BURIED TREASURE: Archie Goodwin and Walt Simonson’s ALIEN
An ANNIVERSARY TRIBUTE to the Ridley Scott classic — and its brilliant comics adaptation… By PETER STONE “It’s cold and boring in space. Best bring a book.” — Peter Bowditch Stone, last survivor of the USCSS Prometheus shuttle On May 25, 1979, two years — to the day — after Star Wars revamped science fiction movies for the modern age, another epic sci-fi flick hit the big screen, in limited release. Being a teenager at the time, I was tremendously excited. My uncle had convinced me that this new movie was a lot like Star Wars, and having seen that at least 20 times, I was jazzed to see this film. It opened wide June 22, and I didn’t need to ask my parents to go, because my sister and I were staying with my grandparents for the summer. The movie had a simple name, but it brought about all my fantasies of space and science fiction: Alien. Now, I always thought I was smart, but that summer I was an idiot. I should have known better. The poster was creepy to begin with. The rating was “R.” The tag line was “In space no one can hear you scream.” Alien was terrifying, a new form of horror movie… a monster in space. The alien itself was designed by H.R. Giger, whose work was weird, terrifying, and strangely sexual. Just like the film. That bloodthirsty alien was certainly not Luke Skywalker or even Darth Vader. Then, it got worse! One of my favorite artists, Walt Simonson, was involved. Six years earlier, in 1973, Simonson and writer Archie Goodwin had revamped an old Jack Kirby/Joe Simon character named Manhunter in a series of short stories in the back of Detective Comics, starting with Issue #437. Thanks to Manhunter and Warren magazines, I discovered Goodwin, a DC editor who had written for Eerie, Creepy, and other top-notch projects. These two Hall of Famers combined to create a graphic novel based on Alien — also published in ’79, by Heavy Metal. I had to read it, despite my deep misgivings. Scenes from the movie lived rent-free in my nightmares, but now there was this incredible, and similarly horrifying, adaptation on paper that I could not resist. Simonson and Goodwin were on the set of the movie, working furiously on the project —...
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