Creative Staff:
Story: Chris Warner
Art: Agustin Padilla
Colors: Neeraj Menon
Letterer: Michael Heisler
What They Say:
From the islands of the South Pacific to the mountains of Afghanistan, the Hunters go wherever the Predators appear–even if it’s in a war zone and into conflict with a mysterious government group hunting the same prey! Despite the casualties suffered during their first mission, the Predator Hunters are on the prowl again!
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers):
A year after the previous miniseries ended, Predator: Hunters is back with Chris Warner in the drivers seat again. This one shifts things on the art department as Velasco wasn’t able to return and we get Agustin Padilla illustrating it and Neeraj Menon handling the color work, resulting in a pretty strong looking book that fits in well with the Predator mythos and atmosphere itself. With some carryover with characters from the first, Padilla handles it well while sticking to his own style so that they’re recognizable. But what I really like is his presentation of the Predator itself, which has a couple of powerful moments, and the settings both indoor and outdoor for Afghanistan. It’s got a good raw look to it and Menon’s color work accentuates it well.
Considering how poorly overall things went with the previous mission on the islands, Jaya’s lost a lot of her crew since then as they don’t want to be chewed up by what they saw. She does get to keep several of them on when it comes to the operational side itself instead of standard staffing, which is important as a new mission has come up. A Predator was captured on camera in Afghanistan where it killed a number of jihadists that had captured an undercover CIA agent and were about to execute him on camera. It went down about as bad as you’d expect by Jaya was able to get the footage through some unsavory connections and that has them looking at this mission as a recon one in order to at least get an idea of what’s going on.
The book doesn’t got into a lot of detail here but we get a good extended piece with them arriving in Afghanistan, getting their truck loaded and rolling out with a local, and trying to figure out the best approach. The group dynamic is fun and a lot of that is thanks to the driver as he brings a lot of personality to it while avoiding leaning too hard into the usual cliches about an Afghani man. We do get to see that there’s a competing group in the area briefly, which sets Jaya on edge, and I’m looking forward to seeing more about that. But the main thrust of the final piece here gives us more time with the Predator that is definitely enjoying its hunting ground considering how many people are armed there and what it can face off against.
In Summary:
Predator: Hunters II gets underway in decent form here but it felt like it needed just a little more to reinforce what the first series was about since it’ll have been a year. I only remembered a few fragments overall and found myself struggling to remember names a bit. I do like the shift in location as getting out of the jungle is a plus. I don’t expect much in the way of any serious learning and expansion on the Predator concept because that’s simply not allowed at this point but what I do expect from Warner and will get are some really fun action sequences and craziness that plays out as the sides get underway. It also helps that this is a four-issue series as well so everything will be pretty tightly done.
Grade: B
Age Rating: 15+
Released By: Dark Horse Comics
Release Date: August 8th, 2018
MSRP: $3.99
