Once in Shanghai, Tintin quickly becomes involved in a struggle between another branch of the opium-smuggling operation from the previous book, led by Mitsuhirato, and a resistance movement called the Sons of the Dragon, led by the benevolent Wang Chen-Yee.
The Blue Lotus is notable for being the first issue for which Hergé actually did a degree of research, being aided by a Chinese art student named Zhang Chongren, with whom he formed a close friendship and based one of the characters in the story on. As such, it is generally considered the point at which the series fully grew its beard.
Tropes:
- Accidental Hero: In the Nelvana cartoon, the Thom(p)sons catch Rastapopoulous by accident when he crashes into them while escaping Tintin's capturing his goons.
- Adaptation Distillation: Several parts of the album did not make it to the Ellipse-Nelvana animated series.
- The fakir and racist American businessman W. R. Gibbons don't appear.
- Tintin does not meet Dawson (the Chief of Police of the Shanghai International Settlement).
- The part when Tintin is held in custody by British authorities, delivered to the Japanese and condemned to death has been left out as well.
- There are no comings and goings of Japanese armored cars.
- In the comic, Tintin learns about Professor Fang's research into curing Rajaijah poisoning when has to hide from a Japanese patrol in a movie theater and sees a newsreel describing the Professor's work. In the cartoon, Wang Chen-Yi tells Tintin about it and he heads straight to the professor's residence.
- Adaptational Heroism: Mitsuhirato's butler is an undercover agent of the Sons of the Dragon in the Nelvana cartoon. He's the one who ensures Tintin is injected with colored water rather than Rajaijah juice, reassuring Tintin with a Secret Message Wink.
- All Your Base Are Belong to Us: The opium ring ambushes the headquarters of the Sons of the Dragon near the end.
- As You Know: Usually the exposition throughout the series is at least a little more subtle, but during Dawson's first appearance, he tells a gathering of his friends "Since I'm Chief of Police of the Shanghai International Settlement, that shouldn't be difficult".
- Bilingual Bonus: The Chinese writing in some backgrounds is authentic and contains anti-Japanese messages.
- Black Blood: When Tintin gets shot in the shoulder. Partly explained as the story was originally published in black and white.
- Brainwashed and Crazy: Didi (Mr. Wang's son), who's been infected with the Rajaijah juice.
- Cargo Concealment Caper: Subverted, the occupying Japanese soldiers check an outgoing cart full of ricebags by jabbing their bayonets in the bags before letting the cart leave. An armored car then rolls up and yells at the commander for letting Tintin escape in the rice bags, much to the commander's confusion. The car then leaves the city, where we see Tintin driving.
- Character Catchphrase: A Rajaijah-poisoned Didi's "Laozi said: I must cut your head off!".
- Character Development: Tintin is now lambasting ethnic and racial stereotypes, which is a big change from his earlier colonial attitude in Tintin in the Congo.
- Character Witness: Tintin defends a rickshaw driver from Gibbons. Later, when the Japanese put a price on his head, he manages to escape the town with the help of the driver's brother.
- Chemically-Induced Insanity: The Rajaijah juice or "poison of madness" pops up again, though at the end, Dr. Fang develops a cure for its effects.
- Cloud Cuckoo Lander: A Chinese businessman is hit by a dart dipped in Rajaijah, the poison of madness. Later in the story, Didi has also turned insane after being poisoned with Rajaijah. Tintin is injected with what appears to be the stuff by Mitsuhirato, but a member of the Sons of the Dragon swapped it for water.
- Corrupt Cop: Mr. Dawson, the Chief of Police of the International Settlement, being influenced by Gibbons and bribed by Mitsuhirato to persecute Tintin.
- Deus ex Machina: This book is not nearly as bad about this as some of the earlier ones, but an agent of the Sons of the Dragon having replaced the insanity serum and tinkered with Mitsuhirato's gun and knife just when Tintin is captured is pretty darn convenient. Much less so in the Nelvana Animated Adaptation of the episode, where it's revealed that Mitsuhirato's butler is actually an undercover member of the Sons of the Dragon. The cartoon also has Wang Chen-Yi tell Tintin immediately about Professor Fang's research on curing Rajaijah poisoning instead of Tintin just randomly finding out about it.
- Disproportionate Retribution: Gibbons and Dawson become firm enemies of Tintin after he called out Gibbons about his racist and brutal behaviour.
- Dissonant Serenity: Didi is calm and smiling as he offers to show people the way to enlightenment... by decapitating them.
- Diving Save: Tintin is saved this way from the bullets coming from a Gangland Drive-By in the streets.
- The Dragon: Mitsuhirato is this to Rastapopoulous, managing the local Chinese affairs of the latter's opium-trafficking ring.
