Brightest Day Aftermath: The Search for Swamp Thing #3 – Review

By: Jonathan Vankin (writer), Marco Castiello (penciller), Vincenzo Acunza (inker), Barbara Ciardo (colorist)

The Story: John, you should know the only thing to do with a stubborn weed is smoke it.

The Review: Even if you’ve never taken improv comedy, you can appreciate one of its most important tenets: the only time you should enter a scene is when you’re needed.  This rule should apply as much to characters on the page (and to real life, honestly) as to those on the stage.  If you bring someone into a story, they have to provide some service to it, or they might as well be props, there to decorate the setting and distract your attention, but with no value in themselves.

Vankin seems to believe that bringing in figures from both DC’s occult and superhero traditions will somehow lend credence to this title in both fields.  Why else would he attempt to mash up the most recognizable figures (Zatanna, Madame Xanadu, and Deadman on one side, with Superman and Batman from the other) from each of the two schools?  But rather than making the story more convincing, they actually emphasize its indecisive lack of direction.

Much like Zee back in the debut issue, both Xanadu and Deadman appear briefly to offer a very limited purpose, ultimately proving of little use.  Madame X acts only as a conduit between Constantine and Deadman, while the ghostly acrobat himself only confirms what Constantine can already figure out on his own anyway.  With the Green exerting enough control over the wisecracking Brit to show him what it wants, John hardly needs any extra help.

Brightest Day Aftermath: The Search for Swamp Thing #2

By: Jonathan Vankin (writer), Renato Arlem (artist), Barb Ciardo (colorist)

The Story: Just the what the heck kind of fertilizer are they using around here?

The Review: DC has its reasons for the existence Vertigo, and keeping it largely separate from popular continuity.  It’s not just that in a Vertigo comic, you can cuss up a storm and show people doing the nasty in real-time.  Vertigo comics aspire for more conceptual, complex storylines, and most of the tension comes from subtext than anything overt.  This kind of thing tends not to mesh well with the splashy, direct style of mainstream DC.

Not to say the two schools can’t come together, just that their goals are frequently so different that you usually wind up with an awkward, confused mash-up, which perfectly describes how this title is coming along so far.  The presence of Superman and Batman in John Constantine’s quest seems not only out-of-place, but also unnecessary and silly.  It’s hard to explain, but they make things way too easy for Constantine, yet grossly overcomplicated at the same time.

For one, they undermine Constantine’s independence and competence.  You have to assume a bloke with his background can and would prefer to handle things himself without capes getting involved.  His sudden need for Batman to direct him in a case of magic, something Bats doesn’t “know a lot about,” and Superman to do the heavy lifting in a spar with a magical entity, which goes against Supe’s strengths, seems counterproductive and illogical.

I really hate to use this word in describing anything, but none better describes the sequence of events and character thinking in this issue than “stupid.”  The end of Brightest Day saw John begin his search for Swamp Thing in the Star City forest, and since that’s where he eventually runs into S. Thing or, at least, the shape of S. Thing, why did we have all that pointless world-hopping in between?  And can we really call it a search if apparently what John’s been looking for has been following him this entire time?

And gah!  That voice!  I confess I’m not familiar enough with whatever area of the UK John comes from to gauge his accent’s accuracy, but whether it is or not, it has definitely gotten to a nerve-grating point now.  “What I really need is a ciggie!”  “Give us a nip, luv!”  “Strewth!  Bleedin’ thing’s following me.”  “This is not the way I anticipated I’d pop me clogs.”  Vankin focuses so much on selling J.C.’s vernacular that the actual story seems ignored by comparison.

Brightest Day Aftermath: The Search for Swamp Thing #1 – Review

By: Jonathan Vankin (writer), Marco Castiello (penciller), Vincenzo Acunzo (inker), Barb Ciardo (colorist)

The Story: You bloody well better get out of his way—the bloke’s John Constantine, like!

The Review: Considering the large scope and cosmic forces involved in Brightest Day, it certainly threw off a lot of people (namely me) when the title ultimately resulted in the official return of Swamp Thing and John Constantine to the DCU proper.  Ignoring for the moment the left-field nature of this twist, you had to wonder what contribution these characters would make to the superhero community that warranted their reappearance.

After reading this issue, you’ll likely still be wondering.  Vankin certainly has a love for John Constantine, as he spends far more time stocking J.C.’s dialogue to the max with Britishisms (“This bloke’s not even slowing down.  Just bloody rude, the people in this city.”) than he does crafting a substantial plot.  There’s a lot of Constantine being Constantine in the narration, but he communicates actually very little of import and he does even less.

Twenty-and-some-odd pages later, you find yourself where you started: John looking for Swamp Thing on the suspicion it has “changed” (if attacking and afflicting him with some mystically resistant, vaguely plantlike infection isn’t undeniable evidence of that).  His theory for what causes this change is meant to be impressive, what with the dramatic final splash page and all, but anyone even slightly familiar with the character will come to the same conclusion a few pages into the issue, so really J.C. comes off looking a little thick.

It seems Vankin needs to take some time to clarify his plot ideas a little, because there’s a lot of stuff in the issue that makes no sense.  John claims he’s looking for Swamp Thing, but when he gets attacked in the Kew botanical gardens by a bunch of foliage (presumably S-Thing’s work), he runs off, squandering what seems a perfectly good confrontation.  Later, he connects himself and Batman to the Green, encountering Thing itself (Well, that was easy! you’ll think), but gets attacked and then fades out and they never again acknowledge the incident.  Why, why?