It was exact 89 years ago, on this very day, a senior editor of “Le Vingterme siècle” bid farewell to a junior reporter on the platform and sent him off to report on the situation in the Soviet Union. Nobody knew then that it will prove to be one of the greatest things to have happened, for the comic lovers. for this is how the most iconic character of the gen ‘Tintin’ came into existence.

Today is its 90th anniversary.

The Adventures of Tintin (French: Les Aventures de Tintin) is a series of 24 comic albums created by Belgian cartoonist Georges Remi, who worked under the pen name Hergé. The series has been one of the most popular European comics of the 20th century.

By 2007, a century after Hergé’s birth, Tintin had been published in more than 70 languages with sales of more than 200 million copies. It has been adopted in almost all forms of entertainment channels be it for radio, television, theatre, or film.

Tintin marked its journey with ‘Tintin in the Land of the Soviets’, which was published in the Belgian magazine Le Petit Vingtieme. Apart from the immense popularity gained by the series, it gathered some controversies its route too. For the initial volumes, it was argued that they were anti-Soviet, racist, stereotypical, and promoted animal cruelty, colonialism, violence, and even fascist leanings, including ethnocentric caricatured portrayals of non-Europeans.

Despite the controversies, its popularity kept increasing and gradually it transformed into one of the greatest series. The young reporter Tintin, accompanied by his trustworthy dog Snowy, the always swearing Captain Haddock, and the absent minded nearly-deaf Professor Calculus became unforgettable, impregnating their names in the history.