Animal Man, Vol. 2

Animal Man (2011)

by Jeff Lemire, Travel Foreman (Penciller), Steve Pugh (Artist)

Buddy Baker compagina su sencilla vida familiar con trabajos esporádicos como Animal Man. Pero su mundo se ve trastocado cuando él y su hija Maxine son súbitamente convocados ante el Rojo: la red vital que conecta a todos los seres de carne y sangre. Allí se le desvela que hay una guerra en marcha y que su hija es el avatar del Rojo, la líder llamada a derrotar a la Putrefacción. Como protector del avatar, Buddy debe poner a su hija a salvo y contactar con el avatar del Verde: la Cosa del Pantano.

Contiene: Animal Man 7-11 USA, Animal Man annual 1 y Frankenstein agent of S.H.A.D.E 9 USA.

Genres: Comics, Graphic Novels, Dc Comics, Superheroes, Horror, Fantasy, Fiction

184 pages, Paperback

Published September 1, 2013

About the author

Librarian note:
There is more than one author in the GoodReads database with this name

Jeff Lemire is a New York Times bestselling and award winning author, and creator of the acclaimed graphic novels Sweet Tooth, Essex County, The Underwater Welder, Trillium, Plutona, Black Hammer, Descender, Royal City, and Gideon Falls. His upcoming projects include a host of series and original graphic novels, including the fantasy series Ascender with Dustin Nguyen.

Reviews

[Lyn · Rating 4 out of 5]

Jeff Lemire’s DC New 52! Animal Man is a bonus, did not expect it to be this good; he’s taken off from where Grant Morrison left the title with a fresh insight, some wicked crossover fun with the New 52! Swamp Thing series and includes some Justice League Dark characters.

One of the great things about writing for DC is the wealth of backstory – 80 years of characters and stories and world building to choose from. Grant Morrison and now Lemire scored some level up points by reaching down into the vault and pulling out some exciting crossover and tie in ideas in this graphic novel, collecting issues 7-11 and Annual #1.

As explained in the Swamp Thing issues, the Green Parliament is joined by the Red and the Black – a triumvirate of avatars, knights, protectors and wise old ones that provide a balance for all living things. The Red needs the green, the black (Rot) needs the red and the green needs the black, a circle of life equilibrium that helps each carry on – but sometimes one aspect grows too bold and strong and so the other two need to step up and right the imbalance.

Here we find Buddy Baker, as protector of the Red avatar, his four year old daughter, fighting to try and save the day. It doesn’t help Buddy – but makes our story so much more interesting (Thanks Jeff!) that he really doesn’t know what he’s doing and messes things up royally.

Good fun.

[Subham · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was so good omg!

We get to see what is happening as the Baker family is on the run from the rot and how it continues to target them and in particular and I love the way Lemire writes Buddy and like how he goes into the heart of the red "Bone orchard" and meets with "The shepherd" and we learn of their plans and what the next course of action has to be, in the real world how the rot takes over his body and how Buddy returns which is just epic and then the cameos of JLD which I love and Lemire was writing it at the time so it was awesome, we learn of the previous partnerships between red and green and I just love those stories and in the end finally origins of Buddy and how Maxine his daughter ties into it!

Its one of those volumes that really makes you love the character and the call backs and references are awesome, the cameos great and we continue to build up the larger story of Rotworld here and next volume its gonna be a bang! I also like how this book is a family story at its core, a father wanting to protect his children and everyone gets a good moment here and the return was epic for Buddy and Maxine some cool new powers.

I love the art and yeah it feels Indie and maybe thats why its so awesome. At its heart its awesome and a quick and fun read and Lemire is literally weaving magic here!

[Anne · Rating 2 out of 5]

2.5 stars

Animal Man just isn't my thing I guess.
I'm not a fan of the art, the current storyline, or Buddy Baker.
There's a big crossover coming up with Swamp Thing in the next volume (and I already have volume 3), so I'm going to finish it out.
And who knows? I may really like it.

