Line #79 ComicBook/WalterMelon


1	[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/Achille_Talon_1.jpg]]
2	[[caption-width-right:350:[-That short guy he's leaning on? That's Creator/ReneGoscinny.-] ]]
3
4	->''"Hop!"''
5
6	''Walter Melon'', originally titled ''Achille Talon'', is a French comic created in 1963 by Michel Regnier a.k.a. Michel Greg in Pilote magazine. Originally one-page gags, it turned quickly to two-page gags to which complete 62-page adventures were added in 1974, and continued until [[DiedDuringProduction its creator died]] in 1999.
7
8	The character is an {{Homage}} to ''Monsieur Poche'', a pretentious bourgeois created by Alain Saint-Ogan who's reputed to have created the ''ligne claire'' style and whom Greg was such a big fan of that he remade his star characters ''Zig et Puce'' just to give some royalties to the poor old master.
9
10	Achille Talon, according his author, ''"knows everything and improvises the rest of it. Apart of this, he's generous, petty, pacifist, aggressive, progressist, bourgeois, selfless, jealous, intrepid and a bit of a coward. In sum, honest and brave just like you and me..."''
11
12	The comic book was translated for different markets in the 80's and published in English under the title ''Walter Melon'' with little success, as it was so specifically French by its main character and its language. Readers hardly understood Talon's favorite interjections, "hop !" and "bof..." which simply express positive/negative moods.
13
14	Received a short-lived AnimatedAdaptation produced by [[Creator/SIPAnimation Saban International Paris]] that aired on Creator/ABCFamily (back when it was Fox Family)[[note]]in some English-speaking areas overseas, this show aired on Disney's Jetix (successor to Fox Kids) and on spinoff Jetix Play[[/note]] in which Walter Melon works as a "hero for hire" with his hapless sidekick, Bitterbug. Together, the duo step in for the hero and sidekick in parodies of popular movies, TV shows, works of literature, and, in its second season (which aired in other countries save the United States of America), historical events. The show also had a woman named Amelia, who often played the female roles (often the sidekick, love interest, or FemmeFatale), and a Joker-esque clown named Sneero, who played the villain.
15
16	----
17	!!''Walter Melon'' provides examples of:
18
19	* TheAlcoholic:
20	** Achille Talon's father is one, but this is strictly PlayedForLaughs. He's remarkably good at holding his liquor.
21	** Also his old friend, Arthur de Glouswallow in ''Le Trésor de Virgule'', a British gentleman who's constantly drunk -- but still makes a valuable jungle guide.
22	* AllCrimesAreEqual: In the end of ''l'Âge ingrat'', Grelot is arrested by [[MeddlesomePatrolman the cop]], just after his car exploded, for ''"scattering debris on the public way, unpleasant behavior, setting a bad example to the younger generation, and, [[ArsonMurderAndJaywalking I'd almost forgotten]], kidnapping!"''
23	* TheAllegedCar: Achille Talon drives a sputtering old jalopy which, as it turns out, is a real car, the 1903 Achilles.
24	* AmusingInjuries: The fights between Achille and Lefuneste involves them using lethal weapons such as spiked clubs, axes, chainguns, grenades, etc., yet the worst they get are bloody noses or black eyes.
25	* ArtisticLicenseBiology: Pétard (the duck) is always identified as some kind of bird, but never the right one. The prize goes to the guy who corrects his acolyte with "a toucan is not an amphibian but a cetacean".
26	* ArtisticLicenseGeology: For fun. Tutanémipartou sand + [[BilingualBonus Dontgo-Zisway]] volcano dust = [[ElementsDoNotWorkThatWay BOOM + madness smoke]].
27	* ArtShift:
28	** One page was drawn in a child-like style, the in-story explanation being that it was actually the work of the author's kid.
29	** On another occasion, Greg parodied the flamboyantly psychedelic style of Creator/PhilippeDruillet.
30	* AskAStupidQuestion:
31	-->'''Lefuneste:''' ''[on a stepladder, wearing paint-spattered-clothing, holding a paint roller]'' Yes, Talon! I am indeed painting my ceiling! Anyone other than you, on observing the pose I am in, would immediately have jumped to the conclusion that I was furiously engaged in shelling green peas!
