Near the end of the episode, Abby says to Swamp Thing that she’s fascinated by this new world she’s seeing through her relationship with him, and that she “wants to see more.” And she might as well be talking about the show, because I’m pretty sure most of us would like to see more…more seasons, more episodes, more weirdness from the comics, etc. Of course, Abby also tells Swamp Thing “I’m not going anywhere,” for that extra bit of ironic knife-twisting.
So anyway, that was ten episodes of Swamp Thing we got, cut down from thirteen a while back, and then eventually just plain ‘ol canceled for reasons that have never exactly been nailed down. But whatever the reason…it wasn’t a perfect translation, it had some problems, but overall it was a reasonable translation of the comics that maybe rushed through the concepts a little too quickly, plugged in some strangely irrelevant elements (I like Blue Devil an’ all, but still not sure why he had to be there), but it looked right and by and large, it felt right. And cudos for Swamp Thing being a dude in a costume, and not a CGI effect.
I seem to recall at the time, when word got out they were cutting episodes, that producers were also being told to kinda wrap things up best they can in episode 10. And now that I’ve seen said episode, with the very knowing title “Loose Ends,” it definitely feels like folks desperately trying to put as nice a bow on things as they could while not necessarily preventing continuation of any of the plotlines. Okay, one or two things were a little cliffhanger-y, but what can you do. One final curiosity is the inclusion of a post-credits scene, setting up a conflict for a second season that will never come. No, it’s not Arcane, but you can probably hie yourself hither to the YouTubes and see that scene yourself. It is, at least to me, an unexpected payoff to a character we’ve seen all season. Didn’t think they were going to go for it, but go for it they did.
But that’s as far as it’s going, and it’s too bad. Maybe a little more of the craziness from that final scene may have goosed the series along to survival, if the show’s survival did indeed depend on positive response (whether from viewers or highers-up at Warner Bros.). Like I said, both just above and in the last time I wrote too much about this show, they seemed to plow through Swamp Thing’s evolution from “man become monster” to “nope, just the monster, sorry” with all those cool elemental powers Moore gave him once he was on the comic. With the first season devoted to Swamp Thing accepting his place and his power, the “origin” was effectively over and maybe we could have moved on to just straight-up swamp monster adventure.
I half-joked on the Twitters about a SWAMP THING SEASON TWO comic book, and I would kinda like to see that just to get an idea of what the producers of the show had in mind. I think I read somewhere they had ideas for the next couple of seasons, and if those were presented in comic form, I think that would be interesting.
I mean, it would have been nice to see their idea for Abby’s uncle Arcane, Swamp Thing’s arch-nemesis, beyond that shadowy dream-figure I assumed was him from a past episode. In my last post on the show, I noted that it totally looked like they were going to introduce Arcane via Matt Cable’s car crash, the same way the character was re-introduced in the comics, but nope, big ol’ red herring for comic nerds such as myself. Ah, well, that’s probably all for the best.
So, Swamp Thing…a pretty good show, not a great show, but better than expected and certainly lots of potential for future installments. A shame it ended.
I will note that the DC Universe talk/news show DC Daily did finally start explicitly referring to the end of the series, with even some lamenting that they’re not going to see certain things before the show’s conclusion. I’m not sure they’re going to say anything about why the show is ending, not just because no one else seems to quite know, but I wouldn’t expect a DC promotional program to do that anyway. Probably we’ll get a “sad to see it end,” and that’s it, which is probably as much as we can expect, and rightfully os given the nature of the venue.
I’ll probably have to think a bit if I’m going to get into more specifics about what worked and what didn’t about the show (like getting into the whole Blue Devil thing and the superfluity thereof). Maybe next time. In the meantime…bon voyage, Swampy…better luck in your next live action incarnation. Maybe on DC’s Legends of Tomorrow…c’mon, why not.
[SPOILERS ahead for Swamp Thing episode 9, “The Anatomy Lesson”]
So we get a whole lotta stuff goin’ on in the ninth (and penultimate) episode of DC Universe’s streaming Swamp Thing series. Titled “The Anatomy Lesson,” it is very loosely based on the classic Alan Moore/Steve Bissette/John Totleben story of the same name, in which Everything Is Changed and Nothing Will Ever Be The Same.
And, well, that was the case in the comics, least until the whole “Brightest Day”/New 52 stuff happened. That was the story where we learned that Swamp Thing wasn’t a transformed Alec Holland at all, but rather plant life, affected by Holland’s formula, that absorbed his memories and molded itself into a humanoid appearance. All these years thinking he was a human being and seeking a cure for his condition, only to find out there is no cure, this is what he always will be…it was quite the shocking change to the status quo after the then-12 years of this character’s existence.
