Comic Book / Kayko & Kokosh

Corporal: Long what Bloody Hegemon?
The rest: Long live!

— The series' answer to "these Romans are crazy!"

Kayko and Kokosh^note Kajko i Kokosz in Polish, sounds the same is a long running comic book series staring a pair of titular characters, created by the Polish cartoonist Janusz Christa in 1972. Living in medieval Poland (or at least some vague Slavic country), the short, clever Kayko and the muscled, rather simple-minded Kokosz are warriors who protect the fortified village of Mirmiłowo from various threats, including the recurring schemes of a band of knight-themed brigands, appropriately called the robber knights.^note Localized in the animated adaptation as "knaveknights"; the original word, zbójcerze, is a clever portmanteau of "knight" and "thug"

The duo itself is essentially the medieval version of Christa's older characters, modern sailor adventurers Kajtek and Koko, created in 1958. The characters star in both full-length "albums", and in a couple of shorter stories.

If you think that the premise sounds familiar, you're right; Christa himself admitted in late interviews that he was greatly inspired by (some would say, he had ripped off) Asterix. On the other hand, Kajtek (the short, resourceful guy) debuted on his own before Asterix. Regardless, the comics enjoy an enduring popularity in Poland and keep seeing re-releases. There was a spin-off series after the creator's death with short stories focusing on different characters from Christa's universe, and official new books by Sławomir Kiełbus and Maciej Kur (as well short stories by other creators) continuing the series appeared in 2019. In 2020 the series was published in Denmark, marking its first foreign release.

There were also a couple of video game adaptations (some not very well received), a theatrical play, and a short CGI animated movie based on the comics (universally hated). In 2021 an animated series debuted on Netflix - making it the first Polish animated Netflix original production. A stage musical based on the book "The Flying School" debuted in the same year.

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Kayko and Kokosh by Janusz Christa provides examples of:

