To coincide with the airing of Swamp Thing on the CW, we are re-broadcasting our reviews of the series from its original airing on the DC Universe platform. If there are any differences in the episodes aired on the CW (edits for time or content, for example), those changes will not be reflected in our reviews.
Welcome back Swamp dwellers! This week we are going to take a walk through fields of lovely flowers searching for the darkness threatening us all. Take a deep breath of these hallucinogenic spores and open your minds.
1. Alec and Abby
Just last week in my Stray Thoughts, I mentioned how much I missed seeing Abby and Alec (in his non-Swamp Thing form) together. What do you know? I get an entire episode of them and it was really nice. At the end of “The Price You Pay”, Swamp Thing shows off his new understanding of the Green and grows a flower from his hand that seems to release hallucinogenic spores allowing Abby to see the Alec that exists inside of Swamp Thing. Abby takes the fact that she is under the influence of some unknown narcotic really well and is just excited to be able to talk and see Alec again. He confirms, though, that he is still Swamp Thing and she is just trippin’. During the time they spend together in this state, I wish the episode had shown us some shots of him as Swamp Thing, especially when he was doing delicate tasks like bandaging a wound. But it was still nice.
2. Brilliant Disguise
The Mama Bears strike back in this episode as both Lucilia Cable and Maria Sunderland have significant roles in this week’s non-Swamp Thing plots. Sheriff Cable is still angry that her hunky deputy son was dragged into Avery Sunderland’s plots and attempted to kill Alec Holland, but her anger has shifted from Matt to Sunderland. She confronts him and forces him out to the Swamp to see if the rumors of Holland’s survival is true. This is of course the first brilliant disguise to show up in this episode, as Lucilia fully intends to kill Sunderland and lose his body in the Swamp. This turns out to be a Mother-Son bonding experience, as Matt shows up right before Sunderland plans to shoot Lucilia.
Maria, much recovered from her spiritual encounters in the Swamp thanks to some good drugs, is planning to host a little soiree for a visiting financier that Sunderland hopes will fund Woodrue’s research (and hopefully settle the debts that Sunderland has accrued). When Sunderland does not show up for the dinner (because he’s in the process of being almost murdered in the Swamp), Maria barely bats an eyelash and carries on with the dinner. The financier (more on him in just a bit) is wooed by Woodrue’s science and Maria’s pecan pie (made from local nuts!) and will fully fund the project going forward or at least until the show ends in a few episodes.
The final brilliant disguise of the episode shows up when Lucilia brings a wounded Matt back to the Sunderland’s house with a doctor after their failed attempt to kill and dispose of Sunderland (the wily bastard is still alive out there in the Swamp). I started to suspect that something was up when Maria did not immediately ask where Sunderland was, but instead welcomed them into her house to have Matt’s stab wounded treated and stitched. It turns out that Maria has had plans of her own and has gotten sick of Sunderland getting in her way, so she and Lucilia plotted to remove him and allow Maria to become head of the company. I had to applaud Maria for the audacity of involving her husband’s mistress in trying to kill him.
3. Nathan Ellery and the Conclave
The bigwig financier showing up to dine at the Sunderlands and possibly shower them with money turns out to be another major character in the Swamp Thing stories. After watching the episode, I did a quick search on him and the Conclave, curious if it was something that connected to the larger DC universe. It seems like Ellery and the Conclave are mostly just associated with Swamp Thing. Nathan Ellery is the mysterious Mr. E. (I see what you did there Swamp Thing writers) who, in the comics, was the man responsible for originally killing Alec Holland and his wife leading to Swamp Thing’s creation. In the DC Universe show, he is a member of the shadowy organization that has been helping to fund Sunderland’s developments in Marais. Ellery and the Conclave are introduced here to present a view of the larger world outside Marais. This definitely seems like something that would have gotten a lot more examination if the show had the opportunity to continue past the first season.
Continued below4. More on Powers
“Brilliant Disguise” also gives a look at some of the new powers that Swamp Thing is learning to harness as he grows closer to his connection with the Green. A lot of these powers seem to be happening instinctively and not really under his control though. For example, when Abby mentions that she is hungry, Alec goes off searching for crackers that may be in the cupboard, when suddenly a fruit tree in the lab sprouts a wide variety of fruits including plums and mangoes. Later on, the wild growth happens again when Swamp Thing needs a plant (Chinese lantern) that does not grow near Marais.
During the episode when Abby is walking with Alec, she notes how much of the swamp is blooming and bright. She always remembered it being quite dreary and acknowledges Swamp Thing’s influence on the plants around the Swamp. He has also informed her that he is able to listen and speak to the language of the plants. He says something profound like plants are much more sensitive than animals, their voices are just a bit quieter and there is a funny bit about how noisy kudzu is.
We see the culmination of these powers when Abby is injured by the Darkness and it tries to take over or kill her body. Swamp Thing exerts his will over the flora inside her body (apparently 200 different species of flora live in our bodies) to fight back against the encroaching Darkness.
5. The Darkness
Finally, “Brilliant Disguise” brings back the main enemy of this season: The Darkness. When Abby and Swamp Thing are out on their little walk, they reach the edge of the Darkness in the Swamp. Alec is hesitant to cross that line, because his powers with the Green are limited. Abby being Abby rushes in because she believes that with a sample she can figure out what is going wrong with the Swamp and possibly find a cure for Alec. He tells her that this patch of Darkness is symbolic of the pollution and chainsaws that have been cutting into the health of the Swamp. Of course she gets attacked by some sort of tendril vine (as a sort of opposite to Swamp Thing’s vine manifestations) and Alec is forced to carry her out to aid her. Abby did get her sample, though, and both characters come to a pair of decisions at the end of the episode. Alec realizes that he was only able to save Abby from the Darkness because of his powers as Swamp Thing. He decides that as much as he would like to return to being Alec Holland, the Swamp and the Green need him to be Swamp Thing. Abby, having acquired her sample, decides that she cannot properly study it in Marais, so she is headed back to Atlanta and the full resources of the CDC. Who’s betting that she’ll be back in Marais in pretty short time?
On a final note here, there was a really lovely aerial shot of the Darkness growing through the Swamp.
Stray Thoughts
– The timing of some of the scenes in this episode seemed really odd. When Abby and Alec are walking in the Swamp it seems like day, but then really quickly it becomes night.
– It was sweet that Abby and Alec were able to share a brief kiss before the spore hallucinations wore off.
– Avery Sunderland announced that he was hunky deputy Matt Cable’s father! And of course we get the typical “Who’s your daddy” type drama that causes enough of a distraction for Sunderland to escape being murdered.
Okay fen walkers. That is it for this week. See you next week for “Long Walk Home”. Same swamp time. Same swamp channel.
