Swamp Thing Vol. 2: Family Tree (The New 52)
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| Also known as "The Monster at the End of This Book" |
Writer: Scott
Snyder
Artists: Yanick
Pquette and Marco Rudy
Collects: Swamp Thing #1-7
Background
Information:
The second in Scott Snyder week!
I’ll admit, for too long I had dismissed Swamp Thing as a book that was “too
weird” for my tastes. And yeah, it’s
pretty weird- Swamp Thing is listed
under the “horror” subsection of DC’s New 52, along with Animal Man and Justice League
Dark. But don’t dismiss it- Swamp Thing is every bit the superhero that
Superman or Batman are.
Alec Holland was a brilliant biochemist until a lab
experiment killed him. Post-death, Holland was found by an entity known as the
Parliament of Trees and chosen to become the Swamp Thing. Swamp Thing is the
avatar of the Green- the life force that controls plants. As such, Swamp Thing
can also control all plant life- creating anything out of vines, like his
wings, or a large, tough-looking blade.
Review:
If there is a book that makes a good argument for not having more Batman titles, it’s Swamp Thing. It’s kinda ironic, considering that the series is
written by Batman writer Scott
Snyder, but it goes to show that a great comic is more about who’s writing it
than which character’s name is in the title.
So in this title, Alec Holland has been Swamp Thing before
and well and truly believes that he’s finished. Not so, a life-force known as
The Rot is resurfacing with a young boy as its avatar. The Rot is the force of
death and decay, and it’s starting to build its own kingdom on earth. In
response, the Parliament of Trees calls on Swamp Thing to defeat it.
But Alec is done being Swamp Thing. He has too many
haunting, disjointed memories of the experience and never wants to take on the
mantle again. There’s a great message about personal sacrifice here. We want to
sympathise with Alec- being Swamp Thing is a living hell and nobody would
actually want to be him. At the same time though, there is a zero per cent chance
that the human race will survive if Alec doesn’t take on the Swamp Thing
mantle, so we also end up seeing him as somewhat selfish for his reluctance. It
makes for a deep, multi-layered character that none of the Justice League has
really managed to pull off just yet.
Equally interesting is Alec’s love interest Abigail Arcane, a
woman with a deep connection to The Rot. Snyder somehow manages to balance
Abigail’s part as both a love interest to be rescued and as a strong female
character who is more than capable of handling things herself. It’s fascinating
to see this line walked so well and by the end, you are cheering for both
Abigail and Swamp Thing equally.
There’s some brilliantly dark dialogue in Raise Them Bones. Snyder gets the horror
comic genre perfectly, allowing the dialogue to be highly entertaining without
it being funny in the least. There’s a weird belief around comics at the moment
that in order to be entertaining, a book has to have humour. DC’s been
regularly attacked for not having enough humour in their books. While there are
some titles about which I could say that’s a fair comment; Swamp Thing isn’t one of them. It’s appeal comes from visiting that
dark side and being completely removed from your comfort zone while going
somewhere rather disturbing.
And at the end of the day, it’s the art that really drives
that disturbance home. Undead humans with twisted necks, zombie pigs with
soulless eyes and other twisted creatures made of rotting flesh abound in this
collection and they look as unnerving as they sound- possibly more. Okay, sure,
some of the creatures of both The Green and The Rot look like rejected pokemon,
but they’re scary rejected pokemon. The book also benefits from the total lack
of gutters in the page design. Panels are separated at odd angles with
blood-splatter and vine shapes and give the book a chaotic feel that suits a
horror story like little else can.
My one gripe with Raise
Them Bones is that for a book in a series entitled Swamp Thing, you see a lot more of Alec Holland. Swamp thing only
appears at the end of the book which is a problem when that’s the title of the
book. If the book was called Scary
Rejected Pokemon, I’d probably be okay with it, but I imagine you buy a comic
called Swamp Thing, you want to see
Swamp Thing.
But all the same, Raise
Them Bones is an excellent look at the horror genre and it gets a four out
of five scary rejected pokemon.
****
+ Well-developed characters
+ Dialogue that is great despite a lack of humour
+ Art is gorgeously creepy
- Swamp Thing doesn’t actually show up that much
Alternate Option: Batman: The Court of Owls
Another great one by Snyder, and if you’re worried about a
book about a swamp monster being good, you can at least check out Snyder’s
talent here.
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