As Poison Ivy experiences an agonizing brush with death, her mind continues to flash back to her origin. Issue #21 wraps up this arc, giving readers their promised explanation of how Pamela Isley became Poison Ivy. 

From a plot perspective, this new origin is pretty simple: Ivy is experimented upon by Dr. Jason Woodrue, gains her powers and begins her tenure as a villain in Gotham. What is impressive about this series so far is less the stories it tells and more about how it tells them. 

G. Willow Wilson is the definitive writer of Pamela Isley for me at this point. It is clear that she loves working with Ivy as a protagonist and knows how to exploit the central conceit of the character. 

Ivy's motivation is made powerful without being preachy. Readers aren't expected to be fully on-board with Ivy's antics (she did start this series intending to wipe out the entire human population, after all) but they are offered an emotionally intuitive reason why Pam acts the way she does. 

It seems so strange in 2024 that a character fighting for the environment would be a villain. I suppose it says a lot about how much the climate emergency has shifted in public discourse since Ivy was introduced. This issue makes Ivy so sympathetic I'd argue she's more of an anti-hero than a villain at this point. A line describing her arrival in Gotham offers a stinging critique of our unhealthy collective attachment to economic growth:

“This was what it all amounted to, all our so-called progress. A parasitic superstructure made of steel and glass, bloated with the blood of the earth.” 

It is hard to argue with Pamela’s condemnation of Gotham given the real-world context in which this issue is being published. 

Wilson’s environmental statement continues in a rooftop confrontation between Batman and Ivy. It feels similar to Bruce and Jason's confrontation in Under the Red Hood. The Dark Knight is confronted by a potential ally who he cannot get along with due to their extreme methods. It's a fascinating conversation that stays true to the core characteristics of the characters. 

There's also a moment near the very end that I expect will upset readers who always want Batman to be the 'good guy,' which I thought was a fun risk which could pay off later in the series. 

It isn't that Ivy is blameless, or that her methods are moral, but rather that her anguish at the destruction of the environment is rendered in a compelling way. One particularly moving panel illustrates how Pamela hears the physical ripping of trees from the earth: “I could hear every single root fiber snapping and breaking.” 

The art compliments Wilson’s writing well. Marcio Takara is particularly gifted at maintaining a character's essential visual cues while changing various features in their appearance to signify the passage of time. For a series that is often bouncing between several decades, Takara fills a critical role in keeping this comic visually consistent. 

I love the flashback to an earlier version of Gotham. Batman and Robin are both sporting a classic Jim Lee inspired look, and Ivy looks awesome in her original villain suit. It says a lot about Takara that he can render Ivy in her original attire without retaining the gross and weirdly exploitative way a lot of '90s and early '00s artists treated her. 

The colors by Arif Prianto complement Takara’s work well. The inside of Ivy’s mind has a vibrant style reminiscent of the brief Shade the Changing Girl published under the Young Animal imprint. It’s a great palette which helps delineate Ivy’s internal monologue from what is happening around her. 

I am a little confused as to where this comic could go from here. There are too many romantic subplots for me to keep organized in my head and there have been at least three significant location changes over twenty issues. That hasn't been much of an issue because the comic has focused on Pamela’s internal life, but now that this origin is over I wonder where Wilson will take readers next. 

Recommended if…

• You are interested in Poison Ivy’s origin story. 
• You want a comic with some interesting political commentary. 

Overall:

This is the best series I’m reading right now, and this issue continued to showcase Wilson’s knack for dialogue. I hope that this level of quality is sustainable now that this origin is essentially over.

Score: 8.5/10

Disclaimer: DC Comics provided an advance copy of this issue for the purpose of review.