This is what happens in this episode as well. Swamp Thing, after being brought down in the previous installment (by being frozen, not shot through the head as in the comic, so they missed out on one of the great cliffhangers in funnybook history) is dragged into a secret facility for Dr. Woodrue to examine. Yes, it’s still Woodrue…not the former Justice League “Floronic Man” villain like in the original, but still a Woodrue, cutting Swampy apart in delightfully gross fashion.
In the comic, we learn of the odd nature of Swamp Thing’s inner workings (lungs that don’t process air, a heart that doesn’t beat) as commentary from Woodrue as he’s rooting (heh) though the inert corpse. The TV show makes it…well, weirder, by having Swamp Thing awake, restrained by bonds and a magical Kryptonite-esque light that apparently weakens him somehow. As such, Woodrue tells Swampy to his face just what he’s finding during his biopsy, cutting and slicing into the body as Swampy groans in agony.
Like I said, it’s weird and gross and that’s all fine. But it does pale in comparison to the original on a few points. First, like the various media adaptations of “The Death of Superman,” Superman isn’t really away long enough for the impact of the supposed “death” to really be felt. He was goine in the comics for a while…the Superman series themselves were even briefly suspended. While the comic fans never really believed Superman was dead, the way it played out in the comics couldn’t help but make some small, irrational part of you think “…but what if he is?” The actual physical presentation of the story, with several months of Superman comics without a Superman, and even a brief time without Superman comics, made you feel that loss. Compare to the adaptations, where he dies and comes back in the same film, or he dies and comes back in the very next film…the latter being a slightly better translation of the loss, but still not really the same since it’s not like there were a bunch of Superman movies put out in between where Superman was just dead and buried.
That’s a lot of set-up for my rather minor analogy, in that TV Swamp Thing hadn’t really been around long enough, that we hadn’t really spent enough time invested in his and Abby’s search for a cure, for the Shocking Revelation to have anywhere close to the same impact. I mean, I get it, they probably wanted to get that out of way early so they didn’t spend the next couple of seasons explaining why Alec just didn’t go with Abby to a friendly clinic somewhere to help him. But that reveal hits a lot harder after over a decade’s worth of stories he was a Scientist What Was Done in by Science and trying to find a way out.
And just to say again, leaving out the bit from the comics where Swamp Thing is shot through the head and you’re left to wonder “hokey smokes how’s Alec getting out of this one?” ’til the next issue was a real missed opportunity. I so wanted to hear this iteration of Woodrue declare “you can’t kill a vegetable by shooting it through the head.”
The other big difference is that, since Swamp Thing was never “killed” in the show, we don’t get the comic’s cool revival scene where he grows back, fresh and new, after Woodrue disables the freezer where his body was being kept. And of course we don’t get the reason for that freezer shutdown, which is Woodrue’s elaborate plan to kill his “benefactor,” Avery Sunderland. No screaming Swampy chasing Sunderland through the corriders of his gleaming building, and no final kill. I’m sure they wanted Sunderland around for future seasons of the TV show, which is a moot point now.
A couple of other notes about this episode:
Blue Devil finally appears! It’s brief, and Dan Cassidy apparently can change (unwillingly) from human form to Blue Devil form (iinstead of being a dude magically stuck in his costume, which would have made for an interesting comparison to Swampy). Let’s see how this plays out in the future (“checks notes”) one episode.
However I suggested on the Twitterers that maybe they can replace the Swamp Thing show with a Blue Devil show, and have Swamp Thing’s plots transfer over to that for continuation. DC is free to use my brilliant idea.
Another Marty Pasko-era supporting character turns up, this time Dennis Barclay as a doctor from a mental health institution. No connection to Liz Tremayne, like in the comics, but who knows? Probably not us, ever.
As a payoff to the “you were never Alec Holland” plot, we do get a reenactment of this cover to issue #28:
…as Swamp Thing hauls Holland’s corpse out of the murky waters. Another version of this same cover was used in promotional material, but with Swampy holding a more skeletal body, like in the original, versus the slightly more enfleshed one we see in the episode. Anyway, it was nice to see this classic Swamp Pietà actually used in the narrative.
The big thing in this episode is that Officer Matt Cable gets in a car wreck…which, if you’ve read your Swamp Thing, like I knoq I have, then you know this is what leads to the return of Anton Arcane, Swamp Thing’s arch-enemy. Arcane, escaped from Hell following his death in his last match-up with our mossy hero, possesses Cable’s body and and wreaks some havoc, as is his wont.
