Rhino - Handle With Care - Grant McLaughlin

Four rows of panels.  Panel 1 and 8 are their own rows (one and four), extending slightly further to the left and right than rows two and three (which are made up of panels 2-4 and 5-7, respectively).

1 - Rhino stands on the street, looking wistfully into a storefront window.  From the framing, we can't see what the store is or what's within that window.  All we have to go on is the longing of Rhino's body language - he places a hand on the window, as if he could reach whatever it is that holds his attention.

RHINO (1): *sigh*

RHINO (2): One day.

2 - Rhino stands, surprised and sheepish, holding a blinged-out car door that he has just ripped off of its frame while trying to open it.  Overdrive looks out from the driver window in surprise and frustration.

OVERDRIVE: My getaway car!

RHINO (quietly): Sorry.

3 - Close-up of a deck of cards on a card table.  The deck is all ripped, rumpled, and wrecked - it's completely unusable.  In the background, it's clear from the colourful costumes that supervillains have gotten together to play a hand or two.

OFF-PANEL: So it's agreed: Rhino never shuffles again.

4 - Rhino sits at a desk, his bulky frame far larger than the tiny surface before him.  The desk and the ground around it is littered with broken pencils.  If you can manage it, Rhino can be in the midst of breaking yet another one while trying to write with it.  His shoulders slump in defeat.

RHINO: They've got to make these out of something stronger than wood...

5 - Rhino and Electro's faces look towards each other, framing the foreground of the panel.  Electro looks towards Rhino angerly; Rhino looks back in embarassment.  In the background between their faces it is clear they are in an elevator.  Particularly, we see the elevator controls (all the numbered buttons), which have an enormous finger indentation in them, which has clearly destroyed the panel (it can spark electricity if you'd like).

RHINO: It was like that when I got here.

6 - Rhino stands in a mixture of shock and agitation.  Before him, Shocker is doubled over, holding his arm, which is clearly in a ton of pain.

SHOCKER: That's what you call a high five?!

7 - Doc Ock is having Rhino over for tea (don't question this, just roll with it).  Doc Ock holds a fine china teacup, a delicate teapot, milk, and sugar - one in each of his tentacles.  He gestures proudly to a reinforced monster of a mug that is placed in front of Rhino.  It is huge, metalic, and surprisingly scary-looking for a drinking vessel.  Rhino once again slumps his shoulders sadly, a fact that Doc Ock seems to overlook in his pride.

DOC OCK: I think this should do perfectly well after what happened last time.

8 - Back to that first scene.  We've changed perspective, as we're now looking into that storefront Rhino was staring wistfully into.  Through the glass we can now see the object of his desire: a "Build Your Own Boat in a Bottle!" set that sits happily in the display case (with a picture of a boat in a bottle, possibly a child and father looking on happily, etc).  While this should be the focus of the panel, Rhino's face should be visible in the "reflection" - we can see that he is one sad panda (possibly shedding a tear).

RHINO: One day...