• The Ace: Kayko is a good enough warrior that the Hegemon considers attacking the village with him in it impossible, and clever enough to outsmart the enemy if open combat is ill-advised.
• The Alleged Steed: Wit's horse.
• Always Camp: in the first book, Wit had a very flamboyant personality. This was toned down in other books to make place for his growing Cloudcuckoolander traits.
• Anachronism Stew: Some of the books feature anachronistic concepts for the sake of jokes, particularly the politics of the time — for example, one episode had the heroes preparing for a visitation from a "castle inspector".
• April Fools' Plot: One book is obviously titled "Dzień Śmiechały" (engl. "The Day of Laughter") and takes place during the titular holiday that is depicted as Slavic precursor of April Fools, where residents of Mirmiłowo play pranks on each other, such as Kayko who carried the bed with sleeping Kokosh to the roof of their house.
• Battering Ram: On one occasion the brigand Oferma suggests that the brigands simply break down the town's gate (as opposed to coming up with a scheme of the week). They agree to the plan but forget to bring the ram and end up using Oferma's head instead. On another occasion, one-shot villains break down the gate with a ram, only to realize that the heroes had covered it with glue the night before.
• Big Eater: Kokosz.
• Brains and Brawn: The protagonists. As stated above, Kajko is the brains and Kokosz the brawn.
• Broomstick Quarterstaff: Kokosz once used a broom as a very effective weapon. However, a Magic Feather was involved, so he immediately started losing once it fell apart.
• Butt-Monkey: Oferma ("Klutz") is this to other robber knights who like to pick on him and consider him a worthless idiot no matter what the situation is.
• Cloudcuckoolander: Wit the Knight, and sometimes Kokosz and Mirmił.
• Cowardly Sidekick: Kokosz is usually played as this in contrast to ever cool headed Kajko. On his own, however, he usually flipflops between being over confident and a total coward.
• Crushing Handshake: When the heroes are sent to meet Mirmił's large brother, Wojmił. He and Kokosz are both examples of Stout Strength and squeeze each other's hands to a standstill. Kajko, being much smaller, saves himself from injury by kicking Wojmił in the shin. Luckily, Wojmił finds this amusing.
• Cool Horse: Wit's horse is incredible smart (often pointed out to be smarter then his owner) and many times manage to get Wit out of jam by fast thinking. Shown able to climbing trees and swim in rivers like a pro.
• The Ditz: Oferma (his name means "clumsy," "klutz," or "ditz") the brigand.
• Druid: Jaga the witch, usually supplying the heroes with various magical herbs. Most of her magic is quite nature-oriented.
• Early-Installment Weirdness:
  • In the first story, "The Golden Chalice" Jaga was known as Zielacha, and looked like an ugly old hag before making herself young again through magic in later volumes. When introduced, she also appeared to be more of a clever con artist than a real witch.
  • Mirmił was called a duke, not a castellan and had different hairdo.
  • A Christian missionary, father Placid, appeared in the first story as a resident of Mirmiłowo. He's nowhere to be seen in later volumes.
  • The robber knights, the iconic antagonists, don't show up until the fourth story, "Flying School".
    • In fact, the villains in the first story, The Knights of the Black Triangle, are so similar to the brigands that some fans tend to confuse the two, or theorise they are meant to be the same characters.
  • In the first story, the inhabitants of Mirmiłowo moved their houses into a castle courtyard, while Mirmił and Lubawa moved into the stone castle proper. They seem to live in the same castle in book two and three. They then return to living in a village and wooden house, respectively, in volume four, with the castle never addressed again.
• Egopolis: The titular heroes' settlement is called Mirmiłowo, after its leader Mirmił.
• Everyone Calls Him "Barkeep": The corporal of the robber knights is only known by his rank.
• Exact Words: One comic has Jaga enchant a wooden spoon to automatically attack "thugs" in an attempt to chase away the robber knights. The spoon obeyed — and attacked her husband, who's benevolent and not a danger to her, but still a thug.
• Expy:
  • As stated above, the main duo mirrors the duo of Asterix.
  • Łamignat (translated in the animated series as "Breakbone") appears to be a parody of the legendary Polish highwayman, Janosik.
  • The somewhat Germanic robber knights might be considered a twofold case, as they seem to be a stand-in for The Teutonic Knights or a more generic group of invading Germans on one hand, and for the Gauls' Roman foes on the other.
• Flanderization: Wit the knight, appears to get this every time he returns (not counting silent cameos in the crowd scenes):
  • In his first appearance, while very much a romantic and poet, Wit is still a noble and competent knight, even if a tad silly at times.
  • In his second appearance he's turned into Don Quixotish Small Name, Big Ego loon who constantly challenges every person he meets to a fight, sings love poems to women he is "yet to meet" and spends most of the story getting Kajko and Kokosz into trouble.
  • In his third and final appearance, Wit talks in rhyme all the time and basically becomes village's Mad Scientist, blowing up houses with gunpowder he invented and demanding reward for it.
• Flying Broomstick: Jaga flies on one, as one'd expect from a witch. In a twist, it's not the broom itself that's magical, it's the ointment applied to it that allows it to fly. Put it on anything else, like, say, a large log, and it'll float alright — though it'll use more of the ointment in comparison.
• The Friends Who Never Hang: Wit and Łamignat never interacted in the original Christa books, at best they appeared once or twice in the same panel during a gathering scene. They finally got to interact in the newer series.
• Got Volunteered: One of running gags with Oferma. Whenever an volunteer is needed to a dangerous mission his companions will simply kick him to the front and his superiors assumes he volunteered on his own. He is so dumb he only wonders how come he's always the volunteer.
