alibi_shop (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
alibi_shop) wrote2019-05-20 08:26 pm
alibi_shop) wrote2019-05-20 08:26 pm
Entry tags:
Swamp Thing reread, part 6
Swamp Thing #46-55 (1986-87)
Written by Alan Moore
Art by Steve Bissette/John Totleben, except #48/#53 by Totleben, #49 by Woch/Alcala/Totleben, #50 by Bissette/Veitch/Totleben, #51/#54 by Veitch/Alcala, #55 by Veitch/Alcala/Totleben
The resolution of the "American Gothic" storyline, in which all those short monster stories turn out to be just the groundwork for a plan by ancient Chilean warlocks to summon an ultimate darkness, is like a summing up of Moore's favorite aspects of the series so far. There's some very dark horror imagery that's nearly irrelevant to anything, but still cool*. There's some peaceful trippy stuff about cosmic awareness (expanding on the mythology even more to establish Swamp Thing as basically a god in a long tradition of gods). There's a certain amount of superhero nuttiness, due to contractual obligations. There's more of the "gather a bunch of magic-themed DC characters in a cosmic setting" stuff that we saw earlier in the Abby-in-hell story. And there's a strong philosophical point of view, basically Romantic, that ultimately is what resolves the problem rather than punches or magical force of will.
The superhero nuttiness is required because DC decided to do a year-long miniseries event, Crisis on Infinite Earths, in order to clear the decks of a bunch of characters and universes they didn't want. If you haven't read Crisis, I really don't recommend it (aside from the art); it's mostly just a lot of "Hey, we also have this guy! and this guy!", with a denouement where everyone keeps trying and failing to kill a big mean alien. But every DC comic has to mention this event, so Moore does the bare minimum to acknowledge the plot (Swampy gets beamed up to a space station! Who are all these superheroes? Don't know, don't care), and goes on for a bit describing random sci-fi chaos because writing one-sentence-long pulp stories is fun. He then has his all-knowing mystery man Constantine explain that this stuff is just a distraction from the real conflict—the spiritual one. And when the ultimate darkness shows up... in a way it's a similar denouement, where all of these powerful magical heroes keep trying and failing to kill it. But the difference is that it actually matters who they are: each one has a specific emotional attitude toward conflict, and Swamp Thing's equanimity, his willingness to consider that maybe everything has its place (even though he did shut down the Brujería pretty violently), turns out to be the key. And where Crisis concludes by making a new Earth with all kinds of visible changes, this other thing results in a world that's exactly the same, but with sort of a different subtext—a pretty hard concept to get across, but I have to admire him for trying.
Where do you go after saving the entire universe? How about to court? We've seen some jarring transitions before, but I think it's safe to say that no one expected the next conflict to be with the government of Houma, Louisiana, arresting Abby for bestiality. This is a very weird storyline. Ultimately it's just an excuse to set up a standoff between Swampy and humanity (that is, Gotham City, where Abby has fled for no real reason except that Moore likes Batman) which produces some jaw-dropping imagery as the city is transformed by vegetation and menaced by a 100-foot-tall wooden version of our hero. The legal premise makes no sense in a world where there are all kinds of non-human superheroes with human partners, as Batman himself points out a bit late, and the characterization of the citizens is not exactly nuanced: small-town residents are hateful garbage whereas city dwellers have no hangups at all (delightfully, when Swampy has turned Gotham into a jungle, people decide it's cool and start romping around naked). But this does work to convince us that nothing can possibly stop our guy now. And then he gets blown up and destroyed.
