THE SUNDAY GUEST. Heckled in his early days, Montpellier resident Reno Lemaire is today recognized as the pioneer of manga made in France

There was a time when France was not yet the second country in the world where the most manga were published and sold, after Japan of course. There was even a time when almost everything relating to Japanese popular culture was very widely stigmatized, cartoons in particular, mainly for their supposed violence.

A general judgment that was summed up quite faithfully by a position taken by Ségolène Royal which remained famous, when, then deputy for Deux-Sèvres (in 1989), she criticized in a work entitled Fed up with baby zappers Japanese cartoon series which were, according to her, only “beatings, murders, ripped off heads, electrocuted bodies, disgusting masks, horrible beasts, roaring demons. Fear, violence, noise. With minimal animation. Scenarios reduced to their simplest expression.”No less.

800,000 copies sold

This historical reminder signifies that, for a young Frenchman, to imagine himself, a few years later, as an author of manga in his own right in France, was utopia, at the very least.

A context which did not prevent a young Montpellier resident named Renaud Lemaire from getting started, in the mid-2000s. Nearly twenty years later (in the meantime, Renaud has become Reno, so we will keep this spelling), we find him, at the age of 45, complete author of a famous, very successful series, Dreamlandwith 22 volumes and 800,000 copies sold cumulatively.

“At the age of 7, I made my first comic book”

A series whose first volume has just been translated and published in Japan (a translation already exists in Germany), and which is being adapted into an anime, which will be broadcast from 2026 on the ADN platform, renowned as “Netflix you manga”.

The whole thing is therefore well worth a flashback and a Sunday portrait page of the main person concerned. Who presents himself thus to those who do not yet know him: “I am from Montpellier, born in Montpellier, middle school student in Las Cazes, high school student at Mas de Tesse, student at Paul-Valéry. I am now 45 years old, and when we belong to my generation, we started reading manga around 15-16 years old, with Dragon Ball. Me, at the age of 7 I made my first comic book, like an ersatz of P’tit Spirou or Asterix.”

Crazy about the manga format

Then, when he was barely 25, he decided to turn his passion into a profession. And as he is crazy about the manga format, the manga he will do, the mangaka he will become. Without even being aware that he is a pioneer, if not a precursor “in any case one of the first authors to be signed by a publisher, Pika, who aims to publish a book that resembles what is done in Japan, for a series”.

A series aimed at an adolescent audience (therefore falling under shonen manga) and which is part of the genre keeps its French, even regional, DNA, since its hero, Terrence (who, by overcoming his phobia of fire, finds himself transported, every night , in the world of dreams), is a high school student who attends the same establishment as the one where Reno Lemaire had studied a few years previously.

“Not a French author as lynched as me”

At this stage of his history, the destiny of Reno Lemaire resembles an unblemished success story, that of a young comic book artist who, at the age of 25, makes the dreams of the 7 year old child that he once was come true. Except that its beginnings “were very poorly received, it really split. I don’t think there is a French author who has been lynched as much as me.”

The blows rain from all sides: “Already, the manga format was considered the invader, bookstores refused to sell them at the time! At Fnac, my covers were spat on, yes, it happened, or they were sometimes tagged! It made everyone nervous: the public of the Franco-Belgian, of the 48-page hardcover album, was unhappy to see young authors imitating, according to them, the Japanese But where are we going? manga remained very extreme, did not understand the approach coming from a non-Japanese author, and that, I expected less…”

“I went to find my audience”

A reception that would have discouraged more than one young entrant into the profession. But Reno stood up, in his own way: “I didn’t stop. The opinions of others didn’t count, I didn’t know anyone in this industry, I wrote and I drew for myself. I told myself that if success came, so much the better, I could fill the fridge and if that doesn’t work, well… I’ll continue, and I’ll take a little food job on the side. .

And then the tide turned: “In fact, at one point, everyone was talking aboutDreamland but no one read it. So people’s outlook changed when they started reading the series. Those who didn’t like it found other fish to fry, and I signed a lot, I did 90 festivals, I went to find my audience, and that saved me.”

“He knows his audience very well”

And twenty years later, nothing has changed. As Marine Dumas, who welcomed the mangaka a few days ago at the Montpellier bookstore Planètes Interdites, when he came to present his new series, can testify, Freequest which he created and scripted: “He knows his audience very well. His first fans come back every time, he remembers them, has a word for everyone, he takes time to have a real exchange, and it touches them a lot. In Montpellier all the more more !”

Christophe Régner, his colleague from another Montpellier bookstore specializing in comics (Azimuts) confirms: “With Dreamland, it has become a publishing phenomenon, and a local phenomenon too, a bit like Fabcaro, who is also from Hérault. This series has left its mark on the minds and the readership. Hats off!”.

Unanimity now

A success almost unanimously hailed from now on. But that comes at a price. That of a titanic work, which, in the case of Reno Lemaire, can be measured by the yardstick of 6,000 pages produced in 18 years, at the rate of thirteen to fourteen hours daily spent in front of his drawing board, six days a week. seven : “From 9 a.m. to 6 p.m., then from 10 p.m. to 2 a.m., every day. And close to the closure, I push until 3 a.m., otherwise it’s impossible!”

A tour de force carried out with the help of two assistants to sketch the sets (including one from Montpellier), a collaborative process routine in Japan, but rare in France: “We had to invent new contracts. Because if there were some for scriptwriters, designers and colorists, for the job of set assistant, there was nothing!”notes Reno Lemaire. Again, a pioneer!