Les Légendaires



Les Légendaires (could be translated as The Legendaries) is a french fantasy comic book written by Patrick Sobral.

Set in a fictional fantasy universe named Alysia, the comic focus on the eponymous characters, a group of five heroes who were once famous and praised by people for protecting them from the Evil Sorcerer Darkhell. However, during their Final Battle with him, they accidentally break the Stone of Jovenia, a powerful artifact (once used by the Gods to create Alysia) that Darkhell was intending to use to get his youth back. As a result, the stone's energy seemingly kills Darkhell, but also irradiates Alysia and its neighborhood planet, the Elven World, turning every inhabitant into children with no way to grow up. Blaming them for the incident, the people of Alysia banish the Legendaries, causing their group to disband.

The series starts five years after this event, when the leader of the Legendaries, Danael, reunite the group so they can find a way to restore Alysia to normal. Of course, the attempt fails, and the group decides to stay united in order to find another way.

The comic uses a very Animesque style, and often plays with a weird equilibrium between serious and silly, alternating between silly humor and a darker, more violent storyline, especially in latter issues. Characters die, get tortured (physically and psychologically alike), and, while initially comical, get a large Character Development.

Though the comic has yet to be published in other places, it has been quite successful in France (over 3 millions fans), and eventually spawned a spin-off Origins Episode, Les Légendaires: Origines, that relates how the protagonists met before the Jovenia Incident. An animated adaptation is currently in development on as well.

The Protagonist, the Legendaries, include:
 * Danael, a knight from the Kingdom of Larbos and the leader of the group. He is the one reassembling the Legendaries in order to find a cure to Jovenia Incident. Good-hearted and willing to do the right thing, but can sometimes be willing to do dirty actions for the sake of Alysia. Fight with a Golden Sword forged by the Elves from his blood, which he can summon no matter where it is.
 * Gryfenfer "Gryf", a beast-man from the city of Jaguarys and Danael's best friend. When compared to Danael, Gryf tends to be slightly more anti-heroic and more pragmatic, displaying more concern about things like payment and having less strict moral (though he still displays concern about the sake of Alysia, and makes a rule to never break his word). He tends to have crude manners compared to the rest of his group, including displaying some Chivalrous Pervert tendencies. He is still the bravest of the Legendaries.
 * Jadina, a Magician Princess from the Kingdom of Orchidia. She is the owner of the Eagle Staff, a powerful Magic Staff who has the abilitie to turn into an giant emerald eagle for transport purpose. Jadina tends to act shallow and silly occasionnally, but she is probably one of the nicest person in the team. Has feelings for Danael.
 * Razzia, a former Barbarian from the country of Rymar who the Jovenia Incident turned back into a fat little boy while leaving him with his humongous strenght. Seems to be dumb at the first look, but actually possesses advanced knowledge about monsters and archeology. Is also a big eater. Fight with a large saber named the Leviathan.
 * Shimy, a female Elf from the Elven World, who is actually the current Elementary Elf (the Guardian of the Elven World granted with the abilities to control and merge with the Four Elements). A strong-willed Action Girl who doesn't express her feelings much, constantly argues with Jadina due to their contrasting personnalities.

This series provides examples of:


 * Absurdly Sharp Blade: Danael's Golden Sword and Razzia's Leviathan Saber both displayed abilities to cut through hightly resiliant matters, such as steel and rock.
 * Action Mom:, Captain Shamira, is well known for being the leader of the Elven Fleet, a surpringly competent fighter and probably one of the most authoritary characters in the book..
 * A God I Am: Anathos; justified in that he is one.
 * Abyss doesn't outright tell it, but he does define himself as beyond human;
 * The Alcatraz: Prison Barek seems to have this reputation.
 * Always Chaotic Evil: Adverted with the Pirahni: when first introduced, they served as villains, but it was quickly revealed their antagonism with Elves was because of a mistake and that they were being manipulated..
 * Kinda justified with the Darkhellions, the Zar-Iko and the Dragonites, as they seems to be few more things than magically/genetically engeneered drones with limited intelligence and considering Darkhell as their father.