Of course, we haven’t had that Arcane in the series yet (despite all my crazy talk last time), though we may have seen him in that nightmare/flashback/vision thingie Abby had a few episodes ago…a cloaked figure obscured by the darknbess dragging Abby through the swamp. Now, in the TV show, that Arcane may also be long dead and could come back in Cable’s body, or some other ghost or dark spirit from the swamp could take him over. I don’t know, it’s all speculation, but we’ll see what they do with it next week. And only next week.
And that’s almost that. Unless some miracle happens, or a rich benefactor with the initials “M.S.” donates a hefty sum to Warner Bros. with the caveat that more episodes of Swamp Thing get produced, we’re just about at the end of the line. It looks like we have a few pretty significant plot developments that will have to get tied up next time, probably not in a terribly satisfactory fashion…but it was nice having a reasonably well-done Swamp Thing TV show while it lasted. But perhaps I’ll save the eulogy for next time…though I suppose I’ve been eulogizing it since the start.
So over thge years I have heard many, many times from folks who wanted to sell me comics that the items they were offering were “in mint condition, still in their bags.” And of course, while a comic bag certainly does offer better protection for the funnybook contained within than no bag at all, it’s obviously no protection from bending, stabbing, being set on fire, being chewed on by the pet llama, whathaveyou. (And no, even the addition of a backing board to your comic’s security may not be enough to help.) I’d say the vast majority of comics I’ve received “still in their bags” are nowhere close to mint.
Basically, what I’m saying is that it takes more than just sliding a comic into a bag and/or board to preserve its condition. It takes proper handling, storage, and distance from the previously mentioned pet llama. You can keep a comic inside a bag all you’d like, but that’s not a bulletproof container. And it’s not going to magicallly undo whatever damage you did to it prior to its placement in a bag.
This is all a roundabout way to talking about the comics pictured above, Superman #75 and Adventures of Supermnan #500 (and, by extension, other comics packaged by the publisher inside sealed opaque polybags like these). When it comes to pricing/grading these for in-store sale, there’s no real way to gauge the condition of the comic therein if the polybag is still sealed and, from all appearances, still new-looking and intact.
Emphasis on “looking.” Like the standard clear plastic bags used for comic storage, these polybags won’t protect from bending or creasing or the like, but if they are sealed, you aren’t going to be able to directly check the comic for any damage done. I mean, you can kind of feel along the spine and maybe along parts of the cover (working around the various trading card and poster inserts and such, of course) and determine if there is any phyiscal harm. But, again, without visual confirmation, it’s hard to nail down a grade.
So long as the exterior of the bag looks new, and if the item is sealed (and no damage is immediately detectable within the package) I generally just mark these as “MINT – SEALED.” In a way, it’s like Schrödinger’s Comic…so long as that polybag stays sealed, we have no exact idea what’s going on in there. It’s not ’til we open it up that the reality is solidified and we get a comic that’s, I don’t know, actually in FVF or whatever.
Now it’s possible the polybags themselves could do harm to the comics inside eventually. I’m pretty sure that’s not archival material used in the packaging, there, but on the other hand…I opened my personal copies of these when they were new, and just kept everything, comics and inserts and all, still inside those opened polybags and then inside one of your standard comic bags…and far as I can tell, no damage done by those wrappings yet. And if you remember that overflowing case of Adventures #500 I got a while back…people who’ve bought copies of thoese from me and opened ’em up didn’t find any problems.
If you’re really concerned, I guess you can just store the comic and its polybag in separate bags. As I somewhat recall, in the ’90s during the real heyday of publishers prepacking their comics in bags with goodies like trading cards and pogs and such, the price guides, of which there were many at the time, had to set down rules as to what would preserve the collectibility of these items. I think it was Overstreet which put its nickel down on the comic still being considered “mint” or whatever so long as the opened bag and contents were all present. And I think our attitude at the shop at the time was “okay, fine, but sealed copies are still going to sell for more than opened copies,” and lo, it is still true to this day. I don’t have my current copy of Ovewrstreet right in front of me to see if they still hold that position, if in fact it was them.
Anyway, just something I think about every time I get these in collections and have to price ’em up. I’ve written before, somewhere and at some point, about how a lot of those Superman #75s were purchased by folks who didn’t normally collect comics, so I suspect a large number of them had been stored improperly and damaged, or just outright discarded, over the years. There may not be as many sealed copies of this still around as we assume, so getting them at all is welcome. And they do still sell.
• • •
In some brief non-Death of Superman news, it was announced over the weekend that the DC Universe streaming service’s Doom Patrol series has been renewed for a season 2, to be produced in conjunction with Warner’s forthcoming streaming service HBO Max. The story says the new season will show simultaneously on both services, so that, along with the news of the DC Universe exclusive Young Justice series also getting a renewal, that this streaming channel will continue to be its own thing. The fear was that DC Universe would be folded into the HBO Max service, and sure, that could still happen eventually, but it looks like it’s still operating on its own for now.
