Rotworld: Parts 2 and 3

Welcome back Parliamentarians!  We're going to be changing formats a bit as we journey back into the entropic dystopia that is Rotworld. In our first two installments of Rotworld, covering both the prologue and also Parts 1 of the Red Kingdom and Green Kingdom subplots, we reviewed one issue each of Animal Man and Swamp Thing. Having established the lay of the land, and with the two subplots diverging for now, I think it's safe for us to focus solely on our favorite emerald elemental, at least for the time being.

When we last left off, Alec Holland, Poison Ivy, Deadman, and a small army of artificially animated Swamp Thing clones were defending the Green Kingdom, the last bastion of plant life on Earth, from the Rot-infected Teen Titans. As issue 14 opens Holland is being beaten badly by Rot-Superboy, with Ivy captured by a giant millipede-like creature, before Alec is contacted by telepathically by the nearby Parliament of Trees, who urge him to use their power to bolster his own. Alec does exactly that, growing gigantic in size, literally stomping the minions of the Rot to death. The immediate threat negated, Alex then demands of the Parliament the fate of Abby Arcane.

The Parliament tells Alec that Abby died in eastern Europe, trying to stop the spread of the Rot (we're shown a flashback of her mysteriously surviving the plane crash with which we we're teased at the end of the last issue). Though unconvinced of Abby's demise, Alec becomes more determined than ever to find and destroy Arcane.

Deadman offers to be Swamp Thing's guide through Rotworld, and begins steering him toward Gotham, where someone he knows has been working on a weapon to kill the Rot. The farther he journeys from the Parliament in this world virtually without living plant life, however, the weaker Alec becomes. Eventually he is unable to hold together his gargantuan form and it collapses, with Alec returned to more familiar proportions, though more lightly armored. He also senses that the air itself is so infected that it would rot his wings, making him unable to fly to Gotham. Deadman proposes using a river to sail out to sea and then up the coast to Gotham, prompting Holland to form a crude boat from the remnants of his gigantic form.

As they sail down the river they are attacked by several generic Rot monsters, which Alec dispatches easily.   In a quiet moment, Deadman offers his condolences to Alec over the loss of Abby.  Holland informs Deadman that condolences aren't necessary, as he can literally feel that Abby is still alive, given that they have had a spiritual connection since childhood. 

Very shortly, however, Swamp Thing's boat is entrapped and crushed by giant, mutated, starfish-like tentacles. Riding one of the tentacles is a familiar figure who, wearing scuba gear and wielding Aquaman's trident, declares "William Arcane rules the dead seas now!"

Dispersed throughout this issue we're shown flashbacks to the beginning of the spread of the Rot, and specifically to Abby infiltrating the mountain castle of her uncle, Anton Arcane. Within these flashbacks we're shown a reoccurring dream from Abby's childhood where she, as a girl made of bones would descend a dark staircase, encounter a boy made of leaves, and the two of them would open a massive set of double doors, and find the "bad thing on the other side". As we're shown the children in the dream beginning to open the doors, the adult Abby is grabbed and taken by Arcane. 

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I have to say, I love this version of Abby. Though Abigail Arcane was originally introduced by Len Wein and Beanie Wrightson way back in the 70s, she didn't really become a major part of the Swamp Thing mythos until Alan Moore took over the title in the early 80s. 

My appreciation for Moore is largely compartmentalized. On one hand I think he's an amazingly skilled writer, and one of my lesser life goals is to get my hands on some of his early Marvel UK work from before he became THE Alan Moore. I find his narration absolutely beautiful, bordering on poetry, and is truly legitimate literature. 

On the other hand I believe that he's a rampant misogynist, or at least knows how to play to a predominantly male audience in a medium where misogyny is an open secret. From The Killing Joke, to Watchmen, to League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, Moore has a habit of engineering unsettling and humiliating situations for female characters that do more to further the narrative of a male protagonist than that of the female character in question, and his work on Swamp Thing is no exception. Aside from being Mrs Swamp Thing and the perennial damsel in distress, in the first two years of Moore's run alone, Abby is raped by her uncle in the body of her dead husband and sent to Hell for Alec to rescue, then arrested and put on trial in Gotham City for being a sexual deviant for Alec to rescue. While she did later gain more agency under other writers, specifically Nancy Collins, she was still primarily defined pre-Flashpoint as being Swamp Thing's wife and the mother of his child. 

