"My World is Acid and Blood"

A review of Predator #2
Part Eight in "James Versus Fire and Stone"

Am I behind on this? Yeah, I'm behind on this. Sorry. Things have come up. Like this Farcry 4 review. And the podcast's new home. But all that's behind me and you have my full attention. Come on. Sit down right here and let Papa K-berry tell you a thing or two about Fox Media franchises.

I looooooove Predator #2. It's a hulking amalgamation of high adventure and scummy sci-fi exploitation. It's everything I ever dreamed a Predator comic could be.

It's basically an amalgamation of 1980's action movies cliches packed into a fairly straight-forward comic. It is exactly as dumb as it is smart, and that is exactly what a sci-fi action movie needs to be. As a testament to its quality, that assemblage of ideas and tropes are not the kind of thing I flock towards. That's my friend AJ's thing. Maybe that's even Cruz's thing. It is not mine. But here, it's simple, it's fun and I don't have to think about what this says about the human condition or whatever other French junk that's bouncing through my head.

Props to Lucas Graciano for a great cover.

Williamson and Mooneyham decided that this comic wasn't packed with enough classic action movie tropes, he has made Galgo the Merc and the Scarred Predator into a kind of odd couple pairing. But instead of them being a good cop/bad cop team, they're a bad cop/intergalactic trophy hunter cop. Unlike a lot of concepts on paper, this one is as good as it sounds.

It then gilds this concept by chaining the predator and Galgo together, because why the hell not?

Oh man. The predator is also missing an eye, because he's a crusty old predator and he's seen some things in his day.

Oh man.

A lot of licensed comics feel like somebody is checking off a list. Predator? Check. Jungle? Check. Gore? Check. I won't accuse any of the other books on the Fire and Stone line up of doing that, but, the worst of them seem so rote. Or they seem like somebody got real excited that their fanfic was elevated. There's no life to the book. Predator #1 and #2 don't read like that. They read with a healthy mix of enthusiasm and daring.

What makes Predator work is that the premise is clear. The direction and motives are clear. While there are some mild surprises here and there, they aren't in the actual substance of the story. At no point was I forced to ask the questions “What?” or “Really” or “The fuck is this shit?” It works on its own steam and good for everyone involved for pulling that one out of the hat.

MUTANT OF THE WEEK: I am sorry to say that no proper mutants have appeared in the comic book-- YET. Presumably they're saving that for an issue #3 reveal. In the mean time what we get instead is a giant alien bull-thing (patent pending). It hardly counts as a mutant of interest, but Merc Cop and Pred Cop do manage to decapitate it with their laser handcuffs.

Go home, GIS, you're drunk.

TRIPLE LASER POINT OF EXCELLENCE. Williamson and Mooneyham have put together a nice little sci-fi/action story that is exactly what it needs to be. It's big. It's crazy. It's fun. Remember fun? It makes sense that the rest of the items in Fire and Stone aren't “fun” (even Aliens, which has the distinction of being simply “good” is rather dour). Fun is what this cluster-eff of an event needed.

I give Predator #2 a FIVE OUT OF FIVE CHESTBURSTERS. This comic almost makes this entire Stone and Fire series worth it. I mean, I don't think I would have picked this book up and enjoyed it in the way that I am if it wasn't for this entire, dumb series and this even dumber dare that I gave myself. For that, I suppose, I am thankful. Still doesn't make AvP any more literate, but I'm still grateful.

Put that blurb on your cover, Dark Horse.

Apropos of nothing, if you want pulp fiction, check out Bitch Planet #1, which came out this week. It's got. . . Lord Jesus, so many nipples.

You can read the previous installments of "James Versus Fire and Stone" below:
Prometheus #3
Alien Versus Predator #2
Aliens #2
Predator #1

Prometheus #2

Alien Versus Predator #1

Alien #1 and Prometheus #1

James Kislingbury is a boxed wine connoisseur, a writer, and a podcaster. You can support his show A Quality Interruption here.

The Island of Broken Androids

A Review of Prometheus #3

Part Seven of “James Versus Fire and Stone.”

God. Here we are again.

One things that the Fire and Stone event has done well is that every comic book feels different. As interrelated as they are, each one is a distinct entity, each is a distinct type of story. They also each have distinct shortcomings. As the first comic in the Fire and Stone event Prometheus is the first word on what's wrong with this event.

Aliens is slow, but I'm interested to see where it goes. AvP is a total shit show, though that at least presents its own kind of pleasure. Predator is the stand out among this crossover event in that it is a rock solid genre comic. But Prometheus? It is this vast scene of blandness. An entire ocean of semi-sentient pureed vegetables that think of "Yeah, I guess so" is the height of repartee.

I wish it were more terrible. That might actually be fun.Then again there must be some inherent value in keeping me tortured.