[some SPOILERS for Swamp Thing episode 7, “Brilliant Disguise”]
So the weird thing about watching the Swamp Thing TV show for a longtime fan of the character like me, aside from the fact that there’s even a halfway faithful Swamp Thing TV show in the first place, is the way it mixes elements of the character from all across its history. Having the Conclave and Nathan Ellery (pictured above) from the original issue #1, in the same episode as the “hallucinogenic plant stuff lets Abby see Swamp Thing as Alec (from #34 of the second series) and all that Rot hoohar from the New 52…it’s just strange not having to wait for all this to gradually accumulate over decades. But then again, the show only has thre episodes left, they got a lot to squeeze in.
Oh, and yes, Avery Sunderland is there, too, as I mentioned when I covered a previous episode. Still a businessman, still involved in, y’know, bad stuff around the town while keeping up a positive public face…anyway, he gets shot out in the swamp for various plot reasons I won’t get into, and as he drags himself to shore, it appears he’s being taken over by whatever evil force has been lurking out in those dark waters and I’m pretty sure this is how we’re getting our Arcane for the series. Okay, he’s not really an actual Arcane, but he and his wife did take Abby in as a child and raised her, so I guess he’s kinda like her uncle now, if you kind of squint a bit? Oh, and the New 52 version of Arcane is tied into the Rot, which is, as previously noted, part of the TV show, whihc makes me think that we’re getting our Arcane-equivalent this way.
A customer asked me the other day if I liked the Swamp Thing show, and I said “yeah, it’s good,” and he was like “oh, I figured you were such a big fan of the character you’d be a purist about it,” and I was all “nah, they got the tone right, the specifics don’t have to be exact.” And I think I found my limit. I’m hoping we’re not seeing Sunderland’s origin as “Arcane.” Would not be a big fan of that.
Now, a couple of episodes back, there was a dream sequence where Abby, imagining her greateest fear, pictured some mysterious shadowed man dragging her off and, without going back to rewatch, I’m pretty sure it was implied this was someone she knew. I thought maybe that was foreshadowing an eventual Arcane appearance, sometime in Season Tw–oh, right. I mean, who knows…maybe that Arcane somehow is the dark force lurking in the swamp, and is possessing Sunderland’s body via the Rot, and thus will actually be Abby’s Uncle Arcane. …So welcome to Mike’s Fanfiction Corner, everybody.
I am trying to enjoy the show for what it is, and honestly, I do. But the part of my brain that contains the last five decades of Swamp Thing comics keeps pushing for certain things to happen. I want Arcane and his Un-Men. I want that alien from issue #9. I was Nathan Ellery controlling a big ol’ robot monster, oh, and also have a pet monkey. I want Chester Williams. …I’m grateful, and frankly amazed, at what we did get (again, pictured above, Nathan Ellery) that knowing the end is near for the show makes me sad for all the stuff we could have had but now won’t. Oh well.
And your DC Daily Update: I think one of the panelists on the show may have made a very, very slight reference to the Swamp Thing program’s impending ending. Nothing explicit, but a soft acknowledgement that maybe we don’t have that much more Swamp Thing to enjoy. I am really curious as to how it’s going to be addressed on the channel’s official “up with DC!” promotional outlet. I know I keep bringing it up, but I’m fascinated by this, and feel a bit for the panelists for eventually having to sell this cancellation as, well, maybe not a good thing, but perhaps not all that bad? We’ll see.
So in episode 5 of DC Universe’s Swamp Thing, we get a character I certainly didn’t expect to see in live action in my lifetime…though to be fair, the last few years have been filled with plenty of instances of “didn’t expect to see that character in live action.” But here we are, with a somewhat more down-to-earth Phantom Stranger, though still with the hat and medallion, popping up in our favorite TV show about a hideous muck monster. (You can see a snippet on the YouTubers here 0 yes, I said “YouTubers.”) It looks like, at least in this episode, he’s taking up the John Constantine role, as he shows up in the show to help Swamp Thing understand some of his new abilities.
As much as I love seeing the Stranger appear (complete with Roy Orbison’s “In Dreams” playing on his boat radio, for that additional DC mystery comic/ reference to Neil Gaiman’s Sandman goodness), it just adds to the frustration. I wrote about it at length last time I typed excessively about the show, but knowing there’s an premature end fast approaching leaves bit of a bad taste, as getting to see all these characters and situations play out over time is absolutely out of the question. I’ll enjoy what we get, I suppose, but it’s simply going to stand as a big ol’ lost opportunity.
