Female fictional characters conceptualised in the Muslim world are either veiled or portrayed as meek and oppressed in the public eye. However, Lahore-based Shahan Zaidi’s debut superhero can finally help combat these stereotypes.
The main character of Zaidi’s English-language graphic novel Bloody Nasreen is a 27-year-old girl from Karachi who wears skull-printed kameez with churidar and sneakers – none of what girls her age would wear. She’s an anti-hero you’re not supposed to like. Her smoking habits and aggressive nature are aimed to make the reader angry.
Zaidi doesn’t think cool names can make a character cool. Hence, he chose to give her a common name that everyone can relate to.
Ruthless but not cruel, Nasreen fights a war against terrorism, human trafficking, corruption and injustice, and thinks that stupid is more evil, than evil.
