― Huk-L, Thursday, 4 November 2004 20:48 (nineteen years ago) link
― Tep (ktepi), Thursday, 4 November 2004 20:55 (nineteen years ago) link
― David R. (popshots75`), Thursday, 4 November 2004 21:03 (nineteen years ago) link
― Tep (ktepi), Thursday, 4 November 2004 21:06 (nineteen years ago) link
― jocelyn (Jocelyn), Thursday, 4 November 2004 21:23 (nineteen years ago) link
― Daniel_Rf (Daniel_Rf), Friday, 5 November 2004 11:37 (nineteen years ago) link
but yeah, the Moore Swamp Thing was great, remember buying one out of idle curiousity and then going back to buy the entire run. plus, it gave us John Constantine which is a treat in and of itself.
― H (Heruy), Friday, 5 November 2004 12:46 (nineteen years ago) link
― danny boy, Sunday, 23 October 2005 15:56 (eighteen years ago) link
― David R. (popshots75`), Sunday, 23 October 2005 16:13 (eighteen years ago) link
― s1ocki (slutsky), Sunday, 23 October 2005 16:56 (eighteen years ago) link
is the current swamp thing worth reading? i like the characters/basic idea, but I feel worried at it being too po-faced.
― Special Agent Dale Koopa (orion), Sunday, 23 October 2005 17:37 (eighteen years ago) link
Seconded! Been a long time since I read them, tho.
― Daniel_Rf (Daniel_Rf), Sunday, 23 October 2005 18:24 (eighteen years ago) link
Doug Wheeler does a fair job of picking up where Veitch abruptly leaves off. It's an interesting run, let's say. Entertaining, overall. Millar's run is also quite decent.
Avoid the Nancy Collins run like the plague. It is one of the most badly-written runs on any comic ever.
Brian K. Vaughn's revamp: eh. What I've read of the newest revamp: very eh, bordering on ugh.
― Deric W. Haircare (Deric W. Haircare), Sunday, 20 November 2005 03:47 (eighteen years ago) link
― chap who would dare to tell uninteresting celeb spotting stories (chap), Sunday, 20 November 2005 19:15 (eighteen years ago) link
― mark s (mark s), Sunday, 20 November 2005 23:03 (eighteen years ago) link
― i0dine, Sunday, 20 November 2005 23:47 (eighteen years ago) link
― Dan Selzer (Dan Selzer), Monday, 21 November 2005 17:30 (eighteen years ago) link
i0dine, re: Diggle - The Losers has been fun rock-em-sock-em espionage stuff. Also, the techno-samurai mini he's doing w/ Leinil Francis Yu for Wildstorm (Silent Dragon) is probably the best Diggle I've read. I liked Adam Strange just fine, but not as much as most folk. And I didn't touch Swamp Thing.
Mark, wouldn't it be safe to say that your evidence for Moore's not-so-veryness would have to include his works by default? (Not that I disagree w/ you, per se - I think it's more a case of AM's greatness being blown out of proportion than AM being not-so-very.)
― David R. (popshots75`), Monday, 21 November 2005 17:37 (eighteen years ago) link
― Dan Selzer (Dan Selzer), Monday, 21 November 2005 19:28 (eighteen years ago) link
― kit brash (kit brash), Tuesday, 22 November 2005 01:38 (eighteen years ago) link
JUST PRINT THE FUCKING JESUS STORY ALREADY, YOU DOUCHEBAGS.
Love,Me
― Deric W. Haircare (Deric W. Haircare), Tuesday, 22 November 2005 02:16 (eighteen years ago) link
― kit brash (kit brash), Tuesday, 22 November 2005 03:03 (eighteen years ago) link
― Deric W. Haircare (Deric W. Haircare), Tuesday, 22 November 2005 03:09 (eighteen years ago) link
― kit brash (kit brash), Tuesday, 22 November 2005 11:46 (eighteen years ago) link
And I really dug the whole Matango storyline that came afterward. Although I realize I may be in the minority. But then I grew up reading Swamp Thing, so it has a warm & special place in my heart.
― Deric W. Haircare (Deric W. Haircare), Tuesday, 22 November 2005 18:03 (eighteen years ago) link
― Deric W. Haircare (Deric W. Haircare), Tuesday, 22 November 2005 18:06 (eighteen years ago) link
― chap who would dare to tell uninteresting celeb spotting stories (chap), Tuesday, 22 November 2005 18:17 (eighteen years ago) link
RELEASE THE HOUNDS.
