Doing what I love

Who doesn’t love Swamp Thing? If the idea of a big green monster with a permanent tether to the natural world isn’t enough to draw your attention, let the continuous emergence of new tales and adaptations be a testament to the character’s enduring popularity. As November draws closer and I get ready for the panel at Thought Bubble, I sat down to think about my own history with the character, and why his stories instantly grabbed me.

I’ve dropped in and out of narratives of the Green over the past few years, mostly following Scott Snyder and Yanick Paquette’s New 52 run and picking up Halloween specials here and there. I had been a fan of Ram V and Mike Perkins’s run before I had the chance to get a look at the scripts and pages myself. But, perhaps predictably, my first brush with Swamp Thing was through Alan Moore, Stephen Bissette and Jon Totleben’s work. I wasn’t recommended the book as much as I stumbled upon it, though in what form, I don’t remember; Italian editions are notorious for always changing, or being dropped mid-run never to be picked up again, and I think I may even have read some of that run in an old black and white version I fished out of a cramped long box at my LCS. But I was thrilled by the promise of horror and the look and feel of the book, which directly called to classic monster movies. Flicking through those pages, I assumed to find a kind of horror I’ve always enjoyed: man confronted with wilderness he has no control over, the hubris of someone attempting to conquer a foreign, supernatural terrain that ultimately revolts, often to gruesome ends. I was sold.

But I got so much more out of that book and, shocker, can trace the beginning of it all back to one issue: The Anatomy Lesson, from The Saga of the Swamp Thing #21 (if you know, you know!) Exclusively told from the point of view of Jason Woodrue, the issue autopsies Swamp Thing—literally—to conclude that he is not the transformed Alec Holland, but an embodiment of the swamp itself, infused with Holland’s consciousness. The issue blew my mind when I read it at fifteen, and did it again when I revisited it before writing this. The idea that Swamp Thing has been hanging onto its tether to humanity, or the possibility of regaining humanity, only to discover that he is only human “by imitation”, that he is a product of swamp organisms eating and then mimicking Holland through the spill of his consciousness into the Green, was something I found instantly compelling. I encountered Swamp Thing as a thing first and Alec Holland second, and maybe that has swayed my preference for stories which narrow their focus on the monster he has become (or was born.)

Looking back on that issue now, I can see why it ticked a lot of boxes at the time. It is without a doubt a horror issue, with masterful pacing and spine-chilling atmosphere delivered through clever layouts and grotesque artwork. It features an arrogant, uber-rich man attempting to dominate a supernatural force (technically, two!) which ultimately tricks and kills him. It even has a callback to Anatomy of a Murder in the title design! But more than that, it hooked me with its dissection of Swamp Thing himself, and its repositioning of the character as not-quite-Alec Holland. Much of Moore’s run as I remember it grapples with questions of humanity in monstrosity, but also inhabits that monstrosity as the definition of what Swamp Thing is. Darkness is comforting, and the inhospitable wild becomes home.

As the life cycle of characters in superhero comics is one of endless rebirths and retcons, I think the best Swamp Thing stories, whether the presence of a human avatar is reinstated or not, continue to be the ones that articulate the dynamic between the natural and supernatural without being overly skewed toward the human side. On top of that, I like a bit (or a lot!) of mystery in the Green; the unknown is fascinating because it can’t always be explained, and that opens up endless possibilities for stories that do not play by human rules and that, more often than not, turn out some of the best-looking comics you’ll read. Swamp Thing is a masterclass of depicting horror in nature, and there is no shortage of terrifying yet beautiful imagery scattered across the character’s history.

But Alec Holland’s—or, recently, Levi Kamei’s—consciousness remains, and should not be erased. One of my favourite things to read in Swamp Thing comics is the notion of the avatar as less of a host and more of an infection; the transplanted memories of the human protagonist serve as a channel to open up stories that delve into matters of identity and legacy, and set up the Green as a playground woven from years and years of blended memories—sometimes deep-rooted, sometimes borrowed. I love a good identity crisis, and it’s been exciting to follow Levi’s run and see how these themes come into play in his story. It’s been especially refreshing to see the role of “avatar of the Green” extricated from Alec Holland and bestowed onto a new character, and to transport the action to Kaziranga and see how Levi’s nationality and culture are central to his role as the Swamp Thing.

It’s a great time to be reading swampy comics. I feel as excited about the character now as I did when I first encountered him, and I am grateful to be working on the book, in a small capacity. I can’t wait to tackle these big questions of identity and human (or monstrous) nature with such a fantastic group of creators, and to hear what has inspired and informed their portrayals of Swamp Thing through the years, both stylistically and aesthetically.

If you’re reading this and will be attending Thought Bubble, I hope you’ll come along! And if you have any questions you’d like to ask, drop me a line at asst@mirrormakerstudios.com and I’ll do my best to get to them.

For now, I’m taking the week to revisit the original Wein/Wrightson run, and thinking up some questions of my own.

-- Chiara