SAGA OF THE SWAMP THING #21 -- Alan Moore's Scene Transitions

 

Saga of the Swamp Thing #21: "The Anatomy Lesson" 

This is the comic where most readers began their appreciation of Alan Moore's Swamp Thing (and, likely, Swamp Thing in general). The original trade paperback collection, published in 1987, started with this issue instead of Moore's actual first issue on the title, #20. "The Anatomy Lesson" is related to us through flashback, narrated by Dr. Jason Woodrue, The Floronic Man. Brought in to examine Swamp Thing and discover what animated him, it's a brilliant bit of work by Moore, Bissette, Totleben, et al. 

But that's for my next post. This one is about the scene transitions utilized by Moore and his artistic collaborators. Since this issue is recounted from open to close by Woodrue, it was a bit challenging to find transitions, since, unlike the previous issue, this chapter follows a single, straight narrative thread. But there are a few scene transitions to be gleaned if one looks closely enough, and Moore does not disappoint with his intentionality, in this regard. 

Transition pp. 1-2:

Page 1 sets the stage for the story Dr. Woodrue is about to tell, sharing the end, as he imagines it, before we've even got the beginning. In the final panel of this page, an old man is banging on a window and the image is almost fully red from the blood Woodrue imagines coating the glass, with the caption, "Blood in extraordinary quantities." 
Page 2 opens close in on Woodrue's eyes hanging over the entire page, his eyes blood red. 

Moore utilizes mirroring, as he does in many of his transitions, with the blood red of the window on page 1 matching the blood red eyes of Woodrue on page 2.

The scene from pages 2 through page 5 is basically an interview by Sunderland of Dr. Woodrue. He wants Woodrue to examine the corpse of Swamp Thing and figure out what animated him. It is also imperative for Sunderland to know that Dr. Woodrue is who he claims to be -- The Floronic Man. So, Woodrue uses a spray to dissolve his artificial skin and reveal the woody, mossy visage beneath. 

Transition pp. 5-6:

The final panel of page 5, on the bottom right of the page, is a closeup of Sunderland asking Woodrue, "When can you start?" in reference to his impending examination of the corpse of Swamp Thing. 
Page 6 returns to the present and Woodrue's apartment, where a caption box shares his thought, "I started the next day." 

In this transition, Moore mirrors the dialogue of "start"ing rather than mirroring the imagery, as he did on pages 1-2.

The scene from pages 6 through 9 involves Woodrue performing an autopsy on Swamp Thing's corpse. He pulls out vegetable growths that look like human organs but do not, and could not, perform the same functions as in the human body. It's fascinating and puzzling, and in six weeks Woodrue has the answer. 

Transition pp. 9-10:

At the bottom of page 9, we see a green shoot sprouting from the chest of the gray body of the Swamp Thing, as Woodrue thinks (in the final caption), "...and something strong and soft and green, thrusting through the dead and petrified grayness." 
At the top of page 10, we see Dr. Woodrue coming to Sunderland's office to explain his discovery. Woodrue is wearing a green overcoat or lab coat. 

Again, this transition utilizes mirroring, in this case mirroring the green shoot emanating from Swamp Thing with the green coat of Woodrue. 

This scene, from pages 10 to 13, is the moment where Woodrue explains exactly what happened to Alec Holland, when he raced into the swamps to die, and how it was that Swamp Thing emerged. Woodrue is excited, the ramifications are astounding . . . and Sunderland does not care. He has his answer, though he does not understand it, and Woodrue is done. Sunderland will find someone else to continue the work. 

Transition pp. 13-14:

At the bottom of page 13, we get a close up of Sunderland's teeth, his creased face, and the trail of smoke wafting from his nostril, as he tells Woodrue, "We'll sort out the termination papers when I get back." 
Page 14 opens on a closeup of Woodrue in his true guise of the Floronic Man while, in a caption over the panel, he thinks, "...and that's how the old man fired me." 

More mirroring, as we get Sunderland discussing "termination papers" while Woodrue defines it more colloquially, "firing." But this mirroring of dialogue is not the same as the previous transition in this vein, as Moore uses synonymous phrases rather than directly using the same word, as before. 

The scene from page 14 through to the end of the issue is a recounting (or imagining, on the part of Woodrue) of Sunderland discovering the ramifications of what he, Woodrue, discovered, and the terminal climax that must come from such a revelation. For the Swamp Thing is not dead. But he does understand. And his humanity is lost. And Sunderland will pay. . . 

Transition p. 23: 

Panel 3, in the top row of panels on this final page, ends the scene with Swamp Thing (and Sunderland) discovering the truth of his being. It has a closeup on the dead eye of Sunderland, with a tiny Swamp Thing walking away in the far background. Over this panel is a caption stating what Swamp Thing would do once Sunderland was taken care of -- he would, in Woodrue's mind, go "back to the bayou," where he came from. 
Panel 4 has the caption, "Back home..." continuing this idea and is overlaid on an image of the Floronic Man standing at the window of his apartment, his own home during this experience. 

Moore gets a bit more inventive with the mirroring in this transition, mirroring the captions stating that Swamp Thing would go "back home" with the image of Woodrue standing in his current, but temporary, home. 

