Colleges From the TV

Offshoring

As the Universes are proved malleable by Xeno, the two Timelines begin to bleed into one another and the comic begins to cite itself, much to the chagrin of our protagonist as this scene:


Echoes this one:

From this point, the comic becomes a rehashing of the opening infiltration/exfiltration, differing slightly and modified by the fact that Cass is aware of the trajectory of the first. Indicative once more of Fraction's joyful use of reappropriation, the citation extends to the non-diegetic, fictional T.A.M.I. quotation.

W.A.S.T.E.

Newman Xeno's W.A.S.T.E. (yet another playfull acronym demanded by the genre) is a reference to Thomas Pynchon's post-modern classic The Crying of Lot 49. In the novel, the protagonist Oedipa Maas discovers an ancient conspiracy involving two rival mail delivery companies: Thurn and Taxis and Tristero. In the novel, Oedipa finds the recurrent acronym W.A.S.T.E. (We Await Silent Tristero's Empire) in a series of forays into the subcultures of 1960's California.
Not unlike Casanova, The Crying of Lot 49 is an excellent example of the literary pastiche which Wikipedia (with help from the OED) defines as something:

"cobbled together in imitation of several original works. As the Oxford English Dictionary puts it, a pastiche in this sense is "a medley of various ingredients; a hotchpotch, farrago, jumble." This meaning accords with etymology: pastiche is the French version of greco-Roman dish pasticcio, which designated a kind of pie made of many different ingredients."

Also:

"the term [may denote] a literary technique employing a generally light-hearted tongue-in-cheek imitation of another's style; although jocular, it is usually respectful."

Specifically pertinent to Casanova's cinematic fixation is the site's argument that:

"Pastiche can also be a cinematic device wherein the creator of the film pays homage to another filmmaker's style and use of cinematography, including camera angles, lighting, and mise en scène. A film's writer may also offer a pastiche based on the works of other writers (this is especially evident in historical films and documentaries but can be found in non-fiction drama, comedy and horror films as well)."

Further reading, without leaving your seat:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Crying_of_Lot_49#Allusions_within_the_book

Newman Xeno

Without too much dexterity, one can draw a bold line between Newman Xeno, Casanova's enemy/employer, and Zeno of Elea. In dealing (however hamhanded) with travel between dimensions, crossover events, Xeno's "paradox backwash" and Zeno's "paradoxes of plurality" both concern themselves with existence in multiple states and the resultant logical fallacies. While Zeno dismisses the possibility of plurality, Xeno meddles with it, having mastered its maniupulation. The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy has this to say about Zeno's understanding of Plurality:

" This first argument, given in Zeno's words according to Simplicius, attempts to show that there could not be many things, on pain of contradiction. Assume then that there are many things. First, he says that any collection must contain some definite number of things, neither more nor fewer. But if you have a definite number of things, he further concludes, you must have a finite — ‘limited’ — number of them; he implicitly assumes that to have infinitely many things is not to have any particular number of them. Second, imagine any collection of things arranged in space — imagine them lined up in one dimension for definiteness. Between and two of them, he claims, is a third; and in between these three elements another two; and another four between these five; and so on without end. Therefore the limited collection is also ‘unlimited’, which is a contradiction, and hence our original assumption must be false: there are not many things after all. At least, so Zeno's reasoning runs."

More on Zeno: http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/paradox-zeno/#ParPlu

Guernica

I'm not sure if Fraction (or artist Gabriel Bá) employs Picasso's Guernica for specific means. Perhaps it is simply a juxtaposition of high art and low art, perhaps it is an interestingly stylized portrayal of violence. Probably not. Odds are, Bá cites Picasso as joyfully as Fraction cites Godard.

Silent Funeral

A year later, in issue 11 of Casanova, Fraction cites Jean-Luc Godard's 1964 Band of Outsiders as the inspiration for a silent casino scene, in which all of the characters' dialog is erased, leaving only blank speech bubbles. The film was no doubt the inspiration for the silent funeral in issue 1. While the trick is interesting in the film, toying with diegetic sound and meta-narritive, it is just as striking, and perhaps more playful in this graphic medium. Just as Godard excelled at twisting cinema's arm and torturing convention, Fraction revels in exploring the limitations of the comic book.