So Buddy and his family have hit the road in an RV, in an attempt to outrun the Rot.
Not working out very well for them...
I got a little tired of his mother-in-law continually harping on him. But I really tired of his wife squeaking and squealing about how they needed to ignore Maxine's connection to the Red.
Ok. I get it. She's four.
However.
If gross rotting monster things were constantly attacking us...and my kid could zap them with her magic powers?
Um. That's pretty much a no-brainer, right?
Nap time's over, Sweet Pea! Squish the zombies!

But the biggest question I have about the story doesn't have anything to do with the Red, the Green, or the Rot.
No, the biggest question I have is this:
Why the hell does Buddy's son, Cliff, have a fucking mullet?
Am I missing some pertinent piece of information that makes it ok for a middle schooler to have Hockey Hair in this day and age? And it's not one of those maybe-it-is-maybe-it-isn't a squirrel pelt.
The kid is rockin' a full-on Camaro Helmet!
Forget the Rot, his hair is the creepiest fucking thing about the whole story.

Recommended for fans of Billy Ray Cyrus

[Mike · Rating 2 out of 5]

Man was this hard to get through. I don't know how I could be so enthral led by the last book, and so squirmy while reading this one. Reading this made me feel awkward so often, I thought I was back at a high school dance.

Some of it is the dialogue, and while my complaints about bad dialogue are well-documented, I can't quite articulate what's wrong here for me. It just feels stiff and staged, like a small-town play can feel when the local pharmacist is going though the motions self-consciously. Too much first-person narration of what we already see on the page.

Some of it is the poorly-inked art - can't help but feel flat like Saturday-morning manga.

Somewhere along the way the weight of this book got misplaced - when the big reveals come along, somehow they feel small, liminal, ho-hum. The flashbacks feel forced, either as filler or overprescribed exposition in service of a readership they don't trust to go along with the weird storyline.

When did Lemire lose his faith in the intelligence of his audience? If there's on thing Lemire's previous work wasn't, it wasn't pedantic. Or did editorial decide to start dictating a dumbed-down version? Didio and Lee sure convey their lack of faith in an intelligent readership every time they show some level of influence over the New 52.

Am I interested in reading more Animal Man from Lemire? No - and especially after the boring melodramatic preview they padded into this book. Would I pick it up as part of the Rotworld crossover with Snyder's Swamp Thing? Possibly - let's see how ST 2 comes out.

[William Thomas · Rating 5 out of 5]

Grant Morrison is possibly the most inconsistent writer around, but he hit some serious home runs in his time. By far, Animal Man was the leader. I hated not seeing Buddy Baker used in regular continuity for so many years, though. Like Resurrection Man, I always felt like he was a seriously under-utilized character in the DCU.

Jeff Lemire brought him back and removed the humor, the surrealism and the absurdist nature of the original series and injected it with the maximum amount of seriousness he possibly could. Oh, and horror. Lots of grotesquerie and horror.

Looking back at the first few issues, at volume one, I think maybe we could have gotten a little bit of an introduction to the character, to the players. But Lemire dropped us right into it and ran away with it, and we had no choice but to keep up. I loved it, but this volume allows for a little more character development and I'm glad for that. Lemire obviously could let the Red/Green/Rot story run for years and years, just adding to this mythology- but fortunately it's coming to a close soon. I thought I'd lose patience with it, but seriously, Lemire is worldbuilding with Snyder and creating a little piece of Vertigo off in the corner of the DCU and creating a separate mythology away from the capes, and I'm so glad.

Art- all of the pencils, the inks, just spot on gorgeous. Colors aren't as striking as I'd like, but the layouts and style are just gorgeous. Stylistically perfectly compatible with the story.

Art: A
Writing: A

[Kyle · Rating 3 out of 5]

The artwork stayed pretty consistent with the artwork of the first volume and the characterization and tone remained consistent as well. Where this volume lapses in comparison to the first is in concept.

