In the boots of Lucky Luke - In the kingdom of cowboys

The cartoonist Jul takes us to the heart of the United States in the footsteps of Lucky Luke, the least American cowboy. A mischievous and instructive journey to meet figures and landscapes that have shaped our imaginations... and sometimes overshadowed reality.

In seventy years and eighty albums, Lucky Luke has forged a single American dream, making generations of young Europeans fantasize. While the colorful universe imagined by Morris and Goscinny was inspired by historical facts, he fed mainly on archetypes built by cinema and literature, which he parodied with love. An early fan, Jul ("Silex and the City", "50 nuances de Grecs"), who has been writing the adventures of the famous cowboy since 2016, has set his mind to confront the character and its folklore against reality. What is left of Lucky Luke today? In his footsteps, the Parisian author arrives in the Far West, the true one, looking for figures and places that rocked his childhood...

The Shadows of the Wild West

In the shelves of a clothing store, Jul looks through endless rows of boots and hats, before going back in time alongside a descendant of pioneers, between the walls of an old school planted on the plain of Cheyenne River. In fact, from the counter of a saloon-like bar to the scenery of Monument Valley, it seems that nothing has changed since the conquest of the West. This is the reality of a certain America, white, rural and proud of its culture: poker players, rodeo champions, sheriff’s more or less bonny and old timers screwed to their chairs, the colt at the belt... : over the three episodes of this documentary series, Jul plays the candid and starts from this seemingly immutable image to gradually unveil its nuances. He then becomes an attentive observer, pointing out – without teaching a lesson – the shadows that official history and popular culture have wanted to erase, especially those of genocide and slavery. This constant comparison of the legend with reality makes all the flavor of this journey as mischievous as instructive. On the rhythm of Keren Ann’s music, the cartoonist manages to combine homage and analysis, between excerpts from comics, explosive encounters and breathtaking landscapes.