Just so I’m not completely down about this episode, I will note that we got a lot of clear shots of the Swamp Thing get-up, and it does look quite nice. I’m glad they remembered Swamp Thing’s red eyes. It all certainly looks a lot better than the “soggy diaper that leaks” look of the costume in that first Swamp Thing movies in the early ’80s. I’ll even give this new costume the edge over Swampy’s look in the second film, mostly because of the “red eyes” thing.
Last Monday, on the service’s DC Daily talk/news show, they ran a graphic listing topics for episodes later in the week, and for Friday they had listed “MAD ABOUT SWAMP THING.” “Whoa,” I thought or at least saying I though for ease of describing my general non-verbal feeling at the time, “I wonder if the DC Daily show is going to address the whole ‘Swampy Got Canned’ sitch.” Given that the program is a promotional tool for the DC Universe service, and for DC publications, movies and other TV shows, it seemed unlikely we were going to see any hard-hitting investigative journalism regarding the abrupt cancellation. But still, that “MAD ABOUT SWAMP THING” title had me wondering.
Well, okay, as it turned out, it was folks from Mad Magazine riffing on Saga of the Swamp Thing #29, the first part of the “Arcane Returns” storyline, so it had nothing to do wtih the TV show at all. But I do wonder…you’d think eventually the show’s ending would have to be addressed, somehow. I just wonder how they’re going to do it while still maintaining a positive spin on the whole endeavor…or if maybe episode 10 rolls around, and the DC Daily is all “that was great! Can’t wait to see where it goes from here!” and just straight up never mention it again. It’s a tricky thing to handle, and it has me honestly curious about how they would go about approaching an admittedly difficult topic. …I still think just calling it a “mini-series” is still a good idea.
[SPOILERS for the first two episodes of Swamp Thing (2019)]
So the big problem with watching a show that you already know is doomed from the start is, basically, investment. I mean, yes, you can just watch it and enjoy what you got, sure, but it’s difficult to divorce yourself from your assumptions of abandoned potential, watching as plot threads and character developments are introduced and you realize they’ll never get the required time necessary to play out properly.
You could think of the DC Universe’s Swamp Thing TV show, which debuted at the very end of last month, as a “mini-series,” I suppose (and it’s really only a matter of time before the cheery hosts of that service’s DC Daily news show start referring to it as such), but a mini-series would imply a planned beginning, middle, and end, and not a suddenly assembled “well, tie it up best we can” final episode when the word came down a while back that the series order was cut from 13 episodes to 10. Now that we know this is all we’re getting with news of the show’s outright cancellation (for not 100% clear reasons just yet…there seems to be some contention over the popuarly-reported financial causes for the shutdown) it makes it hard to think about what could have been.
Because what we got so far? Not too shabby, thinks I. My eye troubles over the past week were maybe a good thing, at least for blogging purposes, as I’ve now had two episodes under my belt to reflect upon, given that Swamp Thing his own self doesn’t really even show up ’til the end of the first episode. (Another nagging thought…with only ten episodes left, the slow burn on Swampy action is a little frustrating…I want as much crammed in as possible. I want a Swamp Thing/Anton Arcane throwdown, complete with all the Un-Men, by episode 4 at the latest.)
But overall, all the elemnts are there, if shuffled around a tad. Abby Arcane works for the Center of Disease Cotrol, sent back to her hometown in Louisiana to investigate a mysterious swamp-borne virus. She meets Alac Holland, a dusgraced scientist who had been working for local Powerful Man up to No Good Avery Sunderland, but remained in town investigating the weird goings-on in the swamplands after Sunderland let him go. And Matt Cable is there, now a policeman and old schoolmate of Abby’s, and Liz Tremayne, a reporter introduced in the Marty Pasko/Tom Yeates 1980s run, is there as well, and still a reporter.
Alas, no Linda Holland or Chester Williams as of yet. But we do get Dan Cassidy, a local actor who, as we all surely know, is the Blue Devil in our beloved comics. Will he become the Blue Devil in the series? That feels like a season two or three thing–oh, right. And Madame Xanadu, DC’s mysical seer-type person, is there as well, and she establishes with Sunderland’s wife that there are some supernatural shenanigans happening involvin their long-desceased daughter (whose death is tied to Abby, who was their daughter’s friend). Oh, and did I mention Matt Cable’s mother is the local sheriff, played by Jennifer Beals?
So yeah, it’s not quite as simple a set-up as in the original comics. But some of those elements are still present. It’s established that Matt had a crush on Abby, and since Abby started to have feeling for Alec before…well, more on that in a second, but that had the makings of some kind of love triangle eventually, made to play out over the years to…um, anyway.
