While René Goscinny is certainly credited on some covers for this album, it's actually another solo effort from Albert Uderzo. He's clearly finding his feet as a writer, because he has fun with this as early as page one. We start out in the forest outside the Gaulish village with a first panel that's a riot of motion, half a dozen stories being told at once. Then he apologises to purists for providing a dubbed version of what a pair of wild boars are saying to each other. Of course, what Obelix says when he sees them is "Dinner!" but one of them has a cunning plan.

He's the last boar remaining from his particular herd because he's figured out how to survive. Run fast, he tells his friend, and lead the Gauls to a Roman patrol, because that's guaranteed to serve as a distraction from food. And it works too! In a hilarious touch, the Romans believe the boar was trained by the Gauls. We're only two pages in and this is top notch stuff on a number of levels. It's good to see Uderzo finding his feet as a writer as well as an artist. Of course, his art is impeccable, as always. He was always so good with motion and that takes up most of these two pages.

Meanwhile, in Rome, Julius Caesar, who's appearing more and more frequently nowadays, is fed up with this one Armorican village making his vast empire look ridiculous. His many opponents in the Senate are making fun of him by this point, so he consults with M. Devius Surreptitius, who's the head of M. I. VI., leading us into a James Bond spoof. Of course, while the meaning there is as clear as can be, it's an awkward translation, given that M. I. VI. is 1000 1 6 in Roman numerals. Are we supposed to not notice that? What I didn't notice is that Surreptitius is based on Bernard Blier, a famous French actor who I apparently haven't seen in anything. That's embarrassing.

Anyway, Surreptitius points out that the reason the Gauls are invincible is because of their magic potion which has been kept frustratingly secret, at least from the Roman perspective. However, druids do pass along their secrets but only by word of mouth. Fortunately, he has a secret agent ready to deploy who's also a qualified druid. In fact, he's already there in Caesar's apartments, in disguise as a statue. When he brushes off the grey, we can't fail to recognise Sean Connery, here Dubbelosix. So, with his ability immediately proven to Caesar, off he goes to acquire the secret of the magic potion. Surreptitius sends a trained carrier fly with him, which is the earliest known use of a bug in espionage. Ha.

I had a blast with Dubbelosix, because Bond movies are so easy to parody and Uderzo does a good job with that here. There isn't much in the way of Connery parody, merely a moment in which he's able to revive Getafix with a grain spirit called Caledonian. Ancient Scotch. Nice. Well, the fly, who steals a lot of scenes here, thinks Dubbelosix has a honeyed voice, which is pretty fair. However, I would bet large money that it would fail miserably at a Roman accent. We've already heard it try Egyptian. Right, Juan Sánchez-Villalobos Ramírez?

In fact, there's a lot more general spy parody, starting with a papyrus that Surreptitius sends with Dubbelosix that auto-destructs after he reads it, marking that we're clearly in M:I as well as MI VI. That's a great papyrus, as it sets us up for a nest of betrayal. Surreptitius plans to keep the magic potion for the two of them. Dubbelosix immediately proclaims that he plans to keep it alone. The intrigue doesn't stop there either.

The other crucial plot point ties to the magic potion, though Uderzo milks the tension around it a little longer than necessary, waiting for the arrival of the Phoenician merchant Ekonomikrisis to reveal what Getafix is so worried about. It turns out that he's out of magic potion and he doesn't have all the ingredients he needs to brew up more. Ekonomikrisis was supposed to bring him rock oil from Mesopotamia, but he forgot and Getafix collapses in shock. Uderzo throws a running joke in here about the rock oil, which everybody's aware of but believes is completely worthless.

I should add that, as we suffer through another war in the Middle East over rock oil, that joke has serious legs. In fact, it's even more topical than that right now because, when our heroes arrive in the Middle East on their inevitable quest for rock oil, they find that Tyre is blockaded by Romans. So's Sidon. And Byblos and Arad. Sound familiar much? They merely need to get some oil from the Middle East but access is blocked by a powerful western oppressor. If Albert Uderzo hadn't died in 2020, maybe Donald Trump would sue him too. But I'm getting ahead of myself. Let's rewind.

Of course, this gives Dubbelosix a convenient opportunity to get an invitation into the village to treat Getafix and we're off and running. Of course, Asterix and Obelix, with Dubbelosix in tow, are promptly sent on a mission to the Middle East to acquire a supply of the rock oil the druid needs. Of course, that means travelling by sea and that means yet another encounter with pirates, but, as predictable as much of this is, Uderzo continues to have fun with it. For one thing, he ditches a traditional sinking of the pirate ship in favour of forcing them to buy all of Ekonomikrisis's stock. They sink a Roman galley instead.

And, while we continue with the spy spoof when we arrive in the Holy Land, we found ourselves in a Biblical spoof too. For every Dubbelosix gadget, there's a historical joke that turns out to seem a lot more topical than it should. When he can't get into the usual ports because of the blockade, Ekonomikrisis decides to sail down the coast to the Kingdom of Judaea because "I promise you'll find that a more hospitable land!" He's really not reading the papers, huh? Fortunately, he has a rock oil dealer in Jerusalem, Samson Alius, which is indeed an Alius. He's Rosenblumenthalovitch. The jokes here are well meant, with Saul ben Ephishul based on René Goscinny, who was Jewish.

My favourite joke here is another running joke but one with set parameters. The central quest for rock oil takes the Gauls into the desert where Sumerians attack them, believing them Akkadians. Then Akkadians attack them, believing them Hittites. Then Hittites attack them, believing them Assyrians. Then Assyrians attack then, believing them Medes. But the Medes don't attack them. They're just lost. It's an impeccable sequence.

If there's a flaw, there aren't a lot of great new punny names. We've met Ekonomikrisis before, so he doesn't count. M. Devius Surreptitius is pretty solid and Dubbelosix is fantastic, given how well it works with the traditional Gaulish suffix. I'm good with Samson Alius and Saul Ben Ephishul, but they're not highlights of the series. It took me far too long to get Joshua ben Zedrin, but that's a good one. I just wish there had been more like it. Pontius Pirate, on the other hand, is just far too easy, especially given that he washes his hands a lot.

That's a small complaint for a surprisingly solid album though, one that bodes well for the future. Uderzo would be the sole creator of the next five Asterix books, with another one in between two collections of short stories, some of which had been written earlier by René Goscinny. He's able to end this one well too, with a good joke, a karmic joke and a traditional panel banquet that has the two boars from the beginning watching from the sidelines. Obelix is back. Their holiday is over. I'm now looking forward all the more to 'Asterix and Son' next month. ~~ Hal C F Astell

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