He was a victim of the dictatorship in Argentina: the death of Héctor Germán Oesterheld, the creator of “El Eternalauta” | Mix

The emotion for the imminent premiere of “El Eternalauta” in Netflix, with Ricardo Darín playing Juan Salvo, is undeniable. However, this anticipation also leads me to reflect on the origins of such a powerful narrative. Beyond the attractiveness of the new series, I feel the call to remember who gave life, Héctor Germán Oesterheld, and the source of which this story emanates.

It is difficult to talk about “El Eternalauta” without talking about his author and his death. It is even more difficult to do it without stopping at your tragic destiny. Therefore, today I want to tell you not only how she died, but also why her story, the real one, is as powerful as she wrote. Because behind the creator of one of the most emblematic Spanish -speaking comics, there was a man, a family, and a country pierced by horror.

Héctor was kidnapped on April 27, 1977, in La Plata, for a group of tasks of the military dictatorship. He was 57 years old, he lived in hiding, and his political commitment to Montoneros had made him a target. But his militancy was not expressed with weapons; His was a struggle from words, from cartoon, from art. He had already lost his four daughters, all kidnapped and killed by the regime. And yet, he continued writing until the end.

One of the last places where he was seen alive was in the clandestine center El Vesubio, a detention field located in Aldo Bonzi. There, according to the testimony of psychologist Eduardo Arias, his physical condition was unfortunate. Arias shared with him a Christmas Eve in 1977: Héctor, already very deteriorated, asked to greet his fellow captivity one by one. I was 60 years old. I was malnourished, sick and weak. But even in that hell, he maintained dignity and respect for others.

His wife, Elsa Sánchez, witnessed how the dictatorship was dismembering his family. First Beatriz, then Diana, then Estela and finally Marina, eight months pregnant. All militants, all young. All missing. Also his sons -in -law, and at least two of his grandchildren to be born. When he told his story, he said something that still rumbles: “Ten missing people in my family. But I prefer to remember the years in which I was happy”. A phrase that says everything.

In the midst of that context, Héctor managed to finish the Eternauta II, a more raw, more explicit version, where the political message was inescapable. The story was no longer just science fiction: it was a complaint, a warning, a resistance. Juan Salvo and Germán himself – self -referential person – were part of a struggle for dignity in a destroyed world, such as the country he lived from underground. It was his way of continuing to fight. He did everything hiding clandestinely before his kidnapping.

The moment or exact place of his murder is not known with certainty. It is estimated that Hector was killed between the end of 1977 and the beginning of 1978. Like so many other missing, his body was never recovered. His death, like Miles, was wrapped in the forced silence of the dictatorship. But his voice did not go out, but survived in his works, in which they remember him, in the readers who still discover it today.

Thanks to Elsa and her surviving grandchildren, part of her legacy could be saved. In a suitcase they kept their manuscripts, their ideas, their work. That was what came to the National Library and that today we can read, study and share. And now, with this series that will soon see the light, the Eternaluta speaks again. But let’s never forget that its author not only imagined an extraterrestrial invasion: he lived, resisted and died in a real, much more cruel invasion, which destroyed a generation.