• Henpecked Husband: Mirmił the castellan rules over the village... but his wife Lubawa rules over him.
• Hummer Dinger: Once Mirmił gets his broomstick license, he decides to get himself a large wooden chest to fly in. True to the trope, it burns through fuel (magical ointment) ridiculously fast and crashes.
• Horror Hunger: Well, more of a "horror thirst". In the book "Cudowny Lek" ("The Miracle Cure") there is a magic cursed water that makes anybody who drinks it addicted. This leads to one of darkest moments in the series, when Kokosz drinks some of it and, losing his memory, he joins a cult of people doomed for eternity to walk in circle to take a sip of the water.
• Minion with an F in Evil: Oferma of the robber knights is a happy-go-lucky, naive and well-meaning ditz with none of the evil tendencies other knights have. Most of the time he is just following orders, happy he can help and shows zero bad will towards others on his own. The people of Mirmiłowo see him as more of a neutral party than a threat. All of Oferma's faults (being lazy, trying to weasel out of work) cause more problems to his companions than to the heroes.
• Mismeasurement: In one comic, the robber knights would construct a siege tower to get over the town wall, but at night the heroes would sneak into the knights' encampment and alter the plans just enough to foil the plan. Since the knights were too stupid to recheck the measurements they would end up with a ramp that was too short or too long. Hilarity Ensued.
• Name and Name: The title of the series is the names of the two main characters.
• Never Recycle Your Schemes: Inverted. The villain Hegemon likes to reuse a simple plan of capturing the heroes' village: build a siege tower and use it to get his soldiers over the village wall. The trope is played straight with the heroes who will use a different method every time they have to foil his plan.
• Outhumbling Each Other: In "Na Wczasach", Lubawa and Mirmił let Kayko and Kokosh decide who is more deserving of a vacation. Kayko says that Kokosh is more deserving, then the latter tells the former he has accomplished more, to which he insists that he still deserves a reward. Eventually, they start arguing and have to rely on luck.
• Putting on the Reich: The antagonistic robber knights' tunics are patterned with the coat of arms of The Teutonic Knights; to a Polish audience in particular (cf. The Knights of the Cross) this is blatant villain-coding.
• Rank Scales with Asskicking: Hegemon, the leader of the robber knights, is a badass strongman in his own right. The fear and respect his henchmen have for him feels justified by more then just his rank.
• Rhymes on a Dime: Wit used to speak in rhyme all the time in his first appearance but gave it up halfway into the story due to a broken heart. He did return to speaking in rhyme in the very last Christa story - a tendency that continued in the spin-off books and one of the video game adaptations.
• "Scooby-Doo" Hoax:
  • Barnaba and his gang tried to pull one on Kajko, Kokosz and Wit in "Szranki i Konkury" by trying to fool the heroes into thinking that the village they visited was haunted in order to scare them away, as the town served as the gang's hideout. One of Barnaba's goons even pretended to be Utopiec (a monster from Slavic mythology).
  • The villains return to this gimmick in spin-off stories about Miluś the dragon.
• Shout-Out: Jaga the witch is an obvious reference to Baba Yaga.
• Sibling Yin-Yang: Mirmił is short, meek looking, not much of a warrior, tends to panic, and prefers to avoid war or any danger (both out of being scared and due to his mostly peaceful nature). His brother Wojmił is tall, fat, and muscular, and he loves nothing but start wars with neighbours and a good fight. Wojmił also seems to have a much more crude sense of humor compared to gentel Mirmił. Luckily, one trait that both brothers share is their unconditional love for each other (unless Mirmił angers Wojmił by doing something dishonorable).
• Spoiler Cover: The cover for Szkoła Latania spoils one of the latest scene of the book, where the main duo plus Mirmił chase Hegemon's forces away flying on a battering ram.
• Suicide as Comedy: A running gag has Mirmił try to kill himself every time things go wrong (usually accompanied by a dramatic monologue and a demand to have orchids planted on his grave). Luckily his wife Lubawa is there to stop him.
• Verbal Tic: "Lelum Polelum" for Łamignat the club-wielding barbarian.
• Your Costume Needs Work: One short story ("Professor Stokrotek") has both heroes transported to present day where they stumble onto a movie set of a historical drama film about their adventures. The film's main characters are completely unlike them, and when someone proposes that the two strange-dressed arrivals might serve as stuntmen for the lead characters, the director laughs them off; after all, they look nothing like the "real" Kajko and Kokosz!
• We Are Not Going Through That Again: At the end of "Szranki and Konkury", it turns out Mszczuj has a second daughter named Kochna, who sends Wojmił and Wit on another quest, with them expecting help from Kokosz and Kajko respectively, again. Kajko decides that he and his friend will also vie for Kochna's hand, making the other duo quickly send them back to Mirmił to reduce competition. Kajko lampshades that this was the only way to end this story for good.
• Women Are Wiser: there are only two female characters in the series, but they are both this. Jaga is the wisest person around, even more so than Kajko, and Lubawa - while more of a comical character (since she's a large housewife stereotype) - is also usually the voice of reason, putting her much more emotional husband in check. In fact, the only woman in the original series that can be described as foolish, Fochna, is a one-shot character, and she ends the story in a very advantageous marriage and an implied position of power.
• Women Drivers: Inverted — since the vehicles in question are witches' broomsticks, when Mirmił tries to get a license for a broom, the school's headmaster proclaims that women are natural drivers and men just can't compare.