32	* AstroTurf: "Yes, thank you Lefuneste. I know you were hired to applaud vigorously during my conference, and, honest man that you are, want to earn your salary, but I'd like to begin the conference now!" (Lefuneste is ''the only guy in the audience.'')
33	* AuthorAvatar: Downplayed, Lefuneste's more prominent traits were an exaggeration of Greg's, but his personality isn't.
34	* AuthorTract: ''L'Archipel de Sanzunron'' was initially ordered to illustrate a bank's newsletter, and as such is a pamphlet about the wonders of capitalism in general and banking in particular.
35	* BagOfKidnapping: Sneakules and Potates kidnap Hercules girlfriend Arianny with this method in "The Hard Labours of Hercules".
36	* {{Balloonacy}}: Achille Talon's father escapes [[MeddlesomePatrolman annoying cops]] by blowing into a breathalyzer balloon until it becomes an improvised blimp and he takes off with it.
37	* BerserkButton: Papa Talon losing his beer.
38	* BigApplesauce: In the album ''L'appeau d'Ephèse'' (it's a pun; "ça coûte ''la peau des fesses''" (literally "it costs the skin of the buttocks") means "it's hugely expensive" in French). Greg lived in the USA for a long time and even worked as writer for TV Shows such as ''Series/TheLoveBoat''. Talon Sr. serves one of his most beautiful sentences in front of the "Megacash Museum" where he can't go in since it's the night: ''"I was once more forgetting that, in this retrograde country, clocks ignore that in good French it's actually tomorrow morning."''
39	* BigEater: Charlier, the other editor of Pilote magazine. Supposedly an actual trait, here flanderized as always having a three-foot-long sandwich in hand.
40	* BlazingInfernoHellfireSauce: Achille Talon once forced himself to ingest a dish made from all the most potent spices in the world, just so he could belch out the lethal digestion gasses right in Lefuneste's face.
41	* {{Blueblood}}: The marquise Virgule de Guillemets, Achille's (platonic) fiancée.
42	* BluffWorkedTooWell: ''Le Grain de la folie'' revolves around two kinds of sand that, when mixed together, produce a gas that causes temporary insanity in anyone breathing it. One of these sands is on an island occupied by the US Armed Forces, and while the plan to get them off the island so as to blow up the beach works, they retreat to the island where the ''other'' kind of sand is found.
43	* BreakingTheFourthWall: Achille Talon is probably the most JustForFun/{{egregious}} offender in all French-Belgian comics. See MediumAwareness.
44	* BreakOutTheMuseumPiece: In order to fly to Polynesia on short notice and on a shoestring in ''Le Grain de la folie'', Lefuneste and Major Lafrime hire a veteran German UsefulNotes/WorldWarI pilot, who gets them there onboard his vintage triplane which keeps losing bits while in flight. Amazingly, the obsolete aircraft handily wins a dogfight against a modern jet fighter on the way.
45	* ButtMonkey: Achille and Lefuneste. Usually to each other.
46	* CaptainErsatz: What the AnimatedAdaptation was all about.
47	* CanonForeigner: Sneero and Amelia from the TV series are this.
48	* TheCavalry: Shows up on time to save the day in ''La Main du serpent'', something Achille matter-of-factly hangs a lampshade on.
49	* CharacterDevelopment: Most noticeable with Lafrime, who started out as a StockCharacter (the OldSoldier who never stops talking about his time in the army) and became a useful ally later on.
50	* CliffHanger: Copiously lampshaded at the end of many a page in the longer stories, and sometimes even played straight.
51	* {{Cloudcuckoolander}}: The mystery man from ''The Mystery of the Two-Headed Man'' is definitely this. A running gag in the album has him confusing people to the point of head-splitting headaches, and engaging in constant [[InsaneTrollLogic logic-defying quips and reasoning]].
52	-->'''Constable:''' How would I know your name? I've never seen you!\
53	'''Stranger:''' The police is incompetent! Nobody saw Neptune, yet everyone knows his name! I'm filing for a lawsuit for theft of identity! If you meet someone whose name I can't remember, they stole mine!