About Alec’s transformation. As much as I was hoping to get some version of this scene, with all the retooling of the premise I guess that wasn’t going to happen. While overall I’m fine with what they’ve done, I do have to admit it does bother me a little bit that Alec’s transformation into Swamp Thing is not due to his own experiments, but rather because of some outside force dumping “growth accelerant” into the water, causing the mutations and odd behaviors of the plant life out there in the bog. I’m not sure why that troubles me, aside from losing the inherent tragedy, and irony, of Alec falling victim to his own discovery. Instead, while out in the swamp investigating the dumped chemicls, he’s shot, the boat he’s on blows up, and muck-encrusted mockery ensues.
But, you know, I can live with it, at least for the eight remaining episodes. And everything is certainly moodily lit and plenty creepy. (A shot of the body of an early victiim of the virus, suddenly bolting upright during an autopsy with roots and such jutting out of it, stiffly jerking about, is particularly jarring.) And Swamp Thing, once we finally get a ood look at him in Episode 2, definitely looks like Swamp Thing, all planty and slimy and goopy and stuff. No ill-fitting green wetsuit here. We haven’t heard him speak yet, but episode three is titled “He Speaks,” so I’m guessing we will. It’s definitely caught my interest, and I think it does a good job updating the character and situations for a modern audience, laying the groundwork for what could have been several seasons of story. But oh well.
A couple other things…Tim Russ, AKA Tuvok from Star Trek: Voyager had a bit part in the pilot. Some kind of weird Star Trek synergy goin’ on over at the DC Universe, what with Marina Sirtis showing up for an episode of Titans.
Also, there’s a little blonde girl, the daughter of one of the first victims of the swamp-virus, and appears to be affected herself, who’s present in the first two episodes. I don’t know if they were implying some kind of psychic connection between her and Swamp Thing (her tearing off wires while in her hospital bed, while Swamp Thing, immediately post transofrmation, similarly tearing at the roots and muck that have become his body), but it reminds me a little of the little blonde girl “Casey” from the early issues of this series:
I’m going to presume things don’t work out quite the same way in the TV show as in the comic. However, she does eventually meet our hero, who saves her life, and there’s a bit of offscreen bonding we learn about in the second episode’s cliffhanger (she tells Abby that creature says his name is Alec). I think it’s a nice callback to an overshadowed comic book run, whether it was intentional or not.
As may come as no surprise, I’ll be in for the duration of the series, but I can already see myself thinking “C’MON PICK UP THE PACE, YOU ONLY HAVE FOUR EPISODES LEFT” or whatever. Who knows, maybe this’ll be the killer app that gets everyone to finally sign on for the DC Universe service and the powers that be will strike some kind of new deal to make more episodes. A boy can dream.
The day of the show’s debut, the aforementioned DC Daily did a Swampy-focused episode, which began with this screen:
Kudos to whoever was responsible for that reference to the greatest superhero cartoon theme song of all time:
Your reminder that I, a glutton for punishment, have asked you, people what still read the comic blogs, for questions and topics for me to type a lot about, as is the way of my people. Please feel free to pop in over there and let your query flag quiver!
In other news…okay, what I had originally written here was this enormous rambling thing about the DC Universe original streaming shows and how much they embraced or did not embrace their funnybook origins, and boy did it get out of hand. “What, Mike typed too much?” I hear you asking in disbelieving tones. But yeah, it was a mess and too long and nobody wanted to read that. Instead, let me give you my much more brief opinions on the shows thus far:
Titans – while tonally…off, and with limitations on the characters that likely stem from budgetary/suspension of disbelief reasons (no flying for Starfire/only one animal option for Beast Boy) it still remains oddly watchable. The acting is solid, the ongoing plots about Robin trying to escape Batman’s shadow, and the stuff with Raven, are interesting, and the fight sequences are very well choreographed and easy to follow, which I appreciate. Plus, I love the fact that Hawk and Dove pretty much look like they were 3D printed directly from the comic books, even if they seemed to miss the point of, you know, Dove being a pacifist. Still, it’s enough to bring me back for Season Two, where I hope they shift a little more away from “WE’RE DARK AND ADULT, NOT LIKE THAT TEEN TITANS CARTOON YOU REMEMBER” and more toward the goofy superhero stuff. I mean, they don’t have to go all the way if they want, but a little more would be nice. The end-of-season tag gives me a smidgen of hope.
Young Justice: Outsiders – perfectly fine…if you liked the previous two seasons of this show, here’s more, and it’s a fun look at the DC Universe via the perspective of the younger heroes and sidekicks. Nothing against the Bruce Timm/DC Animated Universe style, but it’s nice to have a longform take on these characters that doesn’t look like every other DC TV cartoon. Good thing DC Universe spaces out the releases of their shows, because this would have been an easy one to just watch the entire initial batch of episodes straight through.
