James Mangold (Logan) delighted horror fans with news that his upcoming Swamp Thing reboot will be in the vein of “gothic horror.” That approach is consistent with producer James Wan’s short-lived CW adaptation, which embraced the character’s roots in pulp horror. He even cast fan-favorite actor Derek Mears, previously Jason, in the Friday the 13th reboot to play Swamp Thing himself. Clearly, the character is ripe for adaptations that appeal more to FANGORIA readers than DC fans.
But before James Mangold releases his gothic take on the character, it’s worth reminding the audience that once upon a time, Swamp Thing was brought to the screen by a Master of Horror: Wes Craven. Coming off the controversy and financial successes of Last House on the Left and The Hills Have Eyes, Craven made one of the very first major comic book films with 1982’s Swamp Thing, which starred Ray Wise(Twin Peaks) and Adrienne Barbeau(Escape From New York). It should’ve been the recipe for a cult classic that both horror geeks and comic book nerds could champion. Imagine if John Carpenter directed a Blade movie, or if George Romero did The Shadow.
Emphasis on the word “should,” however. While Craven’s take on the material did incorporate some of his genre impulses, particularly with how much atmosphere he lends the misty swamps, Craven didn’t use the Swamp Thing property as a vessel to craft a haunting tale of eco-terror, which would’ve been consistent with his brand.
Craven was trying to transition away from his reputation as a provocateur and into more mainstream spaces, so instead, his version of Swamp Thing became an action-packed espionage thriller that centers on Dr. Alec Holland, a brilliant scientist trying to replenish the world’s natural resources through a formula that can make plant life grow anywhere.
That formula ends up getting used on Holland himself when he’s accidentally mutated into a plant-based humanoid by Arcane, a diabolical genius who wants Holland’s research for world domination. Reborn as Swamp Thing, Holland thwarts Arcane while also protecting Alice, a government agent sent to oversee Holland’s project.
Unfortunately, Swamp Thing didn’t help Wes Craven escape the genre but more likely confined him to it because the box office results were, let’s say, less than the triumphant success of Richard Donner’s Superman. Obviously, a low-budget monster movie based on a cult comic-book property won’t reach the same heights as Superman, but critics and audiences didn’t know what to make of Swamp Thing upon its release.
The action sequences were awkward, the tone was uneven, and it was too moody to be camp. You can’t entirely blame Craven, though, seeing as how he had only $2.5 million to work with versus the $55 million of Superman. The investors gave Craven so much grief about cutting costs that he reportedly had to rewrite the screenplay throughout the production, according to Adrienne Barbeau.
Not helping Swamp Thing’s legacy was the timing of its release. Mostly accurate to its contemporaneous lore, Swamp Thing was produced before Alan Moore’s legendary run on the character. He retroactively changed the origin by revealing that Swamp Thing wasn’t actually a resurrected Alec Holland but rather a mutagen of plant DNA that had taken on the consciousness of the real Holland, who was dead.
Moore’s revamping of the character elevated him to a new stature in popular culture and has remained the definitive take on the character ever since. Meaning that this version, which was an iteration of the pre-Moore era mythos, was a relic of an increasingly irrelevant era in the character’s history.
And yet, revisiting Wes Craven’s Swamp Thing is a surprisingly rewarding experience. Now that our media landscape is awash with pandering, slavishly accurate comic book movies that laboriously take every opportunity to plant seeds for a spin-off or Disney + show, Swamp Thing almost feels experimental in the various tones it tries to balance.
It’s a retro creature feature, right down to the dated suitmation, but also violent and sexed-up. It’s schlocky but serious, ping-ponging between scenes of Craven regular David Hess stalking and terrorizing Adrienne Barbeau like it’s B-Roll from Last House on the Left House, to a scene where the villainous Arcane turns one of his own lackeys into a satyr-esque pig man. In between, a slime-transition screen will remind you more of the Nickelodeon Slime than any creature feature you’ve seen.