 * Ambiguously Brown: the inhabitant of Orchidia and Sabledoray are this, though Orchidia seems to have some white men as well. The Marakas and Comanshawas as well. Captain Ceyderom too, though his origin is undefined.
 * And I Must Scream:
 * Animesque
 * Anime Hair: several characters, especially amongst the elves, are portrayed with unusual hair colours: Shimy's is blue, Ceyderom's, Shun-Day's and Halan's are green, and even some Jaguarians have blue fur.
 * Anti Villain: General Rasga started definitely as a Type IV; his only reason for was to help his people finding a safe place to live, and he displays absolutely no villainous trait, even refusing to achieve his defeated ennemies..
 * The Guardian could arguadly count as a Type III, though it's hard to say due to his Lawful Neutral alignment and how much of a jerk he is.
 * becomes a Type IV too during the Anathos Cycle after
 * Arch Enemy: Darkhell to the Legendaries.
 * Base On Wheels: the Castlewar. More accurately a base on legs.
 * Badass: several of it, mainly
 * Badass Adorable: a lot of characters. Well considering this takes place in a world where almost everyone is a child, that shouldn't be surprising, right ?
 * Badass Long Hair: several characters have this, but Darkhell's is probably the most impressive.
 * Badass Princess: Jadina. She wasn't that much of it in the first books, but as the serie goes, she gets her moment, such as the moment she turns into Jadylina. After the Anathos Cycle, she has become this full-time.
 * Handicapped Badass: Shimy after she became blind.
 * Crouching Moron Hidden Badass: the Legendaries are often portrayed as clumsy and kinda goofy when doing unimportant missions, but they definitely kick ass when fighting real treath.
 * Battle Couple: Danael and Jadina. Interestingly, those two were the funding members of the Legendaries.
 * Belligerent Sexual Tension: Gryf seems to have this kind of relationship with both Shimy and Shun-Day. He is usually the one who gets beat up though
 * Berserk Button: whenever Darkhell gets hit in the face, he usually gets mad as hell and attempts to beat the crap out of the responsible. Hurting Tenebris can also have the same kind of effect on him.
 * Beware the Silly Ones/Beware the Nice Ones: both Jadina and Razzia are part of this. Despite his apparent sillyness and fat bookworm look, Razzia is actually smart and incredibly powerful, while Jadina, despite her clumsyness and sillyness, is proven to be extremely dangerous when angy (Ceyderom learnt it the hard way).
 * The Big Bad: Darkhell, later replaced by Abyss.
 * Big Bad Wannabe: Kasino appeared to be the main villain in book 13,
 * Big Damn Hero:
 * The Bigger Bad: Anathos.
 * Brainwashed And Crazy: Tenebris, . Danael too, in some way.
 * Break the Cutie: a lot. ESPECIALLY during the Anathos Cycle with the Legendaries themselves.
 * Calling Your Attacks: Anathos' "Devil Breath" and 's "Divine Exectutionner Lightning".
 * Cool Big Sis: Sheyla to Razzia when he was a kid.
 * Daddy's Little Villain : Tenebris to Darkhell. Partially subverted in that she still redeems herself.
 * Darker and Edgier: the serie goes that way starting with the Anathos cycle.
 * Dating Catwoman: Gryf with Shun-Day. Arguadably Razzia and Tenebris, though their couple was allowed to exist only when they were on the same side.
 * Dead Little Sister: Sheyla, to Razzia.
 * Death Is Cheap: and how. The Legendaries got killed together twice so far, usually with only one survivor left at the end, yet in both case they are brought back to life in a matter of minutes after it happened. And let's not even talk about what happened to Jadina and Danael...
 * Demonic Possession: pretty much the way Anathos is able to come back to life.
 * Did You Just Punch Out Cthulhu?: Gryf punches Dusk, the God of Destruction, in the face in book 8, much to everyone's shock. Fortunately, the God doesn't get pissed off.
 * Jadina attempts this on Anathos, and gets her arm broken in the process;
 * Enemy Mine: Darkhell and Elysio when they were working for the Guardian.
 * Even Evil Has Loved Ones: despite being a cruel, homicidal, insane megalomaniac sorcerer, Darkhell is shown to deeply care about his daughter Tenebris, to the point the concept of sacrificing/loosing her was awful to him, even after she turned against him.
