Regarding Quentin's Immortality

[Bob_the_Bartender]

Hey, gang,

Excuse me if this topic has been broached recently, but I've always wondered about the immortality Quentin "achieved" after Charles Delaware Tate completed that mystical portrait of him in 1897.

As the years passed by after the return of Barnabas, Dr. Hoffman and Prof. Stokes from their trip to 1840 (back to 1971), how do you think Quentin coped with the fact that everyone at Collinwood (and, for that matter, in Collinsport) had obviously started to show the inevitable signs of aging?   I mean, even David, the youngest Collins, would be in his mid-fifties and AARP-eligible by now.   And, yet, Quentin would still look to be only around 30-years-old. 

Of course, Barnabas and Jullia Hoffman would be "hip" to Quentin's personal "fountain of youth," but wouldn't David, Carolyn and Maggie be the least be curious (or even suspicious) about Quentin's ability to defy Father Time?

Maybe they all thought that Quentin was a faithful patient of some of those high-priced plastic surgeons, which many Hollywood celebrities are also suspected of being "faithful patients"?

In any event, kudos to Quentin!  He looks as eternally youthful as Cher, Kenny Rogers, Faye Dunaway, Mickey Rourke, and the always ageless Ms. Joan Rivers!!!   

Bob

[Cousin_Barnabas]

At some point, the painting would have had to be destroyed, thus ending it all.   

[Bob_the_Bartender]

At some point, the painting would have had to be destroyed, thus ending it all.   

Cousin_Barnabas,

Maybe Quentin had that important portrait locked away in one of those mines, where everyone's SAT scores and college grades are stored for perpetuity?

Bob

[Cousin_Barnabas]

LOL! 

Well, I was just thinking of a way to explain Selby's aging, but maybe that would have stopped that as well!   

[Bob_the_Bartender]

Well, I was just thinking of a way to explain Selby's aging, but maybe that would have stopped that as well!   

I think (just to be safe) Julia Hoffman eventually retrieved her personal diary from attorney Tony Petersen and schlepped that all-important-baby in one of those nuclear bomb proof mines as well!

[quentincollins]

IIRC, in Return to Collinwood Quentin was dying his hair with grey to at least give the illusion of some signs of aging.

[Gerard]

I dealt with that in my "what-if-DS-had-continued" thing.  In it, an artist changed Tate's portrait to allow Quentin to achieve mortality without the lycanthropic curse to subdue him.  There was a side story where the consciousness of Petofi tried to stop it ("consciousness," rather than ghost - it's long and convoluted so I won't go into it here).  But it worked and Quentin again became totally human - and mortal.  When I did my "widshc" thing, I tried to tie up illogical and lose ends.

Gerard

[MagnusTrask]

It's funny how we're all taking for granted that Quentin's just coming out and explaining to the rest of the family isn't an option, because they treated all supernatural secrets that way on DS.   At some point it has to come out, and there has been enough of the supernatural going on around Collinwood that it can't be unbelievable by the 70s or 80s, say.

By the way Bob, [spoiler]Julia finds her journal in the ruins of Collinwood in 1995.[/spoiler]

[quentincollins]

From what I've read of Lara Parker's upcoming Wolf Moon, Quentin is going to be tied into the Collins family history in the 1920s, so it's possible that Liz may have always known or suspected there was more to Quentin than she let on.
That's one thing I liked about the Burton movie, it did some things that hadn't been done before, like the family facing up to what Barnabas was, and we got to see how they reacted, which was pretty well. I loved Liz's dynamic with Barnabas there, as she depended on him and accepted him for who and what he was.

[Bob_the_Bartender]

IIRC, in Return to Collinwood Quentin was dying his hair with grey to at least give the illusion of some signs of aging.

quentincollins,

Personally, I think that Quentin should have opted for some of that Touch of Grey hair dye product rather than just ordinary grey hair dye.  In fact, Quentin would have made a terrific tv commercial spokesperson for Touch of Grey.

I can see it now, Quentin, in one of his mod suits, holding a box of the hair dye in his hand, and standing next to his old record player in the Collinwood drawing room, and declaring: "Never trust anyone over 100!"   

Incidentally, my barber once told me that he occasionally gets elderly men as customers, who have lost all the pigmentation in their hair, leaving their hair with an almost yellowish tinge.  So, the barber tints their hair a subdued shade of grey to make their locks look better.  (Maybe the venerable Ezra Braitwaite was having that done to his sweeps at the local Collinsport barber shop?)


MagnusTrask,

Regarding Julia's journal lying around in the 1995 ruins of Collinwood, it's just as well that that guy and his ill-fated girlfriend did not find that highly sensitive journal during their brief (and fatal) excursion to the great house on the hill!

Bob 

[Gerard]

Interesting, Bob.  In my version, Quentin does resort to "cosmetic" means to make himself appear aging.  When his portrait is altered, he no longer has to schlep down to Walgreens to get what he needs.

Gerard

[quentincollins]

Since Quentin and Maggie were living togather as a couple for a year or so in RtC, I think it's a little funny that Maggie would think Quentin was very very well preserved, having the body and sex drive of a man thirty something years younger.

[Bob_the_Bartender]

Interesting, Bob.  In my version, Quentin does resort to "cosmetic" means to make himself appear aging.  When his portrait is altered, he no longer has to schlep down to Walgreens to get what he needs.h

Gerard,

I'll bet that all of the female employees at the local Collinsport Walgreens were absolutely thrilled and delighted whenever Quentin came into the store to shop!

You know, it almost seems that every time that I'm on the check-out line at my local Walgreen's, there is inevitably a kindly-looking, elderly woman in that line, who, when she gets up to the cashier, asks him, or her, for a carton of cigarettes.  And I'll bet that elderly (but, maybe not "kindly-looking") woman at the Collinsport Walgreens, who's looking for a not inexpensive carton of cigarettes, would be our own "beloved"  Mrs. Johnson! 

No doubt, those same Collinsport Walgreen employees must have been "delighted" when that local "regular guy," Roger Collins, came into shop.  Roger probably asked (read: insisted) that one of the employees escort him around the store to personally carry his various purchases, and then, to bring them over to the counter to be paid for while he casually looked for his cash card.  

Whenever poor Willie Loomis came into Walgreens, the store manager probably watched Willie like a hawk, so as to prevent any possible shoplifting occurrences!   (It's too bad that Matthew Morgan wasn't around long enough to get one of those Walgreens Balance Rewards cards to use.  Ol' Matthew would have been a "treat" to serve, imo.)


quentincollins,

Well, I hope that that version of Quentin and Maggie were far happier together, than were 1970 PT Quentin and Maggie!

Bob

   

[Gothick]

Gerard, thanks for letting us know about your project. I'm sitting here exhausted just *thinking* about how much time and trouble it would take to tie up ALL the illogical and loose ends from the series!  lol!

cheers, G.

[Patti Feinberg]

What a terrific topic Bob!!
lololol the workers @ Walgreen's....snort!!

I too absolutely love that in Burton's cover of DS, the family (at least Liz) doesn't 'recoil' from Barn's secret!!

Patti