54	* CoolVsAwesome: An early strip mentions a "Creator/CharlieChaplin versus Franchise/{{Tarzan}}" movie from 1928 ("[[TakeThat Ah, more recent than usual]]").
55	* DarkestAfrica: Lampshaded in ''Le Coquin de sort'' (and somehow parodies ''[[Franchise/{{Tintin}} Tintin in the Congo]]''). All inhabitants of Doduduba ("Fatinbottom") speak in absolutely perfect French and the primitive bush village where everybody walks around half-naked with spears has a big contract with a pet food canning plant in Chicago. Papa Talon, while in the [[ArmyOfThievesAndWhores African Disciplinary Battalions]], encountered some rain-making witch doctors, among others.
56	* DepravedDentist: While he doesn't do horrible things to people's teeth, Dr. Fluquesion does knock them out with a special gas that causes recurring nightmares. Then his accomplice shows up with the (very expensive) miracle cure [[spoiler:which is only tap water or rain water, and not a cure at all]].
57	* {{Eagleland}}: Mostly Type 2s. To quote General Samuel Surrender:
58	-->'''General Surrender:''' Gentlemen, if there's one thing I hate more than the Chinese it's racism.
59	* EasyAmnesia: [[ShoutOut Colorado Jules]] in ''Le trésor de Virgule''. Got a TapOnTheHead that made him forget only a ''part'' of the information about the treasure. Immediately parodied by Virgule who argues him and tells him he's "of bad faith".
60	* DaEditor: Goscinny. Albeit one who is happy to use axes and sledgehammers to reprimand [[ScheduleSlip late authors.]] This portrayal of him was so pervasive that apparently many people exclaimed "[[TheNapoleon Hey, you're not that small!]]" when meeting him for the first time.
61	* EveryoneChasingYou: Sometimes when Talon was too sure of himself.
62	* ExactWords: Vincent Poursan, the very greedy storekeeper, sometimes scams Achille using this method. For instance, on one occasion he sells him a stove by ensuring him it will work exactly as shown on the ad, where the stove is represented surrounded by flames. Sure enough, it set fires to Achille's house. On another occasion, Poursan tricks Achille into buying a trip in the sewers of Paris by presenting it with the exact same words as for describing a gondola ride in Venice.
63	* {{Expy}}: Saint-Ogan's ''[[http://www.bedetheque.com/Couvertures/MonsieurPoche2_17082005.jpg Monsieur Poche]]''.
64	* FantasyCounterpartCulture: Zôtrland is one to [[{{Kaiserreich}} Imperial Germany]] in the album ''Le Roi des Zôtres''
65	* FloweryInsults: Achille and Lefuneste often try to outdo one another in that regard.
66	* FrenchMaid: Subverted; Virgule's maid Hécatombe is a huge woman built like a professional wrestler and [[Franchise/{{Popeye}} anchor arm tattoos]]... in the requisite maid outfit.
67	* FriendlyEnemy: Talon and his neighbour Hilarion Lefuneste. Always calls him ''cuistre'' (prig) but they're inseparable. [[NotHyperbole Especially when they're fighting each other.]]
68	* FunnyBackgroundEvent: It would be actually easier to list panels that ''don't'' have at least one funny event appearing in the background. Expect also any apparatus to contain overly complicated contraptions or unnecessary appendages, like faucets on brass instruments.
69	* GagNose:
70	** {{Lampshade\|Hanging}}d when Lefuneste making fun of Achille Talon's nose ends up having the latter hired to play the title character in ''Cyrano de Bergerac''.
71	** At one point, a crook wants to nail Achille in between the eyes with his gun. He aims, they have a silent face-off... and he breaks down in tears.
72	--->'''Crook:''' I CAN'T DO IT! I CAN'T NAIL HIM BETWEEN TWO EYES HIDDEN BY A NOSE LIKE THAT!
