The DC Universe is full of characters who don't fit into the traditional superhero mold, and few heroes are untraditional as the ecological muck monster Swamp Thing, who debuted during the monster comics boom of the 1970s. Similar to Marvel's concurrent Man-Thing, Swamp Thing was a brilliant scientist mutated into a humanoid plant creature after being exposed to an experimental substance.

This all changed in just the first few issues of Alan Moore, Stephen Bissette and John Totleben's acclaimed run in the 1980s. That seminal run completely reimagined the character and took him down a darker, more mystical path while embracing the horror nature of the comic more than ever. And in the most famous part of their run, Swamp Thing's origin was rewritten to remove the character's central humanity and turn the creature into something far stranger.

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Loose Ends

Swamp Thing Attacked

Alan Moore began his iconic run with Dan Day and Totleben in Saga of the Swamp Thing #20, though this issue would only serve to finish up previous storylines and segue into the new direction that Moore was planning for the book. It involves the Sunderland Company trying to kill Swamp Thing and his allies once and for all, seemingly succeeding in doing so when the issue ends with Swamp Thing's bullet-riddled body crumpling to the ground. Planning to reverse-engineer the Bio-Restorative formula that originally created Swamp Thing from the creature's body, Mr. Sunderland has Jason Woodrue released. Also known as the Floronic Man, Woodrue not only had a hand in turning Pamela Isley into Poison Ivy, but also possessed his own plant-based powers.

In Moore, Bissette and Totleben's Saga of the Swamp Thing #21, Woodrue calls on these abilities to give Swamp Thing's corpse an autopsy. Discovering numerous vegetable facsimiles of organs within Swamp Thing's body, Woodrue surmises that these are merely vestigial limbs of sorts that could not have any real functional role. From there, he makes a discovery that completely rewrites Swamp Thing's nature from the ground up.

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The Anatomy Lesson

Floronic Man realizes that Swamp Thing isn't a transformed Alec Holland, but instead merely a creature that thinks that it's Alec Holland. He suspects that when he was exposed to the Bio-Restorative formula and came into contact with the swamp when he died, that it produced a plant matter copy of him that held many of his memories. Sunderland disregards these and other findings, much to his later detriment. Woodrue realizes that Swamp Thing isn't dead and will simply regenerate, so he escapes the premises while leaving his findings for the monster to see. Having always thought that he was truly Alec Holland and hoping to find a way to return to his human life, Swamp Thing goes on a rampage that eventually results in Sunderland's death.

Floronic Man would go on in the next issue to tell Swamp Thing's associates Abby and Matt Cable about the creature's true origins, continuing his experiments on him all the while. Swamp Thing himself was now in a literally vegetative state, having been paralyzed after a breakdown upon realizing what he truly was. Using Swamp Thing's complacency to his advantage, Woodrue uses samples of his body to connect to the mystical Green force.

This revised origin story would remain with the character ever since, though the New 52 run of Swamp Thing did slightly alter things. It was also adapted in the DC Universe Swamp Thing TV series, with the episode in which Swamp Thing's history is revealed being named after the "Anatomy Lesson" storyline. Surprisingly enough, the retcon was never really controversial and instead was well-received by fans as the catalyst for a vastly expanded Swamp Thing mythology.

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