Alien Legion: Tenants of Hell


By Chuck Dixon, Larry Stroman, Dan Panosian, Mike McMahon & Carl Potts (Titan Books)
ISBN: 978-0-84023-811-2

During the 1980s the American comics scene experienced a magical proliferation of new titles and companies following the creation of the Direct Sales Market. With publishers now able to firm-sale straight to retail outlets rather than overprint and accept returned copies from non-specialised shops, the industry was able to support less generic titles and creators were able to experiment without losing their shirts.

In response Marvel developed its own line of creator-owned properties during the height of the explosion, launching a number of idiosyncratic, impressive series in a variety of formats under the watchful, canny eye of Editor Archie Goodwin. The delightfully disparate line was called Epic Comics and the results reshaped the industry.

One of the earliest hits was a darkly compelling science fiction serial with a beautifully simple core concept: the Foreign Legion of Space (and no, it isn’t at all similar to Jack Williamson’s epochal 1934 creation the Legion of Space). Created by Carl Potts, Alan Zelenetz and Frank Cirocco Alien Legion debuted in its own on-going series in April 1984, running for 20 issues and an oversized Marvel Graphic Novel (see Alien Legion: A Grey Day to Die), before re-booting into a second, 18 issue volume. After that the tales were told in occasionally released miniseries and one-shots such as the ones that comprise this volume.

Alien Legion has come and gone ever since, jumping from Checker Books to Titan and Dark Horse Comics – who have been compiling the series into collected omnibuses – and there is, of course, a movie in the pipeline…

The Legion keeps the peace of the pan-galactic Galarchy on a million worlds spread over three galaxies: a broad brotherhood of outcast militant sentients united by a need to belong and a desire to escape their pasts. For such beings honour and tradition are the only things holding them together.

After years of holding back the forces of chaos and anarchy Nomad Squadron were dispatched to “pacify” the Quaalians; a warlike and unpredictable culture perpetually causing trouble from their strategically critical star-system midway between the Galarchy and its ideological opposite the Harkilon Empire. The mission went tragically wrong and the squadron were trapped in a time dilation field on a planet of raving maniacs dubbed “Hellscape” and written off by the Legion.

Lost for years the last few survivors were eventually rescued by their erstwhile commander Sarigar, who had left the service but never abandoned his men. In the intervening years the Galarchy had become a far nastier, more callous place and the rescue was hushed up. With nowhere else to go Torrie Montroc, Jugger Grimrod, Zeerod and Tamara stayed in the Legion and Sarigar re-enlisted. Whilst exploiting his skills, the corrupt and dissolute Brass punished him for his temerity by converting the last of Nomad into a penal battalion: dirty job cannon-fodder little better than slaves.

(Don’t panic newcomers – this edition also includes text features and comprehensive background on the ‘Hellscape’ mission that catapulted the sorry survivors into the Tense Future of this volume, ‘Our Friends Above: a Galarchy Primer’ on the history and running of the Galarchy, an introduction from author Chuck Dixon and a handy ‘Glossary of Terms’ as well as a cover gallery and biographies of both story characters and creators…)

In ‘Tenants of Hell’ (originally released in 1991 as a two-part Prestige Format miniseries by Chuck Dixon, Larry Stroman & Dan Panosian), the embittered fragments of Nomad are chafing under the brutal new Legion regime whilst “peacekeeping” on the manufacturing planet of Combine IV; becoming increasingly aware that their role is to terrify the populace into submitting to their corporate overlords – the same faceless plutocrats that bankroll the Legion and expect prompt service for their largesse.

Meanwhile Sarigar has enlisted clandestine allies to discover who sanctioned the throwing away of his unit, whilst Torrie Montroc’s mega-rich and almost dead father finally learns through the efforts of industrial super-spy Nahkira that his only heir is still alive…

Fighting a rebellion they actually sympathise with, the Nomads are further tested when they discover that the Hallidor Corporation has decided to cut its losses and liquidate the planet. The board decides to atomise the planet and collect on the insurance. Of course the bottom line dictates that only key management personnel need to be evacuated…

In the final moments of Combine IV, loyalties to their oaths, their honour and the helpless citizens left to die push the valiant heroes out of time to the edge of mutiny…

Terse, tense and compellingly action-packed, this imaginative romp is splendidly readable and perfectly accessible to those unfamiliar with the series.

Also included here is the 1991 Alien Legion: Grimrod one-shot by Dixon and Mike McMahon: a magically cynical and acerbic parable about never volunteering, which finds the double-dealing, greedy sociopath falling for the oldest scam in military history and tricking himself into the worst assignment in the Galarchy.

Thinking he’s to be a cushy military attaché to the king of a paradise planet of balmy skies with women of easy virtue, Jugger is instead trapped on a dank, muddy hellhole just before the annual uprising of the barbarian horde sweeps down for fresh slaves, ripe plunder and all the excessive bloodletting they can handle.

Without a means of escape and no Galarchy back-up or ordnance, Grimrod is forced to turn a nation of wimps and pansies into all-conquering warriors before he loses his own life and only chance of revenge on the conman who switched postings with him…

Sardonic and powerfully funny in the classic 2000AD manner, this delightfully engaging yarn caps the stunning, spectacular, cynical space opera with a bracing jolt of cartoon schadenfreude which renders this chronicle “unmissable” in my book.
© 1991, 2004 Carl Potts. All rights reserved.