Mazeworld heroine (& baddies)

24/03/2022

For these pin-ups of Riadne, one of Mazeworld’s heroines, the face of the Indian actor Esha Gupta has been used. Without her knowledge or permission.

I trust that is not illegal.

I chose to do this because when given the Mazeworld strip I thought about using a diverse cast as I usually did when drawing strips where no previous drawings of a character existed and no description was given. Looking back, perhaps not often enough.

With Mazeworld I decided that in the kind of society it was – inward looking, insular, separated by mountains from the rest of their globe so no history of colonialism - there would be no diversity. It would be all of one racial type.

When Adam Cadman arrives there he needed to be of the same ethnic group in order not to immediately seen as an alien who could not possibly be the folk hero he resembled.

It would have been possible for everybody, including Adam, to look African but that would have given the story a social , political weight that I had no right to impose. Likewise if If they were all looked Oriental it would, coming from me, suggest some comment were being made about a people.of which I was not a member.

For this make believe movie however everybody in Mazeworld could be played by someone from the Indian continent. His face hidden, Adam’s hands could pass that test.

So here’s your opportunity Bollywood.

The green skinned baddies could be played by anybody with the muscles and the make-up.

Click images to enlarge

Mazeworld copyright Alan Grant & Arthur Ranson

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