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alibi_shopSwamp Thing #11-13 (1974): Len Wein and Nestor Redondo
Swamp Thing #14-18, 21-22 (1974-76): David Michelinie and Nestor Redondo
Swamp Thing #19-20, 23-24 (1975-76): Gerry Conway and Nestor Redondo
I'll call the rest of the original Swamp Thing series "the Redondo years", because that's the most obvious change: the writers are still more or less working within the template set up by Len Wein, but the art is a whole different experience.
Redondo is* a lot older than Wrightson and very technically proficient in a more consistent way; he's one of a handful of Filipino illustrators who got into American comics after being trained in an old-school style, more like what you'd see in '50s adventure or science-fiction stories (he also had a successful career in Christian comics). Whereas Wrightson's art alternates between 1. stuff that's fun but perhaps a little hasty and goofy and 2. jaw-dropping holy-shit chiaroscuro environments you could fall right into, Redondo's stuff is always clear and detailed and balanced—really a pleasure for the eye and classy as hell, if sometimes a bit lacking in personality. I could look at his landscapes and buildings all day, and he actually isn't bad at drawing Swamp Thing but otherwise he doesn't have much of a feel for the grotesque; when called upon to draw various kinds of mutated people, he gives them normal proportions but just makes their faces look kind of cartoony. Basically, horror isn't his thing.
Possibly as a result, the writers move further away from monster stuff. There's more science fiction; that's not really Wein's strong point, both of his SF stories are fairly boring and confusing, whereas Michelinie comes up with some entertainingly ludicrous ideas that wouldn't be out of place on Doctor Who (one of his characters has invented the "Ultra-Cerebralociter", which will fry the brains of all world leaders, based on the fact that leaders give off special brainwaves that followers don't have; another one is an alien who's forbidden to land anywhere and so is covered with devices that will kill him if he ever touches the soil of a planet—uh-oh, guess what our hero is partly made out of).
There's also some intrigue with Matt and Abby and various villains trying to study or destroy Swampy (the "bio-restorative formula" from his origin becomes more of a plot device now, everyone wants it) but that's mercifully brief; Matt and Abby are still pretty generic characters, though we get our first hints that Abby is psychic or something. And there's a new recurring character, Bolt, who's even less promising. Bolt's thing is that his girlfriend was killed by monsters and he's really angry—and did I mention he's African-American? If not, the narration will remind you he is, nearly every time he's mentioned! This hasn't really aged well—the writers trying to emphasize diversity but coming off as condescending is a recurring theme, by no means limited to Swamp Thing—and unlike for instance Blade (a blaxploitation monster-hunter created at Marvel slightly earlier, with a somewhat similar name, and similarly motivated by revenge), Bolt has no other interesting qualities. He's soon rendered catatonic, then is healed and forgotten about.
Gerry Conway's four issues are by far the most distinctive in writing style, which is good and bad. His first mini-storyline is a fairly traditional "weird person versus destructive humans" setup, but also adds the first really cool elaboration on Swampy's nature: his arm got cut off earlier, and it grew back as expected, but it turns out that the cut-off arm also grew its own body, and the new animalistic pseudo-Swampy is actually kind of interesting—though also kind of a Man-Thing knock-off. (There's also an immortal Seminole man who says things like "White devils! You must pay!", in what again was intended to be a progressive storyline for the '70s.)
But Conway's last two issues—which unfortunately would be the last word until six years later since the series got abruptly cancelled—read as if he had decided "Screw this series, wandering around in Louisiana is boring, I'll blow it all up!" and his way of doing that was to turn Swampy back into the human Alec Holland and have him fall in love (with someone he just met) while being pursued by yet another supervillain organization. This would be bad enough, but there's also an even more heinous gratuitous origin recap than all the others so far: after establishing that Swampy has just told his whole origin story to Alec's brother Edward, Conway has Edward tell the whole thing back to Swampy in dialogue, in the same flowery narration style used throughout the series ("You became a muck-encrusted, shambling mockery of life... a twisted caricature of humanity that can only be called... SWAMP THING!"). It's hilariously bad (maybe intentionally?), and it makes me appreciate a certain aspect of Moore's "The Anatomy Lesson" even more, but I'll get to that.
However, Redondo's art by this point has become even better, with more inventive layouts and more dynamic action, so the series goes out on a high note visually even though we're no longer in a swamp at all.