― Deric W. Haircare (Deric W. Haircare), Tuesday, 22 November 2005 18:41 (eighteen years ago) link
― chap who would dare to tell uninteresting celeb spotting stories (chap), Tuesday, 22 November 2005 18:47 (eighteen years ago) link
― David R. (popshots75`), Tuesday, 22 November 2005 19:49 (eighteen years ago) link
― Deric W. Haircare (Deric W. Haircare), Tuesday, 22 November 2005 19:56 (eighteen years ago) link
― Deric W. Haircare (Deric W. Haircare), Tuesday, 22 November 2005 22:01 (eighteen years ago) link
(Haven't read any of the Losers, btw; have the trifecta trade on queue.)
― i0dine, Tuesday, 22 November 2005 22:27 (eighteen years ago) link
http://www.horror-wood.com/plant.20.jpg
― David R. (popshots75`), Tuesday, 22 November 2005 23:21 (eighteen years ago) link
Yeah, i0dine, but Morrison's and Pollack's DPs were apples and oranges, really. GM's was about weirdness, RP's was about menstruation. Apples and oranges.
― Deric W. Haircare (Deric W. Haircare), Tuesday, 22 November 2005 23:43 (eighteen years ago) link
― i0dine, Wednesday, 23 November 2005 12:37 (eighteen years ago) link
I really, really like the Marty Pasko issues, especially the ones on the cruise ship - with aliens that become a giant squid because of infection by herpes, how can it go wrong? Liz and Dennis are great in all their issues, and there are genuine WTF??!?!?!? moments like Casey becoming an adult before your eyes via her psychic powers, or Harry Kay and the whole concentration camp/Golem plot. Plus he came up with the insectoid Arcane.
They really deserve a trade.
― aldo_cowpat (aldo_cowpat), Thursday, 24 November 2005 15:08 (eighteen years ago) link
― Britain's Obtusest Shepherd (Alan), Thursday, 24 November 2005 16:11 (eighteen years ago) link
― aldo_cowpat (aldo_cowpat), Thursday, 24 November 2005 16:20 (eighteen years ago) link
not a whole lot of talk about millar's run here?
― moonship journey to baja, Sunday, 28 October 2007 20:35 (sixteen years ago) link
Andrew Farrell speaks highly of it.
― The Real Dirty Vicar, Sunday, 28 October 2007 22:45 (sixteen years ago) link
What's not to like about G-Mo's MM's run? (actually not strictly true, the large-scale ELEMENTAL FITES were very dialogue heavy, perhaps too much so) The last bit, with a benevolent ruler over a transformed world, does feel a bit ripped off Miracleman though.
― aldo, Monday, 29 October 2007 10:40 (sixteen years ago) link
Am I the only one who feels nonplussed by Moore's Swamp Thing? I've read three or four different collections, and while all of them have had some nice moments, there's also way way too many captions, often filled with purple prose, and all in all there's lot of the worst type of Moore pretentiouness. Also, the love story between Abby and Swamp Thing is presented in a very clichéd and fairy-tale like manner, even though Moore generally tries to keep the characters down to earth. All this feels especially weird since Moore had already done most of V for Vendetta and Miracleman before, and was writing Watchmen at the same time, so it's not like he was an inexperienced writer or anything.
― Tuomas, Monday, 29 October 2007 14:38 (sixteen years ago) link
I think Swamp Thing maybe worked better in issues. That was the impression I formed when Vertigo reprinted it in black and white issues a while back.
― The Real Dirty Vicar, Monday, 29 October 2007 15:09 (sixteen years ago) link
way way too many captions, often filled with purple prose
sorta nails my issues w/ moore!
― moonship journey to baja, Monday, 29 October 2007 15:18 (sixteen years ago) link
I'm not sure Tuomas is reading the same book that I did. Abby/Alec's love was presented as unearthly, but also grounded in the same sorts of experiences that are common to everyone, hence the "Rites of Spring" issue. As for it being a fairy-tale, well, it was presented in a book that was marginally, a superhero book, and superheroes (at the time) were pretty much just modern fairy tales. Though I don't see how you could reconcile that term with the horrors presented with The Monkey King, Arcane and Abby's trip to Hell.
And anyone who didn't start out on text-heavy comics (of which you had many examples in the 60s-80s in the US, actually it was the primary mode) would think that SWAMP THING is completely out of control when it came to text on the page. I actually like it. It feels like it was written as much as it was scripted. Haven't read it in several years, but I'm not sure I'd take the pruning shears to it. Different strokes, etc.
