(Paris) The comic strip writer Pierre Christin, who had worked with many big names of the 9e art and whose name remains attached to the character of Valérian, died Thursday at the age of 86.
“He was a comic book scriptwriter – undoubtedly one of the greatest – writer, academic and professor,” recalled his publisher, Dargaud, in a press release.
Between nearly 100 titles from the 1960s to 2020, its name remains mainly attached to the series Valérian and Laureline, “a true reinvention of the space opera genre adapted for cinema in 2017”, recalled the Minister of Culture Rachida Dati, welcoming a “major author of French science fiction”.
A Doctor of Letters, the native of Saint-Mandé, near Paris, was one of those, with René Goscinny, who created the profession of comic book scriptwriter.
“The screenwriter is a guy who is there to handle the words, the concepts, to move the story forward,” he explained to Release in 2020. “We are intrinsically part of the environment, but always like an attached piece. We don’t have the same origins or the same way of working as the designers.”
Valérian, a science fiction hero, and his sidekick Laureline, were born from a collaboration with a childhood friend, the designer Jean-Claude Mézières. He made Pierre Christin “a pillar” of the magazine Pilotrecalls Dargaud.
Younger generations are more familiar with the film adaptation Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets (2017), directed by Luc Besson.
“When I was young, I hesitated a little between two directions. And I think that if I hadn’t made comics, I would have made thrillers,” he said in 1997 to the magazine Parallels. “At the time, in comics, everything had to be done.”
The screenwriter has written for comic book legends like Jacques Tardi, François Boucq and Enki Bilal.
He created political science fiction, then detached himself from it to vary the genres. One of his masterpieces is Hunting party (1983), with Enki Bilal, which shows the decay of Soviet communism.
More recently, in 2019, his biography Orwellwith Sébastien Verdier as drawing, was praised by critics. Authors like André Juillard, Manu Larcenet and Blutch contributed to a few boxes.
He also founded the IUT of journalism in Bordeaux (which became the IJBA) in 1967 and taught there for a long time, he also wrote novels and produced plays… “Pierre worked a lot to democratize the profession of journalist,” says Édith Rémond, who led the Bordeaux School of Journalism after him in 1986.
The 2019 Goscinny Prize was awarded to him at the Angoulême International Comics Festival, for all of his work.
“Pierre Christin is not only considered a major screenwriter in the history of comics, both by the richness of his work which is not limited to the Valérian series, but also by his desire to address social issues. Progressive, he is one of the first to dare to highlight a female character (Laureline) as a strong heroine,” underlined Dargaud.
The publishing house praised “a great traveler, an assiduous observer of our world, a cultured, curious man who loves to debate”.
A screenplay co-written with Stella Lory, The Island of the Richshould give rise to his latest comic book, drawn by Titwane and planned for 2026.