Doom Patrol: probably the breakout star of the streaming shows so far, approaching these weird characters and weird situations, often straight out of the comics, with humor and, well, the willingness to just throw the bonkers stuff at you and tell you “here you go, deal with it.” I know initially I thought for sure they’d figure out a way to have Robotman appear in human form most of the time thanks to some, I don’t know, holographic disguise or something, but nope, there’s Robotman, pretty much all the time. And I have to say, Brendan Fraser’s voicework on the character, as well as his dialogue and general demeanor, is just spot on perfect. That’s Robotman.
The other characters in the show are nicely done as well, though I’m hoping to see more of Rita Farr using her stretchy powers properly, rather than just occasionally melting down a bit. And Cyborg fit in better than I thought he would, supplying a contrast between the other Patrol members and himself while revealing to be nearly as messed up as the rest of them.
The metatextual commentary of Mr. Nobody, the Animal-Vegetable-Mineral Man, Danny the Street and Flex MentallO, even the Beardhunter (somewhat in changed form)…this show really gave us something different and off-kilter in the superhero genre, which was desperately needed.
Forthcoming is Stargirl (about the show I know very little aside from seeing shots of the costume) and of course Swamp Thing (starting Frihay – here have a trailer). They look like they’re fiddling with the characters and set-up a bit, but I’m still willing to give it a go. What, you thought I wouldn’t? Here’s hoping it’s closer to Doom Patrol than to Titans…but let’s face it, I’d watch it regardless. I’ll report back after I get a chance to watch my own self.
Anyway, there’s my shorter take on the DCU TV shows. Aren’t you glad I kept it brief?
Yup, I got in on the ground floor on this, getting that twelve months plus three extra months subscription, which translates to a whole lot of Sweary Robin in my future.
Anyway, I’m going to make this quick, because your pal Mike is up way past his bedtime again (8 PM during the week, maybe as late as 8:30 on the weekends if I’m feeling particularly wild), so let me just thrown some random thoughts out there in a bullet-pointed list with no particular order:
Okay, first off the Amazon Fire TV thingie was supposed to be supported at launch, which was what I was planning to use, but guess what? Har har, it ain’t, so the Roku stick thingie it is. I like the Roku’s interface a little better anyway…a lot less “HERE’S EVERYTHING YOU CAN BE WATCHING OR DOWNLOADING RIGHT NOW ON YOUR LANDING PAGE WHEN YOU FIRST TURN YOUR FIRE STICK ON” which is a bit overwhelming. Roku seems to work fine through my TV.
First thing I watched, which may be evidenced by the above screen shot, was the latter-day episode of Super Friends where both Firestorm and Darkseid were introduced. And, as Super Friends goes, given its reputation as a…not particuarly good cartoon, this episode wasn’t half-bad, to be honest. Definitely written with a young target audience in mind, as it should be, and the Standards and Practices dictates were fairly clear(losts of characters being trapped in nets or bindings, with no full-on punches to the face or anything…though I was surprised a bit at Firestorm calling Wonder Woman “a fox.” But overall, it was a fun episode, and I look forward to perusing other episodes of the series over time.
However, as I watched that episode ogain on the computer, to het that screenshot and this GIF, I experience some kind of glitch where I couldn’t turn off the captions. Didn’t have that problem on the Roku. Not a terrible problem, but hopefullly they’ll get it fixed soon.
The video library seems fairly sizeable so far…nowhere near complete, of course (no Swamp Thing movies or TV series or cartoon) but it did have all three classic Christopher Reeve Superman films plus the fourth one, the George Reeves Superman show, the Lynda Carter Womder Woman series, several of the animated series and films, and more. None of the ’60s cartoons yet, which is what I’m hoping for, but they do have all of Constantine so I can finally watch that, at long last. None of the CW shows are on there, which I think was pretty well publicized but thought I should mention it here anyway.
The comic reading section I haven’t looked through too much yet…looks like some Golden Age mixed in with the more recent-ish titles, plus weird things like the original Authority comics. I tried looking at some DC Comics Presents but got a “not availale” response, so hopefully that’s something that’ll be addressed. But the actual reading of the comic is pretty neat, at least how I did it, which was to blow up the whole page and I could jsut scroll up and down as needed. There’s also a timed page turner/panel progresser you can use as well.
Peeked in on the community section, with message boards for fans to complain about things. Probably won’t be looking at this ever again.
And there’s an online shop where you can buy lots of mugs and figurines apparenntly. Don’t see myself doing much with that either, unless some exclusive DC Universe Streaming Service Swamp Thing goodies.
Probably should have mentioned it up there but IT’S TOO lATE TO TURN BACK NOW: episodic items have a “next up” box that theoretically should pop up over the credits, but I tried watching onoe of those DC Nation fhort cartoons and the “next up” box showed up well before it was completed, so that needs a bit of work, too.
