Francisco Ibáñez Talavera (March 15, 1936 – July 15, 2023) was a Spanish cartoonist and comic book author. Easily the most well-known and influential comic artist of his country, his work was part of the childhood of many, many Spaniards. Mortadelo y Filemón is his most well-known and successful creation, but far from the only one. Think of him as a Spanish, Slapstick humor-focused version of Stan Lee.
Active since 1952, Ibáñez was also one of the last remnants of what is known as the "Escuela Bruguera" (Bruguera School), a group of cartoonists that defined the then-blooming Spanish comic book industry during Francoism. So-called due to working together under the prolific Bruguera publishing house, other members were Zipi y Zape's Escobar and, later on, Superlópez's Jan. The group's comics were characterized by madcap cartoonish Slapstick, flowery language, a healthy dose of Schadenfreude, and pokes at Spanish society of the time. Many of these aspects defined Ibáñez's output.
Free from the shackles of Franco's stringent censorship, Ibáñez's work gained elements of Toilet Humor and political Satire (in which no side is left unscathed), in ways that probably wouldn't fly in any other country.
His output has been exported to a number of countries, though it has never really caught on among English speakers. Notably, he's quite popular in Germany.