If you think there's a huge difference between SWAMP THING and his other contemporary work, I'd look to his editors and collaborators, since no writer is an island in comics, not even Alan Moore (who at the time was just another new writer and not the titan he is in the field now.)
― Matt M., Monday, 29 October 2007 15:57 (sixteen years ago) link
Yeah, I love most everything Moore's done, but I've never been able to get into his Swamp Thing run. Too much caption-itis, etc.
― Chuck_Tatum, Monday, 29 October 2007 15:59 (sixteen years ago) link
It is too bad that Swamp Thing has not been put out in some Showcase editions, both the Bernie Wrightson and Totleben/Bissette artwork would look great in black and white.
I got into the Moore run on Swamp Thing pretty early on. It is a pretty crazy book when you think that the thing used to be sold in grocery stores, it wasn't even a direct title until way later on. I have not read any of those issues in twenty years, but they are on my list to go back and check out. I remember the issue where Abby eats the tubar was very trippy and the issues where Batman shows up with one of the Arcane arcs was really great.
― earlnash, Friday, 9 November 2007 22:44 (sixteen years ago) link
I've read Moore's run more times than I can count - the first thing of his I ever saw (since it was the first American mass market thing of his available...? I remember seeing issues of Warrior around the same time). I musta been 12-13. The captions do get pretty purple and heavy-handed. Otoh it allows for him to do all kinds of great transitions - stuff he would later get a lot of mileage out of on Watchmen - it made the stories feel bound together by a creepy synchronicity.
― Shakey Mo Collier, Friday, 9 November 2007 23:48 (sixteen years ago) link
Waiting for Heave Ho to start the Adrianne Barbeau thread on ILHTML.
― Pleasant Plains, Friday, 9 November 2007 23:52 (sixteen years ago) link
a dry well.
yeah, if you a) don't like Veitch and b) won't skip to Millar or c) jump over to Hellblazer/Sandman et al, you're definitely in for a tough slog. although Collins is probably better than Wheeler, if that's the totality of your bar...
― bobo honkin' slobo babe (sic), Thursday, 17 June 2021 07:07 (three years ago) link
Doug Wheeler's run is also shit, maybe because the art is so bad?
Several decades ago I bought every instalment of Quest For the Elementals as a bargain bundle and I remember the art being quite nice and clean, but the story sucking.
I forgot/never knew that Millar did a run. Wikipedia doesn't make it sound particularly worth reading.
― chap, Thursday, 17 June 2021 09:11 (three years ago) link
It's pretty good, one of the better Millars IMO. Can't remember if it's still rumored or more or less confirmed at this point that Morrison ghosted quite a bit of that run beyond his initial four issues.I don't believe I can ever be objective about Doug Wheeler's run, as the issue where Swampy traverses hell with Bartle at his side was my first ever randomly purchased (or semi-randomly, as that eye-catching Totleben cover depicting the infernal gates still looks pretty killer to me) mature readers comic at the ripe old age of 12 and I continued to fascinatedly buy that run and the Quest for the Elementals was just the most epic thing I'd ever read at that point and frankly still seems pretty great if you want my unvarnished opinion which, as I note, is untrustworthy as all get out in this instance.
― Jerome Percival Jesus (Old Lunch), Thursday, 17 June 2021 11:15 (three years ago) link
I think I read it shortly after bingeing Moore's run for the first time so may not have been judging it on its own merits.
― chap, Thursday, 17 June 2021 11:48 (three years ago) link
At the very least, you have to give it up to Wheeler and Millar for their willingness to get weird and swing for the fences. Both runs really push the boundaries with these long epics that mimic what Moore and Veitch did with their respective runs. And Wheeler took on the pretty thankless task of subbing in for Veitch (and Gaiman/Delano) at the last minute, which clearly didn't even pay off for him in the long term (the only other credit I recall of his was one of the Tekno Comics books right before that whole thing imploded).
The Collins run started out decently but the wheels came off quickly. Pretty much everything she did was low stakes as hell, which can be fine and which a better writer can pull off in a compelling way. But even her character development stank, so there was no real upside to scaling the title back into this domestic drama centered around Louisiana. The horror/supernatural elements are just dull as hell and often retreads of what came before (a serial killer, a ghost pirate, a patchwork monster, the return of Arcane, yawn). And, boy, I sure hope you like exclamation marks! Because at some point she starts ending every sentence with them! And I'm honestly not even exaggerating! Every single sentence! It's ultimately just a soggy, effortless endeavor where absolutely nothing of consequence happens beyond the very end of the very last issue of her run, where Abby leaves Swampy and one of the elementals drags Tefe away into the Green.
