East West Magazine

By Tom Marcinko

Picture this: A global pop-culture renaissance out of India.  Headquartered in New York and Bangalore, a small army of writers and artists unleashes a new breed of India-infused comic books and Asian-edged animated film.These works captivate the world on a scale previously achieved only by Hollywood, Japan or rock and hip-hop. They shape new mythologies for the 21st century.

That's the vision behind Virgin Comics and Animation, a media company founded by an unlikely group of business partners:  Deepak Chopra, the renowned self-help author; Richard Branson, whose Virgin Enterprises business empire covers travel, entertainment, mobile phones, lifestyle products, and, recently, space tourism; filmmaker Shekhar Kapur; and South Asian comics publisher Gotham Entertainment Group. The joint venture also includes Chopra's son, Gotham.

Sharad Devarajan, CEO of Virgin Comics, sees his mission as twofold:  First, to captivate India's reading public -- already fans of Western and Japanese comics and animation -- with high-grade home-grown material. Second, to make India a major player in the global culture market. "Specifically, I think the American audience has an appetite for something new and different," he says, pointing to India's perennial influence in music, fashion and film and to Hollywood's numerous big-screen projects that began as comic books. That means not just Batman and Superman but also "Road to Perdition," "A History of Violence" and "Ghost World."

Few would question India's worldwide impact on the arts and sciences, on literature and fashion and on politics and philosophy. Indian film, both highbrow and Bollywood, continues to inspire the moviemakers of many nations, so an influential wave of Indian pop-culture certainly seems possible.

Still: comic books? That's where Virgin has decided to start. Where it will end is anybody's guess — and the visionaries behind the company plan to take it pretty far. 

Virgin Comics is actually three imprints, or lines, of comics. The Shakti imprint, from the Sanskrit word for “power,” will tell stories illustrated in India and loosely based on Indian myth.  It debuts July 12 with “Devi,” the story of a goddess reborn as a young woman who fights crime in modern Sitapur.  Also slated to be released as part of the Shakti line are “Snakewoman,” created by Kapur about an L.A. woman possessed by a demon, and “The Sadhu,” the story of a young man who abandons enlightenment for revenge.  The latter tale is written by Gotham Chopra, who was one of the executive producers of the Chow Yun-Fat film “Bulletproof Monk” and is chief creative officer at Virgin Comics. 

A second imprint, Director’s Cut — named after a movie director’s preferred version of his or her film — will be devoted to comics by creators best-known for cinema. Famed Hong Kong director John Woo’s comic “Seven Brothers” will make its debut as part of the line later this summer. And the third imprint, Maverick Comics, will feature works by leading talents in the graphic-novel business. 

But even with such grandiose plans and big names, can India-infused comics find a worldwide audience?  In 2004, Jeevan J. Kang scripted and drew “Spider-Man: India,” a four-issue miniseries published by Marvel Comics to coincide with the release of the second Spider-Man movie. The Indian "transcreation," as Devarajan calls it, was well-received in India, the U.S., the U.K. and elsewhere, providing some of the inspiration for Virgin Comics. 

In “Spider-Man: India,” the face under the famous mask is familiar – sort of.  Mumbai-dwelling teen misfit Pavitr Prabhakar gains superhuman powers. This time, though, they come not from the bite of a mutant spider, but by karmic decree from a godlike being. Kang portrays the familiar villains Green Goblin and Doctor Octopus as demons of Hindu mythology. Characters use modern Hindi slang and make knowing Bollywood references (glossary thoughtfully provided). But like his New York counterpart, Pavitr learns the hard way that “with great power there must also come great responsibility.” Some things are true in every culture. 

Devarajan — who as CEO of Gotham Entertainment Group has Indian rights to 700 Western-hemisphere titles, from X-Men to The Powerpuff Girls —says the time is right for new heroes drawn from India’s deep well of myth and legend: “A new wave of characters that simultaneously appeal to audiences from Boston to Beijing to Bangalore.”

Certainly the reading audience for visual thrills is expanding. In the U.S., the market for graphic novels grew by almost 45 percent in the year to date, says Virgin Books Executive Chairman Adrian Sington. In the U.K., he adds, the market has doubled since 2003. The boom in both places is driven largely by comics coming out of Asia. 

In fact, Devarajan says, “today's Western world has an increasing global appetite for the most engaging content, regardless of its cultural affiliation. If you told parents 10 years ago in America that their children would know characters named Yu Gi Oh! and Pokemon as well as they would Spi

der-Man, those parents would have thought you were crazy -- yet in America today an estimated 30 percent of major children's animated programming is now Japanese animation.”

Indeed, go to any large bookstore and you’re likely to notice racks of Japanese manga books.  Japanese anime has become a staple of U.S. culture, and the forces behind Virgin Comics hope lightning will strike twice. But, says Kapur: “The success of the Indian comic book and its related offshoots will come not from copying manga, but from using the base of existing Indian mythology and art, and creating a unique product that has international appeal.  Just like manga did.”

Virgin Comics plans to go beyond the printed page with its wholly owned subsidiary Virgin Animation, slated to open in Bangalore next year with a start-up staff of 250 artists and writers. Its mission is to bring Virgin Comics content to the movies and TV, and eventually, to video games, toy, clothing and more. 

Even with the buzz about the products, the art and the stories, many industry-watcher's eyes are fixated on what Deepak Chopra’s involvement will be. 

When the multimedia venture was announced, the elder Chopra declared:  “I see an opportunity to bring to our society a message that goes beyond the narrow boundaries of nationalism, and invites them to a domain of awareness where we experience our universality and hopefully go beyond racism, ethnocentrism, bigotry, prejudice and hatred. The new superheroes will be hybrids of all cultures helping us dream infinite possibilities and actualize our highest potential.”

That’s certainly something to picture, but before pop culture achieves anything on that scale, it needs to grab the audience, and Chopra seems to get that. His forthcoming novel about Buddha delves into the avatar’s “pre-enlightenment” life of action, adventure, lust and rage. It sounds like a good idea for a comic book, and Virgin is planning to publish it.