It’s been a hot minute since I genuinely enjoyed a crossover this much, and Alien vs. Captain America has scratched that itch and then some. With the finale now firmly delivering on this wild ride of a series, it's great to see things having come full circle in such a fun manner. It’s a crossover many (myself included) never even thought about, and yet it seems eerily perfect in its execution. As mentioned before, the WWII setting just somehow works for Xenomorphs with the mad science aspects of it all, and Cap is well—Cap. It’s a match made in heaven, or hell, depending on which side of the firing line you’re on.
With Alien vs. Captain America #4, the grand finale to this mini has Captain America and his otherworldly friends finally putting the recently Xeno-fied Red Skull down for the count. There are sacrifices, there’s blood, there’s gore, there’s loss, and there’s so much well-executed fan service that it’s just stupendous. I wish there were more to this series, like Aliens vs. Avengers had gotten a few more issues, because there’s still so much more to tell and wrap up than can be done perfectly in a 4-issue mini. But by god, did Frank Tieri and the team have a wild go at it.
Enough of this Red Skullduggery
The finale begins at Normandy, where the Red King’s Xenomorph army is seemingly laying waste to the Allied forces. As grim as the situation is, Captain America and his buddies have a wild go at dealing with the war on two fronts. While Nick Fury, Yon-Rogg, and the other Kree enforcers help the Allies hold the Xenos at bay on the front lines, Steve, Bucky, and Mar-Vell aim to cut the horde off at the head. That head is the newly transformed Red Skull: a monstrous Xenomorph-Nazi hybrid (never thought I’d get to use that combination of words) who now calls himself the Red King. As Bucky takes on Arnim Zola (who is now a precursor to a Weyland-Yutani synthetic), Cap and Mar-Vell aim to take down the Red King with a special Kree device that will take the entire Xenomorph horde down in one fell swoop. Meanwhile, Nick Fury and the Kree forces at Normandy get backup in the form of the Invaders: Namor, the Human Torch, Spitfire, and Union Jack. But even then, the odds are stacked against them as Jack and Spitfire are quickly torn apart by the alien hordes.
In the final climactic battle, Cap and Mar-Vell manage to beat the Red King, sticking the Kree neutralizer on him and stopping the alien horde dead in its tracks. But this isn’t without sacrifice: Nick Fury dies on the front lines trying to protect his frenemy Yon-Rogg, while Mar-Vell also perishes in battle with the Red King. Captain America and the surviving heroes mourn the losses of their friends and allies – vowing to honor their sacrifices and remain worthy of them. It’s a somber yet victorious place to end the book on, but it’s not quite over just yet, because the epilogue takes readers to the modern day… or as modern as you can get in the seemingly far future from World War II. A Weyland-Yutani-Stark freighter finds itself heading back to Earth, having located Cap’s missing body (this is still a Captain America story, so damn right he’s gonna end up as a popsicle). A motley crew comprising Sharon Carter, Carol Danvers, Nick Fury Jr., Sam Wilson, and the Vision (who is a Weyland-Yutani android now) land on the planet and locate Cap in the ice. It should be a hopeful reunion, but something tells me the hitchhiker that Cap picked up probably has other plans in mind as the series ends.
A Mad Scramble to the Finish Line
Frank Tieri manages to bring his story home with this finale, barring a few minor issues, which I blame entirely on this being so short. Before I get into the many, many positives about this finale, the one thing that’s bugged me about this and the previous Aliens vs. Avengers crossover has been how short they are. I feel like the editorial mandate to keep these stories contained to four issues apiece has done more harm than good, forcing writers to kneecap their stories to facilitate this. Just like how Aliens vs. Avengers started off breathtakingly strong, it faltered in the last issue because there was just so much that needed to be wrapped up so fast in the finale that the pacing was just all shot to hell. Similarly, Alien vs. Captain America took its time to build its concept so masterfully early on, but here in this last issue, even with a genuinely satisfying (if predictable) finish, there’s a lot that gets left off the table to have a conclusive ending. We’ll get into some of the specifics on that further down, but this has truly been one of the most annoying things about these books that stops them from being exceptionally great.
The final battle taking place across two fronts is given the same amount of weight throughout. The broader battle between the Allied forces and the Xenomorph hordes could’ve done with a few more pages, honestly. But what we do get is gritty and hopeless, as you would expect a situation to be. Having the Invaders come in to back up the entire team is also great, with all the familiar faces comic book fans know and love being there for the big final battle.
What’s less exciting for some, however, would probably be having half of them killed off rather quickly by the Xenomorphs. Jack and Spitfire getting the short end of the stick in that regard kind of chafes a little, because I really would’ve preferred if the Invaders had lasted a bit longer before you started cutting down their ranks. In contrast, Nick Fury’s death—that too caused by him trying to protect Yon-Rogg, a dude he hated up until a while ago—genuinely felt like a shock. It continues one of the better trends of this book in that it’s not scared to kill off seemingly popular characters as long as it fits the story, and this works masterfully to really show both the price of victory and the grim reality of both the Xenomorphs and war in general.
