Tin-Tin and the Blue Lotus

Tin-Tin and the Blue Lotus

Do you think comics are a children's or adult genre/media? Why? And how does Farr (1991) justify Tintin's appeal to adults? 

Tin-Tin and the Blue Lotus (1935) is a graphic novel/comic written by Belgian cartoonist Hergé, the graphic novel series is about a young detective “Tin-Tin” and all of his cases. The graphic novel ‘The Blue Lotus’ takes place in India first then Tin-Tin discovers a poison that is turning people mad. He finds out the source of the poison is from Shanghai and he travels there to stop the shipment. The genre of the comic is action but also has aspect of thriller, the genre is probably suitable for a young adult audience but a lot of children read the comics. The comics became more appeal to a younger audience when they were adapted into short films. Farr (1991) justifies Tin-Tin’s appeal to adults, “by devising a character who would appeal to children as much as grown-ups, though for often quite different reasons”. Hergé created the character ‘Tintin’ in order to appeal to both a younger and older audience. Farr (1991) also states that, “Hergé said Tintin was aimed at “all young people aged from seven to seventy-seven””, justifying why it does appeal to adults. I believe that Hergé wrote Tintin with the idea in mind that there would be no target reader, which it would be aimed for everyone to enjoy and if the older readers did not like it then it was targeted for a younger audience. Farr continues to say, “the child will be gripped by the excitement of Tintin, the comedy, even farce. The adult will additionally find political satire and parody, puns and prescience.”. An older audience would laugh and find interest in Tintin with the puns used throughout the text and that is how Farr justifies the appeal to adults. Children would read Tintin would not understand the meaning behind some aspects of the text, they would not understand the political references so why would Hergé put write them if they target readers were children? Farr refers to Hergé doing that as to why the comics appeal to adults. In Tintin and the Blue Lotus, Hergé uses events in the comic to relate to past events and its political meaning behind them. An example of this is the railway explosion in the comic, the antagonist in the story blow up the railway and blames it on someone else. Just like some politics, although the explosion to the children reading the comic is just a bit of excitement to add suspense to the storyline. Therefore, I believe that Hergé aimed his graphic novels at all ages and Farr can justify its appeal to adults just by reading the comics and finding aspects children would not understand.

---

Sources: 

Farr, Michael. (1991). Introduction. In Tintin: the complete companion (pp.8-9). London: John Murray.