Jackie

Here, Fraction displays something that will characterize the rest of the Casanova series: brief, seemingly throwaway citations that at once propel the plot and pay homage to those he admires. The phrase "break in the continuum" comes from the New Pornographers song "Jackie" from their 2000 album Mass Romantic. The quotation is a definitive plot point, as well as an appreciative nod at A.C. Newman and co.
More importantly, this citation provides us with more transparency than we are typically offered by authors as Fraction admits to being influenced during the writing process. In the back pages of Casanova Issue 1 he thanks The New Pornographers, as he maintains he listened to them extensively while writing the comic. Thus, the typically obfuscated line between writing process and written work becomes more apparent and less rigid.


06_Jackie.mp3 - Hosted on SaveFile.com

EMPIRE

EMPIRE (Extra-Military Police, Intelligence, Rescue, and Espionage) is an obvious allusion to acro-nemesis such as Ernst Stavro Blofeld's SPECTRE (Special Executive for Counter-intelligence, Terrorism, Revenge, and Extortion).

This tradition was also parodied in the Monolith Production computer game No One Lives Forever (NOLF, popularly) which pits agents of UNITY against the villainous H.A.R.M. The game shares much of Casanova's tongue in cheek, self-aware espionage sensibilities.

Doll-Kink Nutjob

Thanks to Margarida Malarky's portion of Santash Prakash's blackboard post GROUP 3: Bodies:

"GUYS AND DOLLS
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=3710987618964917848&q=guys+and+dolls+duration%3Along
You only need to watch the first five minutes of the above program to get the idea. These life-like dolls are custom-made to suit the owners taste. Their aesthetic appearances are reflective of an unattainable ideal that speaks to our culture. The men would rather have the security of a lifeless body than a real companion. Some of the men talk about their dolls as if they are real people, suggesting how the dolls replace the role of a real companion both physically and emotionally. Technology here is acting like a privatizing force by substituting real human interactions and communication for a life-less body. They are suppressing their loneliness for a technological outlet that is furthering them from any real form of communication of connection. For the men the dolls are worth every penny and they come at no cheap price (3000 pounds). Their adamancy about their feelings towards the dolls affirms the psychological impact that technology can have upon people."

T.A.M.I.

This in-comic citation is important for several reasons. To begin, I'm not sure if T.A.M.I., in the suggested incarnation, ever existed. Internet sleuthing has turned up the following dirt on the acronym:

"The T.A.M.I. Show is a 1964 concert film. It includes performances by numerous popular rock and roll and R&B musicians from the United States and England. It was written and directed by Steve Binder. It is particularly well known for James Brown's performance, which features his legendary dance moves and remarkable energy. In interviews, Keith Richards of the Rolling Stones has claimed that choosing to follow Brown & The Famous Flames was the biggest mistake of their careers, because no matter how well they performed, they could not top him.

The concert took place at the Santa Monica Civic Auditorium on October 28 and 29, 1964. Jan and Dean emceed the event and performed its theme song, "Here They Come (From All Over the World)". Jack Nitzsche was the show's music director. The T.A.M.I. Show was recorded on videotape and transferred to kinescope film for theatrical release."

Also:
http://www.learmedia.ca/product_info.php/products_id/1202
http://blogs.indiewire.com/stevenrosen/archives/002167.html

In the comic, Fraction invoked T.A.M.I. as a band. Searches for a band turned up a middle-age German group; one which never authored a song entitled "Deja Vu."More likely than not, Fraction is using this fiction to draw attention to the flippant use of citation in his work. Unlike a scholarly, peer-reviewed article, the under-regulated comic medium provides him the liberty to quote (or lie) at will. The song will also become important later in the comic, as the citation itself is quoted.

Weird Science-Fantasy

"Boys, Girls, Men, Women!
The World is on FIRE
Serve the LORD
and You Can Have These Prizes!"

Ad on the back cover of
WEIRD SCIENCE-FANTASY #24
June 1954

"Weird Science-Fantasy was part of the EC Comics line in the early 1950s. The science-fiction comic, published by Bill Gaines and edited by Al Feldstein, was a merger of two previous bi-monthly titles, Weird Science and Weird Fantasy, which ran from 1950 to 1953 with both ending at issue #22. The Weird Science-Fantasy series began as a quarterly with issue #23 (March, 1954), returning to a bi-monthly schedule with #27 (January-February, 1955). Over a 14-month span, it ran for seven issues, ending with issue #29 (May-June 1955).

