The Blue Lotus (Le Lotus bleu), first published in 1936, is one of The Adventures of Tintin, a series of classic comic-strip albums written and illustrated by Hergé featuring young reporter Tintin as a hero. It is the second half of a story, the first half being told in Cigars of the Pharaoh. The Blue Lotus is considered to be a pivotal work in Hergé's career, marking a newfound commitment to geographical and cultural accuracy.

In Cigars of the Pharaoh, Tintin pursued an international group of drug distributors through the Middle and Far East. He managed to catch them all, except for the leader, who fell down a ravine. His body was not found. In order to unravel more of the network and stop the opium production at the source, Tintin travels to Shanghai, a major city-port in China, where he is eagerly awaited by the assassins of the opium consortium.

However, the attempts on Tintin's life are foiled by a young Chinaman who is later struck by Rajaijah juice, the poison of madness, used by the opium gang.

While in Shanghai, Tintin meets Mitsuhirato, a Japanese businessman, who urges him to return to India and protect his friend the Maharajah.

Tintin also helps a young chinese boy against a racist bully Gibbons, a friend of Dawson, the corrupt police chief of the Shanghai International Settlement. Gibbons and Dawson set about making life difficult for the young man.

Tintin is on his way back to India by ship when he is kidnapped and taken ashore. He wakes up in the home of Wang Chen-Yee, the leader of a brotherhood called "The Sons of the Dragon" dedicated to the fight against opium. Wang's son is the young man who helped save him on two occasions but is now insane. He goes about threatening to cut people's heads off with a sword and only his father's stern authority can keep him in check.

Wang also reveals that Mitsuhirato is a major villain: a Japanese secret agent and drug smuggler. Tintin follows Mitsuhirato and sees him blowing up a railway line (this is based on the real-life Mukden Incident). No one is killed and damage is minor, but it is beaten up into a major Chinese terrorist incident and used as a pretext for a Japanese invasion of Manchuria.

Having obtained a sample of the poison of madness, Tintin tries to make contact with Doctor Fan Se-Yeng, an expert of insanity, who he thinks will cure Wang's son. However, Doctor Fan has been kidnapped by the opium gang, presumably to prevent him from doing this.

Tintin rides a train to Hukow, but a flood washes the tracks, and all the passengers must disembark. He rescues a young boy from drowning, Chang Chong-Chen. They become fast friends, and Chang rescues Tintin from the Thompsons who had reluctantly arrested him under orders.

Wang and his family are kidnapped by Mitsuhirato. In order to find them, Tintin hides in one of the barrels on an opium ship. But it turns out that he was seen, and when he emerges he is confronted by Mitsuhirato armed with a gun. Then the boss of the opium cartel is revealed to be Rastapopoulos (see Cigars of the Pharaoh for back story). Tintin is incredulous that this man he thought was a friend could be the gang leader until Rastapopoulos reveals on the tattoo of Kih-Osk on his forearm. However, the The Sons of the Dragon had previously overpowered Mitsuhirato's thugs and had hidden in the other barrels, revealed themselves, shot the gun out of a crook's hand, had guns pointed at all the other crooks, who had to surrender.

The title, Blue Lotus, refers to the name of an opium den, itself a reference to the blue lotus.

Up to the writing of The Blue Lotus, Hergé's writing was mainly based on popular prejudice and on what his mentor, the abbot Norbert Wallez, had told him.

As Tintin was published in Le Petit Vingtième, a newspaper supplement, and Hergé announced at the end of Cigars that his next setting would be China, Father Gosset, the chaplain to the Chinese students at the University of Leuven, wrote to Hergé urging him to be sensitive about what he wrote about China, being afraid his Chinese students could be shocked by some prejudice against their people. Hergé agreed, and in the spring of 1934 Gosset introduced him to Zhang Chongren/Chang Ch'ung-jen (known to Hergé as 'Chang Chong-chen'), a young sculpture student at the Brussels Académie des Beaux-Arts. The two young artists quickly became close friends, and Zhang introduced Hergé to Chinese history, culture, and the techniques of Chinese art.

