The Rage War: A three part Alien / Predator epic by Tim Lebbon

[Ultramorph]

Should I peek? Oh yeah, I'll peek. 

[The Alien Predator]

Should I peek? Oh yeah, I'll peek. 

Cool new avatar, is that a Reaper Alien? It's been a while since I've read the comic.

Wait, I think I see the Reaper in the bottom right corner! 

[Ultramorph]

Thanks, it is from Reapers. I love that comic! 

Thanks for sharing the info, I'll peek after dinner. I have no willpower when it comes to easily obtained spoilers.

[The Alien Predator]

Me too. I wish we'd see more of the Reapers. Imagine humans encountered them? I'm sure the Yautja probably hunted Reapers.

[RakaiThwei]

Me too. I wish we'd see more of the Reapers. Imagine humans encountered them? I'm sure the Yautja probably hunted Reapers.

In the old EU, I'm pretty sure that they did. Well.. probably off-panel anyway.

The old EU did show some other alien life forms, nowhere near as abundant as the new EU.. I remember in one comic, the Aliens were hoarding these weird.. dog-monkey things, and corralled them into a group of eggs, they got facehugged and chestbursters erupted immediately. Then there was this weird frog-lizard man who had a red spacesuit and a laser gun and he had killed a number of aliens and apprehended the Queen, before being facehugged anyway. And let's not forget the big alien from Earth Angel.

[The Alien Predator]

Me too. I wish we'd see more of the Reapers. Imagine humans encountered them? I'm sure the Yautja probably hunted Reapers.

In the old EU, I'm pretty sure that they did. Well.. probably off-panel anyway.

The old EU did show some other alien life forms, nowhere near as abundant as the new EU.. I remember in one comic, the Aliens were hoarding these weird.. dog-monkey things, and corralled them into a group of eggs, they got facehugged and chestbursters erupted immediately. Then there was this weird frog-lizard man who had a red spacesuit and a laser gun and he had killed a number of aliens and apprehended the Queen, before being facehugged anyway. And let's not forget the big alien from Earth Angel.

And the giant orange from-lizard alien that was cooking Facehuggers on a grill.

[Lonely Universe]

Also those yellow, tribal types from a story I can't quite recall the title of.

In it a ship carrying an Alien crashes on a primitive but inhabited world. The Alien terrorizes a camp of the tribal types & introduces a sort of 'small fry' youngling who's picked on & pushed around by his peers. The pilot of the crashed ship has survived to hunt the Alien & eventually kills it, saving the youngling, who then betrays the pilot out of greed. I think maybe he shoots him in the back with his own laser rifle? Then the young one returns to the village with both heads & gains praise & respect.

I probably remember a lot of that wrong & I can't remember where it was published, but it was definitely an obscure Dark Horse Aliens story. It may have even been in that short lived Aliens magazine, the one that published Crusade.

[RakaiThwei]

Also those yellow, tribal types from a story I can't quite recall the title of.

That was Aliens: Alien.

[Ultramorph]

I read through the spoilers. Thanks again, Guan Thwei! I really like what Lebbon is doing with this.

Spoiler

It's nice to see some actual technological advancement happen in this universe. Resurrection and Sea of Sorrows gave the impression that tech had remained more or less stagnant, so it's cool to know that it hasn't. It's also refreshing to hear that he's exploring the Predators while also taking care not to over-explain them or anthropomorphize them. It will be interesting to see if Lebbon picks up the ending of Sea of Sorrows in some capacity, or if we're meant to assume that Rollins and company were sabotaged by the Founders off screen like the crew in the prologue.

I remain convinced that the Arcturians will have a role to play in the sequels. 

[close]

Also,

Spoiler

the little reference to "the multiverse" sounds pretty neat. I wonder of Josh Izzo or someone else at Fox had him put that in as a gesture to fans of the old EU.

[close]

[RakaiThwei]

Also,

Spoiler

the little reference to "the multiverse" sounds pretty neat. I wonder of Josh Izzo or someone else at Fox had him put that in as a gesture to fans of the old EU.

[close]

I hope we get one.. I hope we get it.. Then I can be truly happy. Truly, truly happy.

I've talked about it for a year and a half, and it wouldn't surprise me if someone looked at that particular thread. Slim chance but you never know. I just really want that. This has given me hope, and I don't want that snatched or shot down. It's a useful idea, really.