For more thoughts on the actual narrative, along with insights into some of the added depth provided by Moore, Bissette, Totleben, et al. for this issue, check out  my next post, which should be up in a day or so. 

Thanks! 

chris

Comic Book Making: Lettering & Art working together

With relatively few exceptions, the creation of a comic book is a collaborative effort, especially when discussing work from the larger publishers, Marvel and DC.  Much of their output consists of color comics, and much of it is published on a monthly basis.  For a standard 20-24 page comic, that's a lot of work to get done in a short amount of time.  Which is why a division of labor was formed:  writing, penciling, inking, coloring, lettering.  Parsing out these various aspects of a comic to different specialists allowed the schedules to remain intact, for the most part.  And, though all parts of the comic need to come together in order for it to work, there is an obvious hierarchy, with writing and art at the top and, more so now than ever, the writers even getting higher billing than the artists. 

Anyway, preamble aside, I've been reading some older comics recently and came across examples of "unorthodox" panel layouts in two different issues -- one that didn't work and one that did.  The former was from the Wally West era Flash series, issue #201, and the latter was in Saga of the Swamp Thing annual #2. 

  

Now, comparing anyone's work to that of Alan Moore and his collaborators is almost always a losing proposition and terribly unfair.  But if you want to learn how to do things well, you need to learn from the best, so let's get on with it.  

First, let's look at the page that didn't work.  The issue was published in 2003, written by Geoff Johns, drawn by Alberto Dose, with lettering from Kurt Hathaway.  

An important thing to remember, when dealing with a page layout that does not adhere to any recognizable grid (such as a 2 x 2 panel grid like Kirby would utilize or a 3 x 3 panel grid that epitomized Ditko's Spider-Man and Moore & Gibbons's Watchmen) is that there need to be some way for the reader's eye to smoothly follow the storytelling -- because our natural progression, in western comic and reading in general, is to go left to right, top to bottom; anything outside that norm will necessitate hard work on the part of the creators, to get it right.  That doesn't happen in the above page. 

Looking at that page from the Flash, we start in the upper left corner, obviously, as Wally steps from his car, which is hanging in midair (due to Wally's sped up perceptions as he goes into superspeed mode).  This follows to the tall rectangular panel just to the right, overlapping with the initial panel.  Now, this middle panel at the top also heavily overlaps with the larger panel in the upper right.  Our eyes naturally move in that direction, with nothing to hinder our reading progress . . . BUT this would be wrong.  That "third" panel has Wally already on the ground, looking into the vehicle beneath his own.  We only discover is it the wrong order, though, when we shift our eyes back to the left and find a panel that, in time, falls between that second panel and that large one in the upper right.  The caption box:  "My car's floating in midair." also indicates this panel comes before the one where he sees the driver in the neighboring car.   Nothing -- in the art or the lettering (since that caption box appeared not to be attached to that second panel) -- showed readers they needed to move downward rather than to the right.  So, in reading it out of order first, followed by a need to go back and re-read it correctly, the creators have taken the audience out of the story and any emotional response they may have been attempting to spur in the readership is lost. 

Now, let's look at a less hectic but still unorthodox panel layout in the Swamp Thing annual.   This comic was published in 1985, written by Alan Moore, with art from Stephen Bissette & John Totleben, and lettering by John Costanza. 

In this issue, and all the issues to date that I've re-read, the lettering and art come together in a near perfect harmony to bring these stories to life in a way that few comics, even today, are able to achieve.  There's a reason these comics are stone cold classics, part of that's the writing, part of that is the art, including coloring from Tatjana Wood, and part of that is the lettering. 

On this page, we start, as we always do, in the upper left corner.  Deadman is hovering above Swamp Thing as they talk.  This panel leads into the tall panel at the right, which overlaps the first and third.  Of course, our eye naturally moves this way, but just to emphasize the reading of this page, Deadman's hand leaks into that second panel.  There, we have a double-image, wherein we see Deadman and Swampy walking through the nether-realm as a ghost-image of Deadman's face looms above them, speaking.  His word balloons wrap through the image of the two characters, leading directly to the third panel, where Swamp Thing's speech balloons lead directly off from Deadman's in panel two.  Note that, in these first three panels, not only have the word balloons directed our eyes through the reading order of these panels, but the figures also snake through in the direction we should be reading.  Deadman's response in this panel falls outside that "arrow" but, again, we have the art to lead us into the next panel, which is the tall, rectangular one at the lower left.  Not only does Deadman's arm once again point us to the next panel to be read, but the slight overlap of that panel into the third one also pulls us toward it.  And then, once again, we have the characters turned around, facing toward the right, which leads us into the final panel. 

Certainly, this page wasn't as complex as the Flash panel, but it adhered to some fairly "unspoken rules" about comic art, which is to have the images in the panels leading readers in the correct reading order, and adding to this clarity of expression is the lettering from Costanza, who masterfully weaves the word balloons through this page, and other similarly expressive pages, to keep the audience engaged with the story and not having to pause and think about which panel they need to go to next. 

