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alibi_shopSwamp Thing #65-76 (1987-88)
Written by Rick Veitch
Art by Veitch/Alfredo Alcala, except #70 by Veitch/Alcala/Brett Ewins
Rick Veitch makes sense as the next writer for Swamp Thing in several ways: he's both written and drawn the book before, he's collaborated with Moore and Bissette and Totleben on other things, and he shares Moore's interest in obscure old comic characters and idiosyncratic science fiction—but also, in 1987 he just might be the second oddest person working for DC Comics. Veitch's solo work in the '80s is hard to describe; it doesn't resemble Swamp Thing, nor anything else. Calling it experimental would be a little misleading, because Veitch is deeply steeped in mainstream comic-book storytelling of the '60s and '70s, but he's got esoteric interests that tend to take over the story*, as well as a loopy sense of humor.
There are obvious differences in style and focus which I think partly boil down to this: Moore is a foreigner writing for American nerds with counterculture interests, but Veitch is one of those. This can sometimes lend his US characters and settings more realism, or at least the caricatures have a more home-grown quality. But it also means that for a US reader, some of his ideas are perhaps overly familiar: he can come across at times like an issue of Whole Earth Catalog, dropping remarks about how TV harms the nervous system, acupuncture works because "the ancients" knew about the body's "electromagnetic energy", the meaning of quantum mechanics is that mind and matter are the same, etc.—not in an attempt to be cool, but just because he heard them somewhere and earnestly wants to share.
So, what does Veitch think Swamp Thing should be about? The issue he previously wrote might lead you to believe that it'll have a lot of outer-space shenanigans and major DC characters, but no. In fact the story does something a little analogous to the way Moore revisited the original mythology of the character and found a new angle on it, except instead we're revisiting the mythology that Moore added. Moore's Swamp Thing is an elemental avatar, the spirit of plant life on Earth, one in a long line of elementals who all eventually become elders in the Parliament of Trees. But the basis of this story arc is the idea that that whole tradition isn't perfect and might not last forever. While Swampy was lost in space, they thought he was dead and started booting up a replacement, which turns out to be a big problem once he returns; supposedly he has to either destroy the new "Sprout", or help it find a body (which isn't going well) and then give up his own life. The Parliament of Trees are willing to work with Swampy on this matter, but they may or may not really know what they're doing.
This is a decent idea, but it's also kind of inside baseball, especially since it's really unclear what the stakes are or what might happen to the world if the Sprout isn't sorted out. Ultimately much of this 12-issue span is just a detour on the way to the actual solution: the Swamp Thing system has broken down but we can have human elementals instead, which will fix things (somehow; there is an idea in there about reconciling humans and nature, but it's left a bit vague)—if Abby conceives a child (yes, this is a "female protagonist's true destiny is reproduction" story, alas)*. Almost nothing else that happens along the way ultimately matters, but a lot of it manages to be entertaining anyway. There's a lot of pretty good (if maybe a little too whimsical) John Constantine stuff, and some pretty silly Batman-related cameos, and also an indescribably weird subplot where a highly defective Swamp Thing knock-off that was accidentally made out of a crazy right-wing terrorist hijacks a limousine containing two villains** and locks them in the car and drives them all around the country while repeating advertising jingles as they slowly starve and lose their minds. That last bit makes very little sense, and it's the most Rick Veitch thing ever, and I was delighted every time it showed up.
In the last installment I mentioned really liking the Veitch/Alcala art team, and I still do. Veitch's design ideas are often clearer and stronger than his words, and he does a lot of cool stuff in that regard, like a whole issue of joyfully dynamic double-page spreads, or a character traveling through a building in a series of little panels that go in whichever direction he's going, or Swampy growing himself an external brain that keeps getting bigger and more elaborate until it's crowded him out of the panels. One of many examples of the writer's instincts fighting with the artist's instincts is the scene where Abby tries to visit Chester and Liz, not realizing that she's interrupted them having sex: an awkward conversation goes on for most of a page circling the obvious point, until finally we just get a nice big drawing featuring Chester's bare ass, which is worth a thousand words. But there are sometimes some pretty good little ideas in the script, too: bookies taking odds on superhero fights, a psychic kid acting out the incredibly confusing Crisis on Infinite Earths plot with action figures*, and Constantine being a gross person to kiss because he smokes all the time.
Inventories
Stuff that'll be in Vertigo comics later: The unpleasant Dr. Huntoon will be in both Hellblazer and The Sandman; he treated Constantine after the Newcastle event, which is vaguely referenced here even more. Hellblazer starts at the same time as #68, and there's a crossover with #76. There are some scenes in hell, introducing the idea that people are there in some sense voluntarily, which will be part of the Sandman cosmology.
Non-human animals: Veitch seems to really enjoy drawing dogs; a character named Dogbum has about half a dozen of them. Also, one of Swampy's discarded body husks is now occupied by adorable raccoons.
Swamp Thing origin recaps: Not as such, but we see "Alan Bolland" go through something almost exactly the same.
