DC Unveils an 80s Icon's Best Redesign of All Time, Bar None

DC Comics has unveiled an icon of the 1980s comic scene’s best redesign. The 1980s were a landmark decade in comic book history. An influx of new talent took the medium in bold and challenging directions. Alan Moore showed the darker side of superheroes in works such as Miracleman or Watchmen, while Frank Miller gave fans the bleakest vision of Batman to that point in The Dark Knight Returns.

Also, crucial to the revitalization of American comics in the 1980s was Moore’s run on Saga of the Swamp Thing. The book, created as a tie-in for Wes Craven’s live-action Swamp Thing movie, had plummeted sales-wise in the wake of the film’s flop. It was essentially on its way out when DC handed Moore, then an unknown to American comics, the reins. With his collaborators, Moore not only permanently redefined Swamp Thing, but the field as a whole. It can be argued the success of Moore’s Swamp Thing allowed him to write Watchmen.

Despite finding its footing in the 1980s, Swamp Thing goes back a decade earlier. Horror comics experienced a renaissance in the early 1970s, and Swamp Thing arose from this boom. He has been a mainstay of the DC Universe, and like any character with that long a shelf life, he has experienced changes. Now, Swamp Thing's most radical new look in many years has just been released.

Swamp Thing Has Become "Tech-ified" in DC's Far Future

Something Has Taken Out and Corrupted DC's Magical Side

DC Comics has released a first look at its October-shipping titles, including one for The Deadman #5. Written by W. Maxwell Prince and drawn by Martin Morazzo, the issue introduces a new, unsettling version of Swamp Thing. DC’s solicitation for the book reads as follows:

THE FUTURE OF THE DEADMAN! In this loving ode to an occult-classic comic, the Deadman finds himself flung to one of a few feasible futures in which the forward march of Earth's phantoms has fallen off...for good. Boston Brand—human once more!— must survive a strange sojourn through a soulless tomorrow, featuring the freakiest-ever futuristic takes on a few familiar faces belonging to the DCU's phantasmagoric foothold. Soldier on, photon stranger, through the psycho-spiritual swamp that is...the Gr33n.

DC also shared a look at Morazzo’s cover for The Deadman #5. The “techno” version of Swamp Thing described in the solicitation is here given chilling life, with the plants and vines that comprise him replaced by wires and computer chips.

Furthermore, the solicitation seems to indicate that the future Boston Brand has stumbled into has heralded changes for the Green as well. Introduced during Moore’s tenure, the Green is an elemental force binding all plant life together. It is the epitome of organic, but in The Deadman #5, a twisted and blasphemous version is introduced. Rewriting the Green’s name in “hacker speak” only makes it more disturbing.

Finally, it would appear that the entire magical side of the DC Universe has ceased to exist as well, or at least has been depowered. While Swamp Thing is a key part of that corner of DC, it consists of many other heroes, villains and rogues as well. Whatever caused the seeming extinction of the DC Universe’s magic users would have to be one of the most powerful forces in creation. The Green itself possesses god-like abilities, and defeating just them would prove challenging.

Swamp Thing Is Used to Explore Environmental Issues

While the image of a “tech-ified” Swamp Thing might cause fans to squirm, it is not his first go-round with inorganic life. Famously, during Moore’s run, Swamp Thing was dislocated from Earth and the Green, drifting through space. In 1987’s Swamp Thing #60, he materialized on a techno-organic planet, leading to a machine-looking version of the character. Ram V and Mike Perkins would explore similar themes of nature versus machines years later during their acclaimed run on Swamp Thing.

Being an avatar of the Green, Swamp Thing is one of the embodiments of all organic life on Earth. Numerous creators have used the character to explore environmental issues, and the conflict between humanity, usually embodied in machines, and nature has played out in many issues of Swamp Thing. Ram V and Mike Perkins took this conflict and played it to the hilt. Swamp Thing proved triumphant at the end of the book.

What Turned Swamp Thing Into a Techno-Version of Himself?

Nevertheless, a "Borg-ified" Swamp Thing is a Cool Visual

And now, it looks as if the conflict between nature and machines has come to an end, and the machine won. Magic has been seemingly neutered in the DC Universe, replaced with soulless simulacrums. Swamp Thing, easily one of the most powerful magic-based characters in the publisher’s stable, was not spared either. While fans wait for The Deadman #5 to hit the shelves and see how other DC magic icons have been corrupted, they can get a good look at what has happened to Swamp Thing.

Swamp Thing’s new look could be the herald of a great evil menacing the DC Universe. However, it nonetheless makes for a great visual, and Morazzo brings it to awesome life in the cover for The Deadman #5. Swamp Thing helped change the course of comics history, and now this 1980s icon is getting his most awesome redesign ever.

The Deadman #5 is on sale October 7 from DC Comics!