I've mentioned this previously when I discussed New 52 Abby's first appearance, but I love how strong she is depicted here. Yes, she's rendered as being attractive with a great body, but she's never "on display". She's never depicted as being topless in a pair of cut offs in the middle of a swamp (as someone who has lived most of their life in Georgia and Florida, I can tell you with authority you NEVER want to be topless and in shorts in a swamp). She doesn't wish really hard that Alec comes to save her, in any given situation. She's written and drawn as being smart, tough, and resourceful. When shit gets real she picks her own damn self up, dusts off her jeans, kicks the dirt off of her awesome boots, and gets things done. She may prefer that Alec were there to help, but she's going to do the job one way or the other. 

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In issue 15, Alec has been swallowed by the giant Rot-infested starfish that William refers to as Starro (whether or not this is the actual alien Starro or just a regular starfish the Rot has mutated to gigantic proportions is debatable). Alec makes short work of the starfish, though William appears almost immediately with some squid-shark hybrid thing, threatening to torture Alec to death for the crime of loving Abby. William sends a seemingly endless supply of monsters against them, until Deadman jumps into William's body, effectively killing himself but stunning William long enough for Alec to escape.

Alec carries on and, following instructions given to him by Deadman, eventually makes his way to the Batcave. There, be finds what he initially believes to be Batman, but turns out to be a Rot-infested Bruce Wayne, which promptly attacks and severely bites him, though it is shot to death by a being very much resembling Man-Bat. As Swamp Thing collapses from his wounds (again, there's human organs and such under all the plant stuff at this time), the bat creature reverts to it's human form and tells him, "I'm Barbara Gordon. Welcome to New Gotham".

Similar to last issue, we're made privy to Abby's experiences just prior to the takeover of the Rot. Having captured and reatrained Abby within his castle, Anton Arcane reveals to Abby that he has grown infant clones of her, generated from a small piece of flesh he bit from her back at her mansion in Louisiana. We're shown Abby's memories, repressed but recovering, of her as a child, finding the large double doors from her dreams, and people on the other side begging for her help, only for her to be caught by Arcane each time and subdued by some fleshy mass with which he would seemingly smother her. 

The rage these memories inspire drives Abby to take on her much more powerful white skinned, purple eyed form, in which state she easily escapes her bonds and at least temporarily overpowers Arcane. Racing through the castle, Abby finds the double doors and yanks them open, only to be faced with a mass of Rot-infested body horrors, at which Abby can only whisper, "I'm too late".

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One thing I particularly enjoyed about this issue was the clever use of Bat-marketing. As most DC fans will recognize, Batman is to DC as Spider-Man, Wolverine, the Punisher and Ghost Rider were to Marvel in the late 80s and especially the gimmick driven early 90s. By that I mean that if you want to boost awareness and/or sales of a particular character you have Batman guest star in that character's book, or vice versa. It would have been incredibly easy for Scott Snyder, who was writing both Swamp Thing and Batman at the time, to have said "Well of course Batman survived the Rot, because he's Batman". The fact that he recognized Batman's limitations in this scenario (Batman would never have sacrificed his non-powered humanity as we'll find out Barbara was willing to do to survive), and the fact that he decided to make Barbara the obligatory Bat-character of this story, shows a lot of awareness that I think that other Batman writers (as well as much of DC editorial) lack. 

As to what Alec will encounter next, what happened to Abby just before Rotworld, and how Barbara became a man-bat, we'll have to wait until next time to discuss. Though my schedule is somewhat off kilter due to upcoming holidays, birthdays, and anniversaries, Avatar of the Green will be back in roughly two weeks to continue our journey through Rotworld. 

In roughly one week, though, be on the lookout for the next installment of Feral Samurai: a Wolverine Blog (feralsamurai.blogspot.com) as I further expound upon the classic X-Men graphic novel God Loves Man Kills. In the meantime, if you have any questions, comments, or suggestions, the best way to reach me, as always, is on Twitter @IamGrantRichter. Also, if you find my ramblings enjoyable, consider donating to an entertaining cause at Patreon.com/GrantRichterWrites. 

Until next time, think Green and be epic!