Warning! This article contains spoilers for Alien #4It is no secret that Predator’s Yautja have a long and bloody history together within their shared canon, and now they have even more of an excuse to fight-it-out as Alien’s new planet just became totally irresistible to Predators.
Xenomorphs were first introduced in the 1979 film Alien while Predators first hit the scene in 1987’s Predator. While both alien species proved to be insanely deadly in their own unique ways, the two wouldn’t face-off against each other on the screen until the 2004 film Alien vs Predator which introduced the idea that the conflict between Xenomorphs and Predators stretching back thousands of years. Skip over to the Alien vs Predator novels and comic book series and fans will learn that Predators’ entire culture revolves around hunting Xenomorphs as killing one is something of a ‘coming-of-age’ task for Yautja. Similarly, Predators are the reason Xenomorphs are present on so many different planets across the cosmos as Yautja transport Queens to different worlds to hunt them there–each planet acting as a uniquely challenging hunting ground. Now, without even needing to intervene, the Predator race has yet another planet on which to hunt Xenomorphs–and one twist makes this planet way more special than any other.
In Alien #4 by Phillip Kennedy Johnson and Julius Ohta, a spec-ops group of synthetics known as Steel Team are on a mission to extract an Ovomorph from a planet that had been overrun with Xenomorphs known as Tobler-9. This world was once a scientific outpost operated by Weyland-Yutani while also being a fully populated terraformed planet. The experiments Weyland-Yutani’s scientists were conducting (of course) were related to the Xenomorph species, and one of them resulted in the creation of a Xenomorph/mosquito hybrid that has the ability to infect humans with a single bite. Unlike a Facehugger, the Xeno-squitos don’t infect humans with a Xenomorph embryo, but instead actually transforms the humans into a Xenomorph-like creature–effectively giving life to a human/Xenomorph hybrid.
Alien Has Combined Both of the Predators’ Favorite Prey on One Planet
The Xeno-squitos can create human/Xenomorph hybrids with a single bite, and there were plenty of them in the abandoned Weyland-Yutani laboratory. If they infected every human on Tobler-9 (plus any other humans that will inevitably investigate this world at a later date) then Tobler-9 would become a planet full of a type of prey the Predators have never hunted before–one that they would assuredly be very excited to kill. Within the previously established lore of Alien vs Predator, Predators hunt Xenomorphs to prove their worth, and as established in every Predator movie/novel/comic, Predators just love hunting humans. This means that Tobler-9 should be at the top of the list as the Predators’ favorite hunting ground as it is the only place in the known universe where two of their favorite prey are not only located, but are combined into one brand-new entity.
There is currently only one human/Xenomorph hybrid located on Tobler-9, but it assuredly won’t be the last. This entire Alien run has been focused on two things: synthetics and Xenomorph evolution. Steel Team has made synthetics the main protagonists of an Alien story, and their mission is all about uncovering the secrets of Xenomorph evolution by way of experimentation. Therefore, it is unlikely the idea for Xenomorph mutation within Alien canon will be abandoned anytime soon as it is much more likely it will simply be contained to Tobler-9–which is a very good thing for the Predators as it gives them a new hunting ground that, by all counts, they should find totally irresistible.
Alien #4 by Marvel Comics is available now.
