Beyond hero or villain.
Creative Staff:
Story: Amy Chu
Art: Clayton Thomas Mann, Seth Mann
Colors: Ulises Arreola
What They Say:
Murder in the lab! As the police investigate the death of her mentor, Dr. Pamela Isley suspects poisoning! But by whom, and why? Before the cops suspect her alter ego, Poison Ivy, Pam needs to find the true murderer. Meanwhile, her DNA experiments are about to pay off!
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers):
The opening installment of the Poison Ivy miniseries worked pretty well for me with what it did in reconnecting me with a character I haven’t read in the post-New 52 world for the most part. Outside of her Harley appearances early on I’ve had no exposure to her. So seeing her setup as a scientist with her record hidden for the moment, digging into some neat new concepts and ideas because of the progress of science and how it can alter what we know of how her abilities may work, it all provided a good launching point. That it was mired in a murder mystery didn’t thrill me as much, but that’s an unsurprising catalyst to get things underway. it also didn’t hurt that Clayton and Seth Mann made the book look fantastic, especially in the botanical sense.
With the second installment, events start moving forward over a week or two as we see what’s going on with the investigation and at Pamela’s home. The investigation itself has a lot of potential suspects, especially since Pamela’s boss wants it declared an accident because of the potential blowback otherwise. Whereas Pamela knows it’s anything but as Doctor Cruz wouldn’t be so careless, never mind the missing research. The book offers us some good material in getting to know people in the lab and the company itself and seeing the police doing a bit of digging as well to try and piece it together even after it’s ruled an accident. Since this is a six issue series, a bit more exposition and character setup isn’t a surprise. Amy Chu handles it well and the Mann’s do a solid job of making it as visually interesting as they can amid the offices and hallways of the workplace.
The more interesting angle is what Pamela is doing back at her Canal home where she’s using the science she’s gained access to in order to birth more of her kind. She’s gone beyond just the ordinary person granted powers thing to different kind of hybrid that’s now less human than before. So working with the splicing of animal and plant DNA in the mix to essentially birth new beings of her own kind is definitely intriguing, especially as she views it as a way to change the world for the better with beings that are more bonded to the natural state. Where’s Swamp Thing when we need him? Her dialogue about what she’s doing works very well in painting her more scientist than villain and there are some serious pros to her approach alongside a lot of cons. But it’s a story angle that feels new and welcome, even if it dabbles a bit more in the horror area in my mind than I expected.
In Summary:
Poison Ivy has a number of areas it can dig into as it progresses from here and while I suspect the murder angle will have its own interesting twists and turns, it’s the events going on at Pamela’s home that will intrigue me the most. This book moves things right along, though it’s a bit exposition heavy at times and with an almost awkward recap page, but it gets us to where we need to be in establishing things and people without it feeling too forced or by the numbers. A lot of this is smoothed out a bit thanks to the Mann’s artwork as the pair have put together a great looking book that leaves me wanting whole sections of this done up in bigger ways with some of the visuals. It’s an appealing looking book that I suspect will come together as a whole with the story as we get into the second half of it as more elements surface. Definitely a bit of a slower burn but one that you want to ease into like that.
Grade: B+
Age Rating: 13+
Released By: DC Comics via ComiXology
Release Date: February 17th, 2016
MSRP: $2.99
