TinTin: Explorers on the Moon

When I first skimped through this space adventure of Tintin's I wasn't completely sold on the comic. The characters looked a tad simple, and the story itself a tad childish... till I saw the unconscious dog kicked down a port hole. That defiantly got my attention. Then only a few panels latter is see Tintin, pointing a gun and smiling, which will now haunt me. Needless to say I had to read this comic.

I was unfamiliar with the adventures of Tintin prior to this comic. I found myself pleasantly surprised. The story was very enjoyable. Not to mention I got my first true taste of space Phlebotonum, with the Nuclear engine that gives them gravity. I was surprised at some of the mature themes in Tintin, mainly because of my own preconceptions. Tintin, the character, comes off as a very innocent adolescent, somewhere lost in an ambiguous stage of older child to late teen by design. His face seems to be normally drawn in a state of semi shock, leaving him to appear exceedingly innocent at first glance. I was very pleased when Tintin yelled at Captain Haddock for being stupid enough to get drunk and decide to leave the space ship. One, because he was drawn yelling, which was a nice change. Two, because he wasn't yelling about the Captain endangering himself, but endangering everyone else. The comic in general felt very intelligent. they talked about how propulsion works in space, a little, and some solar system geography and in general seem to be trying to give knowledge along with entertainment, which I liked. The side characters however seemed a tad, well, boring and flat.

Captain Haddock was in the middle of going to the moon and when he wakes up the first thing he talks about is how very little he knows/understands about what he's doing there, or anything about space travel, which just bugged me since he clearly should have known a little since he agreed to go or else he wouldn't be on the ship. But nit picking aside, he came off as a very just angry man verses a multi dimensional character. His role seems to be the angry party-pooper with old fashioned ways, that drinks. That's it. I'm sure his character gets more depth over the series, but for now he falls a tad short. The two characters that I really could have done without were the two detectives. They didn't feel like they had a point to them. They just seemed to be there to cause minor inconveniences, which the story could have easily done with out them. Colonel Jorgen though might be my favorite for very bad reasons. Mainly because I couldn't take him seriously. The man went to the moon for revenge... he waited for DAYS before doing it. There is no way i can take a man seriously for that, but it's a quirky enough scheme that he won me over as a character.

I definitely want to read more Tintin. Especially if there are more Colonel Jorgen hijinks.