Writer: G. Willow Wilson
Art: Marcio Takara
Colors: Arif Prianto
Letters: Hassan Otsmane-Elhaou
Cover: Jessica Fong
Variant Covers: Amy Reder & Seb McKinnon; David Nakayama
Publisher: DC Comics
Price: 3.99
Release Date: April 4th, 2023
If you’re interested in this comic, series, related trades, or any of the others mentioned, then simply click on the title/link to snag a copy through Amazon as you read the Poison Ivy #11 Review.
The Dispatch
Many people greet wellness seminars, cleanses, affirmation sessions with skepticism. In a case of art imitating life, this is what happened in POISON IVY #10 when Janet dragged Ivy to just such an event. Ivy viewed the whole thing with cynicism in the beginning. But in POISON IVY #11 she discovers that there is true power to be found in wellness. All of the women at the wellness seminar are infected with lamia spores courtesy of drinking Gwen’s green concoction. At the start of POISON IVY #11, they are high as a kite, and Ivy can do nothing but watch. As the minutes pass, though, the women enter a trance-like state and stare at Ivy. She realizes that her previous connection to the lamia spores and their mycelial network gives her the ability to communicate with and control the rogue lamia now inhabiting the women before her. Unsurprisingly, Ivy uses her influence on the women to create her own little environmental disruptor cell.
Wilson continues to build the series’ ongoing story atop the foundation of the first issue. Almost everything stems, in one way or another, from the lamia stores. In POISON IVY #11, the lamia exposure continues to pay story dividends; it takes the form of a power base that Ivy can briefly use. It also gives Ivy a new ability that saves her life and that of the women under her influence. This isn’t necessarily special when it comes to serialized storytelling. What does stand out is how Wilson continues to successfully grow the story from what was effectively one inciting incident. Ivy can’t completely escape what she began, and every issue drives the question of where that will drive her to. Indeed, there is a moment here where the arrogance built out of Ivy’s ability to influence these women endangers all their lives. This issue’s events in particular–as relatively minor as they are–feed heavily into the question of whether Ivy will eventually pay a true and heavy price for what she’s done and the power she retains.
Extending also from those inciting moments in POISON IVY #1 is Ivy’s new philosophy. In POISON IVY #11, she puts voice to it. Ivy confronts a truck transporting oil to a refinery. The truck’s drivers tell her that her “climate freaks” aren’t actually accomplishing anything by standing out on the road in the middle of the night. Ivy’s response: “We are. We’re slowing it down.” Even with the softening of her goals after the series’ first arc, this is a surprising admission of incrementalism–and to those she would have considered enemies not long ago. With each issue Wilson layers Ivy with new levels of complexity.
The Art & Colors
Takara ranges from subtle to intense in POISON IVY #11. In one of the issue’s nicest small details, he draws the same flowery lines on the women’s faces that he frequently uses on Ivy’s. In the case of the women that are under Ivy’s thrall, though, it’s less subtle. The spores resemble less a slight accent to their appearance and more an outbreak of a disorder. The panels on the first two pages–where the women are clearly high and before they’re under Ivy’s thrall–don’t use traditional borders and instead are divided by something that looks alive and flowing around the edges of the page. One page in particular stands out. When Ivy lucks into a new ability that saves her and the women she’s leading, Takara draws the women with an almost two-dimensional quality. Prianto cuts loose here with that psychedelic style that has become a hallmark of POISON IVY. The flowing panel dividers on the first page work because of the pink and purple he uses. The coloring matches what is going on with the growths that are appearing on the women. It’s an effective way to tie the comic book itself into the action it’s depicting.
Psychedelic-like pages of course appear in POISON IVY #11. These have become a hallmark of the series thanks to Prinato’s work. The first one that makes an appearance is distinct, though. It plays into the same moment where Ivy accesses a new ability and Takara depicts the characters almost two dimensionally. Prianto colors Ivy and women with their edges almost blending into the ground around them. Later on Priato uses the wild coloring to depict one woman’s transformation into what appears to be a new creature created by the lamia. The flesh color that remains at the center of the character changes into the uneven browns reminiscent of tree bark. The woman’s new, transformed and distorted face is vomiting the pink and purple spores that have become associated with Ivy since she got the lamia under control. It’s an absolute horror.
The Letters
Otsmane-Elhaou uses similar devices in this issue that are similar to other POISON IVY issues, the most common of which is green colored caption boxes and dialogue bubbles for Ivy’s dialogue and thoughts. A couple things stand out, though. In the panels featuring the oil truck first coming to a halt and then accelerating, Otsmane-Elhaou writes the letters into the truck’s dust clouds and in corresponding colors. Later, in one of the series’ trademark psychedelic pages, he uses uneven dialogue bubbles with multicolored backgrounds that match Prianto’s colors on the page.
Final Thoughts
POISON IVY #11 recaptures the energy from the series’ first six issues. This isn’t a criticism of recent issues. But Ivy using these other women to help her agenda, gaining a new ability, and facing consequences to her actions is a reminder of the complexity that Wilson introduced in the series’ first arc and that hasn’t been quite as prevalent since.