Absolutely, being a 50 something years old French reader of BD (comics in French), I would like to point out the luck we had to have this school of comics grouping The Netherlands, Belgium and France.
We grew up on magazines such as Spirou, Tintin, later on moved to Pilote, Métal Hurlant (The inspiration for Heavy Metal Magazine), À Suivre, L’Écho des Savanes, Fluide Glacial and Psikopat. All of those publishing many of the great artists who influenced our view of what makes good narration. They have a very different approach to the medium of graphical story telling. More akin to graphic novels from Will Eisner or Art Spiegelman than Marvel or DC Comics.
Mézières, Mœbius (Jean Claude Giraud), Philippe Druillet, Enki Bilal, Jean-Claude Forest, François Schuiten, and many others set the tone for sci-fi or dystopia.
Others were more on the humorous side, while others were pushing stylistically the medium in new directions (Serge Clerc, Frank Margerin, Denis Sire, Luc Cornillon, Yves Chaland, Alejandro Jodorowsky (with Mœbius), Jean-Louis Floch).
All this, just to say that Europe, as other continents, has its own comics eco system well worth a read ! And don’t get me started on Tintin, Asterix and Spirou !