Next: Pasko & Yeates
Swamp Thing #14-18, 21-22 (1974-76): David Michelinie and Nestor Redondo
Swamp Thing #19-20, 23-24 (1975-76): Gerry Conway and Nestor Redondo
I'll call the rest of the original Swamp Thing series "the Redondo years", because that's the most obvious change: the writers are still more or less working within the template set up by Len Wein, but the art is a whole different experience.
Redondo is* a lot older than Wrightson and very technically proficient in a more consistent way; he's one of a handful of Filipino illustrators who got into American comics after being trained in an old-school style, more like what you'd see in '50s adventure or science-fiction stories (he also had a successful career in Christian comics). Whereas Wrightson's art alternates between 1. stuff that's fun but perhaps a little hasty and goofy and 2. jaw-dropping holy-shit chiaroscuro environments you could fall right into, Redondo's stuff is always clear and detailed and balanced—really a pleasure for the eye and classy as hell, if sometimes a bit lacking in personality. I could look at his landscapes and buildings all day, and he actually isn't bad at drawing Swamp Thing but otherwise he doesn't have much of a feel for the grotesque; when called upon to draw various kinds of mutated people, he gives them normal proportions but just makes their faces look kind of cartoony. Basically, horror isn't his thing.
Possibly as a result, the writers move further away from monster stuff. There's more science fiction; that's not really Wein's strong point, both of his SF stories are fairly boring and confusing, whereas Michelinie comes up with some entertainingly ludicrous ideas that wouldn't be out of place on Doctor Who (one of his characters has invented the "Ultra-Cerebralociter", which will fry the brains of all world leaders, based on the fact that leaders give off special brainwaves that followers don't have; another one is an alien who's forbidden to land anywhere and so is covered with devices that will kill him if he ever touches the soil of a planet—uh-oh, guess what our hero is partly made out of).
There's also some intrigue with Matt and Abby and various villains trying to study or destroy Swampy (the "bio-restorative formula" from his origin becomes more of a plot device now, everyone wants it) but that's mercifully brief; Matt and Abby are still pretty generic characters, though we get our first hints that Abby is psychic or something. And there's a new recurring character, Bolt, who's even less promising. Bolt's thing is that his girlfriend was killed by monsters and he's really angry—and did I mention he's African-American? If not, the narration will remind you he is, nearly every time he's mentioned! This hasn't really aged well—the writers trying to emphasize diversity but coming off as condescending is a recurring theme, by no means limited to Swamp Thing—and unlike for instance Blade (a blaxploitation monster-hunter created at Marvel slightly earlier, with a somewhat similar name, and similarly motivated by revenge), Bolt has no other interesting qualities. He's soon rendered catatonic, then is healed and forgotten about.
Gerry Conway's four issues are by far the most distinctive in writing style, which is good and bad. His first mini-storyline is a fairly traditional "weird person versus destructive humans" setup, but also adds the first really cool elaboration on Swampy's nature: his arm got cut off earlier, and it grew back as expected, but it turns out that the cut-off arm also grew its own body, and the new animalistic pseudo-Swampy is actually kind of interesting—though also kind of a Man-Thing knock-off. (There's also an immortal Seminole man who says things like "White devils! You must pay!", in what again was intended to be a progressive storyline for the '70s.)
But Conway's last two issues—which unfortunately would be the last word until six years later since the series got abruptly cancelled—read as if he had decided "Screw this series, wandering around in Louisiana is boring, I'll blow it all up!" and his way of doing that was to turn Swampy back into the human Alec Holland and have him fall in love (with someone he just met) while being pursued by yet another supervillain organization. This would be bad enough, but there's also an even more heinous gratuitous origin recap than all the others so far: after establishing that Swampy has just told his whole origin story to Alec's brother Edward, Conway has Edward tell the whole thing back to Swampy in dialogue, in the same flowery narration style used throughout the series ("You became a muck-encrusted, shambling mockery of life... a twisted caricature of humanity that can only be called... SWAMP THING!"). It's hilariously bad (maybe intentionally?), and it makes me appreciate a certain aspect of Moore's "The Anatomy Lesson" even more, but I'll get to that.
However, Redondo's art by this point has become even better, with more inventive layouts and more dynamic action, so the series goes out on a high note visually even though we're no longer in a swamp at all.
Next: Pasko & Yeates
