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In Part 2 of our Infidel interview I, writer Pornsak Pichetshote, and artist Aaron Campbell are joined by editor and veteran colorist Jose Villabrubia. The trio very openly delves into their motivations for crafting Infidel’s narrative and how they have each been touched by the book’s social significance.

(Cont’d)
CA: We were actually just about to get into favorite characters.

Jose Villarrubia: So favorite characters from the series or in the world?

CA: In Infidel. Not necessarily in any particular issue, but in the entirety of the story so far?

JV: Oh, well of course Aisha is by far my favorite character. She’s kind of like the protagonist, but not the protagonist and I think that Pornsak wrote her perfectly believable. She’s the one character I identified with when I was reading it and I think that the fact there are surprises in what happens with her, I think it’s very interesting.

Pornsak Pichetshote: So, for me, I have a tie between Aisha and Medina because to me Aisha and Medina are the two voices in my head. Aisha is that part of me that everyone says is too nice and Medina is the part of me that I think I’m always so cynical about everything. And those two voices are constantly fighting in my head, and that’s why I have a hard time choosing between Aisha and Medina.

Aaron Campbell: Aisha is my favorite character. I mean, part of it is I connected so much of her to my model, who was my niece. So it became a very personal connection for me as I was going through the story I could think about Aisha’s struggle and imagine my niece who is just beginning college and she’s a minority and you know, the world as it’s turning, it worries me about what lies ahead for her future. So just that alone is what connected me a lot to Aisha.

And then there’s a lot of subtlety in her character and her dynamic with her family that I related a lot to. This girl who is… Who comes from a tradition that is very religious, very fundamental, and she’s trying to find her own way in the world, trying to redefine her place; like in her family, in her background, and in the world she’s coming into. And this very much relates to me, I’m from a very fundamental Christian background in the south and as a young kid I moved up to St. Louis and my family still remains very, very religious. And for me, I’m still trying to figure out where do I fit in in all of this? What do I really believe anymore? And how do I express that to my family? And how do I fit in with them? So there’s those kind of parallels that really connect me to her.

CA: Now Jose, just to ask you, you’re working with some extremely gifted colleagues here, but also very, very experienced. Would you say that they provide, contextually, and definitely Aaron in the art, everything you need to bring your voice into the project and execute from where they begin?

JV: Yes. The thing is, it was my idea to bring Aaron into the project because Pornsak entrusted me to find a good visual representation of his story that he had in mind. So I had full confidence that Aaron would do something that would almost colorate itself. So I was not worried about the color part at all. And so, I think the other thing that’s different from anything I’ve ever done is that Aaron provided us with layouts, for everything. And Pornsak and I would go very carefully over the layouts and Pornsak had so much experience as a great editor that he was very helpful to me as a new editor in really figuring out any potential problems that could happen with storytelling. And then we did a good number of corrections to make sure that the art told the story without even having text, so I didn’t want the color to be a secondary aspect of the art. But all three of us discussed what the color approach was going to be in advance and doing the first issue we made some adjustments, which is kind of natural. But after that, we just hit the ground running.

Because I was editing, I couldn’t edit my color, but Aaron and Pornsak were great editors for my color, and Pornsak in particular really pushed me in the psychedelic aspects of the last issue to go much wilder than I guess I would have gone. And so I felt fully supported in that way, but it was different to have actually have a plan to how the art I was later going to be coloring would be and to make sure that… I always tell people, I said this to somebody, “When coloring art that looks good, my colors look good. When I do color art that is not so good, my color doesn’t look so good, even when, though, it’s the same colors.” And I don’t know what that is. So somebody in the industry wanted me to do colors like the ones I’m doing with Aaron, and then they provided me with art that wasn’t like Aaron’s and my color didn’t look anything like what I’m doing with Aaron. Even though they were the exact same colors. And so, yes I felt it was not a difficult coloring job at all. I think that by the time I got to that part of it Pornsak and Aaron and me had resolved all of the aspects so I had an extremely strong foundation and it was just putting the icing on the cake, so to speak.

CA: Outstanding. Now Aaron had mentioned before that the genre really affords you an opportunity to take chances. Do you find that there is anything unique about working in the horror genre that you don’t find working in other genres in the medium?

JV: Yeah, well, you know the medium is dominated by superheroes and superheroes, in terms of visual expression, superheroes run the whole gamut from A to B. There’s nothing you can do with superheroes unless you’re doing a weird superhero series. So superheroes by itself are very formulaic in ways that are very restrictive artistically. I think horror is much wider, has a much wider scope. And I think that… The two most recent major projects that I’ve done have been horror as well. I’ve done Hungry Ghosts for Karen Berger, the Anthony Bourdain book, which is a horror anthology and I did a Deadman series for DC. Both of those were much more traditional horror than Infidel. Infidel is based on a traditional theme but it has a contemporary spin that those other projects didn’t have. One was a gothic mystery and the other one was Japanese legends. So this was very, very different. But I think that because we didn’t have the supervision of a mainstream company we could also do whatever we wanted. Like, whatever Pornask and Aaron and I agreed on doing we just went and did it. And I think that all of us have so much experience in the industry as to be able to know what is actually commercial in terms of, “What, is this is going to be too obscure?” or “This can be different, and yet appealing.” And so I think that, because of that, horror gives you a great freedom for visual representation that I think other genres don’t have.

