Richard: "Strange Embrace" was originally published as a miniseries by Atomika Press, why did you agree to have it published by Active Images as a graphic novel?

David Hine: It was always intended to be a graphic novel. Even back in 1993 I was thinking in terms of trade paperback. That's what I was writing for, but the market, then as now, is kinder to a story that can be serialized first, so I built the story around four Acts of 48 pages each. The original publishers, Tundra/Atomeka went under at the same time the last issue came out, so there never was a collection. I couldn't have been happier when Richard Starkings called ten years later, saying he wanted to collect the book under the Active Images imprint.

Richard: Do you think Image's color versions will attract more fans?

David: I certainly hope so. The problem is that the cost of a trade paperback is a big financial investment for a potential reader to make. It's easier to sell a relatively cheap 24-page color comic as a taster. Once they've tried one issue, of course, they should be on board for the whole series. There is also a whole different readership for color books who may never pick up a black-and-white title. It's a very different habit.

Richard: Do you have a website for "Strange Embrace"?

David: Yes, indeed. Active Images designer and secret weapon, JG Roshell has put together a site at http://www.strangeembrace.com with all kinds of samples and background details, as well as some nifty Flash graphics. And look for those pop-up mushrooms for extra goodies.

Richard: Why and how did you end up at Image Comics?

David: This color monthly is being steered through the publishing process by Richard. He has brought in Rob Steen to do the magnificent color job and is re-lettering the book and turning the whole thing into a bright new package. I've done new covers and there will be some back-up strips, re-printing some of my short pieces from the British independent press as well as articles and sketches and also a page of Temptation by Glenn Dakin. All that as well as an average of 24 pages of Strange Embrace each issue. Richard approached Image Comics and sorted out all the boring stuff for me. The guys at Image already knew the book from the Active Images collection and of course Spawn comes out from Image every month, so it was the obvious place to go.

Richard: What is "Strange Embrace" all about?

David: Psychosis, self-loathing, repressed sexuality, obsession, murder, suicide and lots of other jolly stuff. Typical British indie subject matter really. The story itself revolves around a malevolent psychic who collects stories. He homes in on an old collector of African carvings, called Anthony Corbeau and gradually uncovers his story. He starts with the knowledge that the man's wife committed suicide and that Corbeau subsequently retreated from any contact with the rest of the world, locking himself away with his beloved carvings and fetishes. That's fetishes in every sense of the word.

It's part murder mystery and part gothic horror with a dose of bodice-ripping Edwardian melodrama thrown in.

Richard: How does writing horror compare to super heroes?

David: No spandex. Less fisticuffs. More pervy sex. Actually scrub that ­ fisticuffs in spandex probably counts as pervy sex.

Richard: What about "Strange Embrace" did and will attract comic fans?

David: I think it's a unique story. There isn't much else like it out there. It's idiosyncratic, but I also tried to make it as accessible and well constructed as possible. I'm not interested in farting about with self-indulgent navel-gazing. What I always want to do, whatever the genre or publisher, is to tell a great story that hooks the readers and keeps them hooked.

Richard: You have worked for Marvel writing a number of mutant titles, what about working on them did you find rewarding?

David: The page rate.

Oh, I'm so tempted to leave it at that but no, I actually enjoyed writing District X hugely. I've been writing mutant stories since I was a kid, although they never dressed up in funny costumes and hit each other. You'll notice there wasn't too much of that in District X either. I'm more interested in mutants as outsiders. Their mutations make them unique but are more likely to be a disability than a super power. That's an aspect of the Marvel Universe that has been unfortunately swept away by the House of M, no more mutants storyline. As time went on I got reeled into the deeper waters of X-Men and crossovers and pretty much lost control of the stories. The first story I pitched to Marvel was Daredevil: Redemption which was essentially a realistic legal drama, and within two-and-half years I was writing Civil War: X-Men. I realized I was heading in the wrong direction and made a conscious decision to step away from the X-books at that point.

Richard: How is writing about the Inhumans different than the X-Men?

David: The Inhumans may walk like mutants and quack like mutants, but they ain't mutants. Or so I'm told. In many ways Silent War is a lot like District X. The Inhumans are a community of outsiders trying to deal with being unique individuals, and once again their powers may be as much a disability as a benefit.

The X-books are more directly about teams who are formed to battle evil in some form or other. The Inhumans are an entire culture. There's a rich seam of political intrigue and social experimentation to play with. Right now, of course, they are fighting to recover the Terrigen Mists that are the heart and soul of their culture. It's interesting to draw parallels between the war between Inhumans and humankind (specifically the USA), and the interior conflicts going on in the minds of Black Bolt, Medusa, Crystal, Pietro and the wise child, Luna.

In the end the biggest difference is that the Inhumans are largely isolated from the rest of the Marvel Universe. They've been a little neglected of late so I've been allowed to mess with them more than I could with the X-Men. You always have to keep one eye on what the characters are doing in the other X-books. There's an overall editorial direction that as a writer you are constrained by. That's much less evident with the Inhumans.