As a result of this experience, Hergé would strive in The Blue Lotus, and in subsequent Tintin adventures, to be meticulously accurate in depicting the places which Tintin visited. He reached this meticulousness by painstakingly researching all his topics. When his UK publisher complained that The Black Island depicted an old-fashioned England, Hergé sent Bob de Moor across the North-Sea to redraw anything that was no longer accurate, resulting in huge changes to the album. This new-found commitment to accuracy would become a Hergé trade mark.

As a token of appreciation, he added a fictional "Chang" ("Tchang" in French) to The Blue Lotus, a young Chinese boy who meets and befriends Tintin. Hergé mocks his own naïveté deep inside the album, when he tries to let Tintin explain to Chang that Chang's fear for the 'white devils' is based on prejudice. He then recites a few Western stereotypes of the Chinese.

As another result of his friendship with Zhang (Chang), Hergé became increasing aware of the problems of colonialism, in particular the Japanese Empire's advances into China. The Blue Lotus carries a bold anti-imperialist message. Tintin also rescues a Chinese boy from a racist bully Gibbons, who was a good friend of Dawson, the corrupt Police chief of the exploitive Shanghai International Settlement.

Tintin is a direct witness to the South Manchurian railway incident (Mukden incident), Japan's excuse to attack and occupy China and start the Second Sino-Japanese War. The Japanese and some European characters are portrayed as brutal and evil, and their cartoon forms are somewhat racist. Japanese characters like Mitsuhirato and the soldiers are shown with beaming teeth, while the Chinese are shown as tight-lipped. As a result, it drew sharp criticism from various parties, including a protest by Japanese diplomats to the Belgian Foreign Ministry. However, the passage of time has since vindicated Hergé's criticism of Japan's occupation.^{[citation needed]}

The Republic of China was so pleased with the album that its leader at the time, Chiang Kai-shek, invited Hergé for a visit. However, because of the Tintin's ideology, the People's Republic of China forbade the publication of the album for a long time. When it finally allowed publication in 1984, some pictures of the examples of Western prejudice were altered or even taken out completely.

This adventure was originally published under the name Tintin en Extrême-Orient (literally "Tintin in the Far East").

The original version of The Blue Lotus was published in black-and-white in Le Petit Vingtième in 1934. It was later redrawn and colourised in 1946.

Many scenes that appeared in the original 1934 version were left out in 1946. They included:

• The fakir who performs tricks with glass and daggers and reads Tintin's palm is named as Cipacalouvishni.
• As the fakir warns him of the dangers to come, Tintin looks distinctly more nervous in the 1934 version than in 1946.
• After firing the dart into the neck of the Chinaman at the Maharaja's palace, the fakir from Cigars of the Pharaoh can be seen hurrying away through the jungle.
• Tintin then tells the Maharaja that he will not leave for China until he knows the fakir is back in custody. They later receive a telegram announcing his recapture. Tintin, who has lost Snowy, decides to leave without him (this decision was changed in later versions).
• When Tintin is jailed after bumping into a Sikh policeman, Dawson sends three tough men in to beat him up. In the original version they are British soldiers, from England, Ireland and Scotland. Instead of Tintin, it is they who end up in hospital where an official pays tribute for their "sacrifice in the defence of their ideals" !
• While watching a newsreel in a cinema, Tintin sees footage of Sir Malcolm Campbell breaking the world land speed record in Bluebird.
• While searching the cellar of the Blue Lotus, Tintin opens a door and he and Chang come face-to-face with yet another gangster. Tintin tells Chang to follow his example, raise his arms and put down his gun. When the gangster bends down to pick up the guns, Tintin slams the door onto him, knocking him out. Chang then ties him up with rope.

• Pilchardanian Republic: A European Republic, which resembles the pre-World War II French Third Republic. It was mentioned during a newsreel, when Tintin hides in a movie theater.
• Mitsuhirato and his men capture a man they believe to be Tintin wearing a huge fake beard and wig. However it turns out to be genuine hair and beard: the man is in fact the consul for Poldavia.

• The Blue Lotus at Tintinologist.org