When Ibáñez lost Mortadelo’s rights in 1985 he created a new magazine where they would have another name: ‘I and I’ ‘

In 67 years of life, Mortadelo and Filemón have lived a relatively placid existence: always under the authorship of its creator, Francisco Ibáñez, and published by the successive publishers who have held their rights.

Sure? Well, not quite. Basic and officially, this is so, but in his career we find numerous potholes. Secret cartoonists who replaced Ibáñez without their permission, fighting for the rights of the characters, long seasons without charging … or the six criticism weeks in which the author published his creatures avoiding mentioning them. This is the story of ‘I and me’.

The schism started in 1985, when Francisco Ibáñez left Bruguera, the editorial veteran who had been publishing the characters since 1958. The reason was the author’s discontent with the treatment of the editorial: he lived under asphyxiating work pressure, having to produce about forty weekly pages of Mortadelo For headers who multiplied: ‘Mortadelo’, ‘Super Mortadelo’, ‘Mortadelo Gigante’, ‘Special Mortadelo’ … It was in 1973 when the publishing house, without its permission and in need of more volume of stories, began to resort to cartoonists that they will imitate their stories to generate more stories of mortadelos.

That purpose set in a study led by cartoonist Blas Sanchís, who came to have more than fifteen cartoonists and screenwriters under the name of Bruguera Equ. His work was not exactly small: They generated as many pages as the legitimate creator of the characters and even complete albums as ‘The Treasury’ or ‘The infallible growing’ comes. Bruguera Equipo developed a “Calcar Machine”, a template system that allowed copying the teacher’s comics. Although the general consensus is that, except frankly inspired copies, such as Casanyes, the stories of Bruguera Eiers lacked the grace of the originals. And most importantly: Ibáñez did not see a hard for any of it.

This uncomfortable situation resulted in a legal battle, with Bruguera refusing to recognize intellectual property to Ibáñez and finally, Ibáñez marching halfing the story ‘the security preb’. The cartoonist’s march was not made public until 1986, When the press published the rupture And Bruguera had been editing things like ‘El Cochecito Leré’, a story that had previously been created for the German market (where the characters were as popular as in Spain), and performed entirely by the Bruguera Equ. In any case, Bruguera would not give much more war: he closed in 1986.

Grijalbo arrives and stays with the pair of bald

Bruguera’s cartoonists were very disputed in that situation, and Ibáñez was not the only discontent, because they had been charging intermittently since 1982. With Bruguera in free fall, he and others like Raf (‘Sir Tim O k Grijalbo to get the magazine ‘Guai!’, A clear imitation of the Bruguera style, but where they could not use their classic characters.

Ibáñez created in this new magazine ‘Chicha, Tato and Clodoveo’, which would repeat some plot schemes of ‘Mortadelo and Filemón’, already ‘7, Rebolling Street’, a clear double page imitation of ’13, Rue del Percebe ‘. But the situation would take a new turn when in 1987 Law 22/1987 on intellectual property and copyright, which would recognize the property of the characters for the benefit of the cartoonist. Ibáñez had a free way to use them and would do it in a new Grijalbo magazine expressly created for it in 1987 … but that legally could not use the name of the characters in the header, because with that use they belonged to Bruguera.

The solution was to call the magazine ‘I and I’, in what would be a very strange commercial decision: Mortadelo appeared as a claim (and Thus had been publicized In the magazine ‘Guai!’), But not mentioned on the cover. Ibáñez would not get away from the ghost of the apocryphal cartoonists, because their ‘chicha, tato and clodoveo’ would continue in their original head, but made by other artists without accrediting. Only six numbers later, the magazine closes, it is not clear why: the most possible reason is that Grupo Z (new owner of the rights of Bruguera, which would exploit from its seal editions b) pressed to Grijalbo.

Six months later, in December, Ibáñez for editions B, which in all this time had been publishing since 1986 Mortadelo stories illustrated by apocryphal cartoonists, such as ‘The Transmutant Ray’. They are black times for the characters: Although Ibáñez’s return at number 49 of the new ‘Mortadelo’ in February 1988 occurs in style, with the incredible cover of the character disguised as Tejero, the stories give an important downturn.

Until 1991 we are in a Transition stage that, as it was later known (at that time it was an absolutely silenced issue), They would continue to perform anonymous equipment. Many of them would be drawn for what would be their apocryphal par excellence, Juan Manuel MuñozIbáñez trusted man who It would help you for decades to finish the character’s albums, until the death of the cartoonist. The volume of work that Editions B demanded was so high that Ibáñez was forced to record the scripts in cassettes to save time.

As of 1991, however, Ibáñez will regain the complete authorship of the characters. The editor of edition B of that time, Julia Galán, demanded an improvement of the quality of ‘Mortadelo and Filemón’ to rescue them from the creative crisis they were going through, and the result were, since 1996 and with the disappearance of the magazines, long stories that would have been filled with references to the presenta certain levish continuity in characters and scenarios from one album to another and more cool arguments. Thus would remain until the death of Ibáñez in 2023, with Mortadelo and Filemón converted, despite these potholes, in absolute history of Spanish humor.

Header | Grijalbo

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