Predator vs. the Planet of the Apes #1
Writer: Greg Pak
Artist: Alan Robinson
Colorist: Espen Grundetjern
Cover Artist: Stonehouse
Publisher: Marvel Comics
It's interesting how many of these Planet of the Apes comics take place during the original 1968 movie. It's like if most Star Wars comics took place during A New Hope, even though there were multiple sequels (even if I don't like to admit some of them).
Ahem. I digress.
Forbidden Zone
Predator vs. the Planet of the Apes #1 begins with an American spaceship full of Special Forces types. They're on a mission to locate the missing Colonel Taylor and his ship—he'd gone missing from an important mission, and it's their job to find him. Most of them don't even get named on-page before their ship is attacked by a Yautja ship and forced to crash land on a nearby planet. Most of the crew don't survive the crash. The remainder don't survive the next three pages.
The only surviving member of the crew is the pilot, a woman named Arch. She finds herself amongst the wild humans, who she is shocked to learn are very primitive and can't talk. In the nearby city, gorillas General Ursus and Dr. Zaius are convincing the citizens to follow them into the "Forbidden Zone" and hunt down the human called "Taylor."
The apes attack the humans that Arch is hiding amongst—but before the field can be turned into a slaughterhouse, the Predator appears. He leaves the humans alone, but cuts through the apes before disappearing again.
Apes Dr. Zira and Dr. Cornelius were present at the site of both Predator attacks, and they surmise that it only attacks individuals who are armed or otherwise engaged in violence of their own. That's going to be a problem, if Arch wants to defend herself at all…
If It Bleeds
This issue is a lot of setup, but it's entertaining enough.
I liked the bait-and-switch at the beginning. It looked like we were going to get a Special Forces unit that would ultimately engage the Predator, like Arnold Schwarzenegger's team in the original movie. But instead, none of them lived long enough to even associate a name with a face. Instead we have our lone human, Arch, and the various Apes characters that she'll interact with.
It's hard to tell where the story is going to go based on this first issue. Other than Arch and the usual Apes leads from the original movie, no one else has really stuck around on the page very long. It's pretty clear they're going to have to enter the Forbidden Zone, which will cross their paths with Taylor's, but what else will they find there?
Not that Predators are chatterboxes anyway, but it's hard to tell what this one wants. I know, it's hunting someone, but who? There are multiple panels of it fixating on the American flag in various spots, so it's probably Taylor, but I don't know that for sure. At least Charlton Heston versus the Predator is a slightly more believable matchup than Danny Glover was…
The idea of mixing well-known sci-fi franchises of the 60's and the 80's is a strong one, it's just hard to tell from the setup if this is going to be like chocolate and peanut butter, or more like ketchup and ice cream (man, I got grossed out just typing that one). There are four issues left to go, so let's hope the creative team has plenty of ideas to keep things going that long. If nothing else, there's promise in the juxtaposition of "the Predator only attacks the armed or violent" and Planet of the Apes being chock full of both.
The Hunt Begins
It's always interesting to see the creative teams chosen for something like this. In this case, the only name I recognized was writer Greg Pak, the others were unknown to me.
Pak is a prolific comics writer, having worked for almost every major publisher. I personally know him best for Planet Hulk, which I think is a good pedigree to have when you're telling a survival story on an "alien" world. Hopefully he brings some of that feel to this miniseries now that the setup is out of the way. He keeps the pace moving at a decent clip, setting all of the players into place and still racking up a decent body count. The Predator is a walking jump scare, so he uses that to great effect here.
Artist Alan Robinson does a good job throughout this issue. His Apes characters actually maintain the "my face looks like a rubber mask" look that the original movies had (because of course they were). The human characters all have distinctive looks, even though most of them don't live to page six. The Predator looks menacing, but maybe its movements are a little stiff (which might be a reference to the movie and how a person in a suit actually moves—I haven't seen the original in a while). The titular planet looks lush and dingy at the same time, which is a nice touch that is complemented by the colors.
Espen Grundetjern handles the coloring here, and it's a solid job overall. The most important thing for an Apes story is that the world look lush but also dirty and dingy, and that comes across well. For the Predator side, the most important things are blood and the way the world looks through the infrared visor. Those both look good, and the visor is used to strong effect throughout the story. So there's nothing too earth-shattering at play here, but it's all good work.
Beware the Beast Man
Predator vs. the Planet of the Apes #1 is very much a setup issue that takes its time introducing the characters and the setting before really getting down to business. For a comic that is basically the printed equivalent of smashing all your toys together at once as a kid, it puts a lot more effort into the story being told than young me would have—but then again, I would have only played with them for a little while, not had to maintain a whole miniseries. So maybe their way is better after all.