Lemire tries very hard to explain away all of the questionable aspects of the whole red/green/rot balance-of-nature scenario, and it kinda falls apart on him. There seems to be some grasping at straws going on. He tries to tie-in other characters from other titles, namely JLD, and you can see that the story is trying to build up to a major crossover with Swamp Thing.... Lemire even goes as far as making a major retcon alteration in the already established Animal Man origin story to help lend support to this new concept...and it just doesn't feel.... natural. He should have left it all conceptually wide-open instead of detailing an overly complicated mythos. At this stage in the story arch, I think readers simply wanted more forwarding action, and less explaining. Too much detail all at once feels Baroque, unnecessarily heavy.

Such are the stakes with a high-concept series, though. It was the risk that Lemire was willing to take and in ways it is successful. I mean, there is not much out there to compare to the New 52 Animal Man. It truly stands alone. But it could still use some refinement going forward.

Let's hope the script work tightens up a bit in the next volumes. Better dialogue would be nice, and not as much history lecturing. Focus on the core characters and what is happen in the now.

3.5/5

[Alan · Rating 4 out of 5]

In doing some catchup on DC Comics events (somehow they seem less mundane than Marvel's) I find myself enjoying a D list character such as Animal Man for the first time since Grant Morrison's arguably classic run. Wile not as meta fiction as Morrison's Lemire honors much of the work done by those who came before wile crafting his original take on Animal Man.

I mean lets face it. Buddy Baker is a character that only could have been created during one of two time periods in American comics. Either the 1940s when everything was thrown against the wall to see what stuck, or the 1960s boom when every company was seeking to cash in on the Batman television show craze (see concepts such as Jigsaw and Super Green Beret as examples). So how do you make a man who mimics the abilities of the animals near him interesting?

Start with making him a big time player. Buddy's role in the overall scheme of life is smaller than his daughter's Maxine's, and this is again emphasized in the first installment of his part in the Rotworld sage. While tossing aside some of the elemental avatar aspects of the DCU created by John Ostrander, Lemire builds on it by giving some back story to the Red, the Green and the Rot. Despite moving this title, Constantine (aka Hellblazer) and Swamp Thing from Vertigo back into the DCU this is a story that would have withstood the Vertigo test quite well I think.

[Sesana · Rating 4 out of 5]

I thought that the first volume of Lemire's Animal man was well-written, but nothing I could connect with. I'm still not sure what, exactly, was holding me back, but whatever it was has been fixed for the second volume. It wasn't the art, which was essentially the same, and which I still don't care for. There just seemed to be more human depth to the storytelling here. Because some people will feel cheated, it's important to note that the Alec Holland Swamp Thing doesn't show up at any point in this collection. We do get a good story with a precursor (Canadian Forest Thing, perhaps), but no Alec Holland. Also showing up, very briefly and very effectively, are John Constantine, Madame Xanadu and Zatarra.

[[Name Redacted] · Rating 5 out of 5]

Good gravy. This is amazing. They even managed to reference Grant Morrison's run on the 1980s "Animal Man" title, and incorporate the aliens who gave Buddy his powers into their new mythology.

The only complaints I have are the new version of Zatanna and Buddy's increasingly shrill and unreasonable wife -- dagnabbit, can't we have ONE story about a family impacted by the supernatural in which one of the parents doesn't wind up becoming intransigent and illogical?

Otherwise, this volume was worth every penny and confirms my growing feeling that this is the only New 52 title worth reading.

[Blindzider · Rating 3 out of 5]

While not a lot happens in the main story other than Buddy goes through a transformation to help fight the Rot, there is a tweaking of his origin, particularly just who gave him his powers and why. It partially works, making sense, but at the same time it feels very convenient to fit into the current narrative. There's also a reference to Morrison's run!

The art is much better this time. Steve Pugh draws a nice balance between the everyday human stuff and the creatures.

While I still say this isn't a completely original plot and the writing is just average, I am still curious about how this ends.

[Quentin Wallace · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.5 Stars

I am normally not a fan of surreal comics, which is one reason I couldn't get into a lot of Vertigo comics, but this series is holding my attention. I think it's because it stays rooted in the "real world" and never quite loses me like some stories of this type do.

So "the rot" is still attempting to destroy the red and the green, which would mean the end of all life. We finally find out who the big villain really is this volume, and it won't be a surprise to long term Swamp Thing fans.

The art is also not my usual style, but it works for this series.

