Written by: Dan Abnett
Art by: Brian Albert Thies
Publisher: Dark Horse
It’s weird. When I think back upon the Life and Death shared universe of Aliens, Predator, Prometheus, and Aliens vs Predator, all I can remember are the highs; however, when I go back and look at my reviews for the series, there are a good smattering of okays thrown about. It hasn’t been perfect—far from it, as it turns out.
Maybe I shouldn’t be surprised at how empty and bland the ending is then.
Before I dive into Prometheus: Life and Death (One Shot), I need to touch upon Aliens vs Predator: Life and Death #4, which was last month’s issue and the end to one of the major arcs of this series. It wasn’t good. Instead of keeping the big beats rolling, it ended all of them in an anticlimactic, poorly written way, leaving our cast stuck on LV223 with a half-dead Engineer and a timeline of escape. The “Will they die?” characters were dead, all of the Xenomorphs were gone, and the big questions were all answered.
This Prometheus One Shot then, is just the falling action–a necessary evil–and one with no real emotional weight to speak of. That all happened last issue.
What we get are some halfbaked conversations with Jill about Chris, none of which do much for her character, and some obligatory conversations about the Engineers creating humans. It’s a topic that’s been done to death in the comics, and I really wish writers in this universe would stop bothering with it.
There are no good answers, and the speculation rings hollow.
At some point, someone brings up time travel, which is the last thing I want in this universe. Please, no time travel. No one wins with time travel. It’s the worst.
The rest of the issue boils down to two quick action beats with the Engineers, both of which feel anticlimactic because the Engineers act out of character, and then we’re done. 17 of 17. At least the artwork’s great. I’ll give Brian Albert Thies his due, and I’d like to see him return to Aliens in some fashion. He pens a good Xenomorph.
Other than that, the only saving grace this issue has is that it’s better than the one before it.
