You know that Arab innovation has come a long way when superheroes created in Kuwait have the privilege of fighting evil alongside veterans like Superman and Batman.
That is exactly what The 99, the Islamic superheroes created by Kuwaiti psychologist Nayef Al Mutawa, are about to do in a new comic book series to be launched by DC Comics.
Al Mutawa has catapulted the series into the international limelight. Television giant Endemol has turned the series into an animated TV show.
Much of its appeal has to do with the concept of the comic book, which has a story and a set of characters that are deeply Islamic yet entirely secular.
Al Mutawa reached this delicate balance by introducing characters based on Islamic values that he says are universal.
“Even atheists have those values. They don’t tell their kids to lie three times a day,” he says.
While the characters reflect Islamic values, they are not necessarily Muslim, as religion is absent from the story. The superheroes come from 99 countries and their names reflect their ethnic backgrounds.
“I will only consider this an achievement when a Muslim kid thinks these are Muslim characters, a Christian kid thinks they are Christian, a Jewish kid thinks they are Jewish and a Hindu thinks they are Hindu,” he says.
Dark period
The story starts at a dark period of Islamic history associated with tragedy and decline.
It is set in 1258. Abbasid Baghdad, one of the world’s richest cities, is being sacked by the Mongol army of Hulagu Khan, grandson of Genghis Khan. The Mongols destroy the Bait Al Hikma, the House of Wisdom, throwing its vast wealth of books and knowledge into the Tigris river, and marking the end of the Golden Age of Islam.
The ink from the books, it is said, turns the river black for the next six months.
A group of librarians from the Bait Al Hikma are determined not to let the knowledge be lost forever. They drop 99 stones into the river to absorb the wisdom, to be known later as Noor Stones.
A century later, after the Noor Stones make their way to Andalusia, the son of one of the guardians of the stones, Rughal discovers their extraordinary powers and plans to exploit them. He disappears, and so do the stones.
In the present day, Rughal is found to be alive and bent on exploiting the stones’ powers, and that is where 99 superheroes step in to stop him.
Each superhero acquires powers from the stones that are loosely associated with the 99 attributes of God in Islam. Jabbar, the powerful, is a Saudi character who has extraordinary strength, Noora, the light, is an Emirati character that creates holograms, Mumita, a Portuguese character has martial arts skills.
I haven’t seen any of the comic books or the animated series, but isn’t making money the main reason someone creates pop art? If such creations also foster children’s pride in their culture, so much the better, but I don’t think many entrepreneurs work hard simply for charity.Unfortunately, this Kuwaiti psychologist/entrepreneur/comic book salesman is all about using God and Religion to make money. He is a slick operator who prides himself on manipulating others for financial gain.