But more United you will not find either

More dissimilar than them, you will not find. But more United, you will not find either. Yuri Jigounov and Mythic form a couple in the Laurel and Hardy. The first, smooth and thin, always seems to hide behind his pen of cartoonist. The second, hairy and bearded, occupies the space of his stature of debonair ogre. The one expressed by simple-minded. The other practical emphasis: with him, a Brussels-Paris Thalys banal turns into intergalactic epic...

United for better in the "Alpha" (best 100,000 to release) adventure, these two - there might well have to know the worst. As their case was wrong part. First, this is Jigounov. In direct origin of his Moscow home, he spoke almost as Russian, and it is to draw on behalf of the Editions of the Lombard, Brussels, traits of a CIA agent! Then, Pascal Renard, the writer of the series. The unfortunate disappeared tragically, by choosing a 1 April to end his days. It is at this point where Mythic, real name Jean-Claude Smit Le Bénédicte. He was called in emergency by the publishing Director of the Lombard, Yves Sente, to regain the thread of the scenario. His experience argues for him. Fans of comics he must already adventures smiling and eventful Rubine, created jointly with François Walthéry, with whom he has already worked on "Natacha". However, he knows nothing of the secret intentions of the creator of Alpha, because it has left no posthumous indication. Never mind, fortune duettistes will make team. Strange tandem! Until the popular success transformed their baroque triumphant char headstock.

It is true that, at home, everything is fiction. Thus the arrival of young Jigounov in Brussels in 1994. At the time, he has twenty-six years. He has almost never traveled. His English is limited to phrases gleaned in of old copies of the newspaper "Tintin", offered by a son of diplomat stationed in the Russian capital. Indeed, it is this unique address he appears, without complex, at the headquarters of the Editions du Lombard from the Midi station. Its plates of drawings under the arm, he asks to speak to Raymond Leblanc, founder of the weekly.

"His name was on the newspaper, said Yuri in an interview with the magazine"LBP"." Upon entering the building, I cross a gentleman and I told him I want to meet a certain Mr. Leblanc. Announces me that he is. But, because of my strong focus Russian, he feared to be a terrorist and he asks me my papers.

However, quickly, confidence is installed. To the extent that the leader he introduced Yves Sente. He also quickly enough seduced by the virtuosity of artist who excels both in the realistic registry in the comic. But from there to engage on a coup de coeur... Yves Sente is in need of a bit of time. But by the time this is what is missing more than Jigounov: "my savings spun at high speed." With my wife, we changed all the time of youth hostel. Could not call me, it's me who telephoned.

A talkative, the other secret

Finally, two days of final exhaustion of its cash 2,000 dollars loaned by a friend, he landed his first contract. Yves Sente presented writer Pascal Renard. The Editorial Director commissioned to adapt in French the text of the "Kristov letters", the album project that Jigounov had brought from Moscow. Which prefigures is primarily, it is the tandem which, a few months later, will give rise to "Alpha".

Las, the untimely demise of Pascal Renard, at thirty-seven years, will almost immediately threaten the saga. The young writer was promising. Some saw in him a future Jean Van Hamme. And that is that he leaves his hero in plan, after two albums, lost in Moscow face with the Russian mafia in a dark history of traffic of foreign currency. Mythic must therefore assume the paternity of a hero which he ignores any genealogical history. "I requested forty-eight hours of reflection, he recalled." And then I said banco. "Certainly, Mythic has always been sensitive to norms atmospheres of intelligence, the polar and the detectives. Only, it is not naturally behind an author, especially when he has planned for its amount of areas of secrets and shadow heroes.

To get rid of this cumbersome legacy, Mythic will choose a radical solution: "The third album, I myself am arranged to massacre all the characters I didn't know what to do." Once freed from these constraints, there not too many concerns to be feed to the suite. Because in this hungry life, overflows: imagination, activity, documentation...

Thus he devoted all his weekends to scour the flea market and vacuum-attics. He comes back with an Edition exhausted chronicling the life of Beria... Or with best 1,000 former "Paris-match", intended to feed its documentary Fund. And so much worse if the walls of its flag, in the suburbs of Brussels, are not extensible.

However, a last pitfall threatened: the exuberant Mythic was able to agree with introvert Jigounov and vice versa So one is talkative, so is the other secret. Yuri Jigounov reveals that piecemeal. His unpleasant irony and offbeat humor hide obviously a great shyness. In addition, between the two friends, the age difference is not thin: twenty years just between them. But the answer to these concerns lies in sales: sept. The ninth book to come will be their seventh collaboration in common. And if this response is not sufficient to convince their complicity, detailed reading of the bubbles provides additional evidence. It found that, among other talents, Mythic has to paint. At the time, whenever Jigounov should draw an interior of apartment or House, he managed to reproduce on a wall one of the works of his friend.

However, the language barrier or one and the other fantasy play sometimes towers. When Jigounov finishes an album that was supposed to count 46 45 boards, it is then necessary to operate a catch-up of last hour: with a sticker is full page, to the example of the detailed map of the Ireland that the end of the sixth book, "the emissary"! Otherwise, it would remain while the classical solution to complement the adventures of charming scenes. But here, too, the tandem cultivates his atypia. "Erotic scenes, I the application every time", pretends to complain Jigounov in the direction of his sidekick, who apologizes: "while asked often to other writers to moderate their zeal in this matter, I am the only one who can is obliged to say:"Put in"."