New Marvel Double-Sized Comic Coming in October, Alien Annual #1

[Acid_Reign161]

Despite how much I loved the looks of some of the previews, this one didn't work for me. Wasn't a fan of the art in this. The native creatures looked far too large for what the story was trying to accomplish which seemed to imply to me

Spoiler

that they were actually infected by some Huggers being eaten???

[close]

I like the concept of the conflict between the 2 different breeds, so to speak. Not quite Genocide in the way that depicted as 2 different whole strains, but there's precedence for violence between different Aliens from different hosts in AvPR.

Yeah, they definitely showed very selective panels in the preview - panels which I think they knew is what most of us wanted to see in a comic... except this wasn't representative of what the comic was like at all. 😢


EDIT: as a side note, even without the benefit of being an artist, having writing experience, or film making experience,  I can't help but feel that many of us in the community here could churn out better quality Alien media that what we get from official releases - they just don't seem to *get* it 😅 Remind me, what are the legal rules on fan projects @Corporal Hicks ? (as in what fans are allowed to create before invoking the wrath of the mouse? I seem to recall several projects getting cease and desists in the past).

[Corporal Hicks]

https://twitter.com/dannyearls16/status/1710612682850652528

[jacobo1122]

I haven't "read" it yet, just glanced over some panels on internet, and I'll admit I'm not so big on that one. I never liked idea that Aliens that came from different host attack other Xenos. They still came from the same hive after all. But art looks nice. Also creature getting infected by swallowing facehuggers? It's weird, but interesting, it something that was always bothering me, how are Aliens supposed to infect bigger Creatures, or ones with weird jaws? Recepty Dark Descent came with its own explanation, and here their made their own, and I'm okay with that. Also Facehuggers injecting genetic material instead of embyro makes thar more plausible.

[Acid_Reign161]

I haven't "read" it yet, just glanced over some panels on internet, and I'll admit I'm not so big on that one. I never liked idea that Aliens that came from different host attack other Xenos. They still came from the same hive after all. But art looks nice. Also creature getting infected by swallowing facehuggers? It's weird, but interesting, it something that was always bothering me, how are Aliens supposed to infect bigger Creatures, or ones with weird jaws? Recepty Dark Descent came with its own explanation, and here their made their own, and I'm okay with that. Also Facehuggers injecting genetic material instead of embyro makes thar more plausible.

Yup, it's makes zero sense that xenos of different hosts fight, considering Alien 3 clearly demonstrated a xeno from a dog/ox host protecting the queen of a human host.

My personal take on how facehuggers attach to larger species is that they adapt to the prey. In alien 3, we see a regular hugger on the Sulaco, but in the assembly cut, the prisoner picks up the carcass of a superfacehugger (larger, darker coloured, webbed legs, armoured). I theorise that like a chestburster sheds its skin to grow into an adult, a facehugger may be able to do the same to attach to larger prey (eg; an ox). The webbed legs could also be explained as an environmental adaptation, since the EEV was partially submerged in the sea, it may have had to swim.

[Still Collating...]

Read it. Like that Marvel is trying experimental stuff. They should feel free to do it like Dark Horse did. This was a brave choice and I support that. The story was ok. The impregnation method was weird but I liked it. The art wasn't bad, but the art was better in the full series. And with little story and no dialog, the art has to do all the heavy lifting. The action could've been plotted better. Why would hives fight is always a question, but if they were separated by distance or something, that would be okay. But here things go so fast, you don't have a clear timeline of the action and the time for the hives to grow.

[Corporal Hicks]

But here things go so fast, you don't have a clear timeline of the action and the time for the hives to grow.

I had the same thought as well. We could do with some setting suns or shifting snow patterns or melts or something, just to denote some further time.

[jacobo1122]

But here things go so fast, you don't have a clear timeline of the action and the time for the hives to grow.

I had the same thought as well. We could do with some setting suns or shifting snow patterns or melts or something, just to denote some further time.

Yeah, from what I saw, I think the intention was to much time passing between some panels, but artist just didn't make it very clear. Then again, in the main series "shrimp aliens" had faster growth rate, or it was just a little bending to fit a story.

[Corporal Hicks]

https://twitter.com/dannyearls16/status/1714337235225493555

[Xiggz456]

Finally got around to reading this one and definitely got a "Genocide" vibe from it with the warring Xeno variants. I enjoyed that the comic had absolutely no dialogue as we rarely have stories solely told through the art. Also liked that similar to the last Annual it was a prequel to the mainline series and gave us a backstory to why there were a whole slew of xenos frozen in ice. 

Spoiler

I can see some readers being confused with the large fauna eating facehuggers which still lead to impregnation, however, if we go by P. Praepotens lore then as soon as any of that sweet black goo touches organic tissue the Burster process begins. So I imagined by chewing a facehugger one would get an acid & accelerant one two punch! Ouch!

[close]

[Corporal Hicks]

https://twitter.com/dannyearls16/status/1717490868804895158