The beginning of Rotworld!
This is the second part to the crossover with Animal-man please go check out the Animal-man review as well.
Plot
This issue starts off with Swamp-thing and Animal-man in the rot they are attacked by a group of Un-men they defeat them they find a tear in the rot that leads to a inner layer of it they go down the tear. While this is happening Abby Maxine and Ellen are being attacked by Rot monsters in the end the are defeated and Abby seals the Portal to the rot apart from where Swamp-things tether to the swamp is. Swamp-thing and Animal-man jump through the tear in the rot there is a ladder of bones for them to grab on to Animal-man has lost his powers due to the Rot's influence Swamp-thing hasn't because of his Tether to the Swamp, Animal fall deeper into the rot and is in the end grabbed by Swamp-thing they travel further into the Rot. As they journey further down Anton Arcane follows them and bites through Swamp-things tether before the tether is totally destroyed it sends a message to Abby. Abby grows stronger because Swamp-thing and Animal-man have been lost because the rot is happy she then decides to find and destroy the parliment of Decay. The issue ends with
Review
The cover I love the Animal-man one had problems but this is faultless Swamp-thing looks great and I love the background with the Parliament of trees it's just another awesome Yanick Paquette cover.
I love Swamp-thing he is by far my faviourite DC character he's just such a great idea for a character and this series has been plain awesome and the Rot storyline has been one of the most well written stories all year and I've only read little bits of it. It's great to see Swamp-thing get involved with other characters in the DC universe as he's always been fairly restricted it just nice to see this and too get into a crossover is even better.
When Swamp-thing and Animal-man enter the Rot they are immediately attacked by Un-men the fight only lasts a page but showcases how powerful these to heroes are (especially Swamp-thing) I just thought it started the issue off pretty well.
I also liked the fight with Abby Maxine and Ellen it was an interesting fight and characterizes all the characters wonderfully Ellen feels out of place because she has no powers and is in a fight with mutated creatures Maxine is young kid who is unsure what to do in a battle and Abby is a bad ass I loved it was really good.
The actual inner of the Rot is quite interesting and is nicely laid out with the panels as small little wavy panels with a Ladder of Bones passing through each of them it's nicely done and I love how the characters appear three times on the same page it's a really beautiful way to lay out a page.
All these twists together create a great story that really pulls you in and makes the story more interesting.
Anton Arcane I cannot get enough of this guy he is a great villain he only appears for a few pages but he is so creepy and scary he's a great villain and one of the reasons I love this series.
I also liked the interaction between Maxine Ellen and Abby it was nice to see these characters come toghether and they were characterized so well in this issue.
The cliff hanger is great but unfortunately you had to wait two months to see what happens next (I say had because this review is coming out a while after the issue came out) it was a great cliffhanger and I have high hopes for the main story.
Marco Rudy's art suffers from different inkers he inks himself on the first ten pages but someone else inks it later it just looks very different and is not as crisp as the first ten pages Marco Rudy's page layouts are really good and flow really well from one to the other and the action scenes are really good.
Verdict
This was a good second part to the story and makes you want to buy the next issue the writing is perfect and faultless it just isn't a five because of some of the art problems.
4.5 stars.
