Yragael Urm

Yragaël #1-2

by Philippe Druillet (Illustrator), Michel Demuth (Text), Dominique Amat (Lettering)

The collected adventures of Yragael, the doomed prince, and his unfortunate progeny, Urm!

Born from chaos, Prince Yragaël, is the last hope for Earth. Gods and demons stroll the land, attempting to enforce their authority on the Last Men once more. He falls prey to the queen of Spharain, and from their union comes a son, Urm - a grotesque fool with the potential to redeem mankind.

Genres: Comics, Graphic Novels, Fantasy, Science Fiction, Fiction, Art, Comic Book

144 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1974

About the author

see https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philipp...

Reviews

[Damon · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is gorgeous nonsense. The artwork is beautiful - stunning at points, even - with huge double-page drawings that you have to rotate the book around to appreciate, and which really allow you to marvel at the level of detail Druillet included.

The "story," though, is nonexistent, and the text is total surrealist word salad for the most part. It's like a string of words put together to visually approximate a sentence, but when you read it there's no possible interpretation that makes sense.

I can't say anyone will be left moved by the plot, but the imagery and execution of the artwork is really impressive.

[Gabe Tansley · Rating 5 out of 5]

A 70s baroque psychedelic masterpiece from Druillet.
A totally manic, utterly incoherent story (no fault of the translation), but the artwork is the star here. Stunning pure imagination poured out onto the page.

[Malum · Rating 4 out of 5]

Check this out for the artwork (which is phenomenal) over the story (which is not great).

[Jesse · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wow.

First piece of work I've seen by this duo. I'm late to the game, but this book is amazing. Bizarre, macabre, incredible depth and detail. Writing is poetic and surreal...metal band lyrics. Really cool stuff. I'm going to get all of these books.

[drown_like_its_1999 · Rating 4 out of 5]

An epic saga told in two acts which depicts the last age of Earth's final empire, Cameroon. The first half is presented as a piece of lyrical poetry, recanting how the once great empire was brought to destruction by vengeful gods and how the ages old king of Yragael fruitlessly fought to recapture his domain from the clutches of said dieties. The second act follows the grotesque fool Urm who wanders the resulting wasteland before being recruited by the gods who brought its ruin. Under the guise of restoring the once glorious empire, the gods send him to infiltrate the heart of its greatest city but in secret harbor yet another plan to harvest human suffering for their own means.

This was probably the most interesting Druillet work I've read so far and one that rivals some of the auteur's best artistic output, at least during the first half. The two acts are both narratively and artistically quite distinct; the first presenting as an illustrated novel with prose like lyrical poetry, and the second structured more like Druillet's dynamic comic fare but with art that's a bit looser and somewhat lacking the jaw dropping detail of the initial half. The narrative, while rather opaque at times, is pretty epic and feels like a bombastic space opera with a killer blend of futurism and mysticism. If it were not for the incredible art the story would be pretty forgettable and it's prose more grating but alas such is the work of Druillet and it does a serviceable enough job as a vehicle for some simply stellar visuals.

The art in the first half is among the best Druillet has put to page, with some absolutely insane compositions of otherworldly subject matter depicted with profuse detail. While the linework is often less intricate in the second half and the color work more drab, it's still quite engaging and up to the visual standard of all but "6 Voyages" from among Druillet's work.

[Dat-Dangk Vemucci · Rating 5 out of 5]

in all of comics only Druillet can achieve this truly massive sense of scale

[Nighteye · Rating 5 out of 5]

I dont know what too think of this comic, right now there are a lot of diffirent comis around me as I for a while live with my aunt who are a comiccollector so I finds all fromTove Jansons Moomin and Asterix and Tintin to this and more adult comics. In this comic a lot of me are fasinated by the complexity and depth in the images but the images are far from nice ones and I feel discusted by a lot of them at the same time as Im fasinated by their complecity. They are showing a twisted, mad, groutesk and evil alternative world full of helthern Gods and mad figures and the suposed story in this one is nonexistent. But he is a really skilled artist and this comis deservs to be read!

[Charles Vincent · Rating 5 out of 5]

I love Yragael Urm, not just the amazing art, but also the fantastic and elaborate story. I have read it many times over through the decades. For those who struggle with the plot, I am providing a summary of my interpretation that you can read along with, or check afterward. This is the whole story, so it is all spoiler.

Yragael Urm:
As time and entropy draw to their close on Earth, humans cling to the grand heights of power they have achieved, and try to maintain civilization in the kingdom of Cermoon. Meanwhile the most ancient of gods are awakened as reality crumbles to resemble the chaos from which they initially sprang.

Human cities are built and demolished, and the ancient gods appear poised to take over, when a magician-warrior prince emerges as the hero and champion of humans. Yrageal and his cohort assemble a great military of ships and soldiers to escape doom and battle through the vortex. But the death of a passing bird sends a bad omen for their plans.

Yragael says the ships and his companions must wait while he embarks alone to undo the curse that he suspects was sent by his mad brother Sabre. Yragael takes a journey to the city Spharain where he believes he will confront Sabre, but instead finds the witch Nereis who has merged herself with the city’s spirit. He is seduced and falls in love with her, and he never battles the gods.

Yregael’s embrace with Nereis brings forth a wretched son, Urm, who is a hunchback with a withered second head. Urm is cast into the decaying deserts of Earth where he roams alone in torment and fury at everything and everyone that led to his creation.