That unbalanced tone, combined with the obvious low production value, hindered Swamp Thing’s success coming out of the gate, but it’s arguably added to its rewatchability. Wes Craven wisely chose to make this a throwback to the B-Movies of the Atomic Age rather than to a successor to Superman: The Movie. While there’s some vulgar auteurism on display, especially depending on which edit you watch, there’s an uncharacteristic innocence that will prevent you from totally dismissing the simple charm of Swamp Thing.
That’s not to say that it’s not dated, or even deeply flawed. Craven’s direction can go from amusing to awkward real quick. Some of his grindhouse instincts also hurt this movie’s appeal to children, given that this was surely envisioned as a family-friendly affair. Not only does our titular hero kill his enemies by crushing their skulls, but this probably has the most gratuitous nudity of a superhero movie ever, which was filmed exclusively for the European cut.
Apparently, the European cut was accidentally printed on the U.S. DVD with the PG rating of the American theatrical cut. A mother showed this version to her young children and was aghast at seeing a topless Adrienne Barbeau. Outraged, the mother complained, and all the DVDs were recalled, replacing them with the American version.
That’s part of the mystique of Swamp Thing, and what will either alienate or intrigue. Very few other flicks by household-name directors have attempted a mishmash of popcorn entertainment and grindhouse garnishing. It has the score of a Friday the 13th film. Literally. Harry Manfredini does a composition here that’s eerily similar to his Friday the 13th work.
Then there’s the question of whether to take Swamp Thing seriously. The atmospheric locale and straight-faced performances would suggest that Craven’s aiming for a respectable effort, so we can’t laugh “with” the movie when we see our titular monster’s rubber suit fold every time he crouches. Its genre flairs mostly land as flat, although Swamp Thing makes a great entrance when he first attacks a cigar-chomping David Hess and overthrows an entire boat. It’s one of the more convincing stunts, and the tension builds as Swamp Thing continues to take out Arcane’s men with a vengeance.
Sadly, Swamp Thing is more suspenseful when the eponymous Plant Man isn’t on-screen, probably because the limited mobility of the costume renders almost all of his action sequences comically stiff. Not to mention that fight choreography isn’t Craven’s strong suit. He still remains a maestro of suspense, though. Almost any scene following Adrieence Barbeau as she’s forced to outrun and outsmart Arcane’s grunts has more life to it. Her character, Alice Cable, is another of Craven’s survivalist Final Girls, and ranks up there with the best of them thanks to Barbeau’s screen presence.
That’s probably where Craven’s direction makes its greatest strides in the performances, particularly with Barbeau and both of our Swamp Things, Ray Wise, and Dick Durock. In less than 30 minutes, Ray Wise makes Dr. Holland a compelling and tragic protagonist, an intense scientist who relates more to the serenity of the swamps than to the company of people.
But Wise doesn’t go for the stereotypical anti-social genius that actors like Benedict Cumberbatch have made a career of. He’s thrilled to share his insights with anyone who will listen, has a great repertoire with his sister, and develops some real chemistry with Barbeau.
By the time Wise is doused in flames and dives into the lake only to re-emerge as Swamp Thing, you’ll wish he was in the movie for far longer. Wes Craven seemed to agree, as the original plan was for Wise to play both Dr. Holland and his plant-humanoid counterpart. But Wise’s figure just didn’t match his Swamp Thing stunt double, Dick Durock, so the production company opted to give Durock the titular role, much to the film’s benefit, I’d argue.
Durock gives Swamp Thing more pathos than he really has any right to, given the Grinch-esque makeup he has to work with. He’s also given the script’s most memorable lines, like when Barbeau asks if his wounds hurt. With a slight chuckle, he says, “Only when I laugh.” His performance really taps into the spirit of The Universal Monster Movie ethos that’s clearly inspired Craven.
The only false note in terms of performances is Louis Jordan’s villainous turn as Anton Arcane. His performance almost perfectly crystallizes the tonal contradictions of Wes Craven’s approach. Arcane is such a hammy villain that he checks off every Bond Movie Baddie cliche, spouting Nietzche, locking his enemies into a murky dungeon, and forcing Adrienne Barbeau to wear a sexy dress.