CA: Going back again to the political side of things, in the industry the conversation around diversity and inclusion has kind of taken on a mind of its own. Do you think that readers can really appreciate; I mean, do you feel like there is a large enough audience for Infidel that it can make a substantial impact for people who might not necessarily have been looking for these characters. Like, someone who might have been looking for another kind of book that picks this up, do you think this is an eye-opening experience?

PP: Honestly, I don’t know. I mean, that’s the big question, right? That’s the question of why I wrote the book in the first place. Is that, “Is there enough empathy in the world to be able to relate to experiences other than your own?” I want to believe that, and the response the book has given me has sort of encouraged my believe in that. It’s definitely the way that the book was constructed, with the idea of having it be accessible to people. Have it be, you know, experiences that people relate to. In a context that you sort of.. It’s New York, it’s urban living, it’s something I know that everyone can relate to. But the big question of, someone who is not willing to see these ideas, would they be receptive to it. I mean that question is kind of what the book is about at the same time. The book doesn’t answer it because I can’t answer it.

The one thing I will say is that we have gotten a lot of surprising response from… I don’t know, they’re not necessarily- They’re people from the conservative side of the spectrum who are trying not to like the book because of just us using the word Islamophobia in the marketing materials, talking about Islamophobia in the marketing materials. And they didn’t think they would like the book just because we used that word. And I’ve heard the podcasts and I’ve seen the Youtube reviews where they talk about how surprised that they are that they do like the book and how much they connect to everything. And that has been a surprise for me and one of the things, I think, that has been gratifying about the book is I’ve learned a lot about my preconceived notions and my own prejudices. So it’s definitely opened up the kind of people I thought would respond to the book.

I had, I don’t want to get into too specifics, but I definitely had a situation where someone was coming to talk about the book and he was a big strapping sort of white guy with hair slicked back and like, guido as all could be. And I felt though like, “Oh god, this guy’s going to hate the book. I don’t know why he’s here.” And he talked about how he had grew up around Arab people his entire life and he so knew… There was so much stuff that we were doing in the book that he really picked up on. “Did you mean to do this,” and, “Did you mean to do this?” And the answer was yes. With that, that was really a mirror for me in being like, yeah my first thinking the way he looked, I thought he was going to think a certain thing about it. So that’s where I find the book was gratifying for me is that the book has definitely been a mirror to my own preconceptions and my own prejudices and has encouraged me to want to spread out on my own vantage point of people. And I hope it’s a two-way street, but I honestly don’t know.

CA: You guys have anything you want to add to that?

AC: Yeah, I would just say that I think a lot of it is about just people picking the book up. Because I think first it becomes about access. You know, even like hearing about it. I think that if everybody were to give it a chance a lot of people would feel the impact. I mean, just yesterday I had like this 45-minute conversation with this Muslim American guy who just wanted to thank me so much for the book. Just for the representation and then we ended up just having this whole conversation where, of all of his experiences, that somehow relate to the book. From his time in the Middle East, Egypt, Turkey, to here at home. It was incredible and I was like, “This is exactly why I did it.”

And at C2E2 there was a young girl who came up and it was the same thing. And she was like, “Oh, I want to thank you so much!” She was young, she was probably 20, 22, and she said, “This is my family. My family is very fundamental. I don’t know if I fit in that and it’s great to see this story being told.” So I think those are people who are directly impacted by the book because they are Muslim. But I think beyond that, I mean especially with NPR giving it coverage, it could open it up to an entirely new spectrum of reader who might not even read comics with them putting it on that list of 100 favorite horror stories. You know that’s… There were only four comics in that and everything else is novels. That could be… That right there is proof, to me, that this is worthy of a broad audience. And it could have some kind of impact, I mean the way that any other novel that is substantial can have an impact on an individual and a connection can be made.

JV: It’s a story that we haven’t seen and I was thinking of that when Pornsak first told me of the idea. “Well, that’s a story we haven’t heard.” It’s a story that, in a way, tells itself because the premise of it is so intriguing and so resonant without the collaboration. I think I find appealing to me is that, as an immigrant who is Hispanic, I felt that I know a lot of other immigrants from many different cultures and I’m friends with many of them. I found out through working on the project that so does Pornsak and the atmosphere in the story resembles a lot, a younger version of what a lot of my friends are like.

