From white eagles to turbopoles. The specifics of superhero narratives in Polish comic books

Authors:

• Tomasz Żaglewski

Abstract

Within the larger context of global superhero narratives, Polish comic books are not considered meaningful—both artistically and financially—types of such stories. However, it would be misguided to consider Polish superhero comics as a marginal area of research. In my article, I would like to recreate the approaches of Polish creators towards building and expanding local superhero universes in comics, who tend to adopt either of two main strategies. One of those, represented in the Biały Orzeł (The White Eagle) series by Adam Kmiołek and Maciej Kmiołek, can be defined as an 'interception' strategy, because these titles extensively derive from the American models of universe-based narratives. Secondly, by looking at the growing range of Polish superhero comics such as Jan Hardy (John Indomitable) by Jakub Kijuc or TurboLechici (TurboPoles) by Karol Kalinowski, which evidently challenge the American pattern, I intend to describe the logic of the 'localization' strategy in the construction of superheroes and the overall idea of a universe-alized storytelling. Subsequently, I would like to concentrate on presenting these 'transnational' and 'transnarrative' connections between American and Polish supermen whilst explaining the characteristics of managing the 'local' variation of a superhero universe. © 2020, © 2020 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group.