Overall this is holding my interest and I'm looking forward to the next volume.

[Brian Garthoff · Rating 4 out of 5]

Animal Man vol 2 is guilty of spinning its wheels a little bit, bit still full of what made the first so good. There’s still plenty of gross out moments, a lot of setup for the upcoming Rotworld, and a pretty fun journey overall.

[Aaron · Rating 2 out of 5]

Ultimately, this volume feels like a bit of a non-event. In practical terms regarding the plot and building threat, essentially nothing of importance happens in this book. It's all just more and more exposition about what The Red is and how Animal Man and his daughter are connected to it, and, frankly, I get the point. I want this to move forward.

The only real "plot" of this book involves Animal Man being transported yet again to The Red while his physical body is taken over by one of the evil agents of The Rot. It's a very slow odyssey through a realm we've already seen too much of, and the action cuts away from Buddy's physical body so often that we never have any idea what the Rot is up to. It's just taken over his body and... done nothing. Buddy's gone so long that the Rot could've done pretty much anything it wanted with his family, and yet it just kind of waited around for no reason until he showed up to punch it. Throw in a completely pointless cameo from John Constantine and the Justice League Dark and you've got a real time-waster of a volume here. Feels like Lemire's just stalling until he can crossover with Swamp Thing.

Now, I'd be able to forgive this minimal plot development if there was a single character in this book I cared about. However, everyone is just a two-dimensional stock character with nothing new or interesting to offer. Buddy is just protecting his family. His son is an aloof teen. His daughter is creepy. His wife is a buzzkill and a nag. His mother-in-law is also a buzzkill and a nag (great job writing women, btw). There's nothing else discovered about any of these people, and the dialogue is flat to the point of being laughable.

I'll also say this about the way people speak in this. I can't handle the nicknames. Buddy calls his daughter "Little Wing" every time he talks to her. Little Wing? So, just, a Jimi Hendrix song? It does not at all feel like a real nickname a father would give his daughter. It just feels like a way to work in animal imagery, and it bugs the living hell out of me. Then, when Buddy goes to the Red, there's a goat man there who keeps calling him "Butter Baker." Constantly. Like, dude knows Buddy's name is Buddy. It just feels like Lemire scraping the bottom of the barrel for an iota of comedy in this story and then really leaning into it hard, and it just took me out of it every time he said it.

So, unfortunately, this series just isn't doing it for me. I'm enjoying Swamp Thing, so I'll probably keep reading it for the crossover appeal, but with Travel Foreman's creepy art gone this series has little redeeming value. Oh well.

[Charlos · Rating 2 out of 5]

I worry about this title and Swamp Thing. I really like the mythos they are setting up with The Red/Green/Rot, but inconsistent plots and subpar (but at times really cool) illustrations make me think that the duo won't have longevity. Still, I like them enough to look forward to the next issue of both.

[Peacegal · Rating 3 out of 5]

The new reboot of ANIMAL MAN is back with another installment of bizarre adventure and frightful, incredibly detailed imagery. As with the first volume, Lemire plunges the characters into malarial fever dreams of the warring underworlds battling to rule Earth.

The first half of the book has Animal Man mostly fighting animals who have been zombified by "The Rot" and are going on a rampage. The original series by Grant Morrison was quite unique in that it had Animal Man battling people who exploit animals, taking inspiration from the creator's own sensitization to these issues. The "New 52" reboot has mostly skirted the animal activism content, which in my view is removing the heart from the character. (Although, Vol. 2 acknowledges this content extremely briefly--there is a magazine cover shot of Animal Man "saying no to meat" and an earlier Animal Man persona who is tricked while attempting to save a chimp from a poacher. However, these items are either played for laughs or are just a device to advance the story, rather than an integral part of the graphic novel.)

[Devero · Rating 2 out of 5]

Prosegue, con disegni migliori, questa sequenza di avvenimenti sempre più gore splatter. La situazione si fa mortalmente seria per la famiglia Baker, suocera antipatica compresa, e il tutto converge vero un grottesco crossover con Swamp Thing.

