This book includes Discriminatory Content produced during less enlightened times. Clifton was originally devised by child-friendly strip genius Raymond Macherot Chaminou , Les croquillards , Chlorophylle , Sibylline for iconic magazine Le Journal de Tintin ; a doughty True Brit troubleshooter who debuted in December , just as a filmic was preparing to set the world ablaze….
These strips were subsequently collected in as Les lutins diaboliques in French and De duivelse dwergen for Dutch-speakers. The setup is deliciously simple: pompous, irascible Colonel Sir Harold Wilberforce Clifton , ex-RAF, former Metropolitan police Constabulary and recently retired from MI5, has a great deal of difficulty dealing with being put out to pasture in rural Puddington. He thus takes every opportunity to get back in the saddle, occasionally assisting the Government or needy individuals as an amateur sleuth.
This particular tale strays somewhat from well-trodden humour paths, indulging in some frantic action and sinister suspense bombastic whilst still resolutely going for comedy gold. In his third Cinebook album — as first seen in — the Gentleman Sleuth is notably absent as the tale opens in London at the secret Headquarters of MI5. Veteran warhorse and ultra-capable spymaster Colonel Donald Spruce is having a little bit of a crisis… A battled-scarred survivor of simpler times, Spruce longs for one last field mission, but is instead swamped with petty admin nonsense.
In the age of automation, Betty controls every aspect of physical eliminations for the agency. Information on a target is fed in and Betty commences a contract, contacting outside agents to do the dirty work, providing all details they will need to complete the commission.
No hostile has ever lasted more than a week when Betty is concerned: she provides efficiency, expediency, economy and utter deniability…. Except now the harassed technos are enduring a severe tongue-lashing from Spruce who has noticed that the latest print-out is retired agency star and his old chum Harold Wilberforce Clifton. As Spruce fumes and fulminates the abashed boffins try to explain that the process is irreversible.
