This is often heralded as a major turning point in the Tintin series as Herge started to get a bit more serious about his plotting and art. It's hard to tell because Cigars of the Pharaoh, for which this is a sequel, was re-drawn so you can't tell the great leap in Herge's artistry. But he did try to make more of an effort with the drawings, especially to increase accuracy and base his opinions less on local Belgium prejudices.Tintin goes to China to try to find a cure for madness and clashes with Japanese and also nasty Westerners. The story is very anti-Japanese (to be point of racism, really) and gives Western imperialists in Shanghai a hard time (the head of police is corrupt, an American businessman is a bully and a racist), while the Chinese are mostly nice and brave. The story is more closely tied in to a historical event than any other Tintin - to wit, the Mukden Incident, where a blown up rail line gave the Japanese an excuse to invade Manchuria. The stakes in this one are huge - Tintin really feels to be in a lot of danger, in a war torn country (China) chased by the force of a whole nation (Japan) and the police force of the international settlement - the Chinese govt don't really help him, only a (good) secret society. So you really feel Tintin is in peril a lot of the time. And the Chinese setting mean it really feels exotic and the insanity injections are genuinely terrifying. I admit though I've never been as fond of this story - don't know why, maybe the Japanese are too monkey like, and the stuff with Chan a bit too sentimental.
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