- Early-Bird Cameo: Mitsuhirato uses alliterative curses (such as "seventy-seven suffering samurais!") before Captain Haddock made it famous.
- Emergency Impersonation: Tintin as a fat Japanese general.
- Even Evil Has Standards: Despite getting some of his guards to beat up Tintin, Dawson makes it clear that he doesn't want Tintin to be seriously hurt, just to be taught a lesson about sticking his nose into other people's business. Not that it really matters, since Tintin ends up putting the guards in hospital instead.
- Evil All Along: When Rastapopoulos was first introduced, he seemed to be a hot-tempered but nice person. Here, he's revealed to be the Big Bad and head of the drug smuggling operation.
- Evil Brit: Dawson, the head of the International Concession's police. See Corrupt Cop above.
- Exact Eavesdropping:
- Tintin learns everything he wanted to know when breaking into Mitsuhirato's house and listening in on a discussion from behind some curtains.
- Later he hides inside a vase at the "Blue Lotus" and can overhear Mitsuhirato dispatching important information.
- Face Plant: Thompson and Thomson chase Tintin through a train station at one point and fall on their faces in the process, one falls off a train whilst disembarking when they spot Tintin and the other falls from the platform trying to chase a train Tintin is leaving on. They are next seen in a hospital with their noses in casts.
- False Flag Operation: Mitsuhirato staged the sabotage of the Shanghai-Nanking railway "by Chinese renegades," thereby giving the Japanese a pretext to invade China.
- Find the Cure!: Part of the story revolves around finding the scientist who could develop the antidote to the Rajaijah juice.
- Flashback Cut: Tintin when he realizes that it was Mr. Wang's son who saved him from being shot in the streets and drinking poisoned tea.
- Fortune Teller: The Fakir reads Tintin his future.
- Full-Body Disguise: Tintin successfully disguises himself as a Japanese general.
- Gangland Drive-By: Happens to Tintin but he is fortunately saved by a young man working for the Sons of the Dragon.
- General Ripper: Tintin pretends to be this when he impersonates a Japanese general—it gives him an excuse to be The Voiceless as he doesn't speak Japanese.
- Drill Sergeant Nasty: How he gets away with his act, he holds up a number of fingers equal to the number of days of punishment for various offenses like not shaving (four days) or a piece of paper blowing in the wind ("Four days? But general, it's just a piece of-eight days!? I- yes, general! Thank you, general!").
- George Lucas Altered Version: The story was redrawn and colorized later, but much of it remained unaltered. The only major alteration was a scene where Tintin is threatened by three English guards in his prison cell. Under pressure of British publishers this was changed into three Sikhs.
- Goldfish Poop Gang: Tintin and Chang easily escape Thompson and Thomson every time they meet.
- The Heavy: Mitsuhirato is the main villain, but he's working for the Japanese government and Rastapopoulos.
- Ill-Timed Sneeze: A loud sneeze from Tintin leads to his capture after he witnesses the False Flag Attack on the Shanghai-Nanking Railway.
- In Case You Forgot Who Wrote It: Zhang Chongren, who wrote the Chinese texts in the story, signed his name twice - in Chinese - on two billboards.
- Inexplicably Identical Individuals: There are the Thom(p)sons, of course, but also one of the Japanese military officials looks almost identical to Mitsuhirato, just with a more hooked nose.
- Inflationary Dialogue: After Mitsuhirato's attempts to shoot and then stab Tintin go awry, Tintin retaliates by punching him to the ground. We then see Mitsuhirato angrily claiming to some Japanese officers that he's been "half murdered," and later on find out that Tintin has been charged with attempted murder.
- Insane Equals Violent: After being averted in Cigars of the Pharaoh, it's played with here. Poison darts drive people insane, and the resultant madmen are childlike, silly and harmless... except for that one guy who develops a fixation with decapitation.
- Inspector Javert: Thomson and Thompson have to chase Tintin again, though in fairness, they're really Just Following Orders, and they're saddened and upset about it. They themselves claim at the end that they didn't really believe Tintin was guilty.
- Instant Messenger Pigeon: Mitsuhirato is shown receiving and sending messages by homing pigeon.
- Karma Houdini:
- The Fakir from the previous album becomes this in the redrawn version, escaping offpage, firing a dart filled with the insanity serum at Tintin's Chinese visitor and then never being mentioned again. In the original serial version, he is offhandedly mentioned as having been recaptured soon after.
- Dawson isn't shown to receive any comeuppance at all for his actions in collaborating with Mitsuhirato, while the worst Gibbons gets is his cane snapped by Tintin, and a night in the cells for supposedly giving misinformation to the Japanese.
- Kidnapped by an Ally: Wang Chen-Yee has his men kidnap Tintin while the latter is en route to India because he needs Tintin's assistance.