― Jerome Percival Jesus (Old Lunch), Thursday, 17 June 2021 12:20 (three years ago) link
A slight derail, but I disagree on Hellblazer! I love love love the Delano run, but there is stuff worthwhile after that. I know that people like Garth Ennis for the wrong reasons (juvenile sensibility, violence), but some of his issues are really beautiful short fiction, particularly the issues where John leaves and it's just Kit and the book just becomes these funny/wistful short stories about Irish city life, sorta like Brendan Behan or an early Terence Davies movie.
Most people forget there was this Paul Jenkins/Sean Phillips run. It is less flashy and superheroic, but it has this tone of middle aged melancholy that I quite like and great moody art...
There are a few issues that are generally not as available by Eddie Campbell--it's not a perfect run, but it has a kooky texture and Australian politics; a kind of interesting vibe. There is also one issue by Gaiman and Dave McKean as a rare interior artist that is worth looking over.
However, I agree on the other stuff not being great!
― johnasdf, Thursday, 17 June 2021 15:05 (three years ago) link
Ennis wasn't bad but most of my disdain for his run is that he turned John Constantine into a stock Ennis character and then most subsequent writers just ran with his changes. Moore and Delano's Constantine was much more nuanced and not merely the swaggering, smirking Dreamworks caricature he later became.
There was well-written stuff after Delano but I'm generally just not that into the runs that lean more Ennis. Jenkins and Carey did alright and hearkened back to the OG Conjob a bit.
― Jerome Percival Jesus (Old Lunch), Thursday, 17 June 2021 15:27 (three years ago) link
I prefer the writing on the Ennis issues (at least until Steve Dillon came onboard), and the art on the Delano issues (although iirc John Rxdgwxy refused to draw some 'blasphemous' content? - (sic) may know more - and also about Eddie's abrupt departure from Hellblazer)
Swamp Thing just seems like one of those titles that has had every possible variation wrung from it and has no real reason to keep on going other than copyright control.
― Ward Fowler, Thursday, 17 June 2021 16:00 (three years ago) link
I would agree with that. Even as a huge fan of the character, I quit a short way into the Diggle/Dysart run (v4, I believe?) and haven't returned. Millar's end to v2 is just fine as a stopping point.
― Jerome Percival Jesus (Old Lunch), Thursday, 17 June 2021 16:58 (three years ago) link
I really liked Jenkins' Hellblazer run, at least most of it. To me, it felt like he combined elements of the Delano and Ennis versions of the character, but without the worst indulgences of either. Some of the stories related to Constantine's past, which had been kind of confusing up to that point (to me at least), and gave it some clarity. The only downside is that the last three or four stories were a bit aimless and disappointing.
The weird thing with Delano, for me, is that I enjoyed the one-off issue he wrote long after his actual run a lot more than the run itself!
― Duane Barry, Thursday, 17 June 2021 19:59 (three years ago) link
Does Constantine ever discover the tree tattoo on his butt that Swampy got when he was controlling Constantine's body? Abby mentions it once but Constantine didn't seem to catch what she was saying. Does this pay off in Hellblazer or something, or did it get forgotten about?
― Cow_Art, Thursday, 17 June 2021 20:01 (three years ago) link
idrc, but Constantine gets involved in enough opportunistic sex magick through the years that it probably doesn't bother him
also about Eddie's abrupt departure from Hellblazer
p much what you'd expect - he just didn't get on with the Big Two system of editorial involvement, and bailed out. he especially resisted the editor's chosen plot of sending white magician John to the Australian outback to go on a vision quest with a "witch doctor" from a made-up indigenous people. keen-eyed readers may note that Jenkins' run immediately opens with this cover
afair Campbell's only other stint on an ongoing WFH book was two issues on Captain America this century, in which he confidently drew Iron Man looking like this, having not kept up to date on costume changes in the previous four decades
one issue by Gaiman and Dave McKean as a rare interior artist that is worth looking over
the Morrison/ Lloyd two-parter that ran next to this is also good
― bobo honkin' slobo babe (sic), Thursday, 17 June 2021 20:44 (three years ago) link