WARNING: The following article contains spoilers for The Swamp Thing #3 by Ram V, Mike Perkins, Mike Spicer, and Aditya Bidikar, on sale now
Poison Ivy has gone through a metamorphosis in recent months. She has shed the name of Poison Ivy to become Queen Ivy. But ever since then, she has largely remained underground (perhaps literally) and it is relatively unknown what this new moniker means for her moving forward.
But in The Swamp Thing #3, fans finally get some answer when the new Avatar of the Green encounters not just Queen Ivy, but theformer persona of Ivy inside the Green. In doing so, it also explains why Pamela Isley has been a bit all over the place these last few years.
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Lately, Poison Ivy has been sending mixed messages, alternating between being a hero and villain in equal measure. She’s worked alongside the Birds of Prey, helped out Batman more than a few times, and of course, she’s had Harley Quinn’s back almost every step of the way. But for all the good she’s done, Ivy has also wrought true chaos in the world. In Batman #41 by Tom King and Mikel Janín, and Clayton Cowles, she took over the entire planet before having an emotional breakdown, leading up to one of the greatest superhero massacres in recent memory and leading to yet another rebirth for Poison Ivy.
All of that makes it unclear which side Ivy is really on. The latest developments with Queen Ivy seemed to indicate that she had chosen villainy as her future, but The Swamp Thing #3 revealed two different aspects of the character. The first is simply Ivy, who is sweet, caring, and genuinely invested in helping and protecting her friends. And then she and Swamp Thing encountered Queen Ivy, who is harsh and vindictive, unlike her more gentle counterpart. Queen Ivy even displayed hostility towards Swamp Thing, someone who was an ally to her in the past.
All of this lends credence to the idea that Ivy may have some form of disassociative identity disorder. Queen Ivy even seemed to confirm it by stating that Ivy represented their compassion for other beings who never deserved it or comprehended it. But when Ivy’s caring nature wound up getting them hurt, that was when Queen Ivy would take over, becoming a defense mechanism of sorts to keep Ivy’s heart safe from the world.
If this is true, then that would explain much of Ivy’s behavior in the past. She has tried to be more heroic, to find a better path for herself and the world, but she was almost always wounded every time she opened herself up to the possibility that humanity wasn’t so horrible. That was when her darker, more wrathful side would take over and do all the horrible things that Poison Ivy became infamous for. And only now does that dark side have a name: Queen Ivy.
Now, Queen Ivy is ready to put Ivy on the backburner and be the force for change that she needs to see, regardless of who gets in the way. Even though Queen Ivy is ready to take center stage, her existence is owed to Ivy’s compassion. In essence, the only reason Queen Ivy exists is to protect the real Ivy, the one that cares enough to try. That means that there’s a chance Ivy could one day become a true hero. She just has to be brave enough to do the right thing, even at the risk of getting hurt again.
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