 * Abyss also expressed admiration for his "father" (despite the fact that, unlike Tenebris, Darkhell never even bothered caring about him), and is shown to care a lot about Tenebris (even though his "love" for her is quite twisted).
 * Tenebris and Razzia also developped their relationship while being under Darkhell's services.
 * Subverted with Skroa and Shun-Day; while Shun-Day considers Skroa as her father and loves him as such, he actually finds this annoying and only sees her as his servant.
 * Ceyderom is a played straight use of this trope; even though he's implied to have been evil since the beginning, his whole reason for trying to eliminate the Legendaries and serving as a villain was to bring back his beloved wife, Sisgyga, to life.
 * The serie as a whole seems to actually use this a lot; so far, the only Big Bads with no loved one were Skroa and Anathos.
 * Evil Genius: Darkhell, Skroa and Abyss all are shown to be brillant minds with advanced knowledge and skills in magic and science, as well as being really good at scheming. Anathos can arguably count as well, though he's more of another kind of genius.
 * Evil Laugh: Darkhell does this a lot.
 * Anathos has one after he has another one in Book 12,.
 * Evil Sorcerer: Darkhell and Skroa.
 * Evil Twin: inverted with ;
 * played straight with Anathos creating the Hellions, an evil version of the Legendaries, as his personnal elite warriors;
 * Eviler Than Thou: Skroa with Darkhell. Also, Darkhell vs Anathos, though at this point Darkhell couldn't really be considered as "evil".
 * Explaining Your Power to The Enemy: adverted; Darkhell explains how the Krea-Kaos works to General Rasga and Tenebris explains to the Legendaries how her armband can absorb and send back magic attacks, but both Rasga and the Legendaries were allies to them at this point.
 * Dark-Shimy and Dark-Gryf both explained their Power Upgrade (respectively infinite energy and permanant Chakounia state) to their respective Legendaries counterpart while fighting them. In both case, they had no reason to not do so, as both didn't know themselves weakness; in fact, Dark-Shimy's case was justified, as she was attempting to crush her enemy's confidence. After the fight, Gryf does explain his One Winged Angel form's weakness to Dark-Gryf, who immediatly attempts to take advantage on it... only to find out it's too late for that, as Gryf himself already figured out his weakness and defeat him in regular form.
 * Fan Service: not much of it in the original series, considering the characters are (safe for ) trapped in children form, and as such do not possess bodies built for such matter. Most of the cases, fanservice is reather parodied :
 * Beach Episode: subverted/downplayed as the beginning of the Anathos Cycle, where the Legendaries take a break to swim at the beginning. It doesn't last more than two pages however, We still get to see Jadina stealing Shimy's top swimsuit...
 * Parodied in the front page of Book 11, which portrays the Hellions posing in swimsuits on the beach for a postal card, joined with the mention "Kiss from Hell".
 * Panty Shot: Shimy often gets some of these after the Anathos Cycle, since her originally more tomboyish clothes have been replaced with a robe that occasionnally let her undies visible. Toopie too gets a couple of it in the first book of the Anathos Cycle.
 * Sexy Discretion Shot: played for laught in the Anathos Cycle, where, as Ikael call for King Halan's and Captain Shamira's help,
 * Les Légendaires: Origines, on the other hand, plays this trope much straighter.
 * Fantastic Racism: played straight with the Jaguarians, Gryf's specie; they are considered as monsters by humans, who chase them like beast even when they don't mean any harm, and use them as slaves for bloody arene fights. The persections were actually so much that the specie went near extinction and had to hide in a magically hidden city in order to survive.
 * Partially hinted between Elves and Pirahni, though it was more portrayed as prejudicious hereditary hate (similar to the one between French and German during World War I) than actual racism: apparently, Piranhi considered Elves to be backstabbing arrogant oppressors, while Elves seemed to see the Pirahni as something like monstrous brutish barbarians.
 * Five-Man-Band : with the Legendaries themselves:
 * Danael is the Hero (replaced with Jadina after the Anathos Cycle)
 * Gryf is the Lancer
 * Jadina is the Chick and the smart girl (later become the hero)
 * Razzia is the Big Guy
 * Shimy is the Dark Chick
 * From Nobody to Nightmare:
 * Girl On Girl Is Hot: in book 13, a drunken Shimy kisses Tenebris in front of several people in an attempt to impress Gryf. Some civilians are shown to be obviously delighted by the scene.
