Aliens: Apocalypse - The Destroying Angels

Aliens (comics)

by Mark Schultz, Doug Wheatley

Is it a coincidence that humans have met Aliens in the cold reaches of space? Or is there something stitched into the very fabric of the cosmos that explains their inexorable spread through the galaxy? Deep-space rescue specialist Alecto Throop is about to find out that even a fight with the deadly creatures is nothing compared to meeting their masters . . . or the renegade human who has learned their secrets--ancient secrets.

Genres: Comics, Horror, Science Fiction, Graphic Novels, Aliens, Comic Book

98 pages, Paperback

First published October 20, 1999

About the author

Mark Schultz is an American writer and illustrator of books and comics. His most widely recognized work is the creator-owned comic book series Xenozoic Tales, which describes a post-apocalyptic world where dinosaurs and other prehistoric creatures coexist with humans. In 1993, Xenozoic Tales was adapted into an animated series titled Cadillacs and Dinosaurs and a video game of the same name. Schultz's other notable works include various Aliens comic book mini-series published by Dark Horse and a four-year run on the DC Comics series Superman: The Man of Steel. In 2004, Schultz took over the scripting duties of the Prince Valiant comic strip.

Reviews

[Sr3yas · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.5 Stars

Do you know what's the cornerstone of Alien series is? It's the damn LV-426. For non-canonical Alien comics, LV-426 is the last save point in a particularly tough video game. The story always restarts from there.

Alien: Apocalypse revolves around Alecto Throop, a private deep-space rescue specialist who gets hired to find Dr. Lucien Keitel and his team, who went missing as they were retracing Spaceship Nostromo's movements. This inevitably led them to... *Drumrolls* LV-426!


* Oh, Gwad! We are here again?

The new team of rescuers consists of four humans, couple of synthetics, and an..uh.. owl. Yes, an actual live owl. The owl got its own back story, but it's hard to explain. If you look at the cover, you can see the Owl there! It makes no sense, but be cool and just roll with it.



The team reaches LV-426 and things go south really fast.... Seriously, way too fast!



Thankfully, the story quickly moves forward and away from LV-426 and explores new places!

This was a fun and short event. The new movies have effectively rendered this 1999 graphic novel as non-canonical, but these stories explore some interesting new aspects of horrors in deep space. I'm not saying this is completely fresh. The story simply builds itself up from its predecessor's foundation: Strong female lead, deceptive co-operations, crazy synthetics and so on. Yet the story delves deeper into the Alien mythos. Writer Mark Schultz paints the Xenomorphs as Angels of balance: A crazy concept, but it adds an interesting twist to the whole affair.

However, Prometheus revealed that creation of Xenomorphs was an accident like Powerpuff girls. And then Covenant went a step further and made it all about Humans! So, that's that.

*WTF happened to this guy, Covenent?*

Overall, Alien: Apocalypse is yet another solid dark horse presentation, albeit a bit formulaic.

[Chad · Rating 4 out of 5]

It feels like Alien: Covenant may have borrowed from this some, at least in tone. Alecto Throop has been hired to go after a doctor who was following the Nostromo flight plan. The story brings in the Engineers along with some heady, high concept stuff about how Xenomorphs are a force to wipe the cosmos from time to time to start over. There's also an owl along for some reason. It makes no sense but it looks cool. Doug Wheatley's art is fantastic.

[Little Timmy · Rating 3 out of 5]

Very nice Aliens mini series. I was particularly impressed with the art in this series. Recommended

[Romano · Rating 4 out of 5]

Una efectiva historia de cosmicismo con una conclusión un tanto apresurada y dolorosamente conveniente. En esta novela gráfica de 1999 podemos observar la estructura y elementos que serían apropiados por Ridley Scott en el filme Prometheus. Esta historia de Mark Schultz es mucho más coherente y consecuente que lo presentado por Damon Lindelof y Jon Spaihts, es una pena que no se le haya dado su crédito correspondiente a Schultz. Si bien los personajes son uni dimensionales y algunos elementos desaparecen innecesariamente de la trama, a titulo personal, me resulta más atractiva la historia presentada por Mark Schultz, que lo realizado en Prometheus y Alien Covenant por Scott et. al.

Esta es una de las novelas de Alien más adecuadas y mejor llevadas.