Hell, Jordan would go on to play an actual James Bond villain with Octopussy, a role he was frankly more suited for. Because Jordan, the classically trained actor that he is, just isn’t having fun with this character and never brings any entertainment value to what should be a cartoonish villain. Perhaps he was embarrassed, understandably so. I doubt he’d ever expected to have to say the words “Swamp Thing” with a straight face.
Though give Wes Craven credit in the Villain Department because he was clearly ahead of the curve – before the MCU was pitting all of their heroes against evil doppelgรคngers of themselves, Arcane here takes the same formula that turned Alec Holland into Swamp Thing and becomes something akin to an Aardvark. Or a hedgehog, maybe. One that fights with a medieval sword.
Yet, I vastly prefer this amateur suitmation brawl to the “epic” green-screen drudgery of modern superhero movies. Anybody fond of cheap, Z-grade monster mashes will see the charm here, even if it’s disappointing to see it from the man who gave us both A Nightmare on Elm Street and Scream.
Something that deflates the final bout of fisticuffs, though, aside from the lame-o FX, is that Craven decided to incorporate Swamp Thing’s mystical healing powers. I actually thought that he was going to abandon this ability, and rightfully so, for the gritty and tense tone that he’s aiming for. As soon as Swamp Thing brings Jude, the child sidekick, back to life with his glowing green hand, it’s hard to get emotionally involved in any of the danger that either Swamp Thing or Adrienne Barbeau find themselves in.
Sure enough, Barbeau gets impaled in the climactic fight, and the audience isn’t even given enough time to be tricked into thinking she’s really dead before Swamp Thing easily brings her back to life. And then, he walks off into the swamps in a similar fashion to Bill Bixby walking away from the camera as the Lonely Man theme played him off in The Incredible Hulk.
That brings us to the end of Swamp Thing, directed by Wes Craven. The unabashedly camp sequel, Return of Swamp Thing, followed this up. Durock not only returned for the sequel, but a ’90s television adaptation. He was the only actor to play Swamp Thing on-screen until Derek Mears, and ultimately became as synonymous with the role as Christopher Reeve was with Superman.
After looking back, there’s not a great case that Swamp Thing is a hidden gem for either monster-movie aficionados or comic-book fanboys. It’s Wes Craven without his edge – he manages to inject some ominous atmospherics into the swamps but can’t sustain the suspense for the actual set pieces. He pays homage to old-school classics like Frankenstein and Creature from The Black Lagoon, but can’t restrain himself from the violence and sexuality of his exploitation roots.
The tragedy of it is that Wes Craven still makes a case for himself that he could’ve delivered an exceptional Swamp Thing movie, what with the foreboding swamps and thoughtful characterization, if he weren’t using it as a vehicle for more simpleminded entertainment.
Honestly, Swamp Thing is the perfect comic book IP for Wes Craven. After all, his best work focuses on characters that are products of their environment, which Swamp Thing quite literally is. If Craven had produced this after Alan Moore’s reinvention of the character, then the famously cerebral Wes Craven could’ve approached this with a more spiritual bent.
As it stands, Swamp Thing is still a curiosity that’s worthy of revisiting. As far as the tragic-scientist-gets-lit-on-fire-and-becomes-a-superhero genre goes, it’s no Darkman. For nothing else, it was on this production that Wes Craven supposedly got the idea for his next picture, a dream-based little thriller called A Nightmare on Elm Street. So, it was still a blessing to his career and for us horror fans in general.
I certainly picked up the Vinegar Syndrome Swamp Thing 4K Ultra HD release in August, though, because the novelty of Swamp Thing still hasn’t worn off even decades later. You can summarize it as either a sleazy Creature from the Black Lagoon or an earnest Toxic Avenger. I can safely say that no modern comic-book movie would ever reach for such great heights ever again.
Swamp Thing is also available to watch on VOD.