A century after the deaths of Yragael and his great friends, the gods yank Urm up from the desert and declare him king of the Earth. Urm wanders their great palace unimpressed by its dazzling architecture, and curses the gods. A god emerges and invites Urm to their orgiastic feast. When Urm arrives at the party the gods declare they intend to consume him. Urm escapes their lion-faced king, and battles his legion of the dead, as he is familiar with fighting sorrows.

The battle is interrupted by a vision of Urm’s mother, the witch Nereis, and she bids him to seek the dragons who share his blood through her magic. Urm flees to a dragon who takes him through the kingdom of the dead. There, the lion-faced god urges Urm to sacrifice himself to release the child-shadow who will conquer all that remains of the world and its cities. Urm defies everyone and throws the lion-faced god into the sacrificial altar. The sad-and-cynical wretch Urm has fulfilled his destiny in the place of his noble warrior-father, and upset the balance of all power.

Urm has won, and the gods fade while their spiral of decay deposits Urm back into the desert. A single baby dragon has fallen out of chaos with him, and when Urm regards it with curious affection, it kills him with a spit of venom. In the end, entropy wins everything. The Earth collapses into nothingness. Only the ghosts of the gods watch the emptiness and wait to take advantage—of what they do not know.

[Carlo Gnutti · Rating 3 out of 5]

Druillet ha questa abitudine -che odio con tutto me stesso- di fare una doppia splash page mettendo il soggetto al centro, esattamente sul punto di contatto tra le due pagine, nascondendo quindi parte del soggetto. Accadeva già in Lone Sloane, ma qui con una frequenza decisamente più alta

Yragael
A volte sembra più un racconto illustrato che un fumetto. C’e’ una doppia tavola per esempio ai cui piedi c’e’ un passo che sembra tratto da una sceneggiatura.
Non ho capito niente della storia (non scritto da Druillet) ma disegni meravigliosi.


Urm il pazzo
Ambientata 100 dopo, la storia -ben più scorrevole e comprensibile rispetto al capitolo precedente- ha come protagonista Urm il pazzo, figlio di Yragael e la maga. Questa vicenda però e’ solo una scusa di Druillet per dare libero sfogo alla propria inesauribili verve immaginifica, creatrice di ambienti dalle proporzioni gargantuesche e di architetture mirabolanti.

[Rick Ray · Rating 3 out of 5]

A cross between biblical conjecture on the origins of the universe and some pretty out there sci-fi concepts, Yragaël and Urm the Mad is an effort to weave together an ambitiously laid out story of the rise and fall of ancient space civilizations. Working with writer Michel Demuth, Druillet churns out a series psychedelic album covers with a loosely cobbled together story about Yragaël who surfs the starways on a giant red disc and his heir Urm who seeks to reclaim Yragaël's throne. The story is pretty nonsensical, even by the standards of Druillet's other works, but it's no less beautiful. The scale is mind-bogglingly bombastic and the abstractions are just confounding in their designs. Though the story is a bit of a cryptic mess, there's no doubt that this is one of Druillet's more gorgeous compositions.

[LuckyVV · Rating 1 out of 5]

Urm le fou est une histoire bien meilleure qu'Yragaël, c'est peut-être dû au fait que Druillet n'a pas écrit les textes de ce dernier. Mais je ne donne qu'une étoile non pas pour la BD, mais parce que l'édition de Glénat est pourrie et ne rend pas justice aux dessins ni aux textes ! Les planches sont parfois floues (un comble alors qu'on sait qu'elles sont plus grandes qu'un simple format A3 !), le texte est parfois illisible, et certains dessins sont coupés en deux à cause de la mise en page et donc gâchés. Très dommage.

[Mateen Mahboubi · Rating 4 out of 5]

I have definitely realized that you don’t come to Druillet looking for an easy to follow story. I was definitely lost throughout but the art is stunning. Huge pages with tonnes of details, some two pagers that require turning the book. A couple panels were less sharp and I wonder if they may have been enlarged bigger than the original size but ultimately didn’t detract too much from the enjoyment of this wild ride.

[Zach · Rating 5 out of 5]

It's absolute gorgeous nonsense. Lovecraftian high fantasy with elements of sci-fi and horror. You need a magnifying glass to really appreciate Druillet's artwork in all its glory, and it's even more impressive when you take into account that this was all done by hand in the pre-digital era. AI will never be able to produce anything like this.

[Denis Lamy · Rating 4 out of 5]

Pour les dessins qui sont des toiles impressionnantes, l'histoire qui est bien, mais pas pour les textes souvent difficile à lire.

[Bria]

The illustrations are just wild, and I'm assuming we're not supposed to understand what the hell is going on?

[Kris Shaw · Rating 3 out of 5]

I didn't entirely get it.

[Nicholas De · Rating 3 out of 5]

3 e mezzo

[Lorz · Rating 5 out of 5]

schizofrenia anni 70 la amo

[Nick Douglas · Rating 3 out of 5]

Bewildering, but the art is supreme.

[Mike · Rating 4 out of 5]

A Lovecraft-influenced fantasy epic, paired with Druillet's intricate, phantasmagoric art.

[B. Jay · Rating 5 out of 5]

Reading all Heavy Metal magazines from 1977 - the eighties.