And if you're looking for another example of masterful art and lettering that provides a clarify of expression in an unorthodox panel layout, check out my earlier post on Sam Kieth's Aliens work, here.  It's pretty interesting (the page layout if not the explanation from me), in my opinion.

OCTOBER COMICS (2015): Saga of the Swamp Thing #21

“The Anatomy Lesson,” written by Alan Moore, art by Stephen Bissette & John Totleben, colors by Tatjana Wood, lettering from John Costanza

Swamp Thing is the comic that put Alan Moore “on the map,” and issue 21 is one of my all-time favorite single issues.  In the previous issue, Moore and his collaborators had killed Swamp Thing, as bullets riddled his muck-encrusted body.  Dead, Swamp Thing’s body has been taken to a research lab in a high-rise building, the modern marvel of “the old man,” a businessman who wants to know the secrets of Swamp Thing’s metamorphosis from Alec Holland into this plant creature and, hopefully, exploit these findings for himself.  To that end, he hires Jason Woodrue, the Floronic Man, a similarly afflicted scientist, to do an autopsy and discover all that he can about Swamp Thing. 

Through his investigation, the Floronic Man comes to discover that Swamp Thing, though his body has incorporated plant-like body parts that appear to be analogous to human ones, e.g. lungs, kidneys, a heart, none of these actually work in the manner they should.  These are plants, not human tissue, and could not act in the same manner.  What this means is that Swamp Thing is not a melding of Alec Holland and the swamp plants, as a result of the explosion years ago, but is actually a plant being created to mimic Holland, somehow incorporating his essence, or his soul.  But, for all intents and purpose, Holland is dead and will never be revived. 

More importantly, though, if this is actually a botanic simulacrum and not a human encrusted with plants, then bullets cannot kill it.  It is not dead.  The only thing keeping it subdued is the cryogenic crypt within which it is being held.  If someone were to raise the temperature, it would resuscitate.  And if it found out the truth—that it can never return to being Alec Holland, can only ever be a plant monster with the mind of Holland—then it might take its frustrations out ona a particular old man who did not appreciate the Floronic Man’s findings. 

With this issue, Moore & company completely reimagined the character of Swamp Thing without contradicting anything that came before (as Moore is wont to do).  But, like most comics, this would not have worked so well without the artistic contributions of Bissette & Totleben.  They are the gold standard, all due respect to Berni Wrightson, when it comes to Swamp Thing.  True collaborators—their thoughts and ideas were invited and incorporated by Moore—they not only drew Swamp Thing as a monstrous being who was covered with plants and tubers and vines, but also utilized inventive panel layouts and added details (such as crafting panel and page borders from collections of spiders and their webbing) to add to the ambience and mood of the comic.  Under these three master storytellers, along with the contributions of Wood & Constanza, as well as later collaborators such as Rick Veitch, Shawn McManus, and others, the character of Swamp Thing—and, to a lesser extent, horror comics—was revitalized for a market that seemed to have passed him by.  And he continues to loom over the DC comics landscape today, though nobody has seemed able to crack the code as to his popularity so well as Moore, et al. did so deftly back in the early-eighties. 

chris

OCTOBER COMICS: Taboo from Spiderbaby Grafix

It is appropriate that October be the month of Halloween, especially here in New England with darkness creeping in at the frayed edges of these shorter days, the naked branches scratching against window panes as brittle leaves blow past, propelled by a chill wind heralding the coming winter. The brisk air is tinged with a scent of horror – something almost tangible – that insinuates itself into our minds as we try to reconcile the change in the seasons.

Stephen Bissette’s horror anthology, Taboo (published from 1988-1995), masterfully captures the atmosphere of this time of year. With contributions from such notable writers and artists as Dave Sim, Charles Burns, Tom Sniegoski, Charles Vess, Bernie Mireault, Keith Giffen, Chester Brown, Eddie Campbell, Moebius, Melinda Gebbie, Neil Gaiman, Michael Zulli, Alan Moore, and Bissette himself, every issue of this series reaches for – and often achieves – an incredibly high standard of graphic storytelling.

From Hell and Lost Girls both had their starts in this anthology. Readers also experienced the fleeting glimpse of Gaiman & Zulli’s Sweeney Todd (with the prologue found in issue 7), which never found another publisher once Taboo ceased publication. Spain Rodriguez’s succinct retelling of Alejandro Jodorowsky’s cult film classic El Topo can be found within the pages of this book. (issue 4, to be exact). And there is any other number of horror masterpieces to be found within various issues of this landmark series.

The offerings in Taboo are not what one would describe as typical horror comics. These stories are disturbing, uncomfortable, demanding pieces of art. They are the horrors that keep one up at night, staring into the blackness to identify the sound that startled you awake. These stories are creepy, and the slimy film of the narratives is hard to wash off, staying with you long after the book is closed.

If you’re a fan of “shock” horror and want to be scared – Taboo might not be the book for you. But if you like your fiction challenging, if you want to read stories that make you think, and if you appreciate that anxious flutter in the pit of your stomach when the clock strikes midnight, then you should be seeking these books out because they are becoming harder and harder to find.

The stories found in this seminal anthology are a fitting capstone to a crisp, cool October day.

chris