Flight 714 to Sydney (1968)
Flight 714 to Sydney Review
Flight 714 to Sydney is the 22d volume of The Adventures of Tintin comics series by Belgian cartoonist Herge. It was published in 1968 and it is one of the weaker entries in the series.
Tintin and his friends become embroiled in their arch-nemesis Rastapopoulos’ plot to kidnap an eccentric millionaire from a supersonic business jet on a Sondonesian island. This comic was written at a time when Herge was becoming disillusioned with his series and the end result shows that. It’s one of his least focused and most problematic outings.
This volume actually started off strong with a mystery that was involving and characters that were well developed. The illustration work was excellent here and so was the humor incorporated. It was over-the-top, but I personally gravitate toward goofy humor and making fun of your own overly theatrical villains, so that worked for me.
Rastapopoulos, thus, was a lot of fun here. Yes, he lost his credibility as a menacing villain, but he was fun for sure. I also liked our heroes, but their roles were too reduced and at the end of the day they did not impact the outcome of the story all that much, which was frustrating.
And that brings me to that ending, which was beyond problematic. Herge decided to introduce aliens and ancient aliens at that, which is the stupidest concept that I absolutely despise. At least in the Asterix alien comic they were there from the beginning to the end, but here they were put into the ending hastily, which ended in a lot of messiness. It simply did not work and a better ending would have really elevated this volume to greater heights.
