Tag Archives: Swamp Thing

Oct 4 2012

Swamp Thing 13

Today, Shelby and Patrick are discussing Swamp Thing 13, originally released October 3rd, 2012. This issue is part of the RotWorld crossover event. Click here for complete RotWorld coverage. 

Shelby:  Zero month gave us a little reprise from the events of Rotworld. Sure, we learned more about Anton Arcane’s horrifying history, making him that much more of a serious threat. But it was easy to forget that the last time we saw Alec, he was in a completely dead world, one which he assumed was an alternate version of the reality he knew. I’ll be honest, I assumed it was an alternate reality as well; the single panel reveal at the end of 12 didn’t really sink in. But now, we are fully immersed in Rotworld, and let me tell you: things are way worse than we thought. 

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Oct 4 2012

Animal Man 13

Alternating Currents: Animal Man 13, Drew and Patrick ROTToday, Drew and Patrick are discussing Animal Man 13, originally released October 3rd, 2012. This issue is part of the RotWorld crossover event. Click here for complete RotWorld coverage. 

Drew: Jeff Lemire and Scott Snyder are confident that they can surprise readers. They have every right to be — Swamp Thing 12 (which they co-wrote) saw the shocking reveal that Rotworld is not a place but a time — and that confidence lends their writing an assured sense of purpose. Their ability to surprise has made both Animal Man and Swamp Thing thrilling reads in their first year, and has leant the crossover a sense that anything could happen. Sure enough, Animal Man 13 is rich in surprises, but it also paints Lemire into a difficult narrative corner — to such a degree that I can’t help but see it as a cocksure statement that he can write his way out of anything. It would be annoying if I didn’t have every bit of confidence that he can. Continue reading →

Sep 11 2012

Animal Man 0

Alternating Currents: Animal Man 0, Shelby and Freakin' Animal Man

Today, Shelby and (guest writer) The Freakin’ Animal Man are discussing Animal Man 0, originally released September 5, 2012. Animal Man 0 is part of the line-wide Zero Month.

Shelby: In the comments for the Swamp Thing 0 write-up, we talk briefly about respect. One of the successes of Swamp Thing is that Scott Snyder manages to create his own story while still being respectful towards the stories previous writers have told. Swamp Thing 0 takes the flaming-lab-in-the-swamp origin and folds it neatly into the Rotworld story Snyder wants to tell. Jeff Lemire has done the same thing with Animal Man 0; he maintains the classic Animal Man origin story (powers from aliens), and merely shows us the other side of the story, that it was the Red this whole time! That is smart story-telling.

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Sep 6 2012

Swamp Thing 0

Alternating Currents: Swamp Thing 0, Drew and PeterToday, Drew and Peter are discussing Swamp Thing 0, originally released September 5, 2012. Swamp Thing 0 is part of the line-wide Zero Month.

Drew: One of the most interesting things to me about this zero month experiment is the diversity of types of stories we might get to see. Some titles have large, overshadowing histories that have only been teased. Others have managed to make revealing the origin of their hero a key element in the narrative at large. But what do you do if your title has followed the hero since before he was a hero? Scott Snyder has made clear through his previous work on Swamp Thing that he’s not afraid of telling an Alec Holland story (as opposed to a Swamp Thing story), but is that really necessary at this point in the narrative? Snyder manages to answer both questions in surprising ways, turning the focus to Anton Arcane’s history, and how it shockingly ties into Alec’s own past. Continue reading →

Aug 3 2012

Animal Man 12

Today, Drew and Peter are discussing Animal Man 12, originally released August 1st, 2012. This issue is part of the RotWorld crossover event. Click here for complete RotWorld coverage. Not caught up on Animal Man? No problem! Get up to speed with our video Cram Session. Also, we’re covering Swamp Thing #12, head over to get analysis on the second half of this story. 

