Casanova Quinn in “Paint it Black” by Matt Duarte
This is not the Casanova Quinn that we know, this is one from another reality.
Panel 1
Description: Casanova Quinn is attending a large funeral. He is wearing a suit, and he is surrounded by his family, his father Cornelius Quinn, his sister Zephyr, and even his mother Anna. They are all sad, but it is clear that Cass is the one that is suffering the most. The love of his life has just died, and he is visibly crying.
CASANOVA (CAPTION): I see a line of cars and they're all painted black. With flowers and my love both never to come back.
Panel 2
Description: Cass is now walking around the streets of Hawai, slumping and clearly a broken shell of a man. Around him, people are enjoying a beautiful day. Off into the distance, there is a volcano.
CASANOVA (CAPTION): I see the girls walk by dressed in their summer clothes. I have to turn my head until my darkness goes.
Panel 3
Description: Cass has just dropped himself (not jumped) into the volcano we saw in the previous panel. It is active, and there is a lot of lava in the bottom.
CASANOVA (CAPTION): Maybe then I'll fade away and not have to face the facts. It's not easy facing up when your whole world is black
Panel 4
Description: Cass is in an E.M.P.I.R.E. hospital, he is badly burned in all of his body, and his face is particularly disfigured. He was rescued from his suicide attempt, and is now recovering. Next to him is his father, not really at terms with what his son has done.
CASANOVA (CAPTION): I see people turn their heads and quickly look away. Like a new born baby, it just happens every day.
Panel 5
Description: Cass has jumped out of his bed, and is badly beating his father into a pulp.
CASANOVA (CAPTION): I look inside myself and see my heart is black. I see my red door, I must have it painted black.
Panel 6
Description: The body of Cornelius Quinn lays in the floor, Cass has reached to a medical supply kit that was in the room and has taken out some bandages.
CASANOVA (CAPTION): I wanna see your face, painted black. Black as night, black as coal.
Panel 7
Description: Cass has covered his whole face in bandages. We can see his eyes, just before he is about to put some big dark sunglasses.
CASANOVA (CAPTION): I wanna see the sun blotted out from the sky. I wanna see it painted, painted black. Yeah!
The Beginning.
Note from the author: If you've read Casanova before, you can probably see where I am heading with this, but just in case you haven't or you are a bit slow on the uptake (but we love you anyway!), I'm turning Alternate Cass here into Newman Xeno. I actually think that it's a very logical choice, and Matt Fraction could actually already be building up to this if you think about it.
Holy shit, this idea is great. Though I wish it was more than just jumping into a volcano...but otherwise, Matt, great use of lyrics (the exact sort of thing I'd expect to see in the comic) and you've won me over completely.
ReplyDeleteGlad you liked it. To be honest, I would have loved to expand this idea a lot further, but size constraints obviously put a stop to that. Normally, if I have an idea this good, I would keep it to myself, but with a creator owned character, there was no point because I know I'm never going to write it.
ReplyDeleteYeah, great stuff Matt. I think the use of a song is a somewhat untapped way to convey a scene, and emotions, throughout a comic. You've certainly got your thoughts across here. Have you thought of this for a while, or did it come to you once hearing the song?
ReplyDeleteGreat work.
I knew I wanted to use a song, because of how important Fraction has said music was in the process of creating Casanova, and the Rolling Stones was the obvious choice because Cass' look was based on Mick Jagger.
ReplyDeleteFrom there on, it was choosing the song, and Paint it Black is my favorite. I listened to the song a couple of times on repeat, reading out loud the lyrics. The line that lead me to this script was "I wanna see the sun blotted out", because that sounded exactly the kind of crazy thing that Xeno would do for shit and giggles.