Next: Veitch spins out
Written by Rick Veitch
Art by Veitch/Alfredo Alcala, except #70 by Veitch/Alcala/Brett Ewins
Rick Veitch makes sense as the next writer for Swamp Thing in several ways: he's both written and drawn the book before, he's collaborated with Moore and Bissette and Totleben on other things, and he shares Moore's interest in obscure old comic characters and idiosyncratic science fiction—but also, in 1987 he just might be the second oddest person working for DC Comics. Veitch's solo work in the '80s is hard to describe; it doesn't resemble Swamp Thing, nor anything else. Calling it experimental would be a little misleading, because Veitch is deeply steeped in mainstream comic-book storytelling of the '60s and '70s, but he's got esoteric interests that tend to take over the story*, as well as a loopy sense of humor.
There are obvious differences in style and focus which I think partly boil down to this: Moore is a foreigner writing for American nerds with counterculture interests, but Veitch is one of those. This can sometimes lend his US characters and settings more realism, or at least the caricatures have a more home-grown quality. But it also means that for a US reader, some of his ideas are perhaps overly familiar: he can come across at times like an issue of Whole Earth Catalog, dropping remarks about how TV harms the nervous system, acupuncture works because "the ancients" knew about the body's "electromagnetic energy", the meaning of quantum mechanics is that mind and matter are the same, etc.—not in an attempt to be cool, but just because he heard them somewhere and earnestly wants to share.
So, what does Veitch think Swamp Thing should be about? The issue he previously wrote might lead you to believe that it'll have a lot of outer-space shenanigans and major DC characters, but no. In fact the story does something a little analogous to the way Moore revisited the original mythology of the character and found a new angle on it, except instead we're revisiting the mythology that Moore added. Moore's Swamp Thing is an elemental avatar, the spirit of plant life on Earth, one in a long line of elementals who all eventually become elders in the Parliament of Trees. But the basis of this story arc is the idea that that whole tradition isn't perfect and might not last forever. While Swampy was lost in space, they thought he was dead and started booting up a replacement, which turns out to be a big problem once he returns; supposedly he has to either destroy the new "Sprout", or help it find a body (which isn't going well) and then give up his own life. The Parliament of Trees are willing to work with Swampy on this matter, but they may or may not really know what they're doing.
This is a decent idea, but it's also kind of inside baseball, especially since it's really unclear what the stakes are or what might happen to the world if the Sprout isn't sorted out. Ultimately much of this 12-issue span is just a detour on the way to the actual solution: the Swamp Thing system has broken down but we can have human elementals instead, which will fix things (somehow; there is an idea in there about reconciling humans and nature, but it's left a bit vague)—if Abby conceives a child (yes, this is a "female protagonist's true destiny is reproduction" story, alas)*. Almost nothing else that happens along the way ultimately matters, but a lot of it manages to be entertaining anyway. There's a lot of pretty good (if maybe a little too whimsical) John Constantine stuff, and some pretty silly Batman-related cameos, and also an indescribably weird subplot where a highly defective Swamp Thing knock-off that was accidentally made out of a crazy right-wing terrorist hijacks a limousine containing two villains** and locks them in the car and drives them all around the country while repeating advertising jingles as they slowly starve and lose their minds. That last bit makes very little sense, and it's the most Rick Veitch thing ever, and I was delighted every time it showed up.
In the last installment I mentioned really liking the Veitch/Alcala art team, and I still do. Veitch's design ideas are often clearer and stronger than his words, and he does a lot of cool stuff in that regard, like a whole issue of joyfully dynamic double-page spreads, or a character traveling through a building in a series of little panels that go in whichever direction he's going, or Swampy growing himself an external brain that keeps getting bigger and more elaborate until it's crowded him out of the panels. One of many examples of the writer's instincts fighting with the artist's instincts is the scene where Abby tries to visit Chester and Liz, not realizing that she's interrupted them having sex: an awkward conversation goes on for most of a page circling the obvious point, until finally we just get a nice big drawing featuring Chester's bare ass, which is worth a thousand words. But there are sometimes some pretty good little ideas in the script, too: bookies taking odds on superhero fights, a psychic kid acting out the incredibly confusing Crisis on Infinite Earths plot with action figures*, and Constantine being a gross person to kiss because he smokes all the time.
Inventories
Stuff that'll be in Vertigo comics later: The unpleasant Dr. Huntoon will be in both Hellblazer and The Sandman; he treated Constantine after the Newcastle event, which is vaguely referenced here even more. Hellblazer starts at the same time as #68, and there's a crossover with #76. There are some scenes in hell, introducing the idea that people are there in some sense voluntarily, which will be part of the Sandman cosmology.
Non-human animals: Veitch seems to really enjoy drawing dogs; a character named Dogbum has about half a dozen of them. Also, one of Swampy's discarded body husks is now occupied by adorable raccoons.
Swamp Thing origin recaps: Not as such, but we see "Alan Bolland" go through something almost exactly the same.
Next: Veitch spins out
no subject
2019-06-01 18:25 (UTC)—is that Veitch anticipates the question "Why doesn't he run out of gas?" and has one of the prisoners explain that the Swump Thig [he's really called "Wild Thing" for some reason, but I prefer to think of him as one of those ripoff product names that are intentionally just a little wrong] always waits till they've both fallen asleep and then pulls into a rest stop and buys gas with their credit cards.
Now, Wikipedia tells me that in 1988 there were at least some stations where you could pay by card right at the pump. But it definitely wasn't universal. So it's not impossible that Veitch means for us to imagine some bored-into-oblivion Conoco or Sheetz attendant selling gas to a giant green monster who then signed the credit card slip.