El Eternauta is a runaway hit in Argentina and across the globe. According to Netflix, the series has been streamed more than 10 million times and has cracked most-watched lists in countries as diverse as Brazil, India, Mexico and the United States — all while providing a US$35 million windfall to the local economy.
The science-fiction saga has also rekindled interest in the comic collection on which it is based, selling 2000 copies and counting at this year’s Buenos Aires Book Fair alone, per the latest estimates from Editorial Planeta. And in the coming months, English-language readers will have a chance to rediscover the dystopian masterpiece by Héctor Germán Oesterheld and Francisco Solano López as well.
“We intend to re-issue the book later this year, working closely with the authors’ estates,” Gary Groth, the founder and publisher of Fantagraphics Books, has confirmed to the Herald.
Tucker Stone, the publisher’s executive director of communications and marketing, added that it was “wonderful” that a new generation will be discovering the work through a different medium.
“The importance and relevance of The Eternaut to the history of the comics medium is unquestioned,” he wrote in an email.
Fantagraphics Books published the first English-language edition of the science-fiction saga as The Eternaut in 2015. The collection, which was translated by Erica Mena and featured an afterward by Juan Caballero, earned several prestigious Eisner nominations the following year. These included Best U.S. Edition of International Material, Best Publication Design, and Best Archival Collection/Project—Strips, for which it won the award.
The English-language edition has since fallen out of print. In its television review of the series, the New York Times noted that a used copy of the book could be purchased secondhand for no less than US$350. The original Fantagraphics Books hardcover edition cost US$50.
El Eternauta first ran serially from 1957 to 1959 in the comic magazine Hora Cero Semanal. The comic’s story centers around Juan Salvo — one of a handful of Argentines to escape a mysterious and deadly snowfall in Buenos Aires. Together, they must figure out who (or what) is behind the apocalyptic event in order to survive.
Published two years after the Argentine Navy and Air Force bombed Plaza de Mayo in the first act of a coup d’etat against Juan Perón, the comic is widely interpreted as an anti-colonialist allegory. In a tragic twist, Oesterheld and much of his family were later kidnapped and killed during the subsequent junta that ruled Argentina from 1976 to 1983.
The new Netflix series, directed by Okupas veteran Bruno Stagnaro and starring Ricardo Darín as the titular eternaut, is set in the present day. The production reportedly had a $15 million budget and was shot over a period of 148 days on location in Buenos Aires.
SOURCE: buenosairesherald.com