Hey my first time reading Animal Man was in Justice League Europe, and in those comics he was a filler character, nothing special really. some time after, reading The Forgotten Heroes (some few comics here and there) i was impressed how fun and spunky he was!!. similar to Wally West Flash.

maybe he`s the same in their Galactic adventures with Adam Strange, i will see in a future...

oh man! this guy Adam Beechen, is really talented, he knows and should write Animal Man.

a lot of characters were different before certain writers "defined" them

In a sense he's still that guy, it just depends on the context. A character's not always gonna act the same, it depends on the story that he's put in, it's what makes a character three dimensional.