El asunto Tornasol
In his psychoanalytical study of "The Adventures of Tintin", the literary critic Jean-Marie Apostolidès declared that "The Calculus Affair" marked the beginning of the third and final period of the series, which he believed could be characterised by Hergé's depiction of a world run by "wheeling and dealing" and in which "detective work takes precedence over any mystical quest". Apostolidès considered "The Calculus Affair" to be both Calculus' "triumph and his defeat". He felt that while Calculus had become "an impartial figure" in the preceding two-volume story arc, "Destination Moon" and "Explorers on the Moon", here he had become "the Bad Mother" through his creation of an ultrasonic weapon and the threat that he poses both to the tranquility of Marlinspike and to world peace. He viewed the scene at the end of the story in which Calculus burns the plans to his ultrasonic device as "a symbolic castration", allowing the character to become "the Oedipal Father with whom the sons [Tintin and Haddock] can compete", thus stabilising "the family hierarchy" of the series.