Tintin, Nerd Rage & Class War

There's a film about the well-known Belgian comic book Tintin in the cinemas at the moment. I have no idea about the states, but here in the UK you'd be hard-pressed not to know about this because there have been Tintin fans decrying it all over the media. It's been on national radio.  It's been on national TV. It's been in well-known national broadsheets, including this particularly egregious example. And it's making me increasingly angry.

I don't know anything about Tintin. I've never been a fan, and I've only ever glanced at the comics. I have no particular interest in seeing the film and I'm content to accept the view of purists that, whatever its merits, it fails utterly to live up to the source material whilst remaining entirely unconcerned about these issues. So why am I bothering to blog about it? I'll tell you.

Because it's nerd rage, that's why. It might not be the nerd rage that we're used to but whenever a particular fan-based leaps on something for being insufficiently pure and true to its source, that's basically still nerd rage.  And there's been nerd rage about any number of adaptations of superhero comics into film, nerd rage about popular fantasy and science fiction franchises such as Lord of the Rings, Harry Potter and the Narnia Chronicles into film, nerd rage about CGI changes to classic films like Star Wars and nerd rage about other adoptions galore. The world is awash with nerd rage, all of it as heartfelt - and as nerdy - as those of anguished Tintin fans. 

So why is it only Tintin nerd rage that makes it into national media? This is what makes me so furious. Why are Tintin nerds allowed all over the news, but fans of superheroes, science fiction and fantasy ignored?

Well one possible answer is that Tintin is perceived by many - to paraphrase the author of the article I linked above - as 'great art'. Again, I know nothing about Tintin so I'll take his word for that. And seeing great art bought low is indeed a sad thing, which has been committed many times in the history of cinema when bringing classic plays and novels to the big screen. But while I accept that you'd have a hard time classifying a lot of favourite nerd properties as great art - I don't think Star Wars, for example, really deserves the label no matter how influential it is, then if Tintin is great art, so is Lord of the Rings, and Narnia, and Harry Potter, and the comics of Frank Miller and many other things that directors have crapped on over the years. So that answer doesn't cut it.

You could also argue it's an issue of quality. After all most fanboys will admit that the current Batman films are superb. And whilst there are some question marks over the Lord of the Rings trilogy, which I've raised myself in the past, at the bottom line it's certainly great cinematic entertainment on an epic scale. But the Tintin film has enjoyed a relatively smooth ride from the critics and the punters alike - for non-fans, it sounds like it's a pretty good flick. So that answer doesn't cut it either.

Know what I reckon? I reckon it's a class thing. Superhero comics are dismissed en masse as junk by the intelligentsia. So is much of science-fiction and fantasy. Because the much of these genres consist of mindless pulp, the genuine art and intelligence they contain ends up getting tarred with the same brush. Critics have always been very sniffy about Tolkien. But Tintin gets a pass. Tintin harks back to Victorian adventure stories. Tintin is full of non-threatening white characters and has vaguely liberal-leftist leanings. Nice boys read Tintin. Yobs and scum read Superman and pulp horror.

It's stereotyping, pure and simple. And it makes me sick.