73	* GargleBlaster: In ''Viva Papa!'', the only product of the BananaRepublic of Tapasambal is an alcohol made from cactus juice. The locals seem able to drink it without much trouble, but when the hero and his sidekick Lefuneste sip a little, they instantly [[HighPressureEmotion turn red and produce cartoonish jets of steam]]. Along with the obligatory ''Film/LesTontonsFlingueurs'' ShoutOut: "''Cha, ch'est une boichon d'homme, cha!''" ("Now, jhat'sh a men'sh drink, jhat!").
74	* GeneralRipper: Samuel Surrender, the commanding officer of the US garrison in ''Le Grain de la folie'' is obsessed by the YellowPeril. To the point where he chews out a subordinate for almost stepping on a butterfly ([[{{Eagleland}} as American soldiers are the protectors of the weak and the small]]), then chews them out again when he realizes the butterfly is yellow.
75	* GenghisGambit: In ''Le Roi des Zôtres'', Achille finds himself becoming King of [[{{Ruritania}} the Zotrland]], which is so rife with internal quarrels and conspiracies that it is only one step away from civil war. Achille manages to unite everyone against himself by announcing overly warlike laws that convince every subject to give peace a chance and embrace the rightful heir, a Hippie, as King.
76	* GenreSavvy: In ''La Main du serpent'', Achille Talon correctly surmises that the other survivors of the submarine wreck were scattered by the storm. In fact, as another character observes, there was no storm. But Achille Talon replies that in adventure stories, there is ''always'' a storm -- and so there was one.
77	* GettingCrapPastTheRadar: "L'Etang Tacule" (Tacule Pond) reads phonetically like "les tentacules" (the tentacles) and is a spoonerism for "L'Etat t'encule" (the State fucks you).
78	* GrievousHarmWithABody: Often.
79	* HalfDressedCartoonAnimal: Pétard the duck wears a black beret and nothing else.
80	* HazmatSuit: Poursan had one ready for the Snake's Hand radiations.
81	* HilarityEnsues: Every time Talon tries [[EpicFail to take an initiative]].
82	* {{Housewife}}: Maman Talon subverts this, in that she's quite happy with merely keeping the house running, but is quite able to go ActionGirl as needs be. In fact, her first appearance was of her fixing her motorcycle in the garage, a characterisation that didn't make it because of how hard it was to draw.
83	* HurricaneOfPuns: And it ''never'' stops. The title character himself is a pun (from Achilles' Heel).
84	* {{Hypocrite}}: After chewing out a subordinate who asked why the upcoming exercise featured China as the enemy...
85	-->'''Samuel Surrender:''' Naturally, there is no particular reason I chose China as the opposing force for this exercise. As you know, gentlemen, if there's one thing I hate more than the Chinese it's racism.
86	* HypocriticalHumor: The aforementioned GeneralRipper gave us the little gem "if there's something I hate more than the Chinese, it's racism."
87	* IllFatedFlowerbed: One panel has Virgule's philodendrons buried under a literal truckload of mud. Ironical, since it is accidentally caused by Achille, who wanted to bring her fresh soil for the poor plants.
88	* INeedAFreakingDrink: Unlike his father, Achille usually avoids heavy drinking. However, in ''Le Trésor de Virgule'', after finding out his fiancée had bought several (fake) shrunken heads as souvenirs, Achille grabs Arthur de Glouswallow's whiskey bottle and gets promptly plastered.
89	-->'''Achille:''' I'll never understand either Platopabo or women!
90	* InexplicablyIdenticalIndividuals: PlayedForLaughs in ''La Main du Serpent'', where the three envoys from the Maharajah sent to help the heroes look and dress exactly the same, while they have different surnames and professions (one is head of the secret service, another is a doctor and the last one an historian). Lefuneste comments upon being introduced to them that, [[LampshadeHanging for some reason]], he did not expect them to have different names or jobs.
91	* InNameOnly: The obscure AnimatedAdaptation from the late '90s starred Achille (under his English name, Walter Melon) as a "hero for hire" who substituted for various action hero [[{{Expy}} expies]].
92	* IntimidatingRevenueService: The plot of ''Ne rêvons pas'' is set in motion by the visit at Achille's place of a persnickety tax assessor. In a subversion of the trope, Achille's father, acting as his tax advisor, turns the tables on the assessor and assails him with a mountain of paperwork.
