Steve Batley
“Come for the sweeping, beautifully-drawn tale of vengeance and rebellion, stay for the really cool robot.”—Jody Houser (writer, Star Wars, Doctor Who)
We caught up with Eisner nominated writer/artist Ibrahim Moustafa to ask him about his latest project with Humanoids: the eagerly anticipated original graphic novel COUNT, his science-fiction adaptation of the classic story ‘The Count of Monte Cristo’
Comic Watch: What inspired you to choose The Count of Monte Cristo for this project?
Ibrahim Moustafa: For me, this was always the project. In other words, I hadn’t found myself in a position to pick from a list of things I was wanting to do; I had the idea to make this book in this way, and I set out to do it and find a home for it from the beginning. The original is such an intriguing premise, and I felt that the broad strokes of it were ripe for a reinterpretation through the lens that I’ve filtered it through with COUNT.
CW: From your initial idea to completion how long did it take you?
IM: It wasn’t a linear journey in that sense; I had the initial idea and then I set out to find and listen to an audio version of the original book while drawing my regular comics work, and I would stop to take notes and jot down ideas as I went. Then I continued to chip away at character designs and an overall pitch package off and on for about a year or so whenever I could find the time. Sometimes I was waiting on a late check from a publisher for work I was doing, and so I’d make a very pointed effort to invest that time in myself and this future project that I would have an ownership stake in.
Once it landed at Humanoids, I spent about 8 months in total, writing and drawing it.
CW: How did you envision the pacing of the story in terms of the comic medium, as opposed to that of the cinema?
IM: I actually looked at the structure of several movies as a kind of guide post for the structure of the story itself. In today’s comics market, I felt like I could probably bank on 5-6 issues to tell the story. I knew I couldn’t fit it all into 4 issues. Ideally, I wanted to do an OGN because I felt like this was a book that needed that kind of presentation. So I paced it out according to how much room I thought was realistic from a publisher’s standpoint, and luckily I was given exactly what I needed; 120 pages (which is equivalent to 6 issues).
CW: Aside from the setting did you find it necessary to make any other changes for a modern audience to relate, such as to the characters or their motivations? And did you find it difficult to make these changes?
IM: Absolutely. In fact, this is more “inspired by” than an adaptation. Aside from the broad strokes of the original, COUNT is very much new territory with regards to the overall story. There are characters and elements within that simply would not work if this were set in 19th century France like the Dumas classic.
CW: When envisioning characters such as the robot Aru, did you have a visual already to go with the story or did that come later in the process?
IM: It was all kind of happening at the same time. Because I was both going to write and draw this, there was no assembly line of someone writing character bios/descriptions, and then someone else drawing them, then the writer and artist talking, giving notes, revising, etc. Since this was coming 100% from me, I was able to envision what I wanted and just draw it, and it was done. It was very freeing in that sense.
CW: Which do you prefer in your process in your dual roles of writing and art?
IM: It’s interesting: I see them as much less of a binary when I’m doing both. The comics industry became so writer-focused that we tend to see it as an either/or thing. But when I’m doing both, they tend to be more inextricable from each other, and the sum of the parts is just storytelling. That being said, I love drawing a lot, and I tend to have the most fun these days when I’m inking a page, because that’s the stage where it starts to feel complete. Thanks!
And we can see that much is clear from the striking images above. So there we have it fellow Watchers. We can’t thank Ibrahim enough for taking the time to give us this insight into his process and we urge you to look out for COUNT when it’s released on Tuesday (March 16th) from Humanoids, wherever you purchase comics. And keep an eye on Comic Watch for more news, interviews, previews and reviews!
And for those who can’t wait, see the below preview pages and follow the link to the Youtube video to watch the stunning action packed trailer.