So, what's going on with the actual comic?

Last issue we left off with an entire hive of aliens (which, as I understand it are hundreds of years old at this point? I think?) chasing our generic main characters, but not swiftly enough to actually do any damage to people with names. And it kind of goes on like that.

The beginning smash cuts to Francis (there, I finally remembered the black scientist's name) being chased by Elden the Android (now in full GWAR mode). We assume he's there to kill Francis, but then he lets Francis go. It's not to tease him, not to play with him like a cat plays with it's prey. No. Elden lets the man go because this comic book is dumb.

All the while, Elden is rambling on about the type of shit that only psychopaths in poorly written stories ramble on about. He's upset that Francis betrayed his trust, yet, by his own admission, he is smarter, faster, and just generally cooler looking, yet he seems to be really worked up about this? Why? Why any of this?

God, do I hate Elden.

The rest of issue #3's story comes in fits and starts, picking up the fumbled ball of the past two issues and just sort of looking at it. “Is this a football?” and “What do you want me to do with this?” it asks.

Across the planet, the scrappy captain and her remaining crew are high tailing it towards the only way off the stygian nightmare planet that they've found themselves on. There's some push and pull about what needs to be done, but who really cares. The captain is a non-entity and so is the rest of her crew.

There's an attempt to characterize a bunch of the survivors (people who should have met and cared about in issue #1), by introducing a female scientist that has a wife that is threatened by the aliens.

But, who is this lesbian scientist? And who is her wife? Why should I care? Does she even have a name? The only information I can glean from this plot line is that in the future people are cool about homosexuals. Good for them! But so what? I'm cool about homosexuals now and I have to live through this comic book. Give me something to care about. Give me something to latch onto. If you're going to arbitrarily introduce characters and ideas, why not just go all out? Why not just make them polygamists? That way you've got even more wives at hazard. More wives means more tension! It'd be stupid not to make them polygamists! You missed a trick, Paul Tobin!

Then, towards the end of the issue, Galgo and his daring-do crew of dirtbag mercs abandon the crew on the ground because they found out that there was a better storyline somewhere out there (which is Predator. Go read that book).

An Engineer also appears for some reason. He's culling the xenomorphs. That's pretty cool, I guess. I kind of wish it tied into the story at all instead of just being a thing that happened.

Also, Captain What's-Her-Face reprimands Francis for exposing Elden to the black goo and then abandoning him. She goes as far as to accuse him of murder, even though Elden is, in Francis' eyes, about as human as a coffee machine. Unlike the nameless lesbian and his equally unknowable cipher wife, Elden and Francis actually are characters. We don't care about them, but we at least know who they are. To then treat Elden as a human being in light of Francis' need to play God could be accused of being an interesting idea. It's not great, but it's a kind of story telling, at least.

All of that said, I think I unfairly criticized Juan Ferreyra's art in my previous reviews. When dealing with a panorama of people, he isn't at his best, but there are individual panels, mostly close ups of characters, that are actually quiet striking. As works of art, they're beautiful. As panels in comics, they also do something that only comics can do, which is to convey, in shorthand, the emotional state of a character in a larger story.

With that said, I don't know if Prometheus is the right book for him, but I'm willing to bet that he has some great work in the past and some great work ahead of him. I would very much like to see what he can do with a better script at his disposal.

On the plus side, I should state that the past two covers have been pretty neat (#2's cover from David Palumbo is an especially handsome work of art). #3 also features art from Mr. Pulumbo (man, he does Magic: The Gathering card art too? This guy sure gets around) and it is another attractive work of art. It almost has me tricked into thinking that the idea of a mutant android is a good one.Then my memories come back to me like a shotgun blast full of piss.

Prometheus #3 receives THREE FACEHUGGERS OUT OF FIVE. And it has just barely earned that third Facehugger. This comic is rapidly souring and the sun has yet to come out. As the inaugural comic in the Fire and Stone event, Prometheus is a poor pointman. It should be leading the pack in both tone and quality. It should be the best thing on the line. Instead the best comic in this whole event is the last one released. Instead of a grand new era in Dark Horses comics we're introduced to a line of comics that are basically dead on arrival.

What can be done to fix all of this? I don't know. Hire me, why don't you? I've got plenty of terrible ideas about Aliens and Predators. Plus, I'll work for a song. Scott Allie, I'm only a few key strokes away. You know you want to.

You can read the previous installments of "James Versus Fire and Stone" below:
Alien Versus Predator #2
Aliens #2
Predator #1

Prometheus #2

Alien Versus Predator #1

Alien #1 and Prometheus #1

James Kislingbury is a writer, a podcaster, and a dirtbag merc.

"We Were So Wrong!"

A Review of Prometheus: Fire and Stone #2

Part Three of "James Versus Fire and Stone."

