How I Was Nearly The Writer For Swamp Thing

[Gail Simone]

Before I turned pro, I had a sense that every comic, every story, was planned out in advance and everything made sense, and if it DIDN'T make sense, it was something I, as the reader, was missing. Something I wasn't quite connecting.

Once I became a pro, I found out that even though most of the broad strokes of comics are planned, a lot of times things are just thrown together at the last moment for any of a million reasons.

I love Swamp Thing, but my love of Swamp Thing (don't yell at me) is just as much about the character BEFORE Alan Moore. I loved the original, creepy stories, most of which I read many years after publication. Great art, twisted morality, I loved them. Alan did brilliant stuff, but at some point, I just lost interest.

This story takes place after I had started at DC. I had written a few issues of Bop and had just turned in some Rose and Thorn scripts, I think.

If I understand correctly what happened, I guess the Rose and Thorn scripts really impressed some people at DC, including Paul Levitz, who, I'm told, made a specific point to come and tell the book's editor, Mike Carlin, that it was the perfect combination of twisted psychology and action. So I guess my name was going around the offices a bit at that time.

Now, Vertigo editors had asked me to come up with something I would like them to print, but I kept sending black horror comedy pitches, or horror sex stories, that were not fitting the Vertigo vibe, I guess. Perfectly understandable...the stuff was not what people think when they see the Vertigo label. In any case, there were some near misses and I put the idea of a Vertigo book away for a bit.

Just as I decided it wasn't happening, I get an email from a Vertigo editor, and he is saying that the guy they had imagined would be doing Swamp Thing may not work out, for whatever reason. So they wanted to have a choice for who to pick to do the book. I didn't want to take a job from anyone, but it was made clear that the job was likely going to not go to the guy they had tagged no matter what happened.

So they asked me if I would please please please do a Swamp Thing pitch.

I said, well. Hmmm. I do love Swamp Thing. Okay, when do you need this by?

Now, just for background, I usually like a lot of development time. I was working Tranquility out in my head for something like eight years before the first issue. I had months before I even did an outline on Wonder Woman.

So I asked, how long do I have for the outline?

I need it tomorrow, says the editor.

(cont...)

[beetlebum]

[Yells at you for liking it before Alan Moore]

Other than that, cool story.

I wonder what path your career would have taken, had you been allowed to write it.

[Gail Simone]

(cont...)

So, I love Swamp Thing, but I have to admit, after Alan left, even with some great writers, it did seem a struggle for the character to find a hold. And people tried various strategies, and nothing was really catching on, apparently.

I figured, you can't out-Alan Moore the real article, but there were some things that could be done that were so far from that approach that it would be startling, to say the least.

So I came up with the idea,

SWAMP THING, INC.

And the basic conceit was this...a money-grubbing, selfish corporate bastard, a real estate mogul (an indictment of the worst facets of American capitalism gone mad), buys up huge chunks of the swamp that Swamp Thing lives in. Through bribery and bullying, he evicts the human and animal and plant life in the area to put up soul-destroying condominiums.

Swamp Thing decides to fight back, but the capitalist dude is prepared for that and uses ST's friends and loves against him.

I can't QUITE recall how it happened, but witchcraft is involved, and as the two become bitter enemies, their spirits are switched. The spirit of 'Alec Holland,' is put in the body of this overweight balding real estate scumbag, and the corporate dude is put in the body of Swamp Thing.

And the black humor of it, and the uncomfortable horror of it, comes from the fact that even though their situations force them to face unpleasant realities (Alec having to realize that these polluters are human beings with families and beliefs, and the corporate guy having to realize what he is doing is killing everything he touches), their true natures are coming through.

Alec finds he doesn't want to leave the swamp, so he's this overweight out of shape guy who used to be an Earth Elemental but now is terrorized by bugs and splinters and infection and basically everything the swamp IS. The corporate guy, still in Swamp Thing's body, puts on a suit and carries a briefcase and still goes into his office and has meetings and smokes cigars, even if he leaves a trail of swampy filth everywhere.

I thought it'd be that kind of black-hearted uncomfortable humor/horror that really gets under the skin. I felt it was a way to see the character through new eyes, and eventually, when he returned, Alec would have to actually remember what humanity is about, even if it's reluctantly.

Swamp Thing on Wall Street still makes me laugh to think about.

So I was pretty excited, I felt it was innovative.

They got the outline, and I didn't hear back for a bit.

I asked what was up, and the answer came back, basically, they found it utterly baffling. Swamp Thing in a SUIT?

I hope I am conveying the perplexed tone they had. They just were baffled. It was hilarious and kind of great. I'm talking about great editors here, it's not that they didn't get it. They just didn't get why I thought DC would PUBLISH it.

I thought it because to me, guys in suits are scarier than monsters, and the discomfort of the real world is that people can buy every aspect of how you live without you even being aware of it.

And Swamp Thing with a briefcase is funny.

I still think it's one of the best pitches I ever wrote, and I only had a few hours to make it happen, start to finish.

I love the books I am writing now, but I do imagine that my career would have been markedly, if not wholly, different if this book had gone forward. If it had been a flop, that would have changed things. If it had been a huge hit, would I still be writing Secret Six and Birds of Prey now?

Hard to say. My career might have gone another way entirely.

Now, multiply that by fifty, and that's how many times something similar has happened--a project or book is offered, a different company wants to publish me, a different media makes an offer. And if I'd taken any of those, it could significantly change my career, and the way my work is perceived. If I hadn't done Birds Of Prey, if I'd done WW before Deadpool, all those odd what-ifs.

Comics is full of them. Are they missed opportunities, or happy decisions in retrospect. A lot of ghosts in the stories that didn't quite happen.

We get in the raft and we push it downstream, but I often wonder about the tributaries I didn't end up taking.

[Gryphon]

Very interesting story.

[HamsterRage]

I like that idea... there's a lot that could have been done with that idea and some really interesting things it could say about people who have differing agendas.

[Patch]

Gail,
They were right to not go with that take. Not that it isn't unique or creative-- but you're not writing about Swamp Thing. When you've got ol' mossy roaming about for much of the story with the personality of a real estate tycoon, you're writing about another character. You've lost your headliner.

[DarkKnightJared]

I think that would have been an enjoyable story--for an arc, at least.

I also now have the sudden inclination to draw Swamp Thing in a suit, holding a briefcase.

[Andreas]

[Yells at you for liking it before Alan Moore]

Other than that, cool story.

I wonder what path your career would have taken, had you been allowed to write it.

Mark Millar would still be writing for 2000A.D. mainly and waiting for his big breakthrough.

[Gail Simone]

Gail,
They were right to not go with that take. Not that it isn't unique or creative-- but you're not writing about Swamp Thing. When you've got ol' mossy roaming about for much of the story with the personality of a real estate tycoon, you're writing about another character. You've lost your headliner.

Yep.

Hey, where is our headliner right now?

Canceled multiple times, you say?

[Gail Simone]

i think that would have been an enjoyable story--for an arc, at least.

I also now have the sudden inclination to draw swamp thing in a suit, holding a briefcase.

i wish you would indulge that inclination!