Swamp Thing is written by Scott Snyder and penciled by Yanick Paquette. Scott Snyder has recently received accolades for his critically acclaimed miniseries, Batman: Gates of Gotham, and artist Yanick Paquette has also worked on several high profile characters and series including, but not limited to: Batman, JLA, Superman, Wonder Women, and the X-Men.
The DC Comics website describes Swamp Thing #1 as:
One of the world's most iconic characters has returned to the heart of the DC Universe, and every step he takes will shake the foundations of the Earth! Alec Holland has his life back…but the Green has plans for it. A monstrous evil is rising in the desert, and it'll take a monster of another kind to defend life as we know it!
Personal Thoughts: Swamp Thing is one of those iconic characters that does not get the attention he deserves. Casual readers and film goers harkens back to 1982’s Swamp Thing film, which unfortunately diminishes the overall appeal of the character.
Scott Snyder does a wonderful job rebooting the characters by essentially writing a Swamp Thing comic without Swamp Thing. By showcasing the importance of Alec Holland in the DC Universe Snyder creates an amusing and well-written narrative describing the struggles of a man trying find himself and once again cement his lot in life. I loved the development of Alec Holland and I will definitely be picking up the next issue when it releases October 5th, 2011.
I really appreciated Yanick Paquette’s art style. Yanick expressed the horror elements nicely by creating a truly complementary art style to the Alec Holland subplot as well as his depiction of Swamp Thing’s cameo at the end of the comic book, which was excellently rendered and was an incredible finale to the issue. There are quite a few other big hitters that are featured in Swamp Thing #1 including: Superman, Batman, and Aquaman. Yanick for the most part does a great job penciling the wide range of characters; the only complaint I have is that Superman seems to have a too square of a jaw. It makes the character look awkward and as if he has a double chin, which for Kal-El makes absolutely no sense.
Overall, the comic had some great horror elements and the subplot interwoven with Alec’s tale was a nice breakup in an effort to avoid monotony. Swamp Thing #1 ended famously and I rank this DC NEW 52 as one of my top favorites of the week.
I give Swamp Thing #1 four-and-half stars out of five. Check back here for here for more reviews and critiques of DC’s NEW 52 throughout the weeks.
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