It looks like the Islam influenced comic series The 99 is going to be made into a TV show (by the same production company that produces the Big Brother reality Tv show).  While the comics, published by Teshkeel of Kuwait, has been fairly popular it will be interesting to see if it translates to TV.  There was a bit of a media explosion covering the comics and I expect a similar fascination to follow the TV series when it comes out.  If nothing else I bet this series (which can be easily re-dubbed in any number of languages) will be a huge hit and a big money maker.  Although it has been described as a “Sharia-compliant version of the X-Men” I kinda doubt that every muslim preacher is okay with the idea of mutant superpowers.  Furthermore, while some reports focus on the burkah sporting Batina the Hidden (because the burkah is so common in her homeland of Yemen, ugh!) many of the female characters are..err..less modest (see pic).  Additionally, all these reporters need to stop breathlessly talking about these being the “World’s first Muslim superheros…”.  This is just patently (and easily proved) wrong!  Can a Kabober get some due diligence?  Some of my favs:

Josiah X: Got his superpowers undergoing a Tuskeegee like experiment on African-American soldiers and now works a muslim minister.

Josiah X

Desert Sword:  Was an entire Iraqi super-hero, or at least super-villian, team.  At least some of them had to be Muslim, no?

Arabian Knight:  There have been at least three different characters with this name, each with a back-story more orientalist amazing than the last!

Dr. Fazia Hussain: What’s interesting about this characters is the author who came up with the idea actually consulted a number of muslim British women to aid him in the development.

Dust:  What’s hilarious is that while the Yemeni woman is described as wearing a burkah, the Afgahn super-hero Dust is rocking a Gulf style niqab.

And that names just a few and doesn’t really include any of the local comics I have seen from time to time (I know there are at least a few in Egypt).  The back-stories of comic book characters tend to be rather fluid so depending on how geeky you are one could probably add another dozen characters in American comics.  On a related note, check out Jehanzeb Dar’s interesting, if a bit belabored, 3 part analysis of Muslim, Mutant Females in comics 1 , 2, 3.

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2. It’s a Bird! It’s a Plane!
3. Arabs Reviewing Comics- Denmark, Eat your Heart Out!
4. Daily Show on Al-Jazeera English
5. Fighting Superpowers