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Welcome back for another Character Spotlight! This time around we’ve got the deadly botanist herself, Poison Ivy! How does one go from average human to some sort of plant-human hybrid? Does she feel awkward walking on grass? I can’t really answer that last one, but I think I got you covered in the first, so let’s get to it!

Pamela Lillian Isely was a brilliant botany biochemist, too bad she was surrounded by mad scientists. She became the recipient of some experiments which would nearly kill her by transforming her whole body chemistry. Poison to the touch, able to use pheromones to manipulate others, and depending on the story she is more plant than human, which explains her sometimes green skin as its needed for photosynthesis. Her most potent poison comes from her kiss, using her knowledge of plants she makes killer hybrids enhanced by her intimate knowledge of botanical life.

Dubbing herself Poison Ivy, Pamela would begin a life of crime and eco-terrorism in Gotham. She’d often try and bring a new world where plants would take over. Batman would be a constant thorn in her side and stop her plans, eventually sending her to Arkham.

When Gotham is declared a No-Man’s Land, Ivy would take control of Robinson Park and shelter plant and orphan child alike. Despite her usual distaste for humanity, seeing children with traumatic pasts makes her protective for their safety. Fighting off the likes of Clayface and any others who wished to use the children in their plans. When Batman attempts to save the children he realizes they are safest there during the chaos outside the park. Batman strikes a bargain with Ivy to help feed the starving masses outside her walls until Gotham is able to become a stable city once more. Just prior to Gotham’s rehabilitation, Ivy finds a near-dead Harley Quinn and nurses her back to health.

When Gotham is rebuilding, they realize that Ivy must be placed back in Arkham and attempt to poison her and her plants. When one of the children is poisoned accidentally by Ivy, she realizes that with the city safe, being with her is no longer the safest for them. Ivy willingly goes with the police as long as all the children are taken into safe custody.

Arkham is where Ivy and Harley frequently end up together when not free to commit crimes. Now teamed up with Harley, the two cause more havoc in Gotham often for the kick of it. Harley becomes the only human Ivy admits to truly care about, and they will team up on many occasions when Harley is not with Joker.

Ivy is not often a team player unless she finds a reason to care about the people she’s working with, or is given a chance to rid herself of an annoyance. Ivy would find herself teaming up with not only Harley, but Catwoman as well. Catwoman would sometimes help Ivy deal with her frustrations at Harley’s penchant for going back to Joker, knowing that the clown would brutalize her again and again. Though Catwoman was too close with Batman for Ivy’s liking, which kept her from ever getting too close.

In the New 52 Pamela was born with a skin condition and would spend her days hiding in the family garden. Her father would end up killing her mother and burying her in said garden. When in college, Pamela used pheromone drugs on students for experiments and drugged the Dean into letting her off free of charges. She’d end up working at Wayne Enterprises and accidentally dose herself with plant pheromones she’d been planning to make with Wayne’s consent, but he fired her for making mind control drugs.

Now as Poison Ivy she’d work a short stint with the Birds of Prey before betraying them and nearly getting everyone and herself killed. She was recently seen in a relationship with Harley Quinn.

There you have it folks, the woman who became the merging point between humanity and vegetation. With a strong desire to bring plants to the top of the food chain and world order. Though she loathed humanity, when some of them needed her most, she’d show compassion. She may want to be as wild as nature, but sometimes she’d be just as nurturing, though still very lethal.

Suggested Reading
Batman #181
Birds of Prey
Gotham City Sirens

Dr. Alexander Bustos

drbustos@comicattack.net