, I know from the trailer they actually went with British Accents which is a decision I'm actually rather skeptical of.  Noir's Dub worked great without any accents, I love Anime dub VAs but accents aren't their strong suite.  Still I will give a shot eventually.

The show is legally streaming on both HIDIVE and Amazon Prime, I think only HIDIVE has the Dub but I'm unsure, it may be you need to buy the DVDs for the full Dub.  Either way neither can be streamed for free, they are not making it easy for me to show this show to outsiders.

Something else about Princess Principal is I feel the episodes should be watched in Chronological order.
2, 3, 5, 4, 9, 1, 7, 6, 8, 10, 11, 12

A lot happens in Anime that reminds me of my Francophilic tendencies.  This coming Fall Season will have yet another Anime version of Jeanne d'Arc in a show that's also about Alchemy.  We also had more Lupin III Anime this year, I won't be watching Part V till it's Dub airs however, which based on the time-frame for Part IV I suspect will be next year.  All the main Lupin III shows are on Crunchyroll Subbed right now, but suddenly The Woman Called Fujiko Mine isn't streaming anywhere.

Thanks to Hulu dropping most of what it had, Rose of Versailles and Revolutionary Girl Utena can't be legally streamed anywhere now either. That's really frustrating.

Lastly I want to talk about an observation I made about Pokemon Heroes: Latios & Latias, the Fifth Pokemon movie.  This observation can only be fully understood by others who have read Knightshade (Brian Stableford's translation of Paul Feval's Le Chevalier Ténèbre), including it's introduction and afterward material.

I feel that Annie and Oakley can be thematically compared to the Ténèbre Brothers.  They are called sisters in material I've read though I don't recall that being explicitly stated in the Dub.  Oakley is definitely Avarice.  Calling Annie "Lust" may be a bit more of a stretch since it's a kid's movie and all, but she is very vain and likes pretty shiny things, and is officially described as the prettier one.  This parallel is most likely a coincidence, but I enjoy making parallels between the works of this semi forgotten author and modern Nerd media.

I'm attempting to revive my Shadowmen Lounge Message Board

http://z13.invisionfree.com/The_Shadowmen_Lounge/index.php

I made some new posts there recently, largely copy/pasting stuff form my blogs.  But it's easier to manage and follow a conversation on a Message Board.  And I like my Blog Posts to be conservation starters.

So for Blog Posts of mine that would be off topic there.  Feel free to share one of my posts on a Message Board you frequent where it would be relevant, and then let me know about it.

I'm planning to read The Hollow Needle and 813 very soon.  That should hopefully give me much to talk about.

Alexandre Dumas novel La Tulipe Noire

In the history of adaptations being done "in name only", the Alexandre Dumas novel called La Tulipe Noire (The Black Tulip) sparks an interesting chain.

The original novel is not what we most stereotypically associate with Dumas, even for those of us who are familiar with more then just his big two.  It is neither a Swashbuckler or a Revenge Fantasy.  It is also not set during the French Revolution but about a century before, and it doesn't seem to feature a masked vigilante or any other actiony elements.  It basically seems from the description like the modern definition of a romance novel.

In 1964 a French-Italian-Spanish film was produced with the same name.  It's plot is not actually based on the novel at all, but definitely seems like a homage to Dumas over all legacy.  It is set during the French Revolution, and involved a masked Vigilante called The Black Tulip fighting on behalf of the peasantry against the Nobles.

Alexandre Dumas did write a novel about a Vigilante operating during the French Revolution, in Le Chevalier de Maison-Rouge.  A Novel most well known for being a key inspiration for The Scarlet Pimpernel, and for the Prequels Dumas wrote for it that are more well known for their villains then heroes.  But the thing is both the Redhouse Knight and the Pimpernel were more operating on the Royalist side.  Ironically however The Black Tulip's politics more reflect Dumas own views, he was not a Royalist in-spite of how many Royalty aligned heroes he wrote.

Dumas was not the only influence on this film, it's Zorro connection is clear, in fact the lead actor went on to play Zorro.  And the Twin aspect interestingly enough makes me think of Paul Feval's Le Fils du Diable (The Three Red Knights) which was a masked vigilante swashbuckling novel that involved triplets.

This film went on to inspire an Anime, the full title of which is La Tulipe Noire: La Seine no Hoshi, which tends to just be called by the subtitle, because the character refereed to there is the real main character.  It predates The Rose of Versailles as an Anime set during the French Revolution.  At the beginning a male Masked Vigilante called The Black Tulip is already active, but it is the young girl who decides to become one herself the story follows.  And once again this time the vigilantes are on the rebel side.

This Black Tulip has a different real name then in the movie, since I haven't watched all of either I don't know if their canons can be reconcilable.

This Anime is super rare, I have gotten to view only the first episode.  I'm pretty sure there is no official Sub much less a Dub.  Once I can view all of it, I may write my own Crossover Fan Fiction with the main character.  I think someone should consider doing an MCU style shared universe bringing the various fictional characters of the French Revolution together, the classic ones are all Public Domain so the copyright wrangling would just have to be with certain Anime studios in Japan and whoever owns the above film which could easily have become one of those ambiguous ones.