Obviously Swamp Thing is not really dead, but he's not around, and it's convincing enough that we can now spend some time with the human characters and feel their loss. Abby now gets to narrate some more, with Moore getting a better handle on her voice now that she's not always terrified or ecstatic. And, in another jarring and weirdly handled mini-storyline, we finally get back our other long-time protagonists—Liz and Dennis. Well, sort of. Due to, I guess, the stress of having been almost murdered many times, and maybe Vietnam PTSD, and maybe Moore just not liking him very much, Dennis has turned into a horrible abusive asshole who has gaslighted Liz into being a total basket case who never leaves the house. Wait, now he's a homicidal asshole, with a machine gun! Where can he go from there? Straight into the jaws of a bunch of alligators, that's where. Liz's characterization is not as bad as that, but it still has so little to do with how she was presented before that I kind of wonder if there was something personal about this, like if Moore based it on something he was angry about that had happened to a friend. It may also just be a commentary on the "people on the run from danger who fall in love" cliché, suggesting that trauma-based romance is likely to turn out really badly; Liz says that "all we have in common is the horror in our lives". Either way, I presume there's some future role for her in the story, so we'll see.
But now human issues will have to wait, because the answer to where is Swamp Thing is he's in outer space.
Inventories
Stuff that'll be in Vertigo comics later: Constantine's supergroup of sorcerers will be in The Books of Magic. I think the idea that the Phantom Stranger is an angel who's on the outs with both heaven and hell (which still doesn't make him interesting, somehow) is also a Moore thing that others will use. And we get a few hints about Constantine having magically fucked up somehow in Newcastle, which will be a big thing in Hellblazer (as will the idea that he's constantly hanging his friends out to dry, in this case the third-tier superhero Mento).
Non-human animals: Constantine's friend Judith is turned into a bird in an extremely unpleasant way. Dennis is eaten by four alligators. We briefly see what might be the first dog we've seen since the unfortunate one in 1972; it looks better. A Gotham City street gang from "the Manchester district"(?) releases zoo animals, but we don't really see them. Ill-fated cats are mentioned twice: 1. a news report about Gotham's vegetable problem mentions that "two cats were eaten" by a carnivorous plant; 2. (in a nice example of Moore's ability to do without a lot of Gothic adjectives when he feels like it) a psychic describes a demon's mind as "a tub full of boiling cats".
Swamp Thing origin recaps: None?!
Next: to seek out new life and new civilizations
Written by Alan Moore
Art by Steve Bissette/John Totleben, except #48/#53 by Totleben, #49 by Woch/Alcala/Totleben, #50 by Bissette/Veitch/Totleben, #51/#54 by Veitch/Alcala, #55 by Veitch/Alcala/Totleben
The resolution of the "American Gothic" storyline, in which all those short monster stories turn out to be just the groundwork for a plan by ancient Chilean warlocks to summon an ultimate darkness, is like a summing up of Moore's favorite aspects of the series so far. There's some very dark horror imagery that's nearly irrelevant to anything, but still cool*. There's some peaceful trippy stuff about cosmic awareness (expanding on the mythology even more to establish Swamp Thing as basically a god in a long tradition of gods). There's a certain amount of superhero nuttiness, due to contractual obligations. There's more of the "gather a bunch of magic-themed DC characters in a cosmic setting" stuff that we saw earlier in the Abby-in-hell story. And there's a strong philosophical point of view, basically Romantic, that ultimately is what resolves the problem rather than punches or magical force of will.
The superhero nuttiness is required because DC decided to do a year-long miniseries event, Crisis on Infinite Earths, in order to clear the decks of a bunch of characters and universes they didn't want. If you haven't read Crisis, I really don't recommend it (aside from the art); it's mostly just a lot of "Hey, we also have this guy! and this guy!", with a denouement where everyone keeps trying and failing to kill a big mean alien. But every DC comic has to mention this event, so Moore does the bare minimum to acknowledge the plot (Swampy gets beamed up to a space station! Who are all these superheroes? Don't know, don't care), and goes on for a bit describing random sci-fi chaos because writing one-sentence-long pulp stories is fun. He then has his all-knowing mystery man Constantine explain that this stuff is just a distraction from the real conflict—the spiritual one. And when the ultimate darkness shows up... in a way it's a similar denouement, where all of these powerful magical heroes keep trying and failing to kill it. But the difference is that it actually matters who they are: each one has a specific emotional attitude toward conflict, and Swamp Thing's equanimity, his willingness to consider that maybe everything has its place (even though he did shut down the Brujería pretty violently), turns out to be the key. And where Crisis concludes by making a new Earth with all kinds of visible changes, this other thing results in a world that's exactly the same, but with sort of a different subtext—a pretty hard concept to get across, but I have to admire him for trying.
