It's not often I give a Predator book a bad review.
(Possible spoilers ahead)
The story starts predictably enough, with a conversation between two humans on the ethics of hunting and manifest destiny, all to the back ground art of Predator Hunt that invariably goes wrong. We all know what happens here - wrist computer is activated, bomb is detonated, leaving only one Predator alive for our intrepid human enterprise to find.
Already I'm seeing problems. It mimics a bit too closely to AVP: Prey, with the familiar tough character Machiko Noguchi and moral reflections. What little plot there is is uninteresting and unoriginal, and the few characters priveleged enough to recieve names are poorly developed. Instead the writers chose to ape on the stereotypical tough-guy/tough-girl personas, giving them obvious foils and flats to accent them. However, these other characters fail to accent the already boring main ones - instead, they just make it even more obvious how un-creative the writers were.
The one thing that could have saved this was the decent artwork and mystique of the Predators and Aliens. Unfortunately, the art is less than stellar in certain cases (namely faraway shots and shading issues) and there are sadly few Predator and Alien sightings.
I am not a discriminatory Predator fan. When Bischoff's "Hunter's Planet" and S.D. Perry's "War" ruffled feathers, I managed to enjoy both despite continuity slips and lapses in Predator character.
The problem with this graphic novel is it fails to focus on its subject: rather than building on the Predators it shows us what we've already seen, and in such tiny doses that we aren't even satisfied with seeing our boys. The aliens are given the typical status of over running a planet with their hive-mother at the center of it all. The humans get far too much prime-time, but their plotline is so uninteresting that I found myself skipping their boring dialogue to find more art of the Predators.
This book is for a hardcore fan wishing to own every aspect of the fandom. It lacks the intelligence of Perry's "Prey" book or the gusto of the previous comics. There is not enough plot or character, or enough Predators or Aliens to apeal to any fan. It is completely uninteresting and disappointing from every aspect of my views, but hopefully, it won't let you down as much as it did me.
(Possible spoilers ahead)
The story starts predictably enough, with a conversation between two humans on the ethics of hunting and manifest destiny, all to the back ground art of Predator Hunt that invariably goes wrong. We all know what happens here - wrist computer is activated, bomb is detonated, leaving only one Predator alive for our intrepid human enterprise to find.
Already I'm seeing problems. It mimics a bit too closely to AVP: Prey, with the familiar tough character Machiko Noguchi and moral reflections. What little plot there is is uninteresting and unoriginal, and the few characters priveleged enough to recieve names are poorly developed. Instead the writers chose to ape on the stereotypical tough-guy/tough-girl personas, giving them obvious foils and flats to accent them. However, these other characters fail to accent the already boring main ones - instead, they just make it even more obvious how un-creative the writers were.
The one thing that could have saved this was the decent artwork and mystique of the Predators and Aliens. Unfortunately, the art is less than stellar in certain cases (namely faraway shots and shading issues) and there are sadly few Predator and Alien sightings.
I am not a discriminatory Predator fan. When Bischoff's "Hunter's Planet" and S.D. Perry's "War" ruffled feathers, I managed to enjoy both despite continuity slips and lapses in Predator character.
The problem with this graphic novel is it fails to focus on its subject: rather than building on the Predators it shows us what we've already seen, and in such tiny doses that we aren't even satisfied with seeing our boys. The aliens are given the typical status of over running a planet with their hive-mother at the center of it all. The humans get far too much prime-time, but their plotline is so uninteresting that I found myself skipping their boring dialogue to find more art of the Predators.
This book is for a hardcore fan wishing to own every aspect of the fandom. It lacks the intelligence of Perry's "Prey" book or the gusto of the previous comics. There is not enough plot or character, or enough Predators or Aliens to apeal to any fan. It is completely uninteresting and disappointing from every aspect of my views, but hopefully, it won't let you down as much as it did me.