93	* IntoxicationEnsues:
94	** Inverted. Lefuneste once claimed to have embraced the hippy counterculture and offered Achille Talon a spliff. Achille angrily turned it down at first, but smoked it when he thought nobody was looking, and had a [[MushroomSamba hallucinatory trip]]. At which point Lefuneste, back to his normal self, told him it was a joke and the "spliff" contained no mood-altering substance whatsoever -- [[FakeHigh Achille's high was entirely self-induced.]]
95	** In another, Achille burns some old wood he found in the attic brought back by an ancestor who traveled to India. The entire neighborhood gets high on cannabis fumes.
96	* LaserGuidedAmnesia: Spoofed at the end of ''La Traversée du disert''. The lieutenant policeman who helped the escaped convicts regrets his betrayal when they attempt to kill all hostages. After Talon punched the wannabe killers, lieutenant tells his sub-lieutenant (who was taken as an hostage) he can now arrest him. Sub-lieutenant smiles and answers the many explosions made him a little amnesiac. It's obvious he actually means "I forgive you."
97	* LatinLand: Platopabo ("Uglyplateau") in the album ''Le Trésor de Virgule'' published in English as ''Magnesia's Treasure''.
98	-->'''Achille Talon:''' What? There are revolutionaries too?\
99	'''Arthur de Glouswallow:''' Come now, Achille! We ''are'' in South America, after all!
100	* LethalChef:
101	** Talon almost assassinated Lefuneste with his "boyscout recipe" for breakfast: the bread soup aux morchella with chocolate. Including onions browned in orange juice and a bechamel sauce.
102	** Some of Papa Talon's recipes, brought back from his more exotic travels.
103	* LimitedWardrobe: Achille Talon and all other characters always dress in identical outfits.
104	* LongerThanLifeSentence: In ''Le Grain de la folie'', Achille Talon expects being sentenced to 745 years (with mitigating circumstances) for [[spoiler:breaking into Surrender's base]].
105	* LoyalAnimalCompanion: Pétard, Achille Talon's pet duck. Originally given as an ill-thought-out thank-you present, Talon resented it as such, but he eventually warmed to it.
106	* MadScientist: Dr Grelot and his three 600-year-old guinea pigs for the longevity experiment. The gag is that the victims of the experience (involving the removal of a gland in their brains that makes them long-lived)... are short-lived idiots, because said gland is so big it compresses their brains.
107	* MamaBear: Don't cross Achille's mother. [[NeverMessWithGranny She may look like a sweet old lady, but she packs a mean punch]].
108	* MaybeMagicMaybeMundane: Invoked in ''La Main du Serpent'', where it is never made clear whether the improbable actions of the titular hand were always due to the fakir's power of suggestion or to its cursed status. Achille chooses to believe the latter while the fakir confirms the former to Lefuneste.
109	* MeanBoss: Creator/ReneGoscinny (the creator of ''ComicBook/{{Asterix}}'') is depicted as a [[TheNapoleon perpetually angry, short and violence-prone]] [[DaEditor editor-in-chief]].
110	* MeddlesomePatrolman: Agent Dussiflet or his peers get to slap a fine on Achille Talon, or drag him in handcuffs to the local police precinct, on more than one occasion. They often try to catch Papa Talon driving or walking around drunk.
111	* MediumAwareness: Achille knows he's in a comic book, even giving conferences on the art of being a comic-book character.
112	* {{Metaphorgotten}}: A recurring gag in the more verbose strips.
113	-->''The gabbling artist stirring deep inside the more methodical reader looks avidly for the outstretched hand that will get his foot in the door of the drawing table and cannot find it. Which is only logical, since this hand, clutching the breadwinning brush, is close to losing its head.''
114	* MultipleReferencePun: Greg was an absolute master of it. One of his best examples is when Major Lafrime mobilizes his friends to put Talon into the election run and orders ''"colonne par cinq pour l'information"'' for launching a campaign. It makes a triple sense:
115	** Soldiers are ordered to be ''"en colonne par cinq"'' (line up five abreast) in the army;
116	** ''Cinq colonnes à la une'' (headline splashed across the front page) was a famous French information TV show in the 60's;
117	** The "5th column" was the term for enemy spying during the [[UsefulNotes/WorldWarII war]].
