Aliens/Vampirella

Aliens/Vampirella is a six-issue limited crossover comic book series that was first published by Dynamite Entertainment and Dark Horse Comics from September 2015-February 2016. It was also published simultaneously in the digital format via Dynamite Digital and Dark Horse Digital. The story was written by Corinna Bechko, pencilled and inked by Javier García-Miranda, colored by InLight Studio, lettered by Simon Bowland, and edited by Joe Rybandt and Rachel Pinnelas, with cover art by Gabriel Hardman and Jordan Boyd. Dennis Calero, Gene Jimenez, Andrew Mangum and García-Miranda also provided variant covers for the first issue. The comic was solicited in Diamond Comic Distributors' Previews catalog.

In the overall Dark Horse crossover comics line, Aliens/Vampirella was preceded by Archie vs. Predator, and was followed by Predator vs. Judge Dredd vs. Aliens: Splice and Dice.

Publisher's Summary[]

Original Release[]

#1: Humans have begun to colonize Mars, but something ancient and sinister got there first. Now Vampirella is faced with a mystery only she can solve, and the bloody realization that some monsters should never be awakened.

#2: With the Xenomorphs awakened, the Martian base is in mortal danger. But can Vampirella win the trust of her human companions in time to launch a counter attack?

#3: Trapped in an ancient underground base, outnumbered by lethal Xenomorphs after all rescue attempts have failed, Vampirella and Lars are in for the fight of their lives. Their only hope is their allies on the surface, but how much trust can a vampire ever put in a human?

#4: The action intensifies as Vampirella discovers an unlikely ally, but is it already too late to save the human Martian colony? With a supply ship ready to dock and the alien threat growing, Vampirella fears that even the Earth is in danger.

#5: The death toll mounts, and the fate of the Xenomorph that hatched from within Vampirella stands revealed! Meanwhile, the Martian Base pays the price for its mistrust of Vampirella as she and Lars deal with a horrifying threat that predates human history.

#6: Aliens/Vampirella reaches its action-packed conclusion! Can Vampirella convince the resurrected Nosferatu to unite with humanity against a common foe? Can even Vampirella survive an encounter with a Xenomorph Queen/Vampire hybrid? The fate of every person left on Mars, both living and undead, hangs in the balance!

Hardcover Collection[]

Two iconic horror franchises collide, as Vampirella - the fan-favorite supernatural heroine - faces the most nightmarish creatures ever to appear in cinema: the Xenomorphs from Alien!

As the first human colony on Mars digs deeper into the crimson soil, they discover the catacombs of a hibernating civilization, tens of thousands of years old. The evidence suggests that they are Nosferatu, an ancient and sinister species that Vampirella is all too familiar with. Called to the Red Planet to investigate, the monster hunter and her human allies find a chamber with hundreds of ellipsoidal, leathery eggs... and after they hatch, the true horror begins. In space, no one can hear Vampirella scream!

Plot[]

When the first human colony on Mars uncovered ancient catacombs beneath Mars Base One, Vampirella was called in as a consultant to evaluate the ruins before excavation could ultimately resume. Upon her arrival, Vampirella was greeted by base director Tucker and a modest group of structural engineers named Jake, Suse, Vicky, and Lars. The team of four escort Vampirella deep into the frozen catacombs where they discover a number of desiccated Nosferatu cocooned along the walls of the abattoir before entering an egg chamber where each member of the exploration team, except for Lars, had been attacked and subdued by the facehuggers within.

A little more than an entire day went by before each crewmember woke from their facehugger induced comas, only to discover they've been sealed into the catacombs and placed under a 48 hour quarantine to prevent the threat of an outbreak at Mars Base One. One by one, each facehugger victim had been fatally wounded when chestbursters erupted from within and scurried off into the dark, leaving Lars alone with an undead Vampirella, and contributes to her regenerative healing abilities by offering her a taste of his own blood for nourishment.

Meanwhile, back on the surface at Mars Base One, Tucker and the remainder of his crew believe Vampirella was responsible for the carnage below, and sent an armed squad down to eliminate her, while tucker watches their feed from above. Immediately following their entry into the catacombs, Dell and her armed squad were attacked by the three fully grown Xenomorphs recently birthed from Lars' team. In an attempt to escape the attack, Vampirella spreads her partially damaged wings and flew Lars to safety within the catacombs where they discover the untouched ruins of an ancient civilization known to Vampirella as Nosferatu. When Tucker realizes his armed escort have filed their mission, he decides to pump toxic fumes into the catacombs and asphyxiate any and all living beings still underground.

