Screenwriter Xavier Dorison and artist Ralph Meyer collaborated on the Asgard and XIII Mystery series. Together, they have just released the eighth album of Undertaker stories[1].
Ten years after its release, this saga is more realistic than ever through the stories of their characters, who draw their strength from their desires for revenge and the traumas of the past to continue moving forward.
A western classic
As a reminder, Lance Strikland has changed his identity since he was wanted for murders he allegedly committed at the end of the Civil War. There is a price on his head for $50,000. He is now nicknamed Jonas Crow. He offers his services as a traveling undertaker through the towns he passes through in an inhospitable Far West.
As we could see in Mister Prairie (2023), Jonas Crow went to the town of Eaden City to find Rose, his childhood sweetheart. However, she has since married Doctor Randolph Prairie who requested the services of the undertaker for two funerals: that of a deceased priest and that of an unborn child.
It is in this context that Jonas Crow arrived in this Texas town, where a certain conception of morality reigns.
Sister Oz is in charge of the madding crowd. She prays to the Lord and wants to lead her own crusade to stop Dr. Prairie from performing the abortion: “God forgive Randolph Prairie her sins,” she says. The will of the Lord is done! Mine is to protect the innocent baby” (p. 7).
Jonas Crow has his own plan too, putting himself through Sister Oz’s destructive bigotry. He wants the soldiers of Fort Keith to intervene in this city, but at what cost…
A thought exercise
Beyond the violence of the events, it is the whole heavy atmosphere which holds the attention in The World According to Oz, as confided by Ralph Mayer, for whom this tension is interesting from a drawing point of view: « When we come out of a closed door, unbreathable, with a heavy discussion, an omnipresent threat, but characters who remain static, an action scene where the violence is unleashed is all the more spectacular! We can let go, go into overkill. It’s a pleasure for the reader, but also for the designer.”
Mastering the graphic codes of the western, the designer chooses close-ups to allow us to immerse ourselves in the emotions of the different characters. In this isolated town, where injustice reigns, everyone defends their own logic by trying to justify their reason for being. More than anything, it is a question of survival.
For Xavier Dorison, the cycle of what is happening in this small village in Texas, which emerged defeated and humiliated from the [Civil] War, allows us to draw parallels with what we see today with Trump attacking the university, the media, etc. For the screenwriter: “The central subject is how we can divert the anger and humiliation of people, who sometimes have a desire for revenge, by promising to restore their pride. It’s the revenge of the bottom of the class. So the Civil War is really the background that explains a lot of the reactions and behavior of the characters.”
In The World According to Oz, humans face themselves. They are forced to confront big existential questions.
Reda Benkoula
[1] Undertaker – Volume 8 – The World According to Oz | Xavier Dorison (Author, Screenplay), Ralph Meyer (Author, Drawing, Colors), Caroline Delabie (Author, Colors) | Dargaud | 2025 | 64 pages
1868, when Jonas Crow, an itinerant undertaker wanted for several murders he allegedly committed at the end of the Civil War when he was still called « Strikland », heard of an announcement to bury Joe Cusco, a wealthy mining owner, in a neighboring town, Anoki City, he set off in his hearse.
Arriving there, he discovers Cusco very much alive. Before passing away, Cusco swallows his precious gold nuggets to take them with him into eternity. The secret is revealed and provokes the fury of the town’s miners.
Thus begins the adventure which will lead him, in the company of Rose Prairie, a former English governess, Miss Lin, a Chinese emigrant, and her dear pet, Jed, a vulture, to try to respect the man’s last wishes and to reveal that he is more than just a solitary undertaker.