Tintin in the Congo 1975 edition. In the late 20th century, "Tintin in the Congo" became increasingly controversial for both its perceived racist colonial attitude toward the Congolese and for its glorification of big-game hunting. Accordingly, attempts were made in Belgium, Sweden, the United Kingdom, and the United States to either ban the work or restrict its availability to children. Critical reception of the work has been largely negative, with commentators on "The Adventures of Tintin" describing it as one of Hergé's lesser works. Belgian reporter Tintin and his dog Snowy travel to the Belgian Congo, where a cheering crowd of native Congolese greet
Tintin in the Congo the final scene. Literary critic Tom McCarthy concurred that Tintin represented the Belgian state, but also suggested that he acted as a Christian missionary, even being "a kind of god" akin to the character of Kurtz in Joseph Conrad's "Heart of Darkness" (1899). McCarthy compared the scene where Tintin exposes Muganga as a fraud to that in which the character of Prospero exposes the magician in William Shakespeare's "The Tempest". In the late 20th and early 21st centuries, several campaigners and writers characterised "Tintin in the Congo" as racist due to its portrayal of the Congolese as infantile and stupid.