Swamp Thing. Woulda, Coulda, Shoulda...

Big talk.  Warner Bros is going to create a streaming service devoted to its DC Comics properties.  This will showcase top, mid and obscure tier characters and be a streaming service for the fans.

Sure.

Except it isn't.  In fact, I'm betting that DC Universe ceases to exist as a separate entity by mid or late 2020.  They're pumping out the shows they've announced but beyond the second season of Doom Patrol they haven't teed up a new show or season.  We'll get season 2 of Titans, another of Young Justice and Doom Patrol, we'll see the Harley Quinn cartoon and the Stargirl live actioner and once those have hit, the experiment will be over.  Warner Bros is gearing up another stream, HBO+ or something, and I'm certain that they won't divide their market.  Shortly after the new one starts, DC Universe will become a small corner of it.

I'd love to be wrong because some of what's emerged on DC Universe has rocked my socks.  Titans was pretty good, Young Justice season 3 is amazing and Doom Patrol was truly great.  And then there's Swamp Thing.  The show that tells me that the powers that be just aren't as committed to this DC Comics thing as they claim to be.  With it's shortened season order (originally 13 eps, cut to 10) and abrupt cancellation, Warner Bros signaled that they'd lost confidence in the financial viability of the less well known corners of the DC Comics universe.  Sure, they renewed Doom Patrol but since then they've done exactly zip to add to DC Universe's content.

As for Swamp Thing, it really suffered from both of the moves it had to deal with.  The shortened order meant that the last couple of episodes had to rush to a less than satisfying conclusion.  The certainty of not getting season 2 meant that "wait until season 2!" concepts just felt abandoned. 

What should have been the unfolding of the horror characters of DC Comics (The Phantom Stranger, Madame Xanadu and Blue Devil for a start) basically gave us a taste of characters that were never really fleshed out.  One can only assume that the original intent was to seed them in season 1 and let them off the chain in later seasons.  I've never liked this type of "just wait, we have plans!" television story telling.  It would have served Swamp Thing much better to have concentrated on the main characters exclusively in season 1 and just cameo these characters rather than trying to introduce SO MANY ultimately useless characters from the get go.  We would have had a better show and the cancellation either wouldn't have happened or at least wouldn't have done so much damage to what should have been a great show.

Many of the season reviews I've read this week say much the same thing.  It boils down to too much time on B and C story lines and characters with the Cable family and the Blue Devil.  Given the loss of 3 episodes from the original order, the C story or even the B story could have been jettisoned all together to at least give fans 10 solid episodes.  With a lot of editing, I'm thinking I could make a solid 6 episode season out of the messy 10 episodes we got.

If Warner Bros really was serious about bringing a streaming service to truly explore the potential of the DC Comics character stable, they woulda found a way to let the Swamp Thing grow into his own.

Swamp Thing coulda been a show that opened up a whole new creepy corner for superhero television.

The show runners shoulda focused on Swamp Thing and Abby Arcane, used the Cable family B story more sparingly and given us a tight season spanning arc with a satisfying conclusion and a few DC character cameos instead of the sprawling, tangled mess we got.

When the powers that be dismantle DC Universe and fold its remnants into the new Warner Bros streaming service, they'll point to Swamp Thing as a bloated budget show that torpedoed the service.  It's a self fulfilling prophecy I see coming a mile off.  I'd love to be wrong but I'm not.