[happypred]

Seems like humans have been really really buffed in the setting...poor Yautja

[RakaiThwei]

Seems like humans have been really really buffed in the setting...poor Yautja

Human Supremacy! For the Human Sphere Empire! OORAH MUDDAFUKKA!

[The Alien Predator]

I am very near the ending of the book and have learned so much interesting stuff about the Yautja.

Spoiler

First, regarding "Yautja"...

When Lilliya used the term "Yautja" while conversing with Hashori (who she "guessed" was female but still is unsure) Hashori tilted her head in confusion as if not understanding "Yautja".

Later on, when Hashori and Lilliya team up (I'll leave how that happens for you all to find out), Hashori says "Yautja" but the name sounds so different that Lilliya just heard it as "Yautja" which makes me suspect that the name is a human corruption of the actual term they use which was always my impression for Perry's Yautja, Machiko could only try and pronounce it I guess.

Now the Yautja... are so amazing...

Hashori did show grief and emotion at the loss of some of her people, she did say it's a tragedy and how memories are lost and history is further tainted by the loss of great experiences as Batman mentioned before.

HOWEVER.....

Hashori also didn't care if she lived or died, she hoped to die well, even another Yautja laughed at a human who said to it "come stay with me" offering it a chance to live, it looked at the proposition as "surrender" and reached for its wrist gauntlet but the Marines blew its head apart.

They're still stubborn gits, Rakai, I'm sure you'd like to hear that.

Regarding their society, they are not conquerors nor are they very war-like, however, they are combat ready. Hunting and killing is their way of life and it's something they always look forward to.

What I loved is how independent and incredibly intelligent Yautja are portrayed as... they are very independent and populations are sparse. Yautja are spread across the galaxy but few in numbers. When the human characters infiltrate a Yautja space habitat (cobbled together from rocks, it looked almost as if they were building a planet than a space station, inside it was cavernous, humid and very natural looking) they find a Yautja settlement in one of the huge hollowed out caves.

The settlement is small, buildings look like little domes which on the inside are more cubed and tend to house one Yautja with its trophies which are artistically displayed, skeletal hands reaching out through walls, skulls, jawbones, leathered wings, talons and so on.

Some homes had ships moored next to them. Speaking of ships, no two Yautja ships are the same and it is said that individual Yautja actually design and make their own ships which gives each ship a personalized look to that specific Yautja.

The humans say how Yautja technology actually progresses extremely quickly, some Yautja communities have technology developed independently from other communities.

Also, when the Rage attack the Zeere-Za warship, Hashori tells Lilliya that their small ship they escaped in is cloaked, Lilliya says "they know about cloaking tech" to which Hashori says "not this one" and proudly boasts "I designed it".

I love this, how Yautja are able to actually make their own stuff. Humans still speculate (like we sometimes do) that Yautja may have inherited or stolen their technology from other beings, but Hashori clearly just shows that they're capable of designing and improving what they have which hints that a lot of the things Predators use was made by them.

[close]

[happypred]

This team-up sounds pretty terrible. It also sounds like the Yautja suck at hunting humans and Yautja ships suck at not getting nuked

Individual Yautja designing and building their own star ships?How ridiculously advanced are their manufacturing technologies?

[The Alien Predator]

This team-up sounds pretty terrible. It also sounds like the Yautja suck at hunting humans and Yautja ships suck at not getting nuked

Individual Yautja designing and building their own star ships?How ridiculously advanced are their manufacturing technologies?

Yautja ships are able to reduce human ships to atoms with their more powerful weaponry. And a human ship was crippled just by a few laser shots.

The Yautja don't suck at hunting humans, humans are just getting better at understanding the Predators. They know to not let them activate their wrist nukes. However, Predators still take some humans with them.

As for your second question, well that's a nice little mystery. A lot of things are a mystery to the humans and even in this era they know so little. The whole "them building their ships" may just be speculation by the humans. However, each ship is heavily personalized and modified.

Also, I liked how

Spoiler

The galaxy is hinted at being quite sparse with life, on some corners, life blossoms while many large space of galaxy are quiet and devoid of life. It incorporate the best of both worlds, some fans want the dark and gritty galaxy while others want some more life in it, well, this has both.

[close]

Also Rakai

Spoiler

The Yautja aren't fleeing, they're regrouping with more Yautja to fight the threat. Their vocabulary doesn't really have the words "surrender" or "weakness", at least not that Lilliya was aware of.

[close]