[OmniBen · Rating 3 out of 5]

(Zero spoiler review) 3.25/5
One of the better, if not possibly the best stories collected within the Aliens Original Years omnibus, volume 3, although that isn't a particularly high bar, should you have read said omnibus in it's entirety. Some very good artwork and an interesting narrative (that seems to have been borrowed somewhat for the recent Aliens sequels). It certainly doesn't match the stronger stories collected in the earlier omnibus', but it's not of the few stories I would even consider re-reading at some point in the future, should I ever open the book again. It's not particularly high praise, but it is what it is. 3.25/5


OmniBen.

[Carolina Casas · Rating 5 out of 5]

Good cosmic horror

This is one of the best stories of the Aliens graphic novels and if there is a ever a TV series of new film series, this should be one of the stories they ought to adapt. Disney ought not to disregard this and other gem stories that expose the horror and possibly even more horrific origin and purpose of the Xenos. For fans of Lovecraft, this story is akin to at the mountains of madness.

[Lea W · Rating 5 out of 5]

Nice work

I gave this a five star rating! The artwork is beautiful and the story is a nice twist on the alien storyline. It still has the ever present Weyland Yutani, this reoccurring "aliens to be weaponized" is getting rather redundant. Still, great read, worth getting just for the artwork!!

[Patrick · Rating 3 out of 5]

You know, for a 1999 Aliens story, that really wasn't half bad. There was an element or two in there that felt over-done but then I saw the original date of publication and realized it was probably first.

I wouldn't call it anything special to write home about, but it was a fun read for a Sunday afternoon for a fan of the franchise.

[Andrew · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was REALLY REALLY GOOD.

It captures the essence of HR Giger in the art style with a premise that is really unique.

This probably could have used an extra issue to really draw it out but it's hard to complain when you get something THIS GOOD.

[Christopher · Rating 3 out of 5]

BY the standards of the 90s Dark Horse comics in the franchise this is just good...but I absolutely would have taken this over Prometheus any day, either as a starting point or a literal exact film conversion. It actually answers more and retains more foreboding mystery at the same time.

[Simon · Rating 1 out of 5]

Meh.

[Brady · Rating 4 out of 5]

Not too bad, but as another reader mentioned, a bit lacking in development of main characters. Overal graphically a really cool novel though, and I like the use of Engineer technology.

[ALJT · Rating 3 out of 5]

Good Story abd great Art.

[Gema Moratalla · Rating 3 out of 5]

Como todos estos cómics, me lo paso bien, pero no los disfruto igual que la películas. Pero bien. Seguiré leyéndolos.
En este me han gustado mucho las ilustraciones.

[James DeSantis · Rating 1 out of 5]

I actually fell asleep reading this 😴

[Gloria Cook · Rating 3 out of 5]

Like most stories in the Alien universe, it struggles with feeling like it's just retreading old beats and settings even if the ideas laid over that base are pretty cool.

[The Smoog · Rating 3 out of 5]

The story is middling, the artwork is better, but Mark Schultz's insistence on pushing his stupid name for the Xenomorphs gets my goat.

[Kaisersoze · Rating 4 out of 5]

Aliens: Apocalypse Destroying Angels may have a laughably bad name, but everything else about this graphic novel is quality. Mark Schultz does the Aliens universe no small amount of favour by setting his tale before the Aliens have spread themselves across human colonised space (so early, in fact, that Ripley would still be drifting through space following the destruction of the Nostromo). The heroes are suitably heroic, while the villains are a little more complicated than the usual fare in this type of story. Best of all though, is the artwork by Doug Wheatley who does a superb job setting a tone that is both foreboding and epic in scale.

If only more of the Aliens comics had been like this ...

4 Barbed Tails for Aliens: Apocalypse Destroying Angels.

[Grantcorp · Rating 5 out of 5]

Another strong tale from the dark universe where the stellar artwork lifts the story into epic territory. A freelancer joins up with a rescue expedition in search of a scientist whose signal disappeared after investigating a derelict spacecraft. Unlike the other tales from Dark Horse this title takes place before the "Outbreak" trilogy in a time and place where the xenomorph is still a closely guarded secret. The change of pace is welcome and wonderful moody paintings set the scene in painful detail as we once again learn that life can be cheap on the frontier.

[Jefferson · Rating 4 out of 5]

The people making the current Alien movies could learn a lot from the work Dark Horse Comics did in the 1990s. This was an exciting, cinematic story that made sense and was consistent with what was established in the first two Alien movies.