118	* MundaneUtility: Alambic gets a job in a construction company specializing in anti-intrusion measures, such as glass shards embedded on walltops. Shards made by breaking empty beer bottles. Guess whose job it is to empty them...
119	* NamesToRunAwayFromReallyFast: Virgule de Guillemet's maid, Hécatombe. In French, it is often used to refer to the massacre of a great number of people.
120	* TheNapoleon: A caricature of René Goscinny, portrayed as the irascible midget-boss of ''Polite (!) magazine'' where Achille Talon works. As for Napoleon, many fans thought then that Goscinny ''was'' tiny. It could be as well an {{Homage}} to Goscinny's character ComicBook/{{Iznogoud}}.
121	* NewJobAsThePlotDemands: Vincent Poursan works in/owns many different stores, selling anything relevant to the plot at exorbitant prices.
122	* NightmareDreams: What if the [[BigBad bad guy]] can ''provoke'' them to manipulate his victims?
123	* NightmareFuelStationAttendant: In ''Le Monstre de l'Etang Tacule'', a cartoonist draws [[Creator/AndreFranquin grotesque and nightmare-inducing cartoons]], but he claims that his drawings are a faithful representation of reality.
124	* NoMoreForMe: Papa Talon, once. Just once. Beer is a serious thing.
125	* OldSoldier: Major Hector Lafrime.
126	* OnlySaneMan: Fo-Pli. Greg actually called him the only intelligent character in the entire series.
127	* OOCIsSeriousBusiness: One strip has Talon and Lefuneste worried sick about Papa Talon, who is over the moon at the idea of going to work (for a construction company, no less!) instead of slacking around drinking; doubly so when the company's foreman keeps praising Papa Talon's performance. [[spoiler: His job turns out to be drinking countless beers so the company, which specializes in building protective walls, can smash the beer bottles up and put the shards on top of walls as a deterrent for climbing]].
128	* OurGargoylesRock: Gargouilla-la-gargouille, a dragonlike creature in ''L'âge ingrat''.
129	* OverlyPolitePals: In one comic, both continuously insist the other go first, but here the stalemate goes on until they're both late, leading to a Big Ball of Violence. Amusingly, this came about after Achille read a book on etiquette, and it turns out the other guy was the author.
130	* PapaWolf: Papa Talon. Keeps an eye opened and a beer with the other.
131	* PerpetualPoverty: Several gags make Pilote out to be worse than struggling ("We've had two new subscribers this year, doubling our customer base").
132	* PoliceAreUseless: Greg didn't like them and projected a part of himself in Papa Talon who keeps a flag of the "Wild Anarchists Federation" in the attic.
133	-->'''Papa Talon:''' Of course they're here. The bad guy is defeated and we're not pressing charges. Being perfectly useless, it is only logical that the police show up.
134	* PunnyName: Does a character have a name? Then it's a pun:
135	** Achille Talon (Achilles Heel), Hilarion Lefuneste (hilarious the fatal/disastrous), Séraphin Dumonde (it's the end of the world), Hector Pedeau the auto mechanic (Torpedo, a kind of car), Doctor Samson Fo-Pli (with the french pronunciation of his first name, "without his crease")...
136	** Talon even ''lives'' on the corner of the Rue Tilante (shiny) and l'Avenue Dumessie (the Coming of the Messiah).
137	** Séraphin Dumonde is another example of MultipleReferencePun. Lefuneste suggests that he [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Desmond_Morris imitate]] this famous ape dressed for painting.
138	* RecycledInSpace: In ''L'Esprit d'Eloi'', Rheingard Van Daag's project is to shoot "''{{Dracula}} in Space''", [[SpecialEffectsFailure in a forest]].
139	-->'''Van Daag:''' It will be ecological!
