Interview: Writer Sophie Campbell on Mothra’s First Ever Comic

Last year, just before the grand debut of the new Kai-Sei universe of Godzilla comics, IDW Publishing dropped a bombshell: The first solo comic in the Godzilla franchise centered around a monster that isn’t the King of the Monsters! Written by Sophie Campbell (Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Supergirl) and boasting art by kaiju frequent flyer Matt Frank (Godzilla’s 70th Anniversary, Godzilla: Rulers of Earth), the five-issue miniseries gave Mothra a much-needed spotlight and solo comic book to call her own.

Packing numerous cameos of fan-favorites, a new villainous kaiju named Antra, and more, the book was a significant moment in the franchise’s storied history in the comic book medium. This winter, Kaiju United had the opportunity to correspond with Sophie Campbell via email to get some of our burning questions about the run answered, including the origin of the concept, Campbell’s fondness for the character, and some of the insights into the collaboration process.

Hayley Doland: This is the very first solo comic for a non-Godzilla Toho kaiju. How did this comic happen? Did IDW ask you to write a Mothra comic, or did you and Matt Frank pitch it directly?

Sophie Campbell: It actually started off as a really loose Godzilla pitch I was working on that I was going to write and draw myself, and it was basically me trying to come up with a Godzilla idea for which I didn’t have to draw things I didn’t feel like drawing, because I’m lazy. No crowds of people, no buildings, no military vehicles! So I came up with the idea that it would take place in a post-apocalyptic wasteland, everything was ruined, everyone was dead, caused by Godzilla plunging the world into a nuclear winter.

I didn’t get very far on the pitch before I felt like I didn’t have anything to “say” about Godzilla that hadn’t already been said better, and at some point I thought hey I should ask about doing Mothra and turn this into a pitch for her instead. There’s never been a solo Mothra comic before so what it could be would be wide open. The editor said, “That sounds great,” but then he left the company, so I shelved the Mothra pitch. A while later Matt, who I’d chatted with about the Mothra stuff, suggested I dust it off and we do the comic together, which was perfect! The rest is history.

HD: What draws you to the character of Mothra?

SC: Everything! Her cycle of birth, death, and rebirth, the Shobijin fairies, her magical elements, what’s not to like? 


HD: There are loads of obscure Toho kaiju cameos in this story. Was there a rhyme or reason on which ones to pick out?

SC: The selection process was purely based on which ones I wanted to see Matt draw.

HD: Emi and Mira have a very dynamic and complicated relationship, were there any personal life experiences that lead to the organic relationship? What types of inspirations did you look at for their dynamic? 


SC: I didn’t have any particular real-life inspiration for them, no, beyond the basic concept of two people having conflicting views about something but being required to work together. I’ve had interactions with people over the course of my life that I probably subconsciously drew on, like maybe having to work with people on a school project and none of us agree despite working toward the same goal, or interactions with friends where we argue about something that we’re actually both on the same page about but we keep talking past each other.

HD: This comic features brand new songs sung by the Shobijin. What were the challenges of writing new songs in a medium without audio for such iconic pop culture characters?

SC: I waffled a lot on this, whether to use existing lyrics from classic Mothra songs or whether to write new ones, I kept going back and forth with Matt and our editor Jake [Williams]. We ended up doing a bit of both, with the existing lyrics from Haora Mothra (ハオラ・モスラ) and then shifting to new ones, which I think works well because Emi and Mira are trying to figure out their own path. At first I had a hard time writing the lyrics before I got into the groove.

HD: You do a lot of art for your own comics, did you play a part in Mothra Gemini’s design?

SC: I did! I did a couple sketches for my original Mothra pitch and Matt wound up using those as a basis for Mothra Gemini. My main contribution is probably how fluffy she is.

HD: You’ve done numerous comics in your career that you have also done the art for, such as your new run on Supergirl. Does working with Matt Frank as an artist for the comic feel significantly different from doing it all yourself? What are some advantages and disadvantages?

SC: Writing for another artist is always different than writing something I’ll be drawing myself. When I write for myself to draw, my scripts tend to be really bare bones, not much panel description, because I mostly already know what it’s going to look like so the script only serves as a really basic, stripped-down framework. When I write for someone else I try to give more description of what’s going on in each panel or what a character’s reaction is to something, what their facial expressions are and so forth; not TOO much description, though, because I want the artist to do their own thing with it. The main advantage is it was always a delight when I’d see Matt’s pages, he’d always do it way better than how I imagined it.

HD: If you were to do another kaiju-centric comic miniseries, what one would you do? Would you tackle Godzilla, or do something else? 


SC: My two holy grails would be working on a Gamera comic or a Daigoro comic, from the Toho/Tsuburaya co-production Daigoro vs Goliath from 1972. Otherwise, I’d want to do my own characters – a totally new monster!

Mothra: Queen of the Monsters is now available in a collected format via IDW Publishing under the Godzilla: Legends umbrella. For more on Mothra’s very first solo comic, we encourage you to check out our reviews of every issue.