Predator vs. the Planet of the Apes #1 // Review
Sarge says that they might just be there to save the free world. (He’s a little weird, though.) They’re a bunch of killers. Probably very elite military men fully armed and placed...and an ANSA flight to a distant planet. They’re accompanying a group of scientists who are there to study the planet. Things are going to get more than a little bit out of hand in Predator vs. the Planet of the Apes #1. Writer Greg Pak fuses a couple of big franchises together in the first issue of a new series with art by Alan Robinson and Espen Grundetjern.
They are en route when they find themselves getting fired on by an unknown spacecraft. Even tough space marines aren’t going to be good with a dogfight in space...so it’s inevitable that they’re going to crash on the planet. The planet in question is one...where apes evolved from man. Humans are considered a lesser species. And what’s worse: there’s a vicious alien predator on the loose that doesn’t really care for the survival of either man OR ape. There are three forces ready to tear each other apart. It’s going to be a rough situation for everyone involved.
Pak is delivery kind of a complicated fusiion here. One wouldn't think that the two franchisees would work together. They're kind of stuck together with dynamic that had been inspired by James Cameron's laughably silly space marines in Aliens (1986.) That dynamic never really serves anything very well. And it's not hard to tell that it's going in a pretty predictable direction by the end of affirmation in the series. Nevertheless, the mashup of different franchises feels like it could possibly land itself to some interesting drug to physicians as themes from to conflicting space fantasy/horror franchises clash.
Robinson and Grundetjern have a pretty tight control over the overall book and feel of the series. Lines are placed on the page with a type economy that allows plenty of room for atmosphere as developed in the colors. It's actually a fairly immersive sort of a situation. The distain look of the apes of the franch feels like it's hidden paid relatively faithfully. As does the overall work of the predator. Action might feel a little bit stiff in places, but this is on the whole pretty confidently rendered sci-fi action series in its first issue.
The visual aesthetics are kind of interesting. The overall look of alien and predator from the 1980s meets the overall look of advanced primates from the late 1960s. The two opposing design styles actually worked pretty well together. This has a lot to do with the fact that the predator franchise one that could be placed in just about any setting and work quite well. It's a bit like the alien xenomorph in that respect. And as interesting as it might be, it's really just an opportunity to use a couple of different 20th Century Fox franchises together. It's OK. There isn't a whole lot of depth here.