In addition, because I teach full time, my students are from all over the place. They’re international students, they’re multi-ethnic, they’re multicultural, they come from many different kinds of families with many different ideologies and so when Pornsak agreed to, and Aaron, they agreed to do a little contest with my students and do artwork inspired by Infidel, which is collected in the trade paperback. Then my students, those of them who don’t read comics, which is the majority, they were besides themselves about being able to contribute to this story in particular. And because what happens is that I as a reader, as I said, identify with Aisha and, unlike most women, I’m not a woman and I’m not 27.

But it doesn’t matter. She was dealing with a lot of the things that all of us deal with like families and change in families and with issues of faith. All of those are universal stories. I think it was very important to Pornsak, I feel, that it was true and authentic, and there was no assumptions about how anybody behaves or what they believe or how they practice. There was research to the maximum level. But besides that, the emotional journey was something that wasn’t researched, that was just to make a tribute, and what I feel that Aaron brought to life.

And so when I see the world coming to them and say, “Is it going to change these people’s minds?” Like them, I don’t know. It may change one or two people, but that’s not the reason that I was interested in the project. I was interested in the project because I thought this is a project that needs to exist, first and foremost. And then if some people are susceptible to it, fantastic. If some people are indifferent, that’s for them. And some people hate it, that says a lot about them too. So we are not going to convince everybody to read this book, nor do we want to.

I feel that the book is a mirror and I know that Pornsak made it so complex that for me, editing it, we had a lot of discussions about some of the aspects that he was bringing up that were much more complex than I was expecting them to be and I sort of resisted at first. And of course, when all was said and done, Pornsak was right and I was wrong. And I was just concerned that he was getting too complex, but no. I am 100% behind him too. I feel that.. We haven’t gotten a single negative response from someone who actually read the book. We only had gotten negative responses from people that are kind of troublemakers that just hate the concept. And that’s fine, that’s their job. It’s indifferent to me.

So, I think that that’s my philosophy. You know I come from a fine arts background and in fine arts, you don’t really think about whether you’re going to change any people’s minds or educate or anything. You think, “Does this need to exist because it’s a valid expression of something important?” And I feel like even though it has a commercial impact, Pornsak had a very finite kind of idea to do this, and Aaron comes from the school where I teach that is very strong in the fine arts part of the education. So I think it’s from a fine arts kind of sensibility as opposed to like, a product that meets the market to cover these needs with a specific goal.

CA: Now I believe that I heard that Infidel is going to be transitioned into a show…

PP: Ah, a movie. It’s been optioned by Sony/Tristar for a feature film. Sugar23 is the production company attached, that’s Michael Sugar’s production company. Michael Sugar won the Oscar for producing Spotlight. And so we’re waiting to hear what the word is. There’s been a lot of enthusiasm on the studio side to move quickly and get people attached and all that kind of stuff. So yeah, hopefully, sooner as opposed to later…

AC: Yeah and their latest project was Maniac.

CA: Which I just finished. It’s a hell of a show. And the last question, what was the absolute highlight of working on this project with this team?

JV: Oh, the absolute highlight is like they’re friends. They’re my friends. You know, I never had an opportunity before to work so closely with a team as close as we are. And I feel there’s been an honesty and trust and a connection between us that I never experienced in any of my projects in comics. And for me, the personal part of working on this has been amazing. Pornsak entrusting me with helping in becoming an editor with this… An amazing thing that I will always be thankful to him for. And teaching me to edit, at the same time. And Aaron not giving 100%, but giving 200% to this project, has been amazing. So it’s been a very intense experience. It’s been a communicative experience. We had some good times and we had some rough spots to work over but I feel that artistically, professionally, intellectually, and personally it’s been the most interesting thing I’ve done so far.

PP: Honestly, the chance to work with Aaron and Jose. Speaking of good friends, they’re like family at this point, so working with them has been amazing. And the project… Just the reaction the project had, I mean the whole thing has kind of been amazing, it’s hard to sort of pick favorites. It’s been a fantastic experience. It’s a book that, I didn’t know if anything… If people would respond or not. I didn’t know if the stuff I had to say was stuff people wanted to hear, one way or another. So the fact that the reception has been rather warm has been kind of amazing to me.

AC: I mean for me, the biggest highlight was the ability to experiment and much as Pornsak and Jose allowed me to experiment. And they gave me like incredible latitude to… And Pornsak had this idea of what he was getting to begin with and as soon as he got me I was like, “Oh yeah, I’m going to throw that playbook out, and I’m going to do this now! Cool?” And I’m sure Pornsak and Jose had a lot of conversations behind my back about that, but at the end of the day, they let me do it. And that’s what I’m really grateful for because, like it said, it’s changed everything for me. So that’s definitely the highlight.

CA: It’s an excellent book. Thank you guys so much for your time.

The Infidel TP containing Chapters 1 – 5 is currently available from major comics retailers. We at ComicAttack would like to thank Pornsak Pichetshote, Aaron Campbell, and Jose Villarrubia for their time and invaluable insights into the process behind creating Infidel. My review of the new horror classic can be read here.

Updated 12/13/2018
Christian Davenport
cable201@comicattack.net