My Swamp Thing Review – Part One

The year is 1985, I am 14 years old and living in a small Northern California town. It’s summer break and I spend the hot days doing what I’ve always done for as long as my 14 year old brain can remember – hanging out with my best friend Brian, riding bikes, climbing trees, watching Star Wars, typing in game codes in my TRS80 computer we got from magazines, drawing, and of course reading comics. I bought my comics down the street at our neighborhood store Warrens Market. A tiny little Mom and Pop store that had that smell – you know that tiny market smell? Whenever I walk into a little convenience store these days, sometimes I’ll catch a whiff of Warrens Market and long for those summer days, scanning the comic book rack for something to catch my eye. On one my favorite comics at the time was Atari Force, but it just ended and I was in the market for another series to collect. So one afternoon Brian and I rode down to Warrens to get a root beer and some comics. I flipped thru the racks not really seeing anything that good. Brian I believe picked up an X-Men comic and headed to the freezer section to grab his A&W. I started to resign myself to getting a comic that I really wasn’t into, but then something caught my eye – A werewolf. There on the cover a werewolf, dripping blood, howled at the moon. Above his head I read the words for the first time, “Swamp Thing”. I grabbed it. Got my root beer. Hopped on my bike and rode back to Brian’s. I climbed the tree in his front yard with root beer and comic in hand, and spent the next 20 minutes in another world. To this day, when I visit my home town I’ll drive past Brian’s old house and I’ll remember that day in the summer of ’85. I still have that comic, Swamp Thing issue 40 – beaten and torn, stained and wrinkled. But every now and then I’ll take it out of the long box and open it up. I can smell Warrens Market in its folds. I can smell the tree in Brian’s front yard. I can taste the root beer. It’s all there, like a time machine I can travel in – taking me back to a simpler time. Those memories are what make me. I cherish them like I cherish that old Swamp Thing comic – knowing that I’ll never have moments like that again.

Swamp Thing swiftly became my favorite comic. I sought out the all the back issues, even going back to the original 1970’s series. But it was Alan Moore’s voice in which Swamp Thing spoke the best. Moore took over the series at issue 21 and right off the bat changed everything. Up until that time Swamp Thing was a human trapped in a monsters body. for years Dr. Alec Holland searched for a way to restore his humanity – to get his life back he once had. In issue 21 he discovers that he never was Alec Holland – just a plant that thought he was Alec Holland. He could never become human. He was indeed a monster. But the ghost of Alec Holland remained. It haunted the Swamp Thing. Unable to rest. Alec Holland’s memories may have transferred to the plant creature, but his bones remained in the swamp in which he died. In issue 28, the Swamp Thing digs up the bones of Alec and gives them a burial. Releasing the spirit of Alec and allowing him to move into the afterlife. The story of Dr. Holland was finished, but for the Swamp Thing this was just the beginning.

For years I followed the adventures of Swamp Thing, Abby, Chester, Matt, Arcane, and a host of DC heroes that would pop up in the title, eventually paving the way for the DC’s Vertigo line. Alan Moore’s run ended with issue 64 and really, for me, ended my love for the comic. I continued to collect the series for about year afterwards but things just weren’t the same. I moved on, and the saga of the Swamp Thing became a moment in time I looked back on with fondness, and something that I truly missed.

I walked into my comic shop today and saw old friend I hadn’t seen for years. Welcome back Swamp Thing, we sure have a lot of catching up to do.

My Swamp Thing Review – Part Two

Talk about hard act to follow.
There were two ways the new Swamp Thing could have went: One, copy Alan Moore. Two, don’t copy Alan Moore. Thankfully Scott Synder is a bright guy and understood that even though imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, the success of a new Swamp Thing title depends on a fresh look into the world of our favorite muck incrusted monster. DC couldn’t have gotten a better writer this job. Synder has been firing on all cylinders this last year in comics and his voice and enthusiasm for this genre is evident in every word he puts to page. What he has done is to allow his own voice now to speak thru Swamp Thing, not Alan Moore’s. But like I said, Synder is a bright fellow, and he knows a good thing when he sees it. What made Alan Moores Swamp Thing so special was the truth he brought to the characters in this totally unbelievable world, and right from the get go Synder is bringing the truth. This world is real. Alec Holland is back, and he is real. Alec tells us of his love of plants, and of his hate of plants, and of his fear of plants. All this punctuated by the facts Synder throws our way. He is teaching us about the plant world through Holland’s character. There is more to this comic then just a swamp monster. There is humanity.

Synder has given us the opening act of his tale of humanity seen through the eyes of a monster. The stage is set. The winds of change have resurrected the bones of the past. Something wicked this way comes.