Thomson and Thompson are fictional characters in The Adventures of Tintin, the comics series by Belgian cartoonist Hergé. They are two detectives who provide much of the comic relief throughout the series. While their different surnames would suggest they are unrelated, they look like identical twins whose only discernible difference is the shape of their moustaches; Hergé twice calls them "brothers" in the original French-language text. They are afflicted with chronic spoonerisms, are extremely clumsy, thoroughly clueless, frequently arresting the wrong person. In spite of this, they somehow are entrusted with delicate missions.
The cover of Le Miroir on 2 March 1919
The Adventures of Tintin is a series of 24 comic albums created by Belgian cartoonist Georges Remi, who wrote under the pen name Hergé. The series was one of the most popular European comics of the 20th century. By 2007, a century after Hergé's birth in 1907, Tintin had been published in more than 70 languages with sales of more than 200 million copies, and had been adapted for radio, television, theatre, and film.
The early Adventures of Tintin naïvely depicted controversial images, which Hergé later described as "a transgression of my youth". In 1975, he substituted this sequence with one in which the rhino accidentally discharges Tintin's rifle.
Tintin and the Black Island at the Arts Theatre in the West End of London, by the Unicorn Theatre Company, in 1980–81
The Tintin Shop in Covent Garden, London
Belgian Post's series of postage stamps "Tintin on screen" issued 30 August 2011 featuring a chronological review of Tintin film adaptations made through years.