In 1971, Bernie Wrightson was riding a train to Len Wein’s house for a weekly meeting about House of Secrets, the horror serial, a popular format for the time, which they co-wrote. The series featured several short stories in each book, and was narrated, in tandem with its sister series House of Mystery, which featured more upbeat stories (and spawned some of my favorite Bronze Age Martian Manhunter stories), by Cain and Abel.
It was on that train that Wrightson was stricken with the realization that it was his week to come up with an idea. Quickly, he sketched out the idea of a swamp monster, “The Heap”, who longed for the love of a human woman. The story would be published in House of Secrets #92, and was one of the best selling issues of the entire series.
As a matter of fact, the grotesque-esque tale caused such a splash, that the duo was offered the chance to expand the idea into an entire series. It was from this one single story, that the Swamp Thing was born.
(Hazzah, these are mine)
Alec Holland, a botanist, along with his wife, Linda, were working on a bio-restorative formula, which would allow plants to grow at ungodly rates. They completed their formula to perfection just before the ever-sinister Anton Arcane, uncle to future love interest, Abby Arcane, called in a hit on the duo. Linda was killed in the blast, but Alec stumbled into the swamp, a burning husk of a man,
only to be reborn as the shambling plant-being known as…
The series ran for 20 issues, and even inspired a 1982 movie, before Wrightson and Wein passed the torch to Alan Moore, John Totleben, and Stephen Bissette
The trio would go on to make one of the most influential comic series of all time.
Wrightson Swamp Thing was a swamp monster with the mind of a scientist. Moore introduced powers of light and darkness, and Rick Veitch-who is the subject of the last blog, and took over after the Saga of the Swamp Thing, as Moore’s run would come to be known, came to an end- helped to usher in John Constantine.
The first “blue-collar” sorcerer came into the fold as a brainchild of Totleben and Bissette, who simply wanted to base a character off Sting. Veitch, along with Alfredo Alcala later gave him the start of a great and long-running solo series, and the character, created on a whim, was the focus of a recent TV show, and a Keanu Reeves movie that isn’t half bad.
Constantine reveals over time that the Swamp Thing is no longer Alec Holland, and that Holland died in the fire. After Swamp Thing finds Holland’s body, badly burned at the bottom of the bog, he must come to terms with the fact that he, as he knew himself, was dead. What followed was a story of self-discovery, as it was revealed that Holland’s immortal soul lived on as the new avatar of the green. “The Heap” from the original story shows up amongst the Parliament of Trees, to explain that Holland’s death was no accident, and that he is destined to take root in the parliament, and leave his human life, along with Abby, behind.
I will never do this story justice. I just can’t. It entirely shaped my childhood and my gratitude for it exceeds reason (I have a tattoo on my entire left shoulder to commemorate it). It is, on the whole, an all-encompassing symphony of horror, love, discovery, and hope. It deals with the battle between Good and Evil on a conceptual level, quite literally, but I wouldn’t want to spoil it. Let’s leave it at the fact that Moore was sure to tie up every single loose end and discrepancy between his Swamp Thing and all those before him,
and I mean EVERY discrepancy,
even a great many years after the original appearance and series.
The series is undoubtedly my personal favorite, and so it seems only fitting that I should end my blog posting with it. It was very formative for me throughout high school, and has led to me finding new, more artistically driven comics than the status quo here in college, and I am sure that it will continue to impact me, and hopefully you, until long after the day I can finally take root myself,
Thanks for reading,
Jack