Back in 2004, the citizens of Paris were able to enjoy an exhibition commemorating the literary characters seen as having done the most to promote Britain across the Channel. It came as quite a surprise to most Brits that, rather than honouring the feisty Bennett girls, the heroic Bond, the dashing Shakespearian heroes or even Noddy, the French chose the cigar smoking, whisky drinking, adventurers Blake and Mortimer as the epitome of Britishness. Created by Edgar P. Jacobs, a friend and collaborator of Tintin creator Herge, the comic strip adventures of Captain Francis Blake, the never seen without a stiff upper lip head of MI5, and Professor Philip Mortimer, a red-haired Scottish nuclear physicist, have been entertaining French speakers for over sixty years. The comics proved so popular that a television series was produced in Canada in 1997 which has now finally been dubbed into English and released on DVD. This boxed set includes all twenty-six episodes of the original series and follows Blake and Mortimer as they travel through London, Paris, Cairo and Tokyo (and occasionally even through time and space) risking their lives while chasing down criminals, spies, mummies and other ne"er-do-wells on a daily basis. The thrill of the original adventures can still be found in this series even though many of the original stories have had to be trimmed and tamed in order to fit into the time available to each episode. Although the animation and plots are generally excellent, the series is slightly let down by the dubious Canadian, American or Scottish-by-way-of-Ottawa accents given to these supposedly archetypal British characters. The Adventures of Blake and Mortimer is a wonderful series capturing the type of thrilling exploits and daring-do not often to be found in cartoons anymore and is a real treat of watch, especially for fans of the comics.