Swamp Thing reread, part 12

Swamp Thing #110-119 (1991-92)
Written by Nancy A. Collins, except #116 by Dick Foreman
Art: #110 by Tom Mandrake/Bill Jaaska/Kim DeMulder, #111 by Mandrake/DeMulder/Shawn McManus, #112-113 by Tom Yeates/Sheperd Hendrix, #114-115 by Mandrake/DeMulder, #116 by McManus, #117 by Jan Duursema/DeMulder, #118-119 by Scot Eaton/DeMulder

This isn't the first time there's been a new Swamp Thing writer who hasn't written any comics before—Doug Wheeler apparently came out of nowhere—but Nancy A. Collins makes more sense, in that she's published two horror novels and she's lived in Louisiana. So, where might she take the series? One possible clue is that John Higgins is now doing the covers, and compared to the moody and surreal stuff we got from Totleben, these are more like really good pulp paperback art, very lurid and cartoony. Another is that in her first issue before #110 (Swamp Thing Annual #6, which I haven't read), she creates a big ugly toothy monster that's made out of a bunch of murder victims from Houma and stalks around the swamp seeking revenge. So we're going more old-school, staying around the hometown and doing horror stuff.
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Swamp Thing reread, part 11

Swamp Thing #99-109 (1990-91)
Written by Doug Wheeler, except #101 by Andrew Helfer
Art: #99 by Pat Broderick/Alfredo Alcala, #100 by Broderick/Alcala/Kelley Jones, #101 by Mike Hoffman/Alcala, #102 by Hoffman/Peter Gross, #103 by Hoffman/Doug Hazlewood/Mickey Ritter, #104 by Hoffman/Bill Jaaska, #105-107 by Hoffman

Doug Wheeler just isn't a good writer, at least not for this, and I'm running out of ways to say that, so I'll try to think of things I liked about this second half of his run.

I have to admit I'm a sucker for excessively complicated SF/fantasy plots. I didn't like the time-travel storyline (especially since Wheeler's ending for it basically made Swamp Thing into the most important being in the whole history of Earth), but it's kind of fun to see him keep elaborating on the consequences of it, and trying to make it somehow make sense—even if that means we get tons of expository dialogue from ancient beings telling us what's what, and massive retcons of all kinds of things for no clear purpose. Similarly, the cosmic SF setup of the Green's war against the Grey produces elaborate detours that make it feel like there's more of a plot than there is, and gives the artists some different stuff to draw*, so that's nice.
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