 * God of Evil: Anathos.
 * Heroic BSOD: Danael has one in book 2
 * Shimy gets a pretty dark one too
 * Jadina has an even more spectacular one in book 14
 * Hero With Bad Publicity: The Legendaries were this until the end of the Anathos Cycle.
 * Humans Are Bastard: not used that much, but occasionnally hinted; the people of Alysia are for most shown to be quite ungrateful to the Legendaries, being quick to not only blame, but despise them because of the Jovenia Incident, despite all the time they saved the ass of everyone fighting Darkhell. When learning the Legendaries were holding a possible cure for the Jovenia Incident in book 7, they immediatly assume the Legendaries were trying to keep it for themselves (they actually were trying to bring it to the King for massive production) and attempt to lynch them, only being prevented from this by the Gods Dawn and Dusk scaring them away. Not to mention their Fantastic Racism toward Jaguarians...
 * Identity Amnesia: Elysio.
 * is later revealed to have suffered this as well.
 * I Have Your Now, My Pretty: Abyss with Tenebris; even though he states he considers her as his sister, the way he interacts with her (seizing her with Energy Tentacles, stating his love to her...) sounds more like incest than fraternal love.
 * Anathos uses it to mock Jadina when he has her captured. She answers by trying to punch him.
 * Jerkass Gods: subverted with Dawn and Dusk; though they do act as jerkass when they show up, it eventually turns out they were doing so as a test to see if the Alysians had grown mature enough. Once satisfied, they went away, leaving the planet harmless.
 * Played straight with the Guardian; though attempted to be a neutral being that must only serve as a guardian to the Gods' magic stone, he wasn't above freely giving the Stone of Jovenia to Darkhell as part of a deal. He also gave mortals fake maps leading to his castle so they would die trying to go through deadly traps in order to get the stone from him, all of this just for his amusement. When he attempted to prevent Anathos' return,
 * Large Ham: unsurprisingly, Darkhell, Skroa, Anathos and Abyss all have hammy moments at some point.
 * Even lampshaded in book 1 when
 * Last Of His Kind: Skroa is said several times to be the last survivor of a bird demon specie called the Galina.
 * Shaki also is the last of his tribe, the Comanshawas,
 * Gryf was once thought to be the last Jaguarian alive
 * Love Redeems: the very reason Tenebris eventually switched sides.
 * MacGuffin: the comic makes a heavy use of them, but the author usually makes sure they disappear once they have served the plot by having them either destroyed (the Stone of Jovenia, the Krea-Kaos, the Temporhell and the Alystory) or taken away (the Stone of Crescia).
 * Magitek: Alysia's Gods' magic sometimes has much similarities with alien tech: the Guardian's castle, especially, has very spaceship-like features (including the abilties to fly in space).
 * Meaningful Name: Darkhell; Do we really need to precise why ?
 * "Shimy" is a pun on the french word "Chimie", which mean "Chemistry" (for a character with the abilitie to merge with the Four Elements);
 * "Skroa" sounds like a crow scream. For a bird-like demon...
 * "Tenebris" is the latin word for "Darkness";
 * "Gryfenfer" is a pun on "Griffe en Fer", which mean "Iron Claws" in french.
 * Mind Rape:Dark-Jadina is heavily implied to have done this to Tenebris in Book 11.
 * Mood Whiplash: the serie is a big fan of this; not only, almost all the arcs start with the Legendaries getting themselves embarrassed in some silly mission and end up sending them in a serious one, but at several points, serious moments suddenly turns into jokes, and vice-versa.
 * Morality Pet: Tenebris refers to Razzia as "her part of light".
 * Tenebris herself came to become this to Darkhell in some way, though is arguadable to say Darkhell "redeemed" himself.
 * Mordor: the country of Shiar, where Darkhell built his castle, is pretty much portrayed as this. Klafooty, to a minor extent, might count as well.
 * Names to Run Away From Really Fast: Darkhell, Anathos (from the greek "Thanatos"), Abyss.
