I had my own experience with Virgin Comics, having worked with them for a year. While I had my own issues with the company and management (which led to my eventual departure) I can't fault them for their enthusiasm and willingness to add diversity to the comic book landscape.I don't know if Virgin intended for any kind of Hindu conversion in the Western audience -- I suspect not -- but I think Reddy makes a good point about comic book readers being a more secular group than the norm. Perhaps that's why I chafe when specific religious dogma is thrust into superhero comics. I can appreciate it when it's used well, as in Daredevil: Born Again, but when Rocky from the Challengers of the Unknown becomes a makeshift priest, it all seems forced and absurd.
But I found a major problem in that they weren't pushing ethnic diversity, they were pushing religious diversity, as the majority of their Indian books were rooted in Hindu mythology, which is by default Hindu religion. They never pushed Hinduism as an agenda, but whether they understood it or not, they were pushing religion. This dooms them immediately to a niche market, and they were spending big-budget money on niche material. If they wanted the mainstream to embrace Hindu religion (which Deepak Chopra was successful with), then the comic book market was an unwise place to do this, as comic book readers' perception of mythology is on a far different plane.
In my experience, comic book readers are probably the most secular readers you will find, because they embrace mythology from the standpoint of legend, character and symbolism, and not religious discovery. Neil Gaiman successfully utilizes myth, ethnicity and religion because he places them in the context of an original (and compelling) story, and doesn't use his characters to simply re-tell a myth, which I feel is what Virgin did.
Comic book characters are mythic already, and having them practice religious rituals from our culture is as silly as expecting Ares to take the Eucharist.