As a final anecdote, in the Pokemon made for TV movie Mewtwo Returns (a direct sequel to Mewtwo Strikes Back) the character known as Domino is also known as The Black Tulip, I wonder now if a direct homage was intended?

Detective Wilden and Lecoq

I've talked about why my love of Paul Feval and Pretty Little Liars overlaps before.  Now I feel compelled to talk about the possible archetypal connection between the PLL character of Detective Darren Wilden,(and maybe also Holbrock who is possibly being turned into a copy of Wilden now, but I shall here focus on Wilden) and Feval's Lecoq aka Toulonnias L'Amitie.

The Lecoq of The Blackcoats is like a corrupt cop though it can be complicated to explain why, the development of French law enforcement over the course of post Revolutionary history is a long story.  Theoretically the organization Lecoq runs is like a Private Detective Agency, but so was the real Surette in it's origin.

Lecoq is among many characters of French literature partly inspired by Vidocq (or rather his embellished memoirs).  Vidocq inspired both heroes and villains. laying the foundations of modern Detective fiction in more ways then one.  Lecoq is the name of both a hero and a villain modeled after Vidocq.  In many circles Gaboriau's heroic Lecoq is more well known, so people might have assumed that's who I meant here.  Gaboriau's Lecoq is a prototype of Sherlock Homles so the PLL character I see as analogous to him would be Spencer Hastings.

Lecoq is also a creeper in a way that's arguably similar to Wilden.  Feval's narrative voice at one point calls Lecoq a "Cassanova" in a way I feel must be meant to be ironic.  From what we see women do not seem to enjoy his advances usually.  He and Marguerite were lovers but they were mutually and knowingly using each other for power like Caesar and Cleopatra.

In Parsian Jungle much of the story largely happens because of Lecoq's obsession with Julie, Andre's wife, but she was completely uninterested.  Fanchette also has a strong aversion to Lecoq, strictly speaking though there is nothing to indicate that ever came from him coming on to her.

As I look back on many Wilden scenes, I feel like I could definitely see Bryce Johnson playing Toulonnias.  Just as I can see Vanessa Ray as Marguerite, besides Marguerite not being Blond.

My thoughts on Gankutsuou

Gankutsuou is an Anime that is based on The Count of Monte-Cristo, but which adapts the plot to a distant future setting with various Sci-Fi twists to the story.

I have recently watched it.  The English Dub only, I prefer to avoid Subtitled versions if I can.  It can be viewed for free on Hulu.  Now all I need is some kind of western release for the Anime version of Les Miserables, and I'll have a pretty good handle on the history of Anime directly drawing on French literature/history.

I enjoyed it a great deal, all the voice actors were great, it shared a lot of common voice actors with the dub of Code Geass.

I like that it starts with when Albert and The Count meet.  I feel that is ideally how modern versions of the story should start, all three Hollywood films I've seen spend half the movie on the origin story.  Which in a two hour movies leaves little time for what we actually came to see.

I feel a serialized format is best for adapting something like The Count of Monte-Cristo, it was a serialized format originally, but people forget that.

It does follow the common rout of adaptations making him save Mondeago for last.

The biggest problems I have all come down to Eugenie Danglars.  I enjoy this take on her character in many ways, but it takes away her being a Lesbian in favor of making her and Albert the romantic endgame.

Her Lesbian affair is frequently dropped from adaptations partly because of it being censored from the earliest translations, and partly for the same reason it was censored.  I can't even decide if including Eugenie but changing her sexuality is worse then most adaptations that don't even include her.

In addition to the issue hurting the potential LGBT representation.  I also consider it interesting how in the original novel the Junior Lead doesn't wind up with either of his love interests.

Eugenie's Lesbian history is possibly homaged by the fact that she at times has somewhat of a Bifauxnen look.  I don't think the writers were ignorant of it, because the versions that censor that tend to also censor the opium sequence, which is referenced in a sense in this Anime.

It disappoints me because I felt it lent itself to an Anime trope quite well, the Yuri or GL genre.  But I guess they felt Eugenie's seeming coldness to Albert lent itself to another romantic Anime trope, which I'd probably screw up the name of.  Perhaps it didn't seem like a good Yuri story to them because of Eugenie being younger even though she would have to be the Seme.

The loss of a Lesbian character is perhaps counter acted by the fact that Franz is clearly in love with Albert.  And also Peppo being some kind of either Trans or Intersex person.

But another problem with what ultimately happens to Eugenie is her becoming ultimately a Damsel in Distress.  And experiencing something very disturbingly similar to a Rape.

The strong Women of French Pulp Fiction, and their unexpected authors

[Update 2026: When I made this series of posts I was still mistaken about some aspects of Political terminology are used.  I called myself a Liberal but I was actually already a Socialist.]

http://z13.invisionfree.com/The_Shadowmen_Lounge/index.php?showtopic=54

The struggle to gain better female representation in Genre fiction is an interesting and complicated one. Recent years have seen a lot of progress with the success of movies  like The Hunger Games, and Divergent and Frozen  and Wonder Woman finally coming to the big screen (First in Batman Vs Superman, then finally a solo movie). But also lots of developments that demonstrate how much more work needs to be done, like the recent controversy with the latest Assassins Creed game announcing it won’t have any female playable characters.