On the other battlefront, Tieri also ensures that Captain America’s strike force has an equally tense climactic battle. I was really chuffed by the fact that Arnim Zola turned himself into a synthetic robot, white blood and all, as the perfect precursor to the synths we all know and love from the Alien franchise. It just makes so much sense in the grand scheme of things. Then, of course, there’s the big bad fight between Cap and Mar-Vell against the Red King. It’s the exact kind of brutal, bloody, tight affair you’d expect: our heroes facing the might of alien fascist science. It perfectly straddles the line between goofy as all hell and still sinister and narratively fitting. Again, this is literally an Alien Queen with the Red Skull’s face on its head. It shouldn’t work. But it does.
What questionably doesn’t work, however, is the convenient little plot device (literally): the Kree neutralizer that Mar-Vell uses to stop the Red King and his army once and for all. Now… my only real issue with this is: (1) If a device that could completely wipe out every Xenomorph in a hive was created by the Supreme Intelligence… why wasn’t it used to save their own planet before everything went to crap?! Or (2) If the Supreme Intelligence was killed before it could even figure out how bad the Xenomorph threat was (as shown in the previous issue), then how did it have time to create a device like this?! It’s a bit of an ultra-convenient, nearly story-breaking issue that really felt like they were rushed to end this story in this issue by any means possible. But SOMEHOW, Tieri’s writing manages to sidestep this simply by virtue of being a fun, action-packed ride even here. And again, even this isn’t without sacrifice, because watching Mar-Vell die to finally put down the horrors that ended his world also felt thematic. As was Cap literally decapitating the Red King in the end.
What I’ve enjoyed the most about this issue, and the series as a whole, has been the more restrained use of fan service—the little things here and there that kind of just work for the story being told. From motion trackers to the Red King using the Dust of Death, to Weyland-Yutani synths being foreshadowed: all these and more are the kind of little Easter eggs that highlight how much love Tieri seemingly has for both Aliens and Captain America mythology. The epilogue in particular is a fun exemplar of that fact, capping off the story in true Aliens fashion mixed with a little Captain America lore. It’s such a great way to wrap up a fun event and goes a long way in reminding readers that stuff like this can be fun, gruesome, and glorious all in equal measure.
The Charge of the Art Brigade
Stefano Raffaele brings out the big guns for this action-packed, war-torn finale, trading horror and suspense for more epic-scale battles. While his earlier line work in the initial issues worked to showcase the more claustrophobic terror of the Xenomorph in dark, confined spaces, here he shifts the tone to them being a truly unstoppable horde of chittering, primal beasts. Every gruesome moment of the horde at Normandy, tearing through Allied soldiers and Kree warriors alike, is shown in frightening detail. This is perfectly interspersed with our heroes fighting their desperate battles – the grim determination and fear palpable in their expressions. You kind of manage to get right into the action, especially when they rally behind the Invaders, and you feel hope falter when our heroes are brought low as well.
Similarly, the big fight between the Red King and the Captains of Two Worlds is just as brutal and dramatic. Staged like a final boss fight, the Red King manages to be a truly formidable and sinister visual force, all thanks to how Raffaele draws him. By combining the most terrifying aspects of the Red Skull and the Xenomorphs into this one being, Raffaele manages to create an entity that is truly formidable without feeling like a parody. The ensuing battle is rough and ends in satisfying carnage, even if the horrifying death of Captain Mar-Vell (courtesy of the Red King’s Dust of Death) is shown in full detail by Raffaele’s art: a gruesome reminder of the cost of this war, visible in Mar-Vell’s horrifically shriveled face.
And of course, none of this ensemble would be complete without Neeraj Menon, once again bringing the perfect color combinations to Raffaele’s line work. His shades really emphasize the fact that a grimdark book like this doesn’t need to be lifeless or joyless. Our heroes stand out in their spectacular colors against the darker villainy of the Red King and his Xenomorph army. Menon’s impeccable work with shadow play has really given this book a very unique and distinct visual identity, with a mix of war story and old-school, pulpy sci-fi feel. All in all, the art truly matches the best of both worlds, of Earth and space, in fun and fearsome fashion.
The Star-Spangled Space-Man with a Plan
Alien vs. Captain America #4 brings a close to a wildly entertaining, surprisingly high-stakes, and thoroughly gruesome crossover that brings back the best memories of WWII action, Aliens franchise sci-fi horror, and classic Dark Horse crossovers, all in one dramatically wonderful package. I’ve adored the amount of love and effort that went into this project, with the creative team giving their all in story and art to flesh out this frantic tale.
So far, Marvel’s Aliens crossovers have fared exceptionally well with the stories they’ve wanted to tell. And while I do pray for them to give the writers more time and pages to make the pacing of these stories better, books like these go a long way in reminding us that there are always so many cool stories to tell with genre and franchise crossovers like this, if given the love and respect they deserve. I am genuinely looking forward to some more Marvel vs. Aliens crossovers in the future, while also hoping the Predator books catch up to this level of quality.
Final Verdict: Alien vs Captain America #4 is the thoroughly entertaining and action-packed finale that this series deserves with mindful fanservice moments, painful deaths and climactic last stands that deserve more issues to truly savor as perfection.