Comic Book Review - Alien: Black, White & Blood #1

Three spine-chilling tales, eight creators, and a whole lot of blood…

Marvel seem to be on a “thing” at the moment with their ‘Black, White &…” series of comics. From Darth Vader, to Wolverine, it seems that no franchise is safe from getting the black and white treatment. The latest star to feature is the ominous Xenomorph whose horror themed ascetic perfectly goes with the Black, White & Blood style.

Much in the same vein as previous outings, Alien: Black, White & Blood #1 features three self contained stories that’s each been created by a different creative team - with one single narrative taking place across each of the respective issues. For the Xenomorph this cross-issue strip comes from Colin Kelly, Jackson Lanzig who along with Michael Dowling and Chris Sotomayor bring us ‘Uptopia’. 

Taking place in the far reaches of space, “Utopia” follows a group of ordinary folks who’ve renounced war and violence for a more peaceful way of life. As their vessel (which resembles a Halo) drifts through the dark this group comes across a seemingly derelict space craft with one faint life sign on board. As the rescue party breach the ship all hell breaks loose as the life sign ends up being the Xenomorph. With no conventional weapons on board, it comes to unconventional methods to protect the many lives on board.

Michael Dowling’s hyper realistic art style perfectly grabs the horror and emotions that are unfolding within the vast spacecrafts docking bay. Chris Sotomayor further extenuates these emotions with a great use of the available colours. More interesting is the use of red which is used for shadow work. This then gives the Xenomorph a great contrast which makes it even more monstrous. 

With more parts to Utopia coming in future issues, Kelly and Lanzig have the openings of very interesting tale. 

Next up we have “The Hunt” which is brought to life by Stephanie Phillips and Marcelo Ferreira. Here we follow a group of wealthy individuals as they participate in hunting the Xenomorph. It’s all made out to be incredibly safe with no real threat involved for the human hunters. Of course things don’t stay that way for long and soon the wealthy become the bottom of the food chain. 

While the story is a little predictable it’s more than made up for by Ferreira’s art and Peter Pantazi’ colours.  Here the “blood” aspect is switched up for a shade of green that works wonders in portraying the Xenomorph’s classic acid blood, and the dull hue of safety holograms. Meanwhile Ferreira switches to the classic ‘Alien’ design to portray the Xenomorph. 

Rounding off this trio of terror is “Maternal Instinct”. Here the narrative is very different as writer, Ryan Cady places us in the circuits of a MU-TH-UR unit. Here we follow the computer unit as it attempts to save the life of a young boy trapped alone with the Xenomorph. It’s quite a harrowing tale as Cady uses the computers internal processing as its dialogue as we understand its motives in rescuing the child. 

Devmalya Pramanik capitalises on letting his illustrations do the talking with a great looking Xenomorph and claustrophobic corridors. It’s a nice and simple chase story that shows that at least some Alien stories do have a “happy ending” 

Overall and Alien: Black, White & Blood #1 sets the mini series off to a great start. The medium is s superb way to highlight the lethality of the creature, while keeping the sci-fi drenched in gut wrenching horror. While ‘Utopia’ is the story that’ll get expanded upon as the series continues - and I’m fully looking forward to seeing what direction it goes - the other two self-contained strips add plenty of more mystery to the wider Alien universe. 

Rating: 8.5/10 

Rob Lake - For more comic book and video game chat why not follow us on X/Facebook @GeekCultureRev, TikTok/YouTube @Geekculturereviews, and BlueSky @geekculturereviews.bsky.social