La Mort de Staline

The Soviet Union in 1953, as Radio Moscow oversees a concert one of the directors receives a called from the General Secretary of the Communist Party Joseph Stalin from a secure telephone line, ordering that a recording of the concert be delivered to him. Due to it being live broadcast, in fear for their lives, the directors order the concert to be hurriedly repeated and recorded in order to deliver it to the NKVD, but the pianist, Maria Yudina, stubbornly refuses to play due to her family being sent to the Gulag by Stalin. This forces most of the directors to bribe her with 20,000 rubles, but as the concert ends she hides a note to Stalin in the sleeve of the record - to the horror of the director - as the NKVD take the record away. As Stalin reads the note in his dacha, the note says she prayed that God will forgive him and decided to donate the money Stalin gave her to the parish for restoration work, after Stalin has thrown away the note, to his dissatisfaction he suffers a cerebral hemorrhage and becomes paralyzed.

After Stalin was founded by his maid and a guard, the first to be alerted to Stalin's declining health was Lavrentiy Beria the head of the Ministry of Internal Affairs. He orders one of the soldier to take the girl he has raped home, then to arrest her father. Later, he orders his driver to drive him to Stalin's dacha while preparations for the "Glorious future" for the state. After arriving at Stalin's dacha he proceeds to steal Stalin's personal documents in his safe and give them to one of his men who were waiting outside the window. Beria then calls Deputy Chairman of the Council of Ministers Georgy Malenkov to inform him of Stalin's declining health and to Simon him to the dacha immediately. As Malenkov panics, Beria encourages him not to call the doctors due to Stalin's paranoia about the Doctors' plot and out of fear. Malenkov instead requests to wait for the Committee to arrive and decide what to do next. The Committee arrives without Molotov due to him being in list of enemies and decided that Lidiya Timashuk (a female doctor who accused her own colleagues of plotting to assassinate Stalin) should make the list of doctors that are loyal enough to examine Stalin.

The doctors confirmed that Stalin may not recover, Beria rushed off to Lubyanka and authorized all of NKVD to put Moscow and other major cities in lockdown to avoid unrest and Pravda the only source of information and news to be allowed in and out of Moscow, further allowing Beria absolute power to control all of the Soviet Union. The NKVD brought Stalin's daughter Svetlana who distanced herself from her father and had grown cynical towards him for arresting her lover Aleksei Kapler. Also returned is the disgraced, drunk, ill-tempered, emotionally unstable, spoiled son Vasily who caused an jet air show accident that killed many Moscovite citizens, and who is also hated by both the Soviet army and General Zhukov who have personally tried to persuade the Committee to try Vasily for his crimes and misconduct. Beria vetoed it due to Vasily being his (Beria's) Godson. After Stalin died because the artificial ventilation was American made, so that the voltage was incompatible with the Soviet plug, Vasily was arrested for killing many of the doctors as they removed Stalin's brain and organs for further study. After the incident Beria ordered the NKVD troops to loot Stalin's dacha, evacuate Stalin's house servants and execute witnesses. As the news of Stalin's death spread throughout the Soviet Union, Maria smiles happily while the populace mourning at the news.