- Kidnapped Scientist: The bad guys kidnap the only scientist who could develop a cure to the insanity serum.
- Last Grasp at Life: A non-lethal version where Tintin notices Chang's stretched-out hand out in the flood water.
- Lawyer-Friendly Cameo: In the animated version, during the scene where Tintin needs to fake madness as part of a ruse against Mitsuhirato, Tintin jumps up on the chair and loudly proclaims, "I'm a bird! I'm a plane! I'm Actionman!" Three guesses as to which iconic superhero the cartoon's producers couldn't get the rights to.
- Look Behind You: Tintin dupes the British guards this way.
- Loophole Abuse: How Dawson gets away with handing Tintin over to the Japanese. Normally turning a fellow European citizen over to a foreign power would not be cool in the slightest, but since Tintin's in the European zone without authorization, Dawson can simply say he's removing a trespasser, and what the Japanese do with him isn't his problem.
- Mistaken for an Imposter: At one point, a man with a large, bushy beard and wearing sunglasses and a coat enters the bad guys' opium den and is immediately recognized by them as Tintin in disguise. Only when they beat him up, it turns out it isn't Tintin, just a man who happens to look like him with a large beard.
- Mistaken for Fake Hair: A man with a big bushy beard enters an opium den wearing dark glasses and a big hat. The villains recognize it's obviously Tintin wearing as many disguises as he can, tie him up, pull off his fake beard... and it turns out they've captured a diplomat with a real beard.
- The Mole: In the comic, Mistuhirato's attempts to poison Tintin with Rajaijah juice fail because an agent of the Sons previously broke into the Blue Lotus and replaced the juice with colored water. In the cartoon, Mistuhirato's butler is an undercover agent of the Sons of the Dragon who switched the bottles just before Tintin is poisoned. Tintin thinks he's going to go mad until he sees the butler give him a Secret Message Wink. Tintin then starts faking his insanity to make Mistuhirato lower his guard.
- Mysterious Protector: Mr. Wang's son, Didi, briefly acts as this to Tintin, but then he's poisoned with the insanity serum...
- National Stereotypes: Subverted. The story pokes fun at the Europeans' perception of the Chinese, debunking many clichés. Similarly, Chang Chong-Chen asks Tintin why he saved him, because he always heard that all white people are evil and racist. On the other hand, the story is very anti-Japanese. Hergé balanced this by introducing a Japanese man, Mr. Kuraki, in The Crab With The Golden Claws, who is shown as a good character.
- News Monopoly: The Radio Tokyo news are shown to be received worldwide, at each location with a different piece of the story.
- Nice to the Waiter: Tintin defends his rickshaw driver against a rude pedestrian.
- No Time to Explain: After having overheard Mitsuhirato, Tintin tells Chang that he cannot explain and they have to hurry.
- Obfuscating Insanity: Tintin pulls this to get away from his captors after they inject him with an insanity-inducing serum called "Rajaijah juice" (which had actually been replaced with harmless colored water). Notably, Tintin himself had no idea the serum had been substituted at the time, only perceiving that he didn't feel any different, which makes his loony routine a gesture of supreme quick thinking.
- Offscreen Moment of Awesome: Three big and muscular soldiers are planning to beat Tintin up while he's safely in jail. We only see the aftermath: three soldiers in a hospital, covered in bruises and bandages.
- Off with His Head!: Mr. Wang's Brainwashed and Crazy son is obsessed with doing this.
- One-Steve Limit: Oddly enough, there are two Changs in the story. Besides Tintin's young friend, there's the agent of the Sons of the Dragon who steals Mitsuhirato's poison.
- Opium Den: The titular Blue Lotus is an opium den.
- Overly Stereotypical Disguise: In the first and arguably funniest instance of the Thom(p)sons doing this, they show up wearing 17th-century Qing-dynasty Mandarin robes, confident that they will blend right into a Chinese town. They then fail to notice an entire town parading behind them while pointing and laughing.
- Politically Incorrect Villain: Gibbons, a racist white American who mistreats every Chinese person he meets (though he was politically correct for the era, which had a different zeitgeist).
- Poor Communication Kills: After the messenger the Sons of the Dragon send to warn Tintin is hit with a Rajaijah juice-tipped dart, he manages to stammer out Mitsuhirato's name before he succumbs to madness. Tintin thinks he needs to go and seek out Mitsuhirato for help, but in fact the man was trying to warn him about Mitsuhirato.