Where do you go after saving the entire universe? How about to court? We've seen some jarring transitions before, but I think it's safe to say that no one expected the next conflict to be with the government of Houma, Louisiana, arresting Abby for bestiality. This is a very weird storyline. Ultimately it's just an excuse to set up a standoff between Swampy and humanity (that is, Gotham City, where Abby has fled for no real reason except that Moore likes Batman) which produces some jaw-dropping imagery as the city is transformed by vegetation and menaced by a 100-foot-tall wooden version of our hero. The legal premise makes no sense in a world where there are all kinds of non-human superheroes with human partners, as Batman himself points out a bit late, and the characterization of the citizens is not exactly nuanced: small-town residents are hateful garbage whereas city dwellers have no hangups at all (delightfully, when Swampy has turned Gotham into a jungle, people decide it's cool and start romping around naked). But this does work to convince us that nothing can possibly stop our guy now. And then he gets blown up and destroyed.
Obviously Swamp Thing is not really dead, but he's not around, and it's convincing enough that we can now spend some time with the human characters and feel their loss. Abby now gets to narrate some more, with Moore getting a better handle on her voice now that she's not always terrified or ecstatic. And, in another jarring and weirdly handled mini-storyline, we finally get back our other long-time protagonists—Liz and Dennis. Well, sort of. Due to, I guess, the stress of having been almost murdered many times, and maybe Vietnam PTSD, and maybe Moore just not liking him very much, Dennis has turned into a horrible abusive asshole who has gaslighted Liz into being a total basket case who never leaves the house. Wait, now he's a homicidal asshole, with a machine gun! Where can he go from there? Straight into the jaws of a bunch of alligators, that's where. Liz's characterization is not as bad as that, but it still has so little to do with how she was presented before that I kind of wonder if there was something personal about this, like if Moore based it on something he was angry about that had happened to a friend. It may also just be a commentary on the "people on the run from danger who fall in love" cliché, suggesting that trauma-based romance is likely to turn out really badly; Liz says that "all we have in common is the horror in our lives". Either way, I presume there's some future role for her in the story, so we'll see.
But now human issues will have to wait, because the answer to where is Swamp Thing is he's in outer space.
Inventories
Stuff that'll be in Vertigo comics later: Constantine's supergroup of sorcerers will be in The Books of Magic. I think the idea that the Phantom Stranger is an angel who's on the outs with both heaven and hell (which still doesn't make him interesting, somehow) is also a Moore thing that others will use. And we get a few hints about Constantine having magically fucked up somehow in Newcastle, which will be a big thing in Hellblazer (as will the idea that he's constantly hanging his friends out to dry, in this case the third-tier superhero Mento).
Non-human animals: Constantine's friend Judith is turned into a bird in an extremely unpleasant way. Dennis is eaten by four alligators. We briefly see what might be the first dog we've seen since the unfortunate one in 1972; it looks better. A Gotham City street gang from "the Manchester district"(?) releases zoo animals, but we don't really see them. Ill-fated cats are mentioned twice: 1. a news report about Gotham's vegetable problem mentions that "two cats were eaten" by a carnivorous plant; 2. (in a nice example of Moore's ability to do without a lot of Gothic adjectives when he feels like it) a psychic describes a demon's mind as "a tub full of boiling cats".
Swamp Thing origin recaps: None?!
Next: to seek out new life and new civilizations