With The Fate of Hellingen the series ends after seven volumes Zagor against Hellingen which re-proposed in chronological order the long challenge between the Spirit with the Hatchet and the mad doctor his bitter enemy. It is a real long tail that connects to the events of the previous one Invasion Day, incorporating that authorial approach sought by a lysergic Tiziano Sclavi first in Twilight Zone, and then by Mauro Boselli with the gothic atmospheres of Shadows on Darkwood, for a story it represents the “final” chapter of the fight between Zagor and the diabolical professor in the wake of an ideal return to the character’s origins and Nolittian tradition. An operation promoted by the texts of Moreno Burattini (current editor of Zagor) and by the pair composed of Gianni Sedioli and Marco Verni to the drawings: a creative team that, despite having the Zagorian canon as its polar star, does not give up more robust, almost audacious passages and some twists that are as unexpected as they are winning.
The Fate of Hellingen: the deadly return of the Professor
Just when Zagor is informed by Tonka of the disappearance of some Mohawks near the Monete Naatani, where the Akkronians had built their base, the Professor arrives in Darkwood Adolfo Verybad seeking the unlikely help of the Spirit with the Hatchet. In fact, the volcanic professor was approached by a mysterious group of scientists who call themselves the Disciples whose goal is to perpetrate the teachings of an enlightened master. Neither Zagor nor Verybad are slow to understand that the master of whom The Disciples speak is Helligen also because the missing Mohawks are found prisoners inside another Akkronian outpost or perhaps a secret laboratory of the mad doctor himself full of even more dangerous inventions such as incredible armor that increases the wearer’s strength and speed.
When from a fort in Illinois it comes then stolenby a group of men equipped with the heavy armor, the tub which had led to a first resurrection of Hellingen the situation appears dramatic. Not only could someone be working from within Somewhere else, the secret organization of the United States government dedicated to studying mysterious facts and border science, but all the signs around Mount Naatani suggest that the showdown will take place at the sinister manor that was built by the evil servants made available by the Wendigo in Hellingen.
Zagor and his men then try to infiltrate it but it’s too late: the resurrection process has already been started. But neither I Discepoli nor Zagor can imagine that, for the umpteenth time, the perfidious genius of Professor even worked from another dimension to take revenge in one shot against Zagor and the Wendigo and to complete the conquest of the civilized world starting from Philadelphia and from the Elsewhere base. Only the Spirit with the Hatchet, with a good dose of courage and luck, will be able to prevent the plan from happening.
The Fate of Hellingen: between conspiracies and revenge
To conclude “definitively” the fight between the Spirit with the Hatchet and the mad doctor, neither The Fate of Hellingen, Moreno Burattini definitively embraces Nolitti’s inspiration not so much in the content as in the narrative structure of this last battle. Indeed, in the eyes of an inattentive reader, the numerous passages in analyses could seem almost redundant or excessively didactic, but in reality they build an increasingly tense tension line between the memory of previous clashes (and thus bringing the continuity zagoriana) and a robust third act of the tale with a fast pace and dramatic and unpredictable resolution. Puppets works thus recovering elements from previous stories but bending them in a decidedly more “modern” and snappy sense, like the classic ones from weird science that had characterized the first clashes between Zagor and Hellingen, against the background of a conspiracy involving Elsewhere (undoubtedly one of the most effective pieces introduced in the Zagorian canon) and which finds its raison d’être in the double, if not even triple Hellingen revenge. The author, for this last chapter, so goes to the heart of the treacherous mad doctor, a real agent of evil impossible to redeem (we actually already understood this in the previous volume when information about his past and his delusional eugenic theories were provided) moved by an atavistic hatred and thirst for revenge that does not spare even diabolical entities from other dimensions such as the Wendigo. Yet Hellingen is perhaps Zagor’s greatest antagonist because better than all the others he represents the selfishness and arrogance of the human being as demonstrated by the final scene of the volume.
In the wake of another inspiration, that of Gallieno Ferri, instead moves the work of Gianni Sedioli and Marco Verni to the drawings. The Ferri’s graphic canon returns to dominate for the last clash between Zagor and Hellingen and it could not be otherwise. There table is built in full respect of the classic scheme of the two squares arranged in three horizontal rows where the rare exceptions (double quadruple, vertical shifts or full-page compositions for passages in analyses) do nothing but reinforce the iteration of the schema itself looks like it makes reading smooth and fast. From the point of view of the sign, however, the Zagor of Sedioli and Verni, like that of Ferri, is nervous and snappy with particular attention to the drama of the expressions. The line is as long and continuous as possible, the use of hatching is considered, preferring instead the classic contrast between full and empty spaces of chiaroscuro to give depth to the whole. The “ray-shaped” solutions for the sequences in analyses are interesting and unusual. The proof of the two designers is very solid and certainly satisfies the expectations of the hard core of Zagorian readers who have always been linked to the Ferri canon, especially for stories involving historical characters and/or villains of the Spirit with the Hatchet.
The volume
With the seventh and final volume of the series Zagor versus Hellingen, the modular image of the rib is now complete and Zagor can dart hanging from a liana in the Darkwood forest. Needless to reiterate that the graphic layout of the volumes, as designed by Sergio Bonelli Publisher, it is extremely effective and easily recognizable. The cover and title of this sixth volume, The Fate of Hellingen, are taken from those of the same name Zagor 650. It should be noted that it is one of the slimmer volumes of the series with a foliation of only 304 pages entrusted to the usual packaging or a softcover volume with an excellent binding that allows an always agile reading, 16×21 cm format, in the traditional black and white with unfinished paper.
The editorial contribution signed by Moreno Burattini it is for all intents and purposes a long and detailed summary of the previous clashes between Zagor and Hellingen. An easily not particularly original choice but easily attributable to the need to refresh the memory of readers, especially the more casual ones, on the continuity zagoriana also about Hellingen’s other appearances – in the third special Dylan Dog & Martin Mystere – The abyss of evil of 2018, which therefore precedes this story, and then in the most recent crossover volume Zagor/Flash – The Hatchet and the Lightning. Also noteworthy is the presence of two full-bodied biographical notes dedicated to the designers Gianni Sedioli Gianni and Marco Verni. The original albums contained within the volume are indicated (Zagor 648-650 of July/September 2019) but at the beginning of the introduction as well as, in addition to a series of cartoons taken from the previous clashes between Zagor and Hellingen which act as a corollary to the texts, there are the covers of the original albums even if the author Alessandro Piccinelli.
