Swamp Thing episode 4 review: A pathogen named Darkness

Swamp Thing is built upon tragedy, romance, horror, and environmentalism. Showcasing all of these pillars of the fandom, episode 4 introduces the Darkness.

What started with a murder mystery vibe, Swamp Thing has transmuted into an actual murder mystery thanks to Avery Sunderland. And with horror being the underlying factor of the show, Swamp Thing episode 4 elevates our expectations by dropping us into some terrifying psychological horror.

Before we jump into the darkest points of the episode (literally), another highlight of “Darkness on the Edge of Town,” is how it depicts Abby and Alec’s bond. Quickly kicking off the episode with a subtly heartfelt gesture, Abby reaches out to Swamp Thing to assuage him.

Masking her motives as a way to get a sample, Abby physically visits to show Swampy that she’s there for him. Amid his drastic transformation and his ongoing identity crisis, she shows him that he’s not alone with her around. Her empathy is extraordinary. Though Alec isolates himself from others, but especially Abby (unless she’s in danger of course), her sheer presence shows him that he doesn’t need to be alone if he doesn’t want to be.

Even if she was there for a tissue sample that was also her unspoken way of showing support and trying to comfort him without seeming overbearing. In a show that’s less than human, the romantic side of their dynamic is refreshing and pulls us back into the romantic foundation the series is built upon. Beyond adding to Abby and Alec’s already mesmerizing relationship, this episode is all about structure, balance, and building.

With the Rot temporarily out of the way for the Guardian of the Green, episode 4 delineates a new side effect from mucking up the balance of the Green. This time, it’s the Darkness. Even with the darkest points, the show takes an artful approach to describing the effects and impact each bayou baddie has on Marais.

The investigative angle allows Swamp Thing to unearth new obscure DC Comics lore and bring some truly heinous villains to life each episode. The show illustrates the Darkness transferring from vector to vector, along with the auditory and visual hallucinations. It defines all of this before the episode verbally explains the functionality of the pathogen. This structure of “show and then tell” it’s without purpose either. It keeps the mystery elements of the show alive… even though there was a casualty this episode. But hey, that’s the balance of the swamp, right?

Apart from how the series successfully builds the Darkness, the discovery of the latest temporary affliction breeds some twisted psychological horror. From cryptic ambiguity that rises from Abby’s tragic past, the Darkness also creates some gruesome and riveting scenes.

The self-inflicted wounds obviously still have us a bit gutted. With a new pathogen that’s transmitted via blood, we weren’t disappointed with the bloody scenes. But can we just take a moment to appreciate Jennifer Beals (who plays Lucilla Cable) and her scene-stealing performance? Honestly, props to Beals and her ability to portray utter duress with her extremely strained and raw scene at the Sunderland abode. Seriously, we can’t imagine delivering that kind of performance while applying pressure to the tile floor, which she thought was her dying son.

Granted, we don’t think this series or any of the talented actors on Swamp Thing are even capable of delivering a subpar performance. We’re just going to continue sobbing through our screeners as we savor what we have left of this, unfortunately, axed series. Just like this week’s baddie, the Darkness, savored the grungy glory it sapped from each of its hosts.

The Darkness brought light to the most gruesome moments that eat away at it host in their most vulnerable moments. For Abby, her vague dark moments just introduce another big villainous player of Swamp Thing lore, Anton Arcane (Abby’s uncle) — who we’re ready to see in the coming episode. (But we’re also ready to find non-existent away to venture into the DC Universe app to keep him the heck away from Abby.)

Speaking of our show bias, we have a lot of questions about Abby this episode. What’s up with her fear-filled hallucination? What is her dark past? And what happened to Shawna? And when will her fellow scientists take respecting her and genuinely start to listen to her?

Behind her gripping yet terrifying flashback-induced hallucinations, Abby’s plight with the Darkness gives us a parallel to her compassionate gesture at the beginning of the episode. In this instance, Swamp Thing takes her darkness and pain away while physically comforting her. And it’s a beautifully bittersweet gesture that mirrors Abby’s earlier attempts to emotionally comfort him.

There’s a metaphor here about Swampy burying the darkness that he took from Abby and how she and him both bury their own darkness living in their past. However, we’re just going to reflect on this bittersweet moment of our favorite OTP.

Like the Rot isn’t gone, the Darkness needs a vector to exist. Fear and Rot always exists on the swamp, even if they lay dormant. Similar to the seemingly endless list of questions the character have to solve each episode, episode 4 gives us even more questions following the series cancellation:

• Will Madame Xanadu and Blue Devil continue their character arcs in some form on the DC Universe after the series and season wraps? Even if it’s unlikely, we’re still hoping for at least a spinoff with both of them as lead protagonists.
• What is Blue Devil attempting to help Abby with? Is he trying to help her find answers to the growing list of swamp-related inquiries? And why is he hell-bent on protecting her (yes, pun intended)?
• And what are we going to do after the show ends? Sure, we the Swamp Thing comics to read, but we’ll still have a bit of a void after the show concludes.

Though the Darkness has returned to the swamp, the Darkness in Marais was a way for the swamp to fight back against the ongoing pollution. Explaining the balance of the Green and how pollution manifests into actual entities that attempt to attack the humans who cause it, we know the series will showcase other fail-safe defense mechanisms lurking in the swamp.

At least there’s a bit of poetic justice that the swamp would attempt to seek its revenge on Avery after all the messed-up stuff he’s done and will continue to do. Seriously, stay away from Susie, Avery.