Beria visit Polina and reveal to her that he had falsified her death to Stalin and intended to used her as a bargaining chip to buy Molotov loyalty to the shock of Molotov seeing his wife alive and released. During the Central Committee meeting Malenkov is named Chairman of the council of ministers while being controlled by Beria now promoted to First Deputy Chairman but due to an abrupt conflict between Nikita Khrushchev and Beria forced him to threaten the Committee by showing them Stalin lists of enemies in which none are signed by Beria but by the Committee ministers themselves, afterward Beria sidelines Khrushchev by putting him in charge of Stalin's funeral. In Svetlana apartment as she has difficulty to sleep as the loudspeaker on top of her roof broadcast Stalin history involvement in the Russian Revolution, she began to have nightmare of her father arresting her lover and cold heartedly arranged marriage her to someone else but then a telephone call woke her up, the caller demanded her to attend her father funeral under the order of the Committee but only to realize that it was just a rehearsal which enraged her to slap one of the organizer and walk away in anger as Maria laughed quietly. Beria enrage at Nikita for allowed a crowd of mourners to enter Moscow by train as Beria delusional believe that large groups can start a revolution, but the crowds were mostly peaceful but forced to walk to Moscow as the train were stopped by the Soviet army. After Svetlana refused to attend her father funeral, Beria convince Malenkov to allow Vasily attend Stalin funeral since he is Stalin only living son. As Stalin's funeral commence a large crowd of mourners from the train earlier reaches the city, the NKVD guards tried to shot a warning shots but the crowds continue to march and started to sing the Internationale and thrown rocks at the guards, one of the rock hit the officer and he ordered the guards to open fire on the crowd, after the carnage came to an end the officer show regret of his action and kneel in a state of shock. After the funeral ended, Vasily slowly became drunk and enter a stage of hysterical begin to yell loudly at the party believe that his father was assassinated to the point Zhukov strip all of his ranks and discharge him from the military then he got arrested again for unauthorized invited foreign journalists to Moscow. Beria fear for Vasily life and he suggested to Malenkov that they should send him to an asylum to avoid court-martial, while Malenkov eating and bored of Beria joked about Stalin testament but then he felt uncomfortable at Beria grin that Stalin always laughed at his jokes. As Malenkov walk to his car Nikita show up and asked for a ride to his dacha, Nikita convince Malenkov to join him in a coup against Beria and Malenkov agree to join Khrushchev coup out of fear that one day Beria will get rid of him. As both visited Molotov apartment he lied about Beria's a good man to the confusing of two men, as Polina resting in her bed Khrushchev, Malenkov and Molotov discussed on Molotov apartment balcony due to Beria telephone tapping his apartment, enraged at Beria disobeyed Stalin order executing Polina despite on many occasion Molotov desired his wife back, due to Molotov being a strong believer in Stalinism he believe Beria was disloyal to Stalin ideals and willing to join the coup but he also demanded a total purge to all of NKVD and Beria followers similar to the 1936 Great Purge, Nikita suggested that Zhukov should also join the coup since Zhukov disliked Beria and they needed the army to commit the large purge of the NKVD and the Ministry of interior. At an unknow asylum as Vasily mental conditions getting worse despite Beria show a much softer side and more supportive toward Vasily, but he continue to believe that he will live under his father shadow for eternity, and he begin to told Beria about the night his mother committed suicide as she the only one that Stalin can't strike fear to then he went back to the state of stasis, Beria requested the nurse to get Vasily something "strong" before leave with a sorrow expression.

Three months later, Khrushchev, Malenkov and Molotov initiate their coup and signal Zhukov to arrest Beria without much resistance. In prison, Beria remarks that he knew this day will come as he slowly walked toward his execution Beria cynically knew that the press will label him as a traitor and remarks about how much power the Party wield just to fabricated the truth to the point where the populace are blind and ignorance enough not to understand the truth, while at the same time in a concert Maria joke to one of the musician about two NKVD officers are happy at Beria execution because he raped both their daughters to the uncomfortable of her associates. Before the firing squad execute Beria in his final words in mind: "They've washed their hands in my blood and now they want to start afresh, to look ahead towards a Glorious Future."

In 2017, British producer Armando Iannucci adapted the comic books to the cinema as The Death of Stalin.[3][4]

• Agonie, Dargaud, (ISBN 978-2-205-06676-0), October 2010
  writer: Fabien Nury - designer: Thierry Robin - color: Lorien Aureyre
• Funérailles, Dargaud, (ISBN 978-2-205-06822-1), May 2012
  writer: Fabien Nury - designer: Thierry Robin - Color : Lorien Aureyre and Thierry Robin