Richard: While writing Spawn what did you add to the character?

David: Even more angst and self-loathing, if that's possible. I also set about tying up all the many plot threads that had become a little tangled over the years. I could see where everything was leading, and its name was Armageddon. So I suggested we actually did it. Destroy the world and start again. Todd McFarlane and editor Brian Haberlin wanted a fresh start for Spawn, but I felt we should spend eighteen months or so dealing with all those plot lines out of respect to the loyal readers who had stuck with the book over the past fifteen years. Besides, I thought the story was actually bloody good, so rather than abandon it, I tried to streamline it, make some sense of everything then destroy the world. With issue 166 we do have a completely knew direction, with a more cinematic, film noir style of art from Brian Haberlin and a more horror-based approach to the story.

What's interesting to me is that although Spawn brought back the human race after he wiped them out, and rebuilt the world, it's not quite like a re-set. He didn't go back in time and undo Armageddon, he reconstructed the world and everything in it. So this is a replica, not the real thing, and there are subtle differences. It's like The Fly on a grand scale. You take a man, break him down into particles, then put him back together, but somewhere along the line some fly particles get into the mix. Now imagine that on a global scale.

As for Spawn himself I'm now getting into exploring what happened in the past to make him the monster that is Spawn. Why was he the one person out of the entire human race who was the ideal candidate to be Spawn? There are going to be an awful lot of skeletons tumbling out of the closet over the next few years and I'm looking forward to it. Spawn is another book where I've been given a huge amount of creative freedom by Todd and Brian.

Richard: Do you prefer writing or drawing more?

David: Writing. No hesitation. I almost missed my vocation by getting fixated on the drawing. It's because I always found drawing very, very difficult. I grew up with the Protestant work ethic that basically says if you enjoy it, then it isn't work and it probably isn't worthwhile either. Now I've decided to indulge in the part of comics I really enjoy instead of slaving over a drawing board for crazy hours. Having said that, I'm a great believer in auteur comics. That's where most of the best stuff happens. The undiluted creativity of a single mind. So one of these days the masochist in me may drive me back to drawing again.

Richard: What future projects do you have planned?

David: A big one hopefully coming up from Marvel. I'm waiting on final confirmation for that one. I'm going to be pitching for more Inhumans stories too. I think Silent War has had a good reception so that may happen. Poison Candy is a manga, coming from Tokyopop in September, drawn by Hans Steinbach. That should run to three volumes of around 180 pages each. And I have another creator-owned project brewing. I just have to find the time to work on it. Spawn is taking up most of my time right now because I'm writing several arcs at once. We have a couple of hot artists lined up to do a couple of short arcs later this year so I'm working on their scripts as well as the current storyline.

Richard: What would be your ideal job?

David: Get outta here! You know the answer to that.

Richard: What comics did you read as a child and do you read now?

David: I read all the English comics. We had weekly comics like Dandy and Beano with humorous strips that ran to a page or two, but I really got into comics with adventure strips like Heros the Spartan and Trigan Empire - swords and sandals adventures that ran in Look and Learn and Eagle. We also had these great black and white comics published by Alan Class that reprinted all the Lee/Kirby Lee/Ditko mystery and horror strips from the fifties. You would get 68 pages of stories in each issue for about 10 pence. A real bargain. Later I picked up the superhero stuff but it was the mystery and science fiction that really turned me on to comics.

Now I read everything. I have to pick up a lot of Marvels to keep up with what's happening with characters. I read Brubaker and Bendis for pleasure. And Warren Ellis, Garth Ennis, Bryan K Vaughan, Joss Whedon. I buy books by author mostly. I still pick up Love and Rockets and anything Robert Crumb comes up with. But the stuff I'm really into is from non-English speaking countries like Japan, France, Belgium. Here's what I have by my bed right
now: Bouncer volume 5 by Boucq and Jodorowsky, the second volume of Magasin General by Loisel and Tripp, NonNonBa by Shigeru Mizuki, Paroles de Poilus (actual war correspondence illustrated by various artists), L'Enfant Penchee by Schuiten and Peeters, L'Aliene by Betbeder and Solmon, a stack of books by Suehiro Maruo that I picked up in Japan, Monster and Twentieth Century Boys, both by Naoki Urasawa, several big fat volumes by Jiro Taniguchi, Bienvenue au Gamurakan by Yoji Fukuyama. The list goes on and on. I have a backlog of hundreds of books and graphic novels. My eyes are bigger than my stomach as my girlfriend tells me. I always buy more stuff than I can ever possibly read.

Richard: How can someone contact you?

David: Through the Strange Embrace site. You can send e-mails to david@strangeembrace.com or drop by my new forum on the Image site: http://www.imagecomics.com/messageboard/viewforum.php?f=37

Richard: Any final words of wisdom?

David: All are not cooks that walk with long knives.

Apparently that's a Russian proverb. They also have one that says "Better a dove on a plate than a wood grouse in the mating place."

You can't really argue with that, can you?