The series takes place in the 50-60s (Clifton is ex-RAF, currently working for M.I.5) so as far as I know Holmes is not a regular character. The issue in question looks to be a Life On Mars-type situation where Clifton wakes up in an earlier age after an accident, but that's only from the short blurb on the publisher's site so details may be more complex, things may be not as the seem and so on.

Enjoying Carmen McCallum and Travis so much (as well as his post-western Nevada), I decided to check out some other series Fred Duval has done. He's written quite a bit and a lot of it has not been translated (and my french is horrible) so I picked out 3 series to test. I've 2 issues of Nico (1 and 2) and one issue of Renessaince (with artist Emem, a regular artist on his works. I have issue 2, issue 3 is on back order at my comic store). The third series is the one I want to talk about: Casus is a series of 6 issues. Each a standalone story with a different creative team (all crime stories as far as I can tell). My comic store had 3 of it (and none of them were the Duval issues), but there's enough talent there that the series was interesting.

So in no particular order: Casus - Gold Fever, Casus - Diamond and Casus - Soul Man.

Gold Fever by Luca Blengino and Antonio Sarchione: Set in the late 19th Century, a stage magician/con-man and an escaped prisoner plan to steal a large lump of gold from a U.S. colonel both have a bad history with. I haven't read anything by either writer or artist, but they seem to do historical based stories (often set in Ancient Rome). The art is very good, storywise it's okay. I've some issues with some details (like the lump of gold is described as weighing 50 kilograms, but is the size of a man. It may be a mistranslation, but a lump of gold that size would weigh significantly more and even if it's a mistranslation, it's lifted by 2 men later in the story.). Also there is are a bit too many character suddenly turning up later in the story, but that's a personel preference. I did like some of the details around the heist though.

Diamond by Cristophe Bec and Dylan Teague: Set in 2009, a group of American criminals plan to steal a diamond shipment from a Siberian diamond mining operation. I've tried several comics by Cristophe Bec and have disliked them all. Will this one be an exception to that rule? (Spoiler: no, it won't.) My problem with Bec's work (at least the ones I've read) is that all characters are completely unlikeable (and I don't have a problem with unlikeable protagonists, but they need to be interesting) and the stories all end in an anti-climax and have a tone of nihilism about it. The art is good, but not enough to overcome my complete lack of interest in the story. Your mileage may vary and Bec is popular enough that others seem to disagree.

Soul Man by David Chauvel and Denys: I'm a big fan of Chauvel's Arthur legend adaptions and Robillar series. Don't think I've read anything by Denys before. The story: Starting out in 1964, after the fall of Bautista, 4 Mafia families move 20 million dollars out of Cuba to invest in Las Vegas. A single white chevolet with 4 trusted men and the money leaves and disappears without a trace, but decades later a prisoner nicknamed the Soul Man,claims to know what happened and Felix, nephew of one of the family's Dons, volunteers to enter prison to get the truth. After 1 issue that I heavily disliked and one that I was moderately positive about, I'm glad that I also have an issue that I really enjoyed. I probably should point out that if I've a problem with a man-sized gold-nugget weighing only 50 kgs and that can be lifted by 2 men, I should have a problem with 20 million dollars fitting in a briefcase, but somehow I've less problems with that.

3 issues to go and not sure I will be able to get them all as the series came out a couple of years ago, but the remaining three include the Duval issue and one by Herik Hanna, another writer I like a lot, so I have high hopes for those.

Continuing Fred Duval-series (and related series):

Casus - The Third Day by Henri Muenier and Richard Guernineau. So Casus is a series of standalone stories, all focusing on crimes and this issue we have a crime set in Jerusalem, April 6th in the year 30 A.D. Not the usual time and location for a crime and the more religious might bark at the concept of this issue. Mary and Jacob try to save their rabbi who has been convicted to die at the cross. Jacob has faith that this was all foretold by their teacher and is part of God's plan, but Mary convinces him that if it's God's will, their actions can only help so she goes off to bribe a soldier named Longinus who is overseeing the execution. As said the religious background in the story may offend some, I found the story to be very interesting and at occassion even funny.

Casus - The Big Swindle by Fred Duval and Christopher Quet. The reason I bought this series to begin with. Duval and Quet are the regular creative team on Cyberpunk series Travis. This is a regular Punk story (or at least the Punk movement is a big part of the story). It's London, 1977: the Queen's Silver jubilee is prepared, the Sex Pistols are set to play a concert at the same time, while the economy of England in shambles. While the police is distracted by the Sex Pistols concert, criminals are preparing one of the largest drug smuggles in history now that the French Connection has been dismantled. As expected, I liked this story a lot as I'm a big Duval fan. It does require quite a bit of background knowledge of the time period as the story gives little exposition, namedropping people and events and counting on the reader to get it. A lot of moving parts and characters in it and Quet's faces can resemble each other a lot, so things can get muddled.

