• Written By: Philip Kennedy Johnson
• Art By: Salvador Larroca
• Colors By: GURU-eFX
• Letters By: VC’s Clayton Cowles
• Cover Art By: Marc Aspinall
• Cover Price: $3.99
• Release Date: September 22, 2021

Alien #7 picks up two years after the last arc with a terraforming colony ready to cut ties with Weyland-Yutani (WY) as part of a legal land deal. The colonizers are all part of a religious sect that believe they’ve crafted their promised land on a faraway moon, but the last WY transport arriving to sign the final papers harbors an unexpected guest that may destroy their new Eden.

Was It Good?

This is a strange one. The prologue page recaps (some of) the events from the previous arc with an an indicator that this new arc picks up on a distant terraforming colony two years later. Based on the description and the events played out, there doesn’t appear to be any connection at all to the previous arc other than the presence of WY and xenomorphs. So, if you’re wondering what happened to the survivors of the space station from the last arc, you’ll either have to wait a while or this arc has simply moved on to other things.

The story is not bad but it’s a little tough to swallow. It centers around a religious group (Spinners) who’ve left Earth under a WY terraforming contract with the agreement the Spinners take over the colony after a waiting period and certain conditions are met. The words make sense, the individual pieces make sense, but the whole premise doesn’t make sense when you put it together.

Why would WY go through all the time, energy, and expense to sponsor a terraforming colony far from Earth just to give it up without a massive ROI? How does a staunch religious order form (with scriptures and deep understanding of faith) in 180 years from now without the congregants coming off as cultists or weirdos? Religions take time, especially new ones built from scratch with prophecies. There are more, smaller pieces that help bring it all together, but I kept thinking throughout this issue: “Nah, I don’t buy it.”

Of course, you can never trust WY, and the ship they’ve sent with an envoy to close the land exchange and deliver the remaining congregants doesn’t land so much as it crashes. It’s discovered an unwelcome stowaway is on board, but It’s never explained how the xenomorph got on board. It would be reasonable to guess it was planted by WY to make sure the land exchange doesn’t happen as intended.

Do I believe the religious group setup? Not really, and that makes it a little harder to buy into the setting. Do I believe the xenomorph was planted on the last ship intentionally to wipe out the colony for some greedy purpose? Probably, and that’s consistent with the WY way of doing business. When you put those two things together, does it make for a compelling Alien story? I’m not sold on it yet, so we’ll file this under TBD.

Larroca’s art is consistently good from the last arc into this one. I notice a shift in the art that makes it a little less photo-realistic, and it suits the comic medium a little better. The art team gets to show off a little bit by creating a wild, alien world to give the visuals of the series some whimsy and color, and it looks great.

Final Thoughts

Alien #7 starts a new arc and continues the series in name only by focusing on a completely different location and completely different set of characters. The art looks great, the characters work is excellent, but the overall premise has some pieces that don’t quite feel believable or realistic… yet. This is a guarded recommendation.

8/10