64 | Moscow, winning over both audiences and critics, will also prove interesting for fans of adventures fromthe French-speakingworld as soon as it is translated into this language. And the Society was formed completely by accident and due to the fact that Zelić responded critically to AlanMoore’s cult comic book series The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen. Inorder tomake this intricateworkmore understandable, Zelić placed – at the end of both parts of his comic – legends who primarily o er quotes from their original literary sources. These legends also reveal details fromtheWorld’s Fair, where thegreatest achievements of minds were presented at a series of planetary expositions organised between 1851 and the outbreak of World War I.“Fromthemany one-o fair buildings, humanity has been left with the Ei el Tower,” notes Zelić. We also discover from legends that Belgrade’s Saint SavaTemplewas conceived as aconglomerate sanctuaryof variousdenominations, that the catacombs of Paris contain more deceased “inhabitants” than the city’s surface, that in the notorious part of London’s East End, where Jack the Ripper lurked, a disguised Jack London resided in order to write The People of the Abyss ... and much more. The postmodern key to the creation of this comic book gave Zelić the freedom to use everything ever created or designed, but also to creatively imagine into existence the adventures of the Dardanelles Society. If lm wasn’t such an expensive art form, we would enjoy watching all those ruthless battles and surreal environments, like the skies above Paris lled with dirigibles, on the big screen. All of this is much more accessible in comic form, especially with such a skilled animator as Dragan Paunović, who doesn’t provide room for boredom in a single frame. It is through his lines that youwill love literature, guarantees author Zelić. inSerbiancemeteries,withthemothrepresenting the soul of the vampire, and transplanted into dead Austrians, which is a method taken partially from mythology. “The Plan is prevented by the Dardanelles Soeicty, primarily thanks to Sava Savanović [a literary vampire] from Milovan Glišić’s work, who spread the infamy of vampires worldwide and rendered‘vampir’the only Serbianwordused by all world languages,”emphasises Zelić proudly. The same heroes are engaged in a di erent situation and location for the sequel to this comic book, under the subtitle “Crime at the World’s Fair”. They are not wandering through cemeteries and caves, but are acting heroically in famous European metropolises. “The storynowbegins inLondon, during the time of Jack the Ripper, themysterious killer of prostitutes, who is deprived of life by none other than the Phantomof the Opera, the controversial gure from Gaston Leroux’s work,” says Zelić, untangling the complicated plot. The Dardenelles Society is joined in this adventureby themost famous Jagodina native, Jovanča Micić from Branislav Nušić’s comedyTravel AroundTheWorld. “The task of destroying them has now been given to Raskolnikov, the villain of Fyodor Dostoyevsky’s novel Crime and Punishment. Events revolve around the Orient Express train, which in the alternate-historical steampunk of the universe of this comic is a ying composite dirigible,”says this screenwriter. Apart from Zelić, the Orient Express has also provided the setting for the literary characters of Agatha Christie and Alfred Hitchcock, while the actual train also used to transport kings, writers, actors and spies. “The next stop for this ying train after Paris is the most famous Giant Ferris Wheel ofVienna’s Prater amusement park, while the nal stop is Constantinople, today Istanbul, on a magni cent mosquebridge over the Bosphorus – another unrealised urban project.” The only Serb victim of this skirmish is Vukašin Katić, and the gang wants revenge for him, which may happen in the next sequel, or then the villain of“Karenina”will mysteriously come to life. “You can also call this graphic novel a comic strip album, depending on your age, because the Dardanelles Society is a feast for the eyes of converted comic strip gourmets, but also a motive for spreading knowledge from the obligatory literature of Serbian high school students,” says Zelić, explaining his intention. This comic series, which has been promoted at exhibitions and stands from Paris to Postmoderni ključ nastanka stripa dao je Zeliću slobodu da koristi sve dosad stvoreno The postmodern key to the creation of this comic book gave Zelić the freedom to use everything ever created I kao da nije bilo dovoljno što je kombinovao nespojive ličnosti i promenio tok istorije, Zelić je u priču uveo i Jazavca (pred sudom) Petra Kočića As if it wasn’t enough for him to have combined incompatible personalities and altered the course of history, Zelić also introduced to the story the Badger (on trial) of Petar Kočić
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