- Public Secret Message: Hergé's friend, a Chinese foreign exchange student named Zhang Chongren, told him a lot about Chinese culture and society, including the then-current situation in Asia, where Japan had militarily occupied China. He also wrote all the Chinese signs, billboards, ideograms and texts seen in the backgrounds. As a Bilingual Bonus only Chinese people could read these. This also might explain why the book wasn't censored from the start because many of these texts are anti-Japanese slogans, like for instance: Boycott Japanese products, Abolish unfair treaties and Down with Imperialism. Upon realising the anti-Japanese tone of the story, Japan's diplomats stationed in Belgium issued an official complaint and threatened to take their complaint to the Permanent Court of International Justice at The Hague. Zhang congratulated Hergé, stating that it would only further expose the actions of Japan in China to further international scrutiny and would make Hergé "world-famous".
- Red Herring: The Fakir at the beginning of the story warns Tintin to watch out for a dark-haired Asian man with glasses, whom Tintin briefly suspects may be his Chinese visitor. But no, that guy loses his mind as soon as he appears. Funnily enough, Tintin isn't at all suspicious when he first meets Mitsuhirato, who also matches the description. The joke is that the warning is almost completely useless, because practically everyone Tintin meets in China is a dark-haired yellow-skinned man with glasses...
- Ripped from the Headlines: The book depicts Mitsuhirato as staging a thinly-disguised version of the Mukden Incident
, thereby paving the way for Japan's occupation of Shanghai. And at the end, it shows the fallout at the League of Nations, and Japan's delegates walking out. - Secret Passage: Rastapopoulos tries to use one to escape when Tintin and the Sons of the Dragon are arresting his henchmen. The passage leads to the Blue Lotus, where he crashes headlong into Thomson and Thompson, who immediately arrest him.
- Secret Message Wink: In the cartoon, Mitsuhirato's butler, who's actually The Mole for the Sons of the Dragon, does this to reassure Tintin that he's not going to go crazy.
- Seppuku: Mitsuhirato commits Seppuku after being captured. As was usual for the time in western sources, this is instead called 'hara-kiri.'
- Shown Their Work: This issue is often called Hergé's first real masterpiece. Compared to the previous albums, it's well documented and researched, has a strong and logical plot, is beautifully illustrated and also takes the opportunity to debunk some inaccurate western stereotypes about China.
- Spanner in the Works: Rastapopoulous runs for it when his thugs are captured. In the Nelvana cartoon, he would have gotten away once he reached the Blue Lotus...if the Thom(p)sons hadn't been there for him to accidentally crash into.
- Stab the Scorpion: Didi has a propensity for saving Tintin’s life in ways that initially look like attacks.
- First, he tackles Tintin to the sidewalk from behind, much to Tintin’s shock… and thus shields him from a drive-by sh that occurs seconds later.
- Later, Tintin is resting with a cup of tea in his hotel room when Didi shoots at him through the window. It hits the teacup in Tintin’s hand, shattering it an instant before he can drink, and leads Tintin to try and chase the man down, unsuccessfully. When Tintin returns to his room the next day, he finds Snowy licked up some of the tea and collapsed, drugged. Tintin then realizes the bullet hit the teacup on purpose to keep him from drinking it.
- Staircase Tumble:
- Happens to one of the servants carrying Tintin's luggage downstairs. It helps to discover that Snowy was locked in one of the trunks.
- Near the end of the story, Thomson and Thompson assure one another that their face-planting days are over — and promptly plunge face-first down a short flight of stairs.
- Tagalong Kid: Chang, albeit he's apparently not that much younger than Tintin himself, and his local knowledge proves vitally important throughout the last third of the story.
- Thwarted Coup de Grâce: Chang and allies save Tintin as well as Mr. and Mrs. Wang in the nick of time before Didi could decapitate them.
- Tuneless Song of Madness: One of the many possible symptoms of being poisoned with Rajijah Juice is singing, to the point that Tintin is able to effectively fake poisoning by singing insanely in "The Blue Lotus."
- Villain Has a Point: When Dawson turns Tintin over to the Japanese, Tintin protests that he is on neutral ground. Dawson then makes the perfectly legitimate point that since Tintin does not have papers allowing him to be in the settlement, Dawson has every right to throw him out and what the Japanese plan on doing to him is none of his business. Even though Dawson is very clearly acting in bad faith (he explicitly called the Japanese police to collect Tintin at the border which goes counter to his "not my business" claims), he is correct.
- "Wanted!" Poster: Tintin learns from a poster in the street that they put a 5,000 Yen bounty on his head.
- A Way Out of a Cave-In: The imprisoned Tintin notices a mouse disappearing between the cracks of the floor panels of his prison cell. He then tries to lift one of the panels but realizes that it's too heavy. Cue the panel being lifted from below where his allies dug a way up to reach him.
- Weaponized Camera: A camera with a built-in tommy-gun is used to try and assassinate Tintin but the assault fails because the gun jams up.
- What Happened to the Mouse?: At the start of the story, the Fakir from the previous comic is reported to have escaped. He never shows up again, however.
- Wrecked Weapon: All it took to snap Didi's blade was a single bullet.