Prometheus #2's greatest sin might be that it is rote to the point of not needing to exist. It is baseline comic book making from beginning to end. Its one or two interesting moments are counter-weighed by an equal number of equally powerful moments of idiocy. It isn't bad, it's just not very good.

Prometheus #2 executes on the cliffhanger issue #1 sets up. Meaning: Everyone gets turns into dog meat by a horde of xenomorphs. So there's that. This is followed by a chase scene involving lots of gunfire and then, finally, a mutant-alien shark attack. And it doesn't work. It's just there. As action, though, it isn't compelling because none of the people being killed or fighting back matter. They're just cyphers for the aliens to chew through, one after the other. 

I couldn't find any real art from #2, so here's this.

It made me think of Alien 3 and one of the many reasons why it doesn't work. It's chock full of violence and carnage, but, as a story it fails to scare you in the same way that it does in Alien and Aliens (or even Predator). Why?

As many people get wiped out in succession in James Cameron's masterpiece (to which all of these stories owe a debt, so I think it is fair to bring it up), that movie does a very good job setting up who these people are in very short order. Drake is a jock. Apone is a born marine. That one butch pilot is a stone cold professional. That one black guy likes pussy. And the world these characters live in. We recognize them, we like them or we hate them, but we know who they are and when they die, we can see them die as people. 

This comic does not accomplish that feat of tricking the audience into thinking they know something. Maybe it attempts to do so. Maybe it thinks that Prometheus, as a film, is enough to carry this world along. That there is a certain amount of knowledge an audience is going to carry in with them. If that's the case, then Paul Tobin has gravely miscalculated how to tell this story.

It isn't until about half of the way through the issue that any of the story actually bothers to get told. That's fine. Nothing wrong with that. I feel like most issues of Zero have a story that could fit on a bar napkin and that series is brilliant. This comic, if you haven't gathered is not brilliant.

The little plot we have is unpacked in a way that doesn't make sense and then completely lacks in any gravitas. So, it fails on both a functional and an emotional level. For example, our captain, you know What's-Her-Face, finally decides to come clean about the "true nature" of the mission. Her secret agenda being that she is out to discover what happened to Peter Weyland.

It's odd, because this is something that we already know. It doesn't read right at all. Is she supposed to appear to be a believer like Elizabeth Shaw? A fanatic like Ahab? A profiteer like the crew from Resurrection? Who knows! Who cares? All I can see is that her crew members are pissed off that they've been mislead. . . Even though danger was already inherent in the mission and there is no indication that they won't still be collecting big paychecks. She doesn't care about her mission, so neither do we.If anything, her "big reveal" is less a confession to her crew than a half-hearted apology to the reader.

Secondly, there is an entire sub-plot involving Elden and some scientist guy, who discover a cave that a survivor had been living in on this hostile alien planet. And, credit to Tobin, the idea of Robin Crusoe in space is pretty neat (if lacking in a monkey this time). Where it falls apart is that this plot goes from "Hmmm, what's all this?" to "Let's shoot each other up with alien goop. Should work out, right?" in about eight seconds flat. It's ridiculous.

To borrow a quote from Roger Ebert, "A good movie should leave you searching for answers, not asking questions." If that is true, then Prometheus #2 isn't a good story. It is less about developing a mystery than it is about leaving certain facts half-told and hoping that's good enough.

It bares stating that Juan Ferreyra is a solid enough artist and he delivers in #2 just as he did in #1. He can draw talking heads that look suffictiently different very well. If any of his work is actually lacking, it is in his panel layouts. His action sequences both show too much and then fail to connect one panel to the next. For whatever reason they don't seem to work like they should. Maybe that's more the fault of the writer, but how fair is that? He's already getting blamed for enough here. . .

The main failing is Paul Tobin's story. It doesn't hold together. On a character level we fail to understand what is motivating these characters and why their actions matter.

And, again, that space ship still looks like shit.

I give this THREE CHESTBURSTERS out of five. Not particularly great, but not particularly offensive. Plus, it gets some bonus points for trying its hand at writing something new for a movie that people talked nothing but shit about. A thankless task, if there ever was one.

The next issue on the agenda will be Predator: Fire and Stone #1. If you read one review in this entire series, I think you should stick around and read that one. . . That and AvP #1, because I hated that thing.

You can also read my reviews for:

Alien Versus Predator: Fire and Stone#1.

Prometheus: Fire and Stone #1 andAliens #1.

And, if I haven't said it before, I'll say it this time: I am riding this fucking thing into the ground. There might even be a bonus after all the smoke clears. . .

James Kislingbury podcasts, writes, draws, and has brow-beatingly bold beliefs about Alien 3. He also has a Patreon going for his podcast, so if you love rambling and movies, why not help us out?