Totan – Manoj Comics and Mahendra Jain have together imagined a superhero who not only protects his city like other superheroes but goes beyond that. Totan not only fights for his home planet Earth but also battles on other planets like Todo, where he was given life. Mahendra Jain has presented various twists in Totan’s story in a compelling manner. The author hasn’t hurriedly presented Totan’s personal life but has revealed it gradually in the pages of the Chitra Comics.
The first comic of Totan was titled “Totan and Lavasur.” The story begins in Delhi, where a devil with wings emerges from the underground and challenges Totan with his deadly poison. Totan suddenly appears in front of everyone and defeats the devil with his unique powers. Totan not only defeats the poison but also discovers that Lavasur is behind it. “I am Totan,” he declares, revealing his identity. In “Main Hoon Totan,” we learn about Totan’s life, starting in 1948, where his real name was Arjun, and his father Vikram was an Indian spy. Vikram possessed some secret files that revealed the true faces of hidden criminals. To obtain these files, he asks Arjun to acquire them from the leader of a dangerous group, Billa. However, Arjun’s parents are killed because of this mission. Arjun survives as he was participating in a school competition at that time. Upon learning this, he decides to avenge his parents’ death and joins the army. However, he discovers hidden enemies within the army during a military exercise, and before he can do anything about it, he is framed for murder and sentenced to death by hanging. Before his execution, Arjun’s friend Ramakant, working on a science project, rescues him. Ramakant starts an experiment, not knowing that the machine has been tampered with by enemies. As soon as the machine starts, Arjun’s body disappears with an explosion, making the experiment unsuccessful. This incident occurs in 1972, and exactly twenty years later, in 1992, during a military exercise, an apparition appears, calling itself Totan. It launches an attack, and the military seeks help from Ramakant. Eventually, they capture Totan, and from his memory, they learn that he is none other than Arjun. However, they cannot determine where he stayed for those twenty years.
As mentioned earlier, the story has many twists, and for some, he is Arjun, while others call him Totan, and for some, he is a criminal named Mukund. Although readers gradually discover answers to all these questions in each comic, the multitude of characters in the story may leave readers bewildered. The author made a good effort, but the story became its own enemy. Additionally, when Totan arrived, Raj Comics had already introduced Parmanu on the scene, and due to its straightforward story, readers began to favor it. Perhaps that’s why Manoj Comics concluded Totan’s story without giving it a proper ending and placed it in cold storage, and a promising superhero disappeared into oblivion.
