Tag Archives | comic book

The Day Batman Came to Beirut

I was on Reddit the other day when I landed on a thread about an issue of Batman from the 80s titled “A death in the Family” in which Batman pursues the Joker all the way to Beirut and the Bekaa valley!

The story is full of misconceptions about the Lebanese people and relates a lot to the politics back then (and unsurprisingly now as well). In the comic book, Batman and Robin go to Beirut and cooperates with a Mossad agent named Sharmin Rosen in order to stop the Joker from selling a nuclear missile to a “Shiia” terrorist group who intends to use it against Israel. They eventually succeed but at the expense of the Joker killing Robin and escaping to Ethiopia where he meets with Iran’s Khomeini and gets offered to become his ambassador at the United Nations (LOL?!).

Putting politics aside, especially if you Support Hezbollah, “A death in the family” is a fun read and is regarded as one of the highly rated Batman comics. If you are interested in checking it out you can do so in high resolution graphics on the below links:

Also check Claude El Khal’s post about the same comic book story here.

0

Gibran Bassil’s new comic book – A nation’s dream

This is hilarious! I’ve been searching for some PDF version of this book ever since Bassam Abou Zaid tweeted about it a few days ago, and just last night, he made a news report about it. The Lebanese ministry of energy and water published a comic book called “A nation’s dream” starring minister Gibran Bassil and his son, telling a story that takes place in 2020 after we became an oil-producing country.

The story starts with Gibran Bassil and his son boarding a metro from Batroun towards Beirut passing by all the projects that Bassil has started, from dams to gas pipes and Beirut’s solar snake, then shows how Zouk became much less polluted and how the public dump in Dora turned into some touristic destination. The story then ends with Gibran Bassil telling how proud he feels to be among the few people who actually contributed into realizing the dreams of this country!

I’m not sure who advises minister Gibran Bassil on such things, but is he/she effing serious?! Morever, I wish the story has started by telling how exactly did Bassil accepted handing over the ministry of energy to someone else.

I totally loved the sarcastic comment by Bassam Abou Zaid at the end of the report by the way.

8

Meet Simon Baz, the first Lebanese-American superhero

Geoff Johns, a comic book writer of Lebanese roots, has recently created a new character called “Simon Baz” who’s a young Lebanese-American guy living in Dearborn, Detroit (the area where a lot of Lebanese immigrants to the US live in) who once became a car thief after losing his job because of the financial crisis but ends up stealing the wrong car. Then, and out of nowhere, he is unexpectedly called to join the universe’s galactic police force known as the Green Lantern Corps, and he eventually converts from being a criminal into a crime fighter.

You can read more about Simon Baz and how was he created here and here. And notice the Arabic tattoo on his right arm meaning “courage”.

2

Powered by WordPress. Designed by WooThemes