Cover illustrations were by Feldstein, Wally Wood, Al Williamson and Frank Frazetta. Artists who drew stories for this EC title were Feldstein, Wood, Williamson, Frazetta, Joe Orlando, Bernard Krigstein, Angelo Torres, George Evans, Reed Crandall and Jack Kamen.

In the summer of 1955, there was yet another title change as Weird Science-Fantasy became Incredible Science Fiction for the final four issues."

Ed. Probably goofy and fun. Also, probably full of lies.

Turgenev

"...My parents...don't worry in the least about their
own insignificance; they don't give a damn about it...
While I...I feel only boredom and anger."
Ivan Turganev
FATHERS AND SONS (1862)

Turgenev's classic of Russian literature concerns itself primarily with the relationship between the generations in mid 19th century Russia. The quote above, spoken by spoken by Yevgeny Bazarov is representative of the nihilistic views espoused by the titular sons. At odds with what he sees as a history of mysticism, superstition and faith, Bazarov condemns these practices and takes up a scientific nihilism he sees as progressive.

"Turgenev wrote Fathers and Sons as a response to the growing cultural schism that he saw between liberals of the 1830s/1840s and the growing nihilist movement. Both the nihilists (the "sons") and the 1830s liberals sought Western-based social change in Russia. Additionally, these two modes of thought were contrasted with the conservative Slavophiles, who believed that Russia's path lay in its traditional spirituality."

This quote speaks to both Casanova's rocky relationship with his father, and his initially nihilistic world view.

Kane

Fraction begins the comic with a familiar scene:



Notice:


AND


In one interview, Fraction maintains that he has dropped out of thousands of film schools. The cinematic influence on his comics is undeniable. As quoting Citizen Kane in his opening image would indicate, cinematic citations are a favorite tool of Fraction's and the tendency to crib from the silver screen will only become more pronounced and natural as the series progresses.

Hertog

Casanova Volume 1: Luxuria, the trade edition which collects the first seven issues of Matt Fractions sci-fi espionage adventure, begins with a series of three epigraphs culled from varied corners of text. From hard science, to Russian literature, to para-literature the variance of the quotations are quite representative of the work that follows. This is certainly due to the themes they address (multiple universes, nihilism, generational malaise, bullshit, etc...) but also to the variance itself. The distended texture, effortlessly created by this marriage of pop-culture, low-culture, high-culture, snake-oil-science, is what helps define the comic as a post-modern pastiche, fully aware of its surroundings, its fathers and its hedonism.

What follows are brief discussions of the cited texts, based on primarily on quotations.

"Quantum mechanics forbids a single history" Thomas Hertog


"In physics, quantum mechanics is the study of the relationship between energy quanta (radiation) and matter, in particular that between valence shell electrons and photons. Quantum mechanics is a fundamental and necessary branch of physics with wide applications in both experimental and theoretical physics. Quantum theory generalizes all classical theories, including mechanics, electromagnetism (except general relativity), and provides accurate descriptions for many previously unexplained phenomena such as black body radiation and stable electron orbits.The effects of quantum mechanics are typically not observable on macroscopic scales, but become evident at the atomic and subatomic level."

In 2006, Steven Hawkings and colleague Thomas Hertog published a paper that claimed the universe:

had no unique beginning. Instead, they argue, it began in just about every way imaginable (and maybe some that aren't). Out of this profusion of beginnings, the vast majority withered away without leaving any real imprint on the Universe we know today....

But Hawking and Hertog say that the countless 'alternative worlds' of string theory may actually have existed. We should picture the Universe in the first instants of the Big Bang as a superposition of all these possibilities, they say; like a projection of billions of movies played on top of one another.

But in the first instants of the Big Bang, there existed a superposition of ever more different versions of the Universe, instead of a unique history. And most crucially, Hertog says that "our current Universe has features frozen in from this early quantum mixture".

In other words, some of these alternative histories have left their imprint behind.