User Reviews

Tintin and Captain Haddock are walking through the countryside when the come across a group of Gypsies camping in a garbage dump. After learning that this is only place that they are allowed to camp at, Haddock invites them to set-up on his land. To Haddocks surprised, when he get back home he finds a letter from Bianca Castafiore who happens to invite herself to his estate for relaxing holiday. Not wanting to be around when she comes, he rushes to leave, but twists his ankle on a loose step. This leaves Haddock's foot in plaster and wheelchair bound. Bianca arrives and so does her entourage. A holiday from the media is short lived, when she invites a crew for photos and a interview. Some story is published involving Haddock and Bianca are going to be hitched. This really gets Haddock angry. Tintin starts to suspect trouble, when Bianca constantly wakes up screaming of intruders, a man who's not with the original film crew pops up and when her prized obsession, an emerald goes missing.

Herge's "The Castle Emerald" was the twenty-first in the series of "The Adventures of Tintin" comic-strip albums and the seventh episode (part 1 of 2) of season three. This Tintin outing obviously sticks out like a sore thumb, as most of the set-up sticks close to home at the Marlinspike estate and plays it all rather subdued. No adventure here. The whole emerald aspect of the story, feels secondary and is there to hold together those other little plots (or episodes) that go onto connect with it. It's quite slow to get going, and basically stays at that pace throughout most of the premise. Since the action is kept minimal, most of the effective entertainment arises from the rich characters (just look who appears; Thompsons and Calculus), comical interplays and the mysterious developments of what's truly going on. There are some decent comic scenes like the weird nightmare sequence of Haddock's and of course his encounter with his new pet parrot. If there's a downer, this could be associated at how repetitive it does seem to get in the narrative. Strangely you could say, not much out of the ordinary did happen. It's a simple experiment of the formula, but effective.