Middle East’s new crusaders

The vast showroom of the International Comic-Con is a pulsing bazaar of pop culture with huge, expensive booths that scream brand names such as Nintendo, Pokemon, “Star Wars,” Disney and Marvel Comics. But in the middle of it all this weekend, a modest placard at booth No. 1935 still managed to turn heads with its boast: “The First Genuine Middle Eastern Super Heroes.” Next to the sign were stacks of comics with the medium’s traditionally gaudy logos, but instead of “The Amazing Spider-Man” or “The Uncanny X-Men” these chronicles were devoted to “Jalila, Savior of the City of All Faiths” and “The Lone Warrior, Rakan.”

The comics and booth belong to AK Comics, which two years ago launched traditional American-style costumed superheroes as a publishing venture in Cairo. The heroes are purposely crafted to be vague as to their religious faith, and they live a futuristic vision of the Middle East where national boundaries have been blurred and harmony is threatened by monsters, not intractable religious rivalries.

The comics have made a footprint in the Middle East -- they are now handed out to kids on every flight of Egypt Air and they have replaced Spider-Man on bubble-gum wrappers in the region. But now AK Comics has its eye on the American market, and so a trip to Comic-Con in San Diego was a must.

“It would be a moral victory to be here,” said Marwan El-Nashar, the company’s managing director. Still, on Friday a passing conventioneer who was also a U.S. Marine did a double-take at the booth’s sign. “I thought we were the only heroes in the Middle East,” he told the AK team.

The global events and tensions of the 21st century are hard to ignore even at the premier convention of comics, fantasy and sci-fi, and they cropped up repeatedly during its four-day run, which ended Sunday and drew a crowd that was reportedly creeping toward 100,000.

DC Comics, the grand old brand name in comics that in the 1940s had covers depicting Superman socking Hitler, had a huge display for “Ex Machina,” a high-profile comic about a post-Sept. 11 New York City where a former superhero becomes mayor.

The convention has become many things to many fans and veered wide enough to include a performance Saturday night by Tenacious D, the ribald comedy-rock duo that features actor Jack Black. Among the songs about sex and dragon-slaying was the crowd-pleasing political statement of “The Government Sucks.” A more serious note on Friday was the panel assembled by Warner Bros. films to debut a trailer for the film “V for Vendetta.” The panel answered questions about the adaptation of a comic that depicts a flamboyant terrorist in England who uses explosives and the subway system to wage war on the government. The book was written in the 1980s and has more to do with Orwell than Osama bin Laden, but the similarities to the recent London bombings gave pause to some.

David Lloyd, co-creator of the comic book, drew applause when he said that facing the specter and psychology of terrorism was vital to defeating it. “I think there should be more movies about terrorists,” he said.

AK Comics, the Cairo venture, thinks kids in the Middle East need more caped heroes and less terrorist tales.

The company founder and comics’ creator, Ayman Kandeel, is a 36-year-old economics professor at Cairo University who grew up in Egypt in the late 1970s searching out the hard-to-get Batman comics from America. The simple messages of those stories stuck with Kandeel.

“Yes, I do think the entertainment created for young people says a lot about a culture,” Kandeel said. “These are stories of optimism and positive messages about what we can all be.”

In a world where Kandeel had to explain what a comic book was, that the circulation has climbed to 15,000 a month is significant. Earlier this year the Jerusalem Post, commenting on the comics, characterized them as “a powerful tool” in the region. The company has printed 5,000 more copies, split between English and Arabic-language versions, exclusively for Egypt Air to distribute to its young passengers.

Candy-maker Cadbury-Adams has even pulled the wall-crawling Spider-Man off its “Blox” gum wrappers in Egypt to replace him with AK’s Zein, a 40,000-year-old pharaoh who now wears a mask and tights.

On Saturday, visitors to the booth included Diamond Comics Distributors Inc., the powerhouse Maryland company that is the world’s largest distributor of English-language comics, and a Beverly Hills investment banker. DC Comics had also made some inquiries with the company, according to Nashar.

In the States there has been interest from some Jewish community centers, Nashar said, which has the company delighted.

“The message here is a very positive one and we want to succeed in America,” Nashar said. “The comics community here is its own world.”