140	* RingRingCrunch:
141	** In ''La Traversée du Disert'', Achille Talon tries to get an annoying transistor radio to shut up by smashing it against a rock ([[PercussiveMaintenance all it does is change the station]]) and feeding the pieces to his pet duck. Unfortunately, the radio keeps working from inside the duck's belly.
142	** At the beginning of ''Viva Papa!'', Lefuneste gets his alarm clock to stop by striking it with a hammer.
143	* RunningGag:
144	** A common gag is to have Achille spend nearly two pages explaining various dirty tricks comic book editors use to fill pages, such as large empty spaces, or consisting of single blocks of color (the lowest point of a mine at midnight, a polar bear blinking in a snowstorm, close-up of the Sahara, etc.), ending with a bloodthirsty Goscinny running after Talon with every intention of removing his head.
145	** In the stories, people keep mistaking Achille's pet duck for a different species.
146	* SafeDrivingAesop: Parodied frequently where, for some reason, the Aesop that the TV presenter kept coming with at the end of various programs (including a western action movie, a children cartoon, a news program and a quiz game, neither of them talking about cars at any point) was "Be careful when you drive."
147	* SanitySlippage: Some gags involve Achille being driven into near madness, usually by a ridiculously mundane thing such as wrapping a gift.
148	* ScoobyDooHoax: ''L'Esprit d'Eloi'' (a pun on Montesquieu's "The spirit of the laws"), where the ghost is trying to scare off the owner of uranium-rich terrain.
149	* SeriesContinuityError: One album has Achille claiming his father only ever left Europe for three days to South America, when he spent a good portion of his early life in the African Disciplinary Batallions. Not only that, but this is in the context of finding out if he picked up a tropical disease or a black magic curse from Africa, when Alambic's established knowledge of witch-doctor magics are essential to the plot in another album.
150	* SesquipedalianLoquaciousness: The trademark of the comics. Lampshaded when an accountant complains to Achille Talon that the translation fees for his comics are double the usual rate.
151	* ShoutOut: Many, staring with Achille himself being a ShoutOut to Monsieur Poche. Greg was at least as cultured as Achille. There are also references to comics authors such as Creator/FloydGottfredson, Al Taliaferro, Hergé, Creator/{{Gotlib}}, Lee Fark...
152	* SitcomArchNemesis: Achille and Lefuneste.
153	* SlippingAMickey: In ''Le Grain de la folie''.
154	* SmallNameBigEgo: Achille, naturally. It's lampshaded multiple times, but building a giant statue of himself in his garden probably takes the cake.
155	* SoundDefect: A Mafia henchman in ''Le Quadrumane optimiste'' has a strange illness that causes every sound he makes to be rendered as a completely unrelated onomatopoeia (like whacking someone on the head with a huge "gulp" sound or flipping a car over with a "tadidadituuut", for instance), and his boss regularly complains about it (Achille comments that this kind of disability will prevent him from appearing in a [[SelfDeprecatingHumor good comic book]]). The henchman is overjoyed at the end of the story to discover that he's cured when the manacles he's handcuffed with make the correct "click" sound.
156	* {{Spexico}}: Tapasambal (''"T'as pas cent balles ?"'' = "You got ten bucks ?") in the album ''Viva Papa!''
157	%%* StealthPun
158	* StereotypesOfChinesePeople: Averted with Professor Fo-Pli ([[PunnyName "crease"]]). Speaks perfect French, huge [[TheProfessor specialist in chemistry and geology]], wears occidental outfit and while he does quote random "proverbs", they're along the lines of ''"The wise man, and a few others before him, peremptorily told it: 'better a little drawing than a long speech', and the television executives added: 'and it doesn't cost any more'."''
159	* StrawmanPolitical:
160	** The [[NoPartyGiven Communist-in-all-but-name]] leader of the opposition party in ''Viva Papa!'', who speaks in hackneyed pseudo-Marxist cliches.
161	** Most politicians seen spring up and are all too ready to help at the mention of the word "voters".
162	* SwampsAreEvil: ''Le Monstre de l'étang Tacule'' (which is ''both'' a wordplay and a spoonerism).
