MV #22/42/1967
MV #22/42/1967 is the second chapter of the very first Asterix story ever serialized by Egmont Ehapa in Germany — a launch that marked the end of the politically scandal-tainted Kauka/Lupo-Modern era and the beginning of Asterix's legitimate, decades-long German publishing history. The underlying story, 'Der Kampf der Häuptlinge' (Le combat des chefs), introduces the first rival Gallic chieftain in the entire series, a narrative innovation that raises the dramatic stakes by threatening the village from within Gallic society rather than solely from Roman legions. It also presents the series' boldest structural risk to date: Miraculix loses his memory and with it the magic potion, forcing Goscinny and Uderzo to explore what the village means without its supernatural safety net. This serialized German debut laid the editorial groundwork for Ehapa's full album programme, which launched in December 1968 and grew into one of the most successful comic-publishing ventures in European history.
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The story was originally created by writer René Goscinny and artist Albert Uderzo, first serialized in the French magazine Pilote beginning in 1964 and collected as the seventh French Asterix album in 1966. After Goscinny and Uderzo terminated Dargaud's contract with Rolf Kauka's German publisher over unauthorized, politically inflammatory rewrites of earlier Asterix stories in Lupo Modern, the rights passed to the Stuttgart-based Egmont Ehapa Verlag. Ehapa launched its German serialization of Asterix on 14 October 1967 in MV Comix (then titled 'MV 67 — Die spannende Abenteuer-Illustrierte'), running 'Der Kampf der Häuptlinge' across issues 41 through 46 of that year; MV #22/42/1967 is the second of those six installments. The German album translation by Gudrun Penndorf did not appear until 1969, making the MV Comix run the sole German-language presentation of this story for nearly two years.
Trivia · 10 facts
- First German publication of 'Der Kampf der Häuptlinge' (Asterix and the Big Fight): serialized in Egmont Ehapa's MV Comix across issues 41–46/1967, beginning 14 October 1967; MV #22/42/1967 is the second installment of that run.
- Written by René Goscinny, drawn by Albert Uderzo; originally serialized in the French magazine Pilote in 1964 and collected as the seventh French Asterix album in 1966.
- First appearance of Aplusbegalix (later renamed Augenblix in revised editions) — the first rival Gallic chieftain to appear in the Asterix series — who serves as the Roman-backed antagonist challenging Majestix.
- First appearance of Amnesix, a druid specialist in treating memory loss, whose own memory is wiped by Obelix in a running comic escalation that drives the plot.
- First appearance of Professor Berlix, the Latin teacher at the school of the collaborationist village of Serum, whose classroom scene is a sustained piece of wordplay centered on Latin declension.
- First appearance of Langelus (later revised to Zenturio Lacmus), the Roman centurion commanding Camp Babaorum who engineers the chiefs' duel; Wikipedia and Figuren aus Asterix note he may be a caricature of Benito Mussolini.
- The story contains the only instance in the classic series where Idefix is placed temporarily in the care of Majestix.
- A background poster in this story features André Franquin's Marsupilami as an in-joke Easter egg (described in later editions as 'das Marsupilamix').
- The story later served as source material for the 1989 animated film 'Asterix – Operation Hinkelstein' and the 2025 Netflix live-action miniseries 'Asterix & Obelix: Der Kampf der Häuptlinge'.
- Gotix is a minor Goth-character cameo consistent with the Goth background figures who reappear occasionally in the series after their starring role in 'Asterix und die Goten'.