 * No Holds Barred Beatdown: Anathos in his first battle with the Legendaries. this scene is pretty considered as the most violent battle ever in the whole serie.
 * Older Than They Look: justified; because of the Jovenia incident, virtually everyone on Alysia and the Elven World look like a 12 years old kid, not matter what their actual ages might be.
 * Omnicidal Maniac: Anathos is basically a king of that : he successfully destroyed the original Alysia, and attempted to destroy the second one as an act of revenge for what the Gods did to him. Not to mention he created a magic plague to kill humans...
 * Our Elves Are Better: Elves are portrayed in a classic fantasy way, except they are technically aliens to the inhabitants of Alysia, having a whole planet of their own which can be reached by using portail-summoning magic keys. They seem to frequently have anime hairs and share the planet with fishmen-like beings called the Pirahni.
 * The Alcatraz: Prison Barek pretty much the definition.
 * The Paladin: Danael, though he does have his dark moments.
 * The Psycho Rangers: Anathos creates evil twins of the Legendaries, the Hellions, from their blood.
 * Reason You suck Speech: Darkhell does an impressive one to General Rasga right after betraying him, commenting about how naive he and his people were to team up with him and revealing them their whole reason to fight with Elves was a silly mistake.
 * Redemption Equals Death: played with repeatedly:
 * In Book 4,
 * In Book 6,
 * Red Oni Blue Oni: Gryf and Danael fit the trope in some way. A rare case where the hero is the Blue while the Lancer is the Red.
 * Elysio and Darkhell could be considered this as well.
 * The Rival: the Fabulous act like this to the Legendaries in the first issue, but eventually became friendly allies. Skroa also used to be this to Dakrhell.
 * The Wrongful Heir To The Throne: Count Kasino was attempting to become this. Sadly for him, he didn't survive long enough for that.
 * Tomboy And Girly Girl: Shimy and Jadina.
 * Screw Destiny: in book 10 of the Anathos Cycle, as the Legendaries are preparing themselves to fight Anathos, Danael destroys the Alystory as a sign of denial of the prophecy that foresees Anathos' return.
 * Sealed Evil in a Can: Anathos when he was trapped in the Bearer. Abyss too, kinda.
 * She's All Grown Up: ironically inverted in book 6, where
 * Played straight with Toopie toward Razzia, to the point Tenebris became jealous.
 * Shout Out: Done several times, most notably through puns in the names of place and characters. Most notable include:
 * A creature looking like Pikachu is shown twice;
 * In the first book of the Anathos Cycle, the hight security prison where Tenebris is kept is named Prison Barek;
 * Jadina's plan to take down Anathos' Castlewar takes place in the Canyon of Gold-Orack. The plan himself was named Operation Gold-Orac Go (Michi-Gan then apologizes to the readers for the lame pun).
 * Toopie was seen using inventions such as a gorilla mecha named Ding-Dong and pumkin-like bomb very much like the ones used by the Green Goblin
 * When turning into his DeathGryf form rescue Jadina from in book 14, Gryf states : "If you wanna get the Beauty, you'll need to fight the Beast first". Even funnier considering the author did write a comic adaptation of "Beauty and the Beast".
 * Slasher Smile: Darkhell just loves doing this. Anathos and Abyss are good at it too.
 * The Bad Guy Wins: played with at several points :
 * In Book 2,.
 * Similarly, in Book 6,
 * The second book of the Anathos Cycle is probably the most straight exemple:
 * The Symbiote/Puppeteer Parasite: Abyss is both of those. Amy serves as the first to Razzia.
 * Took a Level In Badass: Razzia went from a fat bookworm only interested with adventures novels as a kid to a fearsome Barbarian Hero who and eventually joined the Legendaries, becoming one of the greatest heroes of Alysia. Though the Jovenia Incident turned him back to his child form, he retained his humongous strenght
 * Unresolved Sexual Tension: Danael and Jadina;
 * Vile Villain Saccharine Show: at least three of the main villains (Darkhell, Abyss and Anathos) are walking Nightmare Fuel, and another one (Skroa) comes close of being one.
 * Villainous Breakdown: Anathos has an especially nice one toward the end of the Anathos Cycle. So does Abyss when her realizes, though his is more creepy than awesome.