163	* TakeThat: The police are represented as semicompetent thugs or bureaucrats. One cop finds a sidearm "reserved for the officers who passed the dictation test! A rarity!"
164	* TakeThatCritics: In ''Docteur Chacal et Mister Bide'' (a pastiche of ''Literature/TheStrangeCaseOfDrJekyllAndMrHyde'', as the title suggests), Talon spends a whole page mocking a critic who said of every comic (including the first one) that it was not the best of the series. He concludes by advertising the comic as the only one where [[LogicBomb no book is the best of the series]].
165	* ATaleToldByAnIdiot: A repeated gag is for such a character to badly explain the situation to a cop and then get impatient when the cop doesn't understand them (or accuse the cop of being too stupid to understand). FunnyForeigner Lazlo Zlotz once gets himself and Achille thrown into prison after doing this.
166	* TestYourStrengthGame: Achille hoists the hammer over his head to hit a high striker... then falls over backwards, with the shockwave of his landing sending the weight up to hit the bell.
167	* TitleDrop: Lampshaded in ''Ne rêvons pas!''
168	* TryToFitThatOnABusinessCard: Papa Talon actually ''can'': "Alambic-Dieudonné-Corydon Talon -°- [[DadTheVeteran Former]] [[BombThrowingAnarchists Living Witness]] of the Merits of the [[ArmyOfThievesAndWhores Disciplinary]] [[UsefulNotes/GaulsWithGrenades Batallions of Africa]] -°- [[SesquipedalianLoquaciousness Patented Gustator in Distillated]] [[TheAlcoholic Hops]] -°- Man of Taste -°- Voter and Husband."
169	* UseYourHead:
170	** One story has Achille attempt to subdue a gorilla by running into a wall headfirst in an effort to get the gorilla to imitate him. The gorilla picks him up and bashes Achille's head in the wall.
171	** One of the three peasants likes ramming doors with his head, despite Achille's disbelief.
172	--->See, your issue here is that you see problems where there are none.
173	* VerbalTic: Achille has two, "Hop!" and "Bof", which seem to be used approximately as verbal equivalents of a smile and a shrug respectively.
174	* VisibleBoomMic: In a strip where kids watch a western on the Talon's TV, one of them mentions that an overhead branch is actually the mic perch.
175	* VitriolicBestBuds: Talon and Lefuneste are an exaggerated example of this. They routinely insult each other and are always one wrong sentence away from a full-on brawl, but they constantly hang out together and in the adventures never hesitate to help each other and occasionally save one another's life.
176	* WallOfText: The characters speak a lot, and it is not uncommon for speech bubbles to take half of an image or more. A particularly epic example occurs when Achille's mother comes to discuss with Goscinny about the journal Achille appears in, and rambles so much that her speech bubble takes more than half a page.
177	* WeSellEverything: Vincent Poursan, the [[NewJobAsThePlotDemands 1000-jobs]] [[HonestJohnsDealership storekeeper]]. He knows [[{{Greed}} the price of things]].
178	-->'''Vincent Poursan:''' The world's most powerful coil springs? Of course I sell these, seeing as they're also the most expensive!
179	* WhoWantsToLiveForever: The medieval henchmen in ''L'Âge Ingrat'' have second thoughts about continuing the immortality treatment, having not much to do but play cards all day and taking the occasional bath ([[TheDungAges 14 in all]]).
180	* WhyWontYouDie: The radio in ''La Traversée du Disert'' keeps broadcasting no matter the abuse it takes.
181	* WordPureeTitle: The name of the series is actually supposed to be spelled ''Ach!lle Talon''.
182	* YouFightLikeACow: Just about every fight has the participants make comments in a conversational tone, related to whatever weapon they're holding.
183	* ZeroApprovalGambit: In ''Le Roi des Zotres'', Achille is crowned king of [[{{Kaiserreich}} Zôtrland]], and in order to bring political stability back to the fractious country, he connives with his elderly predecessor to make himself so unpopular that the people will topple him and welcome as a savior the legitimate (and lazy) heir to the throne. This does not make the local conspiracy happy, as the revolution is clearly setting up to happen without them.

Context ComicBook / WalterMelon