Walking Corpses & Conscious Plants: Possibilist Ecologies in ...

Bingham 102
The influence of the past is wrapped up not only with the present moment but the
future which will eventually follow. Like Kirkman's work, Saga of the Swamp Thing is a
graphic narrative which grew from artistic re-interpretation rather than pure invention.
Though the premise of bodily reanimation that structures The Walking Dead is not new or
innovative, it is nevertheless important. Rather than being detrimental to the import of
the series, the decision of its creators to reinterpret a previously explored idea in relation
to their own concerns can be seen as an incredibly valuable move in developing an
informed sense of cultural identity using artistry as a vehicle for maturation.
In Saga of the Swamp Thing, the character for whom the work is titled acts as a
symbol whose existence interrogates the supposed divisions between mankind and
nature, science and divinity, and coincidence versus fate. Each of these paired forces is
revealed to connect to its opposite in the work. This structural component of the graphic
narrative capitalizes upon the capability of the medium to illustrate multiple perspectives
and emphasize how identity is shaped in relation to both communal and environmental
surroundings. In this series, writer Alan Moore and artists Stephen Bissette and John
Totleben redesign a narrative about embodied consciousness and re-consider the creation
of the Swamp Thing as a chance to show the potential for sentience to exist apart from
human subjectivity. Whereas the first version of the character was a scientist whose body
was accidentally transformed, in Moore, Bissette, and Totleben's revival Swamp Thing
was never actually human despite the creature's possessing cognizance.
By taking advantage of the ability to illustrate boundaries which separate
communities as well as maneuvers taken to bend or cross them, the form first transcends
obsolescence by maintaining the integrity of the original project. Its main themes are