Quote from: Close Encounters on Mar 23, 2015, 02:04:58 PM
Quote from: Son Of Kane on Mar 23, 2015, 12:01:38 PM
What comic is Jeri from?
Aliens: Stronghold http://avp.wikia.com/wiki/Aliens:_Stronghold
Very fun comic!
http://www.avpgalaxy.net/literature/reviews/aliens-omnibus-volume-4/"On an apparently routine supply run, Philip and Joy Strunk deliver a shipment of synthetic photo receptors to Caspar Nordling, biotechnologist for Grant Corporation. When the Strunks discover that Nordling's experiments have exceeded Stanislaw Mayakovsky's work (as seen in Aliens: Hive), they realize that there's more to Nordling — and the Aliens — than meets the eye."
Stronghold sees the return of John Arcudi to the typewriter with artwork provided by Doug Mahnke and Jimmy Palmiotti. The basic premise of Stronghold is that married technical team Philip and Joy Strunk have travelled to the far flung research facility run by Dr Nordling and staffed entirely by synthetics to ensure everything meets standard health and safety regulations.
You see, the good Doctor is working on a biological way to kill the Xenomorphs and you just don't need any leaks or errors in their safety systems.
What the story turns into is John Arcudi's exploration of Nordling's treatment of his synthetic charges. The script makes it blatantly clear that what he does is tantamount to abuse. Joy takes the limelight in their defence and works to try and find a way to get Dr Nordling in hot water with their employers, the Grant Corporation.
As can be expected she is discovered and everything goes to pot with the synthetics rebelling – as well as their programming will allow –against Nordling and attempting to save Joy and Philip.
The subject isn't really something that has been dealt with in the Aliens franchise. It wasn't even touched in any of the films and it has only recently been revisited in Alien – More Than Human, the latest novella by Dark Horse. Synthetic characters are typically presented as adversarial in the games as well.
Stronghold is a spiritual sequel to Aliens – Harvest in that it includes a synthetic Xenomorph in the form of Jeri, building on from the prototype introduced in Harvest. Jeri is quite easily the best thing in Stronghold. He is, in my opinion, the only character in the story that is interesting and shows actual personality and development.
Character progression is largely forgotten, focusing more on the story and putting across the point of how evil Nordling is to treat the synthetic characters like tools to be used. Jeri is easily the star of the show, the other characters falling to the side.
But as we get to the last pages, Arcudi completely shoots himself in the foot by having Philip Strunk say something like to the effect of "nevermind, they were only synthetic. They weren't people." This completely negates the entire point of the story, underminding his own message and his own characters – and in Philip's case, his own wife.
Mahnke and Palmiotti's artwork is pretty typical of the 90s, featuring plenty of basic colours and somewhat lacking in detail. That's not to say it's bad. It's just a product of its time, like many of the stories in this particular volume. We've definitely seen worse. *cough* that's right, I'm looking at you, Female War *cough*
I think Stronghold is a solid entry in the Aliens mythology and the inclusion of the legend that is Jeri makes Stronghold an easy one to recommend and a very welcome inclusion in Volume #4.
