John Cassaday

John Cassaday, my friend and collaborator of over twenty-five years, died on Monday 9 September at the age of 52.

He had a heart attack on Tuesday 3 September and never woke up.

I first met him in the Nineties, online: he’d done work on some indie project, I think one of Hart Fisher’s, that caught my eye and I made contact with him. We tried to set up a project back then, but it didn’t work out for some reason lost to the mists of time. But he used the pages he’d done as samples, which got in front of Mark Waid, who showed them to lovely Jeff Mariotte, who got him into Wildstorm to do Jeff’s DESPERADOES.

If you read about John this week, I bet you anything that nobody will take the credit for “discovering” John, including me. John was always going to happen. He was just too good. I will use the word “defining” a couple of times.

John and I met properly at San Diego in 1997. We sat down at the far edge of the convention floor and quickly established we wanted to try something together again, at Wildstorm. John said he’d love to try a monthly series, but hated the idea of having to draw the same thing every issue.

That right there was the genesis of PLANETARY. Creating a book for John that wasn’t the same thing every month. That’s the book. Taking that wish right up to changing the covers completely every issue.

(We quickly adjusted to six-weekly, which wasn’t unheard of back then, because John was meticulous.)

“How will people find the book every issue?” they asked. “It’ll be the book that doesn’t look like anything else on the shelf,” we said.

I believe I sent PLANETARY over to Wildstorm as a pitch, just to see if they were interested in the idea, without mentioning John. The story goes that Scott Dunbier saw the pitch and phoned John to say he’d found the perfect book for him. Scott had no idea about John and I’s conversations. He just knew.

John went on to do that joyful, glorious run on ASTONISHING X-MEN with Joss, that defining CAPTAIN AMERICA run, the magnificent I AM LEGION and the STAR WARS comic that sold a million copies.

John could do anything, and was constantly reaching for more in his art, storytelling and design. He made me better. He was a rare talent and a rarer human.

We stayed friends despite the fact that he’d worked with me. He complained about me mildly, he took the piss out of me - he had a very dry sense of humour - but he remained my friend. We last talked about a year ago, I think. He was still trying to drag me out to NYC. He was working on a multimedia project and we were coming up on the time he wanted to pick my brain about animation writing and producing. If you were John’s friend, he supported you and had your back no matter what, and you did the same for him, because he was John.

There are times in your life when you find out who your friends are. John was my friend.

Defining. He was one of the few defining Western comics creators of the last twenty-five years. He should have had another twenty-five years. He was a titan of the form, and a wonderful human being, and I should not be writing this utterly inadequate note on my friend who left the room too early.

Sending all best wishes and best hopes for the future to his loved ones and family.

I know I’ve thanked you before, John, but thank you again, and good night, my good friend.

Letters about the creative life by Warren Ellis, a writer from England. Was this forwarded to you? Subscribe.

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