We like to send our illustrators photographs of locations or characters so they have a foundation on which to develop their art. Thus, Blascovitch is very broadly inspired by French chef Joël Robuchon.

The story “The Chasm” was originally supposed to take place in China. We already had these images on hand and it’s while reading about their origins that our story began to take shape. We kept some elements that we transposed into the story.

We like to send our illustrators photographs of locations or characters so they have a foundation on which to develop their art. Thus, Brookbank is very broadly inspired by the American politician and businessman Peter Fitzgerald.

We’ve already spoken a few times about the super-proportioned physiognomy used to draw female characters. But Andrew Wheeler (“Why Big Superhero Muscles Aren’t the Same Thing as Sexy Curves,” comicsalliance.com, September 25, 2014) turns the tables and wonders if a similar phenomenon isn’t also affecting male superheroes. He asks female readers for their opinion. One replies: “Heroes tend to be drawn with tons of bulky muscles and weird proportions that I find unappealing.” It’s hard to disagree when we look at the illustration of Captain America.

We’ve stated it before in our Axioms, but we want our characters to have athletic physiques, like a cyclist or a soccer player, rather than a bodybuilder who spend 20 hours a day at the gym.

We like to send our illustrators photographs of locations or characters so they have a foundation on which to develop their art.  Thus, Tucker is very broadly inspired by French actor Adrien Jolivet.

In the story “Freaks,” we see that Volcanne has designed a new monster to attack his enemies. At a book fair, some readers told us they had recognized the actual animal that inspired the beast: tardigdrades. We were surprised they had made the connection!

We like to provide the illustrators with locations or people on which to base their drawings.  Valasquez is very loosely inspired by right-wing Dutch politician Geert Wilders.

We confess that we didn’t quite know what to do with the fact that Markham injected himself with a mixture prepared by Andraski. Valasquez finds out by accident, and then, Markham can’t find his box and goes to the lab. In this story, we decided to keep our eye on the long-term and to leave a maximum number of options open for future story developments.

We like to provide the illustrators with locations or people on which to base their drawings. Ross is inspired by golfer Jack Nicklaus. We know his haircut would not have appropriate for a CIA boss, but we wanted a figure that was representative of the early 80s.

We like to provide the illustrators with locations or people on which to base their drawings.  Owens was inspired by the actor Lucien Jean Baptiste.