 * Vitriolic Best Buds: Shimy and Jadina; they keep fighting and insulting each other, Shimy is often exasperated by Jadina's apparent shallowness and keep snarking about her. Yet, it's quite obvious they both care for each other, as both display alarm or shock whenever they believe the other dead.
 * and started out as ennemies, but after, they seem to gradually evolve into that. Of course,
 * We Can Rule Together: Anathos offered this to Tenebris, mentionning that unlike the Legendaries, she was most likely to accept the offer. She declined, however.
 * A weird subversion with Abyss, who tried to force Tenebris into doing so by brainwashing her.
 * What Could Have Been: Sobral initially wanted to end the serie after Book 6, then after the Anathos Cycle, but eventually changed the plot so it'd go on. He has now confirmed he would at least do 20 Books, and even annonced what Books 15, 16, 17 and 18 would be about.
 * What the Hell Hero: Jadina gives one to Danael in book 5 when he treatens Halan with a Darkhellion's stinger, blaming him for putting his jealousy before the mission and thus making things dangerous.
 * Gryf gets two in book 7: one from Jadina when he hinted he would have gladly slaughtered the villagers for hunting Jaguarians like beasts, and one from Danael when he almost threatened Jadina.
 * White-Haired Pretty Girl: Shimy after the Anathos Cycle.
 * Why Don't You Just Shoot Him: inverted; when the Legendaries prepare to infiltrate the Castlewar, Anathos sees that coming, and actually plans on sending his Vultur army against them in order to end this quickly. However, a mysterious woman appears and advices him to let them come and defeat them with the Hellions instead. He chooses to follow the advice.
 * You have failed me: Anathos does this to Dark Jadina after Jadina defeated her. Even creepier considering he said he had forgiven her right before doing so and that she was in love with him.
 * You have outlived your usefulness: Darkhell does this to his allie General Rasga in book 4.
 * Ceyderom does it to
 * Vile Villain Saccharine Show: at least three of the main villains (Darkhell, Abyss and Anathos) are walking Nightmare Fuel, and another one (Skroa) comes close of being one.
 * Villainous Breakdown: Anathos has an especially nice one toward the end of the Anathos Cycle. So does Abyss when her realizes, though his is more creepy than awesome.
 * Vitriolic Best Buds: Shimy and Jadina; they keep fighting and insulting each other, Shimy is often exasperated by Jadina's apparent shallowness and keep snarking about her. Yet, it's quite obvious they both care for each other, as both display alarm or shock whenever they believe the other dead.
 * and started out as ennemies, but after, they seem to gradually evolve into that. Of course,
 * We Can Rule Together: Anathos offered this to Tenebris, mentionning that unlike the Legendaries, she was most likely to accept the offer. She declined, however.
 * A weird subversion with Abyss, who tried to force Tenebris into doing so by brainwashing her.
 * What Could Have Been: Sobral initially wanted to end the serie after Book 6, then after the Anathos Cycle, but eventually changed the plot so it'd go on. He has now confirmed he would at least do 20 Books, and even annonced what Books 15, 16, 17 and 18 would be about.
 * What the Hell Hero: Jadina gives one to Danael in book 5 when he treatens Halan with a Darkhellion's stinger, blaming him for putting his jealousy before the mission and thus making things dangerous.
 * Gryf gets two in book 7: one from Jadina when he hinted he would have gladly slaughtered the villagers for hunting Jaguarians like beasts, and one from Danael when he almost threatened Jadina.
 * White-Haired Pretty Girl: Shimy after the Anathos Cycle.
 * Why Don't You Just Shoot Him: inverted; when the Legendaries prepare to infiltrate the Castlewar, Anathos sees that coming, and actually plans on sending his Vultur army against them in order to end this quickly. However, a mysterious woman appears and advices him to let them come and defeat them with the Hellions instead. He chooses to follow the advice.
 * You have failed me: Anathos does this to Dark Jadina after Jadina defeated her. Even creepier considering he said he had forgiven her right before doing so and that she was in love with him.
 * You have outlived your usefulness: Darkhell does this to his allie General Rasga in book 4.
 * Ceyderom does it to
 * Ceyderom does it to