Tintin Forums

OK, fair point. I concede that if you own a business, especially one with your names above the door, you might well refer to the business premises affectionately or proudly as "our place/chez nous". Similarly, restaurants sometimes call themselves things like Chez Jules or Joe's Place, to denote a homely, personal feel and to suggest it's run with pride and warmth by a chef-proprietor who regards customers as personal guests.

If the Thom(p)sons were working in the capacity of private detectives running their own business, I can certainly see that they might well refer to their office as "our place/chez nous".
However, given that they seem to be employees of some branch of the police force, would they refer to their work office that way unless it was also located in some sort of shared home?
But I accept that the nature of their office is rather vague, and that as with everything else about the Thom(p)sons, multiple interpretations are valid!


Oh, absolutely. I think we've established that whether or not the Thom(p)sons share a flat isn't in itself indicative of whether or not they're a gay couple. I think in the last few posts we've just been arguing (enjoyably I hope!) whether the dialogue in the Crab with the Golden Claws rules out he possibility that they're living apart.


I agree. That's kind of what I meant a few posts above by them being archetypes without a life outside the frames of the strip. That was certainly Hergé's intent when he created them and in their earliest appearances. But as the Thom(p)sons become less two-dimensional and more likeable, and as the books become more sophisticated, with Hergé often implying all sorts of social and personal undercurrents between various characters (look at the implied stuff going on between Sponz and Castafiore between the Calculus Affair and Picaros, for instance), it doesn't seem to be going completely against Hergé's intent as a mature author/cartoonist to wonder about the Thom[p]sons' unseen homelife.

I think Hergé was right to never reveal much about the Thom(p)son's backgrounds or domestic arrangements; it would have rather spoiled the surrealness of the characters. But I don't think he'd have minded us enjoying speculating.

I think Jock 123 is right. The joke is whether the Thom(p)sons have a sexuality at all. First and foremost they are their job, while being staid and respectable. They get into all sorts of ridiculous situations because they try to do what they consider to be their job, while attempting to preserve their respectability. So, if need be, they would have even gone over to overt homosexuality if that would have furthered the solution of any of their cases.

Isn't it strange that Herge, while being rather on the conservative side, reserved the full strength of his ridicule for that bastion of order, the police?

That was not unusual, especially at the time they first appeared in the 1930s. Hollywood film series which relied a lot on humour had bungling police detectives who paled compared to the gifted amateur. These included "Sherlock Holmes" with Basil Rathbone, "The Falcon" with Tom Conway or "The Thin Man" with William Powell.

What is surprising is that French comic book censors took a very hard view of comics which ridiculed the police and would even use those grounds to block some Belgian comics from being sold in France, especially in the post-war years. Maurice Tillieux's "Gil Jourdan" is one such example: in the early adventures Inspector Crouton was an accident-prone officer, very much in the Thom(p)sons mould, but became a lot more reliable in later stories.

I suppose that Tintin's established popularity meant that Herge could get away with it.

Ok I knew someone would throw this subject up eventually, but I'm just going to say that for argument, decency, censorship, and reputation, Herge made all characters "Asexual". No one is offended one way or the other. Of course we can all speculate :)

(Just Opinion)
I think both Detectives are definitely gay, but this is just how I see them. Two men who dress like each other, live with each other, and to me have mannerisms in the story that even for those times--but of course gay people existed then too. A couple of closet cases keeping their life private while over-focusing on their job.

So let me say again, this is just how I see them.
Thanks!

Thomson and Thompson have been referred to on many occasions as 'the Thom(p)son twins', so I see them as twin brothers.

But different interpretations should always be allowed. Homosexuality was a big taboo and illegal during the time the comics were published, so if Hergé had created LGBT+ characters, he would've been sent to prison.

I'm not sure that that is true; it's not that writing about characters being homosexual was itself illegal, as far as I know - I mean, that would have to include people writing to condemn homosexuality, and they have certainly done that.
So, unless you have details which would have shown that there was some law in force in Belgium while Hergé was writing the books, then I can't see that that is an argument in the current discussion, I'm afraid.

It actually seems that same-sex sexual activity was legalized in Belgium in 1795 when it was part of France and has been the case ever since. Generally speaking, the French-speaking world has been more liberal towards homosexuals than the English-speaking one.

However, depicting sexual matters in publications aimed at children, be it straight or gay, was certainly frowned upon. Even a scene of Tintin in bed with a girl would certainly have been censored and, if published, may have resulted in prosecution for offending public morals and maybe a fine, but not necessarily prison.