The post-Christa Kayko and Kokosh books provides examples of:

• Academy of Evil: Łamignat opens a school for highway robbers; however, since he treats his profession like any other job, it never occurs to him that he is sending a bunch of newly trained criminals into the world.
• Berserk Button: While in the original series, Wojmił was exceptionally honorable and was outraged to do things against his code (lie, etc.), the newer books play it up more for over-the-top comedy. When Wojmił finds himself in jail with Mirmił, who confesses that he violated his solemn word of honor given to his wife, Wojmił erupts in anger. He breaks his chains and escapes from prison in a matter of seconds, leaving a trail of destruction in his wake. His sole purpose is to do the honorable thing by revealing the truth to Lubava, and no force on earth can stop him without suffering his wrath.
• The Bus Came Back: Wojmił, who only appeared in the second and third of Christa's stories, returns in the new series and pretty much becomes a recurring character. He gets much more screen time hanging out with his brother Mirmił, and interacting with his sister-in-law Lubava, something that wasn't explored much in the original.
  • One story focuses on Wit looking for a mysterious "love of his life." It turns out he was actually looking for his faithful horse, who vanished from the series in the middle of the book "On Holidays." The writer used misleading phrasing to trick other characters, as well as the readers, into thinking that Wit was talking about a girl from years ago. Given that Wit's horse is a fanfavorite character, the twist was a very welcome suprise.
  • As stated above in Early-Installment Weirdness, the Christian missionary Father Placid vanished quickly from the series, leaving the village of Mirmiłville openly pagan. He makes a brief appearance in a new book where he appears to perform a wedding, and his absence becomes justified by a brief mention that he lives in a smaller village next to Mirmiłville (whether this is meant to imply he moved there or always lived there and only visited Mirmiłvile is up to the readers' interpretation).
  • Miluś (Cuddly) makes a large come back in the book title... What else? "Return of Miluś" (Cuddly returns) One-shot charactes Kaprilda and Prince Wlado make return in the same book.
• Cursed with Awesome: Flip-floped. Salwa's "curse" makes her happy with life all the time, which others see as a curse or find depressing. Given the nature of Polish people, this serves as a subtle satirical commentary.
• Continuity Cavalcade: In one story, Kayko & Kokosh meet a barkeeper who collects wanted posters. When he shows them his collection on the wall, it includes almost all of the one-shot villains from the series. He even asks the two heroes if they've ever seen such Rogues Gallery.
• Helpless with Laughter: Salwa, Mirmił's cousin, is incapable of stopping laughter. It's not sure whether it's a curse (like most people suspect) or if it's simply her nature. Whatever the case, she seems to enjoy it.
• Hurricane of Puns: Common in Kur scripts. One example is when Hegemon loses his trademark anger and goes to a psychiatrist (who works double shifts as an executioner, being an "expert of head issues" and all). Each method to cure him is a literal visual pun on some Polish term or idiom related to making someone angry.
• The Hyena: Salwa's main character trait. She can't stop laughing even when she's in mortal danger.
• Minion with an F in Evil: Zaćmica, the sister and minion of Zmierzchnica, is an even worse example than Oferma above. She is cheerful, friendly, and non-judgmental. The only reason why she works for her evil sister is simply due to the fact that she is not very bright and seam to lack judgment about what's going on.
• Pair the Dumb Ones: The not very bright Zaćmica falls in love with Oferma literally because the idea that someone is just as stupid as she is makes her heart beat faster. She spends the entire book flirting with him and pouring her heart out, while Oferma acts pretty blasé about the entire situation. While played for laughs due to the child-like nature of Zmiećnica, who honestly believes Oferma is returning her feelings, the scenario comes off as compelling and charming. Kiełbus, the new artist of the series, even created some fan-service drawing of them about to share a kiss.
• Pictorial Speech-Bubble: Princess Emotka (Emoji) literally communicates using emojis.
• Psychotic Smirk: Zmierzchnica sports one each time she is about to reach her goals.
• Punny Name: The name of Salwa, the princess who can't stop laughing, is a very subtle example. Her Polish name means "Salvo", which is a reference to the Polish expression "Salvo of Laughter" (meaning "Gale of laughter" or "Burst of laughter").
• Shout-Out:
  • In "The Twilight Eclipse" one large panel of all characters fighting spoofs the iconic Polish painting "Battle of Grunwald" (by Jan Matejko) with everyone taking poses of difrent characters in the painting. One exeption is character Mirmil who take pose of Stańczyk from the paiting "Prussian Homage" (also by Matejko). The irony is pointed out by Mirmil's line "I feel like I dont fit here".
  • In the same book there are several quotes from Polish play "Zemsta" by Aleksander Fredro.
  • Father Placid quotes Pope Francis.
• Siblings in Crime: One story features Wit facing a team of tough triplets bandit girls - Bogna, Czechna and Kachna - who specialize in ambushing people in the woods. The Sisters want to force Wit into marriage, but after he escapes, claiming he is searching for his 'one and true love,' the trio wants to find her first (and presumably kill her) as their revenge for feeling rejected
  • Zmierzchinca and her sister Zaćmica.
• Took a Level in Badass: Miłasia (Cuddly's spouse) underwent a transformation from a passive dragoness in need of rescue by the heroes from Kaprilda, to a highly resourceful character, not only shown to be smart on her own but also using her wings to slap around characters and breathing fire at the villains' face.
• Sibling Yin-Yang''': The sinister, gloomy, and cunning Zmierzchnica is the older sister to the friendly, jolly, and um, not very bright, to put it midly Zaćmica.
• Sinister Scythe: Zmierzchnica's weapon of choice, in reference to Południce, the Polish demon she is based on.
• Unholy Matrimony: Hegemon falls in love with the even more evil Zmierzchnica, who manipulates him for her sinister plot. However, the tables turn when he actually tries to have a wedding with her, and she has to play along in order for her plans to work.