Okay, I’m fading fast, so let’s check out here for now and I’ll report back after I’ve had a little more time to go through it. If you have specific questions about it, just let me know and I’ll try to answer ’em best I can.
So that surprising f-bomb in the Titans trailer had its intended effect — it’s got everyone talking about the TV show, and the DC Universe streaming service where it will debut soon. I mean, I’m not innocent, I had a couple of laughs (NSFW) about it, so DC got themselves almost Todd-McFarlane-buying-baseballs-levels of free publicity. (It also brought out the usual fellas who object every time a person who isn’t white and/or male is cast in anything.)
Now, I mean despite all that, it looks…you know, at least CW-levels of good (which I realize for some folks isn’t saying much). It does seem awfully dark-ish and gritty-ish at a time when it sort of looks like DC is at least trying to back away from that sort of thing in their media adaptations, which is an odd choice…I mean, aside from the odd choice of having Robin do a swear, of course. I feel like Raven is the breakout character here, not that we saw a whole lot of anyone else, but I can see her being especially appealing to young viewers, which is sort of ironic considering.
My other concern, as a retailer who tries to sell comic books (remember comic books? I’ve got a store full of them), is that if this particular bit of dialogue gets traction in cultural awareness, I could see parents steering kids away from Teen Titans comics in the future…”no, you can’t read that, Robin’s a pottymouth!” I did see this phenomenon with Deadpool after that first movie was released…kids wanted Deadpool comics, parents were all “isn’t that R-rated? NO WAY.” Granted, Deadpool comics are not generally speaking for the tykes, but it appeared this reaction was being fueled by the film and not by any particularly awareness of the comics.
Of course, that’s comparing apples and oranges, one of the most successful R-rated movies in history versus a streaming TV show that may be seen by upwards of tens of viewers. Who knows what impact this show will ultimately have, in a world where there is an enormous surfeit of superhero media, beyond the novelty of being part of a network presented by a comics publisher? Sure, I’ll be watching, because SWAMP THING TV SHOW, DUH. And I am curious about the Titans show, and the forthcoming Doom Patrol show (despite my reservations that Robotman will almost certainly have a “cloaking device” or something that will make him look like a normal human and not an expensive digital effect most of the time). And there are the digital comics, which…sheesh, I’ll just have to give up sleep at this point to keep up with everything.
Some folks were wondering why DC would even do this with the Titans, and…well, like I said, to get attention. I mean, aside from Deadpool, you haven’t really seen superheroes with quite so salty tongues. Plus, maybe DC is spreading their Titans demographics…you’ve got Teen Titans Go! for the younger set, you’ve got this new show for the older audiences, and, as was pointed out to me on the Twitters, there’s Young Justice (brand new Season 3 coming exclusively to the DC Universe streaming service, coincidentally!) for the folks who fall in between. I know seeing the shows divided up like that may seem weird to a lot of us who are fully capable of watching all three (or maybe two) of these shows and enjoying them, but hey, that’s marketing!
It was something of a relief to hear concerns that were more in-story character based about that specific attitude of Robin’s, like “why would he even think that about Batman to begin with?” And friend, if the people in charge of the DC Universe digital comics service are smart, they’ll curate a collection of the “Robin Is Pissed at Batman” genre for the edification of those in need.
Anyway, I’m already signed up, as the per-month price was pretty much just what I wanted to pay, so I expect I’ll be reporting directly upon the service here in short order. Maybe I’ll keep a tally of just how many swears I hear per episode. “OOOOH GET THE BAT-SOAP, SOMEONE’S MOUTH NEEDS WASHING”
Okay, I was planning on this being a two-post week, but I find myself having to report on the only big comic news to come out in the last few days. I am, of course, talking about the reveal of the covers for the first issue of Dark Horse’s Mystery Science Theater 3000 series.
The regular cover, by Todd Nauck, which has a real Mad Magazine vibe to it:
The variant, by regular contributor to the MST3K box sets Steve Vance, featuring Tom Servo’s very disturbing man-hands:
I have no idea what ratio that variant will be available in…1 in 10? 1 in 100? 1 in 1000? Well, I hope my customers are ready for 1,000 copies of the MST3K comic, because I’m gonna need both versions. Anyway, read more about it at this article here.
As I assumed back in ye olden tymes, the comics will indeed be the Satellite of Love crew riffing over old comics (as was the original plan waaaaay back even farther when Acclaim Comics intended to do their own MST funnybooks). I’ve been waiting for a MST3K comic book for a very long time, and I’m very glad it’s almost here.
Oh, and I guess there’s some big to-do about Vertigo this week as well. I mean, in much less important news.