Casus - The Kaiser's Inheritance by Herik Hanna and Trevor Hairsine.Germany, 1936. A WW I veteran works as an assassin for German Intelligence but unknown to his superiors, he has a strong distaste of the Nazi ideology and is planning something. A story that fits Hairsine style a lot better than the various superhero comics I've seen him do.

So for a six issue series, there was only 1 story I really disliked (Diamond) and one I found decent (Gold Fever), the rest I found good to great.

Also I've read Nico by Duval and Berthet. WWII, an American officer finds a young war orphan named Nico in Germany after a bombing. He adopts the girl and a few years later, Nico and her friends find a crashed UFO outside Roswell. The discovery is made public, but it turns out that the USSR also found a crashed UFO at the same time. Alternate history timeline ensues as the alien discovery boosts human technology and by 1966 the world has its flying cars and jetpacks old sci-fi stories always predicted. Nico, now an adult woman, has followed her father into service as a secret agent for the CIA. There are rumours of a third UFO crash and both superpowers race to find it first. Berthet is a follower of the Ligne Claire style like Herge and Edgar P. Jacobs and his work is filled with nods at other works (most noticeable are the Russian spacestations and -ships that are carbon copies of Thunderbirds 2, 4 and 5) and a recreation of the opening scene of Blake and Mortimer's "The Yellow M" (which turns out to be a movie adaption that Nico is watching at the beginning of isue 3). I liked the series, though it leans a bit too hard in the popular alternate timeline tool of "guess what is different about historical person X in this world?" (note: I can accept flying cars and jetpacks and all things sci-fi, but sci-fi tech or not , there is no way Marilyn Monroe married Isaac Asimov)

Upcoming: Duval's Wonderball and Renaissance (still missing some issues on those so it can take a while)

I'm usually annoyed as well if they just go for default Marvel comic set in New York, so I get what you mean. Nico is CIA, but she is German/Austrian by birth and the issues take place all over the world.

Duval's work is pretty international usually: Nevada was set in the US/Mexico (but it's a post-Western, so that makes sense), Carmen McCallum and Travis move all over the world, Wonderball looks to be American, Renaissance is set in the far future and possible even not in Earth from the covers (haven't read it), other of his stories are set in Renaissance Italy, Medieval London, 19th century Guernsey, 1914 France etc.

Skipped last week as there was not much coming out that I found particularly interesting. The two things that came out and we're interested I moved to this week (Top Left corner).

So we get three titles that include Berlin in their title. Weird coincidence as far as I can tell.

Anyway a new Blake & Mortimer, a new(ish? not sure I've not read the series in ages) Corto Maltese.
Also a new Les Vieux Fourneaux (the bright red cover in the middle), a wonderful series that I deeply love.
Adaptations of two Conan stories and a Christmas Carol adaptation by Munuera.
Leo, known first for Sci-Fi series Aldebaran and then for multiple other sci-fi series, adds a new issue to his current sci-fi series Neptune.
I am always saying that there are tons of series in Europe about planes and not very little the past few weeks to work with, but this week at least we have 1 title to work with: Old Tiger.
And the history of Flanders in comic book form. I am kinda interested in that one.
The Sons of El Tupo, I think I got issue 1 around here somewhere. It's Jordorowsky, so it can be very weird, but I don't think it stuck with me, but it does have Jose Ladronn on art, so it should still be worth a look.
Not pictured: a revival of Druuna, a series mostly known for appearing in Heavy Metal (as far as I know) and being lots of sex with Not Safe for Work covers, so you can look that up yourself.

Kozmički otpad (Cosmic Trash)
art: Ive Svorcina, script: Krešimir Biuk (2022)

This is a pretty hot-off-the-presses book, released a few weeks ago. It’s a comical SF tale set about 5 centuries in the future and starring Yves Sortino, a young gangster on Earth who ends up going on a series of interstellar misadventures. It all gets started when Sortino publicly kills an alien who had previously murdered one of the prostitutes in a brothel that he runs. The problem is that this alien was from a planet called Stercus (*snerk*) who is responsible for revitalizing agriculture on Earth, which before that could not grow its own food for centuries because the soil was poisoned with industrial chemicals and waste. (The men – but not the women – from Stercus all have the natural ability to fertilize any soil and fruit even grows off of their bodies.) Anway, Sortino gets into trouble with the mafia higher-ups, who basically control the planet in conjunction with the official government, and they decide to send him to Stercus as a sort of sacrificial lamb to be incarcerated there. However, when they arrive Sortino learns that the Earth military actually has a treacherous secret mission, which he wants no part of…
This is a fun and beautifully drawn story…

If Svorcina is known at all among American comics readers, its as a colorist. However, as seen above and as I’ve noted elsewhere before, he’s a damn good penciller/inker as well.
The Yves Sortino character, by the way, was briefly introduced a few years ago in another comic called Parlight Starlov – there’s more details about that at this link.