Something like this could have almost been predicted given how odd it was for the show Swamp Thing to be canceled as it was in the first place. B. Alan Orange of TVWeb is one of the many that already apparently believes that this might lead to a desired second season that will see the show take root in the minds of the fans as they begin to take to the series and possibly demand more before the first season is out. One question to ask of course is whether Marvel will be coming up with their own answer to this show in the form of Man-Thing since the character beat out Swamp Thing by two months back in the day, which isn’t much but is still enough for fans to argue over. Of course they were both beat out by a being called The Heap which arrived nearly three decades before either of them. So who came first is kind of irrelevant since they were both likely a product of someone’s imagination using something akin to The Heap or something similar as a basis for the character. In short though a lot of people tend to back the idea that Swamp-Thing is a lot more efficient than the Man-Thing considering that he’s retained his intelligence in a big way.
The story of Swamp-Thing’s origin is pretty simple, as he was a brilliant scientist who was killed in an explosion and had his body dumped in a swamp, where it came back to life as a humanoid form composed of putrid-looking vegetation. Unlike Man-Thing the Swamp-Thing usually has a well-defined purpose to his actions as he’s not necessarily the actual human that died in the explosion, but the gathered thoughts and memories of that individual converted into plant form. What this does for him however is allows the creature to control every last bit of plant life worldwide, from the smallest to the greatest. Like many DC characters this creates a heavily over-powered being that’s only check and balance is that he is usually seeking to keep nature and humanity from killing each other, though he could easily snuff out human existence if he so desired it sounds like. Yet Swamp-Thing is definitely a tortured character since not only is he basically the thoughts and memories of a dead man in a different body, but he carries little real allegiance to anyone or anything but nature, meaning that he’ll fight alongside someone so long as their goals are roughly the same as his, to preserve the natural world and keep it from being harmed. Apart from that it’s been seen that he has his own motivations and reasons for doing things that aren’t always understood.
It is a wonder that the show is coming back, but perhaps it might be in response to the fact that nothing else is being pushed right now thanks to the shutdown, which means that content is going to become scarce eventually and airing re-runs is bound to get old quickly. The networks have to keep the people entertained if they want to stick around after all, and the truth is that a lot of people were willing to watch Swamp-Thing and get into it before it was canceled, as it does look fairly interesting and could possibly get a lot of people wanting more if the show goes well enough. Right now though leaning on it as something that’s there and is ready to go sounds a bit wrong considering that without the shutdown it might still be languishing where it was. Obviously when the networks need something they’re bound to come running for the first thing they can find, even if it’s something they pulled a while back for no solid reason that they could give anyone. It will be intriguing to see just how the show will do with the audience and whether or not the MCU will think about bringing in its own swamp monster when the time is right and the all clear is given. Until then though this is likely in response to the fact that no new shows are currently in the works and it’s very possible that the well is beginning to run dry, no matter what assurances the CW might want to give that they still have plenty to run. We’re edging up on summer pretty quickly after all, the season when re-runs are usually most prevalent, so it’s easy to think that if Swamp-Thing can get them over the hump and into the warmer months that the CW might breathe a sigh of relief and hope like hell that production will be back up and running before too long.
Otherwise there’s no telling what will happen come fall if nothing is running and the time slots have to be filled.
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