La cosa di maggior peso, secondo me, è proprio il tentativo di Lemire (e Snyder su Swamp Thing) di ricreare un piccolo angolo di Vertigo nel New 52, anche se qui manca quella dose di ironia che in genere le serie Vertigo contenevano. Qui è tutto molto più serio.

Nel complesso una lettura da 2 stelle e mezzo.

[Dave Scott · Rating 4 out of 5]

The pace of the narrative slows a bit (maybe more than necessary) in this volume, as the mythology of The Red within this new continuity is fleshed out further. More characters from DC's magical universe make cameos. The art makes excellent use of the medium, employing phantasmagorical visuals in rapid succession that would be difficult to convey in audio format and prohibitively expensive to portray with special effects. Looking forward to Vol. 3.

[Fizzgig76 · Rating 4 out of 5]

Reprints Animal Man (2) #0, 7-12, and Animal Man (2) Annual #1 (May 2012-November 2012). Buddy Baker has learned that he isn’t the avatar of the Red and that he was only “created” as a means to protect the real avatar…his four-year-old daughter Maxine. The Rot has seized the opportunity to extinguish the new avatar while she is still young and only Animal Man stands in their way. When Animal Man is possessed by the Rot, Buddy much find a way to reclaim his body and protect his family. Plus, Maxine learns of another avatar of the Red and his adventures with the avatar of the Green…Swamp Thing!

Written by Jeff Lemire, Animal Man 2: Animal Vs. Man continues the New 52 relaunch which started in Animal Man 1: The Hunt. The series was well received by critics and fans.

I love Animal Man and have always loved Animal Man. The original series by Grant Morrison is a great read (and highly recommended), but Lemire has breathed new life into the minor character by once again expanding on his powers and origin.

The battle with the Rot is raging in this volume, and Buddy and his family are on the run. The idea that Buddy isn’t really the avatar was an interesting choice and opens up a lot of options in this story. This part of the story is lead up to the big Swamp Thing crossover called Rotworld, but still feels like it is its own story…and great fun!

A number of artist work on this collection…and that usually isn’t something I like. I don’t mind different artists stepping in for flashback issues and if there is a reason behind the art change, but here the changes seem kind of arbitrary. Travel Formean’s art is obviously the most original art of the series though I do feel that it is “love it or hate it”.

Animal Man is a great series and Animal Man 2: Animal Vs. Man is another great entry in the series. This collection is heavily tied to events in Swamp Thing 2: Family Tree, so if you are a fan of this series, you might want to check out the first few volumes of that series as well. Animal Man 2: Animal Vs. Man is followed by Animal Man 3: Rotworld—The Red Kingdom.

[C. Varn · Rating 4 out of 5]

Jeff Lemire writes families extremely well for a comic author, and this really adds strength to this New 52 vision of Animal Man. Lemire moves Animal Man more into the realm of Alan Moore's Swamp Thing, and uses a mythology from Swamp Thing with the Red, the Green, and the Rot. Meta-commentary elements are present though although moved into the this current mythology, so hints to the Grant Morrison style of animal man remain. Still the family dynamic is great, but Buddy Baker's character is not as engaging as the Vertigo run of Animal Man, and the mythology gets a bit heavy-handed at times.

[Gavin · Rating 3 out of 5]

Vol 2 from the New 52 Animal Man series. I really enjoyed the first volume, so was also glad to see this made it to a Vol. 2. I like the periphery characters that are showing up, like John Constantine, Zatanna, and Xanadu. I also eagerly await the actual Animal Man/Swamp Thing team up. Especially if Scott Snyder is involved.
Definitely one of the New 52 titles that has the best chance to establish itself as winner in the secondary/tertiary characters of the DC World.

[Koen · Rating 4 out of 5]

Well well well, this is turning into quite the story :)
The characters are certainly getting more depth, Buddy learning more about himself and his daughter.. and the family bonds are put to the test..

Oh, and of course, always nice to see Constantine and Z popping up ! ;)

Ok, so conclusion: more depth, more action,.. more fun! Jumping into Swamp thing now and then we're getting closer to RotWorld.. Woohoo ;)

[Kris · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great story - I've always liked the concept of Animal Man and Swamp Thing (and Firestorm) being avatars. My only complaint is with some of the artwork (mainly in the first chapter). So really, a 4.5 out of 5.