Upon further investigation of a sealed chamber within the ruins, Vampirella and Lars stumbled upon the Nosferatu's antique view screen that Lars was able to reactivate with a universal battery from his flashlight, only to discover the ancient, technologically advanced vampires posted a warning message along with pre-recorded footage of their subterranean civilization being hunted by Xenomorphs. After viewing a schematic of the base for any remaining Nosferatu in suspended animation, they scavenged for weapons and headed for a sealed sleeping chamber. One Xenomorph attacked them in route, but was decapitated when the chamber door shut on its elongated head. The two other creatures had to wait for the acid blood to burn a hole through the door while Vampirella spread her wings to air-lift Lars through a mysterious, freshly bored hole through the ceiling that lead directly into Mars Base One's greenhouse where a crewmember had previously been slaughtered by a fully grown Xenomorph Queen.

In orbit over Mars, a relief ship carrying materials and a replacement crew that included Lars' wife, Sarah Micho, were in open communication with Lars while waiting for safe passage down to the red planet's surface. After Lars explained that Tucker was not to be trusted and that a swarm of highly intelligent, lethal Aliens were responsible for killing crewmembers at Mars Base One, Sarah took it upon herself to organize a rescue operation.

Back in the greenhouse, Lars and his vampire companion discovered a Xenomorph hive and the mutated, winged Queen birthed from Vampirella, herself. When a nearby egg opened its petals to reveal the facehugger within, Vampirella shocked it with their prod and ran for safety, only to be cut off by the recently resurrected Nosferatu, who transformed into a giant bat and out-maneuvered the flying Queen to carry both Vampirella and Lars to safety. Once they were well hidden, the Nosferatu spoke of their civilizations long history on Mars and how they discovered some other, quite alien, race had been there eons before, who left nothing of themselves behind except for the subterranean stone ruins, and a number of corpses with giant holes in their chests. It was in those same catacombs where the Nosferatu discovered a mysterious egg that delivered to them the same devastating consequences.

Without warning, Lars was lethally impaled by the flying Queen's blade-tipped tail, instantly severing his torso from his legs. In an act of vengeance, the Nosferatu summoned a mischief of rats, all inhabiting Mars Base One, to attack the Queen's nest. Soon after, Tucker, along with a new armed escort, approached Vampirella and the Nosferatu with a steel stake and mallet, intent on driving it through both their hearts. Suddenly, Tucker and his squad are attacked by the two remaining Xenomorphs and a swarm of facehuggers under strict orders from an irate Queen, while Vampirella defends herself, her bloodthirsty ally, and the only two surviving squad members with a rifle, shooting at facehuggers in midair while they lunge for potential hosts, until the two humans and two vampires are safely confined somewhere within Mars Base One's crew's quarters.

From orbit, Sarah wass able to reach Norm at Mars Base One to coordinate a risky search and destroy operation. The four survivors made their way across the base and into a short range M9-B vehicle that they flew just high enough to dock with Sarah's drill ship in midair. In an effort to protect the survivors from the winged Queen flying after them, the Nosferatu transformed back into an oversized bat and tackled the pursuing Queen back toward the surface just before Sarah released a payload of excavation explosives onto Mars Base One, destroying the entire human colony and the Alien hive within.

Reprint History[]

The series was collected as a hardcover trade paperback that was released on July 27, 2016. The collected edition reuses the cover artwork from issue 1 by Gabriel Hardman and Jordan Boyd.

The series will be collected as part of a trade paperback titled Vampirella Team-Up Omnibus and is set to be released in July, 2023.

Behind the Scenes[]

Aliens/Vampirella is notable as one of the few Aliens stories from Dark Horse Comics to depict an alien species other than the Xenomorphs. Other notable non-Xenomorph aliens featured in the franchise include the lizard-like space travelers in Aliens: Theory of Alien Propagation, the Reapers from Aliens: Reapers, the reptilian Xenomorph-eating alien from Aliens: Taste, the extraterrestrial scientists in Aliens: Incubation, the alien pilot shown in Aliens: Earth Angel, the hunting village aliens from Aliens: Alien, the alien monkeys in Aliens: Fire and Stone and, of course, the Predators and Engineers. Such species were, for many years, limited to Aliens comics from Dark Horse, although several Alien novels have also introduced non-Xenomorph species, such as Alien: Out of the Shadows and Aliens: Bug Hunt.

Trivia[]

Aliens/Vampirella is not the first story to feature a vampire/Xeno crossbreed. The earlier crossover short Buffy the Vampire Slayer: In Space No One Can Hear You Slay! features a Xenomorph that was evidently born of a vampire, which is killed when it is exposed to sunlight.
The series' simultaneous digital release makes Aliens/Vampirella one of only five Aliens/Predator/Aliens vs. Predator crossover comics to ever see a release in the digital format (the others being Predator versus Judge Dredd, Judge Dredd versus Aliens: Incubus, Archie vs. Predator and Predator vs. Judge Dredd vs. Aliens: Splice and Dice).
A number of liner notes meant for InLight Studio, that were written by the artist, Javier Garcia-Miranda regarding colors and background designs, can be seen in the final printing of the comic series.
The subterranean civilization of vampires depicted in the story were drawn to physically resemble the infamous Count Orlok from the 1922 silent film Nosferatu.