The producers of Moon Knight have officially confirmed that characters in the show are going to tie back into the hero’s comic book pages.
In an interview with Screenrant, Moon Knight producer Grant Curtis said that both Ethan Hawke’s Arthur Harrow and new character Layla El-Faouly (played by May Calamawy) are going to have tie-ins to the source material.
While not too much is known about the characters right now, he said more will be revealed as the show continues to air, and that there’s certainly “connectivity” to the comics.
“I can tell you this: as we peel back the layers episode by episode on Layla and Arthur Harrow, I think what they brought to the table is going to blow the audience away. There’s connectivity to the comic books for both characters, but it’s really what Ethan and May brought to the table that ultimately made the Layla and the Arthur Harrow that you’re going to see on screen.”
Curtis added that previous knowledge of the Moon Knight comics isn’t necessary to enjoy the show, as long as they enjoy “really good storytelling.”
Oscar Isaac stars as Moon Knight, and in the show, he has dissociative identity disorder, which means that he’s also playing mercenary Marc Spector and mild-mannered museum worker Steven Grant. In fact, the complex nature of his character meant that directors were concerned about an actor being able to pull it off, but they think Isaac did it with ease.
The Moon Knight character first appeared in 1975 in a comic, Werewolf by Night. The character got his first ongoing series in 1980 and has appeared regularly in Marvel comics since then. Moon Knight‘s Egyptian lore and battle with mental illness didn’t become a key part of his backstory until years after he was introduced.
The first episode of Moon Knight is currently streaming on Disney Plus.