I always forget how much Neil Gaiman threw himself into the DC Universe when he’d write in it. This Secret Origins Special is all about Batman’s villains; a TV investigative journalist has come to Gotham to do a special. Gaiman seems to enjoy writing those scenes–the ones with the behind the scenes, the Batman cameo, the anecdotes about living in Gotham City and the DC Universe in general. He doesn’t do well with the characters though, not the TV reporter and his crew. These framing scenes have art by Mike Hoffman and Kevin Nowlan. They do better at the start than they do the finish. By the finish, they’re getting tired and the detail from the opening isn’t there anymore.
Alan Grant writes the Penguin’s origin story, which isn’t a straight origin. There’s something modern to all of the Secret Origins here. Penguin’s grabbed a childhood nemesis–who just happened to grow up to be a gangster too–and Batman’s trying to find the guy while the Penguin’s torturing him. It’s an okay script, not great, but the Sam Kieth artwork is gorgeous. Kieth does action, he does Batman, he does Penguin, he does gangsters–he does kids. The best part of it is the tenderness Kieth shows when he’s doing the kids. I always forget Kieth really does know what he’s doing.
Gaiman handles the Riddler’s origin, which ties in a lot to the framing plot. The TV crew goes to interview him. Bernie Mireault on pencils, Matt Wagner on inks. Gaiman’s enthusiastic but misguided. Lots of monologue from the Riddler, but never particularly interesting. The details about the giant objects used in Gotham’s advertising in the past is more interesting than the Riddler teasing the TV crew with the truth. The art’s solid though and gets it over the bumps.
Then there’s the Two-Face story. Mark Verheiden writing it, Pat Broderick and Dick Giordano on the art. Broderick’s pencils are full of energy and light on restraint. It’s a messy story and a fairly cool one, focusing on Grace Dent (Harvey’s wife) and her side of the story. Verheiden doesn’t write the TV crew well and Grace Dent’s a little too slight, but it’s a solid enough story. The art is brutally violent and full of anger. Everyone looks miserable and angry about it.
The issue would’ve been better with stronger art throughout from Hoffman and Nowlan and either more or less from Gaiman. The TV crew ceases to be characters after the introduction, like one of the stories came in a page or two short and Gaiman was padding it out. But the Penguin story is good, the Riddler story could be a lot worse and is technically strong, the Two-Face story is super-solid mainstream DC eighties stuff. It’s good stuff.
I always forget how much Neil Gaiman threw himself into the DC Universe when he’d write in it. This Secret Origins Special is all about Batman’s villains; a TV investigative journalist has come to Gotham to do a special. Gaiman seems to enjoy writing those scenes–the ones with the behind the scenes, the Batman cameo, the anecdotes about living in Gotham City and the DC Universe in general. He doesn’t do well with the characters though, not the TV reporter and his crew. These framing scenes have art by Mike Hoffman and Kevin Nowlan. They do better at the start than they do the finish. By the finish, they’re getting tired and the detail from the opening isn’t there anymore.
This issue’s pretty trippy. I think, in the final estimation (this issue’s his last), I like what Hoffman did for this Quest for the Elementals arc. He changed up his style, moved Swamp Thing away from horror to the psychedelic. Maybe he realized mushrooms can be scary, but they can be trippy.
Abby’s story comes to its predictable cliffhanger. Wheeler foreshadowed it way too early and then spends the rest of the issue building it into a cliffhanger for the whole issue. He never brings Abby and Tefé back to the others, so now Alec’s got to go on a rescue mission.
Didn’t Wheeler just do an issue where Alec’s in trouble in one place and Abby and Tefé are in trouble in another? It’s apparently just how he structures Swamp Thing.
I still can’t decide about Hoffman’s art. When he does the scenes of Alec interacting with the other plant people, it really does seem like he’s going for a particular style. When he’s drawing Abby, he can’t manage perspective or proportions. It’s all very confusing.
What is the deal with Hoffman’s art? If his style–which occasionally reminds of sixties and earlier comics–is unintentional, he’s incompetent. But if he’s intentionally doing this issue’s war comic scene like Swamp Thing is an old war comic, it’s fantastic.
This issue, establishing even more asinine backstory, really shows Wheeler’s problem. He’s interested in making his mark on Swamp Thing, not making his mark with Swamp Thing. He’s trying to wow with details instead of actions. This issue, Alec and Abby learn the Parliament contrived his birth as plant elemental in order to guarantee he’d go back in time and start the Parliament.
Wheeler answers a reasonable question–why such a long break in Earth Elementals before Alec Holland (the previous Swamp Thing was thirty years prior)–with a silly, contrived answer.