What continually interests me is how surprisingly ahead of their time many older authors were. Both the frequently revered classics, and the more obscure ones, both English and French. In this post I’ll be discussing mainly what I see as an interesting observation about 4 of the major feuilletonists, but I’ll be making more posts on other characters.

I want to point out something interesting I've observed about the four major feuilletonists of the Golden age of the Romans-Feuilletin. Alexandre Dumas, Eugene Sue, Paul Feval and Ponson Du-Terril.

Brian Stableford spends a good deal of  time in the Introduction and Afterward material for the Feval and Ponson translations he’s done for BlackCoatPress talking about the political alignments of those four authors. What I find curious is that the two who were the “Conservatives” in the contexts of post Revolutionary France (in being devout Catholics and Royalists) Feval and Ponson. Seem to me to have over all been more inclined to write surprisingly well written strong independent women.

Dumas arguably invented the modern Femme Fatale, between both writing the Le Tour de Nesle play and the character of Milady d’Winter in The Three Musketeers, but like many firsts I feel they pale in comparison to their more fleshed out literary descendants (both the well known and less well known). I of course love the heavily implied Lesbian characters of The Count of Monte-Cristo, Eugenie Danglars and Louise d'Armilly. And I find Ziska from his Le Vampire play fascinating. But beyond those examples, Dumas’s women conform to the stereotypes you expect, still well written characters because Dumas was a great writer of Melodrama, but not too innovative.

Sue is admittedly the one I’m currently least familiar with. But still, plenty of what I've heard about what transpires over the course of Les Mysteries du People wouldn't sit well with Feminists.  And I've read the stage play he himself made of The Mysteries of Paris (Translated by Frank Morlock).  And the two main female characters are a typical Ingenue (clearly part of the inspiration for Cossete in Victor Hugo's Les Miserables), and Countess Sarah who's a fallen woman desperately seeking redemption (I think the play makes her ending happier then the original Novel based on what I read in Shadowmen).  I feel for the character, she's not horribly written, but also not subversive like I'd expect from France's top Socialist writer.  The character of La Chouette (The Owl) is only mentioned in the play and doesn't appear directly.  She at any rate was an ugly evil old crone.

Ponson was seemingly more inclined then Feval to let his political-religious views influence his writing in a very obvious and, intentionally or not, preachy way.  I've often found myself thinking “really? that’s what’s honorable to you Ponson?”.

But none the less, in what would become known as the Rocambole saga, Bacarat proves to be a very formidable woman. In the first novel she’s an important but minor role, however in the second and third novels she proves to be the real Hero of the story. And Torquise proves to be a very mesmerizing Femme Fatale in the second Novel. The two Ponson Vampire novels Stableford has translated for BlackCoatPress both have compelling women as the title Vampires. In his introduction-afterward material for The Vampire and The Devil’s Son Stableford discuses how Ponson kind of innovated a lot of the tropes common in modern Romance Novels. (Update: more on Rocombole here)

Paul Feval’s characters are endlessly fascinating.  Plenty fit the norms you’d expect of the time, but many do not. I personally think two of the greatest Femme Fatales ever written are Countess Marcian Gregory of The Vampire Countess and Marguerite Sadoulas of The Blackcoats saga. But Sarah O’Neil of John Devil is also an interesting early experimentation with that archetype. The saga of the Habits Noirs also has some strong heroic women. Rose de Malvoy is the real hero of The Heart of Steel, Valentine (Fleurette) and Maman Leo are the core protagonists of The Invisible Weapon. Regina from Bel Demonio is bound to gain conflicting responses from a modern feminist reader, I’d dare say she’d fit in as an Anime character quite well. Susannah gets an opportunity to show some impressive courage in Les Mysteries de Londres.

In Le Bossu our young female lead is allowed to actually save herself from an attempted Rape, something Stableford suspects Feval might have originally intended to do again in The Sword Swallower. Vampire City has both Anna Ward (Anne Radcliffe) and Polly Bird, (warning though, the desire of some modern reviewers to describe Polly Bird as transgender is very misleading).

And there are still so many Feval works not available to me yet. Among them La Louve (The She Wolf) the prequel to Le Loup le Blanc (The White Wolf), and quite possibly the first depiction of a masked female vigilante.  The novel it prequels was the first depiction of a Masked Vigilante period, well before Zorro or the Scarlet Pimpernel.

I want to go back a bit now.  Stableford describes The Heart of Steel as "Unintentionally Proto-Feminist".  I've suggested elsewhere it may not be as unintentional as you'd think.  But by no means do I think Feval would be a cheerleader of modern Feminism.

In the case of the Invisible Weapon.  I'm not sure, but I think it may very well pass the Bechel Test.  Considering how rare passing that still is, I think it's really fascinating to consider that a forgotten work of 19th century literature (a sequel to a prequel) by a man fighting the tides of a change could be capable of passing it.  (Update 12/23/2015, since I've seen it argued The Force Awakens passes, The Invisible Weapon certainly would by that standard).