Drew: One of my biggest pet peeves in comics is the assumption that “bigger is better” when it comes to threats the hero is facing. I understand the sentiment — if saving one person is good, saving one million must be a million times as cool — but in practice, it often turns the risks into abstract hypotheticals. Such abstractions lose the human connection that is so easily established by a single person in danger. In comics, a single loved-one in danger is just as cliched as when it’s the whole city, but when handled well — as in Animal Man 12 — the payoff is much greater. Continue reading →

Aug 3 2012

Swamp Thing 12

 

Today, Shelby and Patrick are discussing Swamp Thing 12, originally released August 1st, 2012. This issue is part of the RotWorld crossover event. Click here for complete RotWorld coverage. Not caught up on Swamp Thing ? No problem! Get up to speed with our video Cram Session.  Also, we’ve got Animal Man 12 coverage, supplying commentary on the first half of this story.

Shelby: I love seeing heroes working together. I don’t mean like in Justice League, on an established team (also, they aren’t really working  together anyway); I’m talking about the almighty Crossover Event. Swamp Thing and Animal Man’s Rotworld isn’t a traditional comic crossover, with multiple books dealing with the same issue and borrowing characters. Snyder and Lemire have instead told the opposite sides of the same story, and now those two halves have finally come together so seamlessly I had to check the cover multiple times to remember which title I was reading.  

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Aug 2 2012

Cram Session: Swamp Thing 1-11

It can be hard to keep up with all the comics you love. But it’s damn near impossible to keep up with all the comics you’re interested in.

Retcon Punch got you covered.

Alec Holland is just about the most reluctant hero of the New 52. Dude didn’t even cape-up until the end of issue 7. But it’s been a great ride, and now all human and plant life hangs in the balance. Catch up here and prepare for the Rot World crossover with Animal Man.

Jul 11 2012

Swamp Thing 11

Today, Patrick and Drew are discussing Swamp Thing 11 originally released July 11th, 2012 (but mistakenly released a week early on Comixology.com)

Patrick: There’s a pivotal moment near the climax of Swamp Thing and Arcane’s fight where Alec realizes what he’s up against. He stares, deadpan, at his injured enemy and puts the pieces together: “every wound… becomes a mouth.” The Rot is consumption: and nothing can quash its appetite. That’s us — you, me, the comics industry, the entertainment industry, consumers. We relentlessly chew up narratives, characters, histories… christ, DC Comics alone puts over 60 titles on the sacrificial alter on a monthly basis. They reboot the line, they run cross-over events, they revive Watchmen, they do line-wide zero issues. But it’s basically never enough, the consumers always want more. And so the war between the Green, the Red and the Rot goes on forever, a conflict insatiable. Continue reading →

Jun 26 2012

Birds of Prey 10


Today, Patrick and Drew are discussing Birds of Prey 10, originally released June 20th, 2012.

Patrick: In a lot of ways, the New 52 incarnation of Birds of Prey acts as as one of only a few blank canvasses in DC’s library. The two founding members of the group are a brand new character — as in Starling — and one reformed in such a way as to be unrecognizable as the Black Canary of old. The rest of the team is rounded out by characters either not normally associated with the Birds of Prey or (in Barbara’s case) aggressively altered by the new continuity. My first dip into this world was so fresh and new and exciting, that I started to feel a little let down as writer Duane Swierczynski wrapped up one story arc, vamped for time, and then paid lip-service to Snyder’s Night of the Owls crossover event. I’m not going so far as to claim that those three issues (7, 8 and 9) were wasted, but now that Birds of Prey seems firmly set its own two feet again, it’s apparent that this series is at its strongest when its free to develop on its own terms. Continue reading →

Jun 7 2012

Swamp Thing 10

Alternating Currents: Swamp Thing 10, Drew and ShelbyToday, Drew and Shelby are discussing Swamp Thing 10, originally released June 6th, 2012.

Drew: Maintaining a sense of tension in an ongoing story is an unenviable balancing act. If a writer plays things too subtly, the tension is lost, but if it’s laid on too thickly, it looses all meaning. After building to what seemed like a sure climax in issues 8 and 9, Scott Snyder brings things down to a simmer for the introduction of Anton Arcane, but a simmer that seems more primed to burst than anything in the previous four issues. That a quiet conversation in a swamp can feel more dangerous than whole armies of the undead is a testament to Snyder’s writing, which continues to feel somehow both inevitable and innovative. Continue reading →