'Scarlet' and 'Casanova'

Partly because I am now on the older side of 30, and partly (or as a result) because my tastes are changing I have found that more and more I have become tired of the standard comic book superhero fare. While DC has had its Vertigo line in place for years now, Marvel has only recently started to offer its own creator-owned line with its Icon imprint. This week I tried two new series from this line - 'Scarlet' and 'Casanova' - (which has actually been around for a while, but not through the Icon imprint; the first issue is a re-release), and both were quite impressive.



'Scarlet' is the more immediate of the two, and has a very interesting concept, although it's actually difficult to glean the concept from the first issue. Essentially, a young scarlet-haired woman decides she's had enough of the wrongdoing in the world, and decides to do something about it, which itself is hardly new, but apparently we're going to see her crusade build up over time from a series of localized incidents into a global revolution. Writer Brian Michael Bendis likes his media and he likes his female protagonists, so it seems like the kind of series he was building towards, even as it is in some ways different from what he has done in the past. The supremely talented (if publicity-shy) Alex Maleev is doing the art, and his photographic style should make the series very pretty to look at, whilst maintaining a sense of realism. Expect a 'Scarlet' film sometime in the next few years as Hollywood-types salivate over this concept...



'Casanova' is a very different series not only to 'Scarlet' but everything else on the stands, and frankly it confused the hell out of me. Artist Gabriel Ba worked with Gerard Way (of My Chemical Romance fame) on 'The Umbrella Academy' and that confused the hell out of me too, so maybe there's a connection. Anyway, from what I can figure out, the main protagonist Casanova Quinn likes to steal stuff, except his dad is the leader of a huge spy agency, and his sister is the top agent. But that synopsis doesn't really do the series justice, and there's things like battles with giant brains, and random liaisons with nurses, and multiple timelines, and who knows what else? I think I like this better than Matt Fraction's other work though because, strangely enough, the weirder it gets the more honest it seems. That is, Fraction seems at his best when he is writing almost purely for himself and doesn't give a toss how stupid it may seem. Then again, by issue four I may be ready to tear the whole thing to shreads. We'll see!