[Ivy · Rating 2 out of 5]

Another weird comic. I just find Animal Man to be very weird. The Rot was very disgusting. All of those poor animals and people. I hope they will be able to stop the Rot. I liked the cat avatar, Socks, though.

[Xavier · Rating 4 out of 5]

The story was good and the art was a lot of percent less fucking disgusting so bravo.

[Melissa · Rating 5 out of 5]

Oh wow...I need to read more of this.

[Ryan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Volume 2 picks off previously, with Buddy Baker and his family attempting to escape the Rot's army of undead. During a city attack, Animal Man tries to fight off the invasion, but he loses his body and end up back in The Red. The Rot sees an opportunity to use the discarded body of Buddy to get to Maddy, now Animal Man must quickly find a way to get back to the land of the living before his family succumbs to The Rot. Meanwhile, Maddy learns the origins of The Rot, Red & Green and must prepare to search for the avatar of the Green in order to fight back against the Rot.

While not as horrifying as the first installment, the second one feels more a transition & yet keeps things evenly paced and interesting to continue despite the slower storyline here. I felt a little misled by the cover and the first few issues thinking that Swamp Thing would be found and the team up would occur by the end, alas it didn't. I did enjoy the Annual and origin story brought in for both Animal Man and the other realms, as it explains some holes that I had questions about that were left unanswered in the first volume. The art also changes to a more suitable style that I like, but it loses some of that psychedelic horror aspect in certain panels though. Still, despite the slightly slower tone here, I am enjoying Animal Man Volume 2 and am awaiting to see where things are going since it ends on a cliffhanger.

[Sarah · Rating 4 out of 5]

*Review for Volume 1 & 2*

Bizarre. Gruesome. Chilling. Trippy.

Totally different from what I usually read. In fact, I'm not entirely sure I've ever read something exactly like it. Because even though it has all the trappings of a horror comic in many ways, it also manages to tell a pretty decent family story. Jeff Lemire does a great job of writing family dynamics while also giving us an unsettling superhero adventure. It's a strange combination...but it somehow works. There are moments that stretched my suspension of disbelief. (Such as his daughter "jumping" into a nearby animal and growing herself a new body. That was just... weird.) But over all... I'm glad I stumbled upon this series.

[Remxo · Rating 4 out of 5]

Lemire is expanding a concept introduced in a previous run (which I haven't read), in which Animal Man is re-imagined as an agent of "the Red", a life force that connects all animal life. There's also "the Green" (plant life, whose agent is Swamp Thing), and "the Rot" (representing death and decay). The Rot is expanding its influence causing an imbalance that threatens to overpower all life on earth. Animal Man's four-year-old Maxine is the primary target of the Rot. This is a body horror comic and Steve Pugh's art is as phenomenal as it is grotesque. This run will look great in an oversized format.

[Rob · Rating 3 out of 5]

It's funny how large of a gulf of ability exists in the comics space. Some books and series are extraordinary, easily the match of great contemporary works in the regular literary space. And then others are not that.

This is not that. It's fun enough, and there are occasionally some interesting ideas in the mix, but interesting only within the realm and logic of comic books. There's nothing here that escapes those basic trappings.

It's a bit sad, because, like the Swamp Thing series with which this Animal Man run is so intertwined, a previous run on this character was revelatory in the comics space. Now it's just a fairly basic comic book.

[Jesse Will · Rating 4 out of 5]

This felt like a heavy improvement from the first book. His powers are better explained and they even explain why he was so weak in the first book. I love how dark it went after he was killed by the rot. When he was reborn with a stronger tie to the red, I was actually getting excited to see what he could do. I would have liked to have seen more but that's what the 3rd book is for I suppose. The one thing that I would change if I could was how whiny his wife was. Every line she has seems like a complaint of some sort. I'm empathetic of her situation in some ways but also I have a lot of hope that she and Abby will be badasses in the coming issues.