REVIEW: Port of Earth #9

We all have those comic titles that we“ve been meaning to read, but just haven“t gotten around to yet, right? You bought and read the first couple of issues the moment they came out, but then one thing leads to another and next thing you know the title has arrived at its“ and final issue. Well that“s exactly what happened to me, with Image Comics’ Top Cow final Port of Earth written by Written by Kaplan with art by Andrea Mutti (Rebels, Batman Eternal).

I am a fan of dystopian Alien invasion stories, and there just simply aren“t enough to satisfy my taste. The trick to creating an interesting Alien invasion story is to take a current sociopolitical issue and integrate into your universe and turn it up to 10. Better yet, do it with several issues, or perhaps all of them. And maybe throw in some robots, or aliens, overlords.

Recap of Port of Earth #8: two Earth Security Agency, (ESA) agents have been following an alien assassin running around killing alien politicians and trying to blow up the Port. The assassin is doing this in the hope that the Consortium leaves, because when the Consortium came to their planet, they offered a bad deal, and when the aliens declined, they were invaded.Â The Consortium and the ESA decide to play it off as a terrorist attack, and the Consortium brings in “security advisors”“.

That is where we pick-up with Port of Earth #9, with the Consortium deploying a regiment of their own alien soldiers in a security advisors to the ESA in order to stave off future terrorist attacks. However, instead of just an unstable security situation to contend with, the ESA must deal with an alien virus epidemic that is deadly only to humans. They consortium has agreed to help inoculate the human race but the disease will persist unless the source is found. So of course the consortium would like to use that as a pretense for the alien regiment to conduct a military search and detain mission for the illegal fugitives.

This is where the comic departs from other Alien invasion scenarios, because the interesting thing is that there is no battle here with where a city is turned into a wasteland. In fact rarely will you find a moment where you find this alien invasion to be violent . The invasion is a slow roll and incremental, and quite transparent in how the consortium is making it difficult for the human race to survive without them.

Thus far Port of Earth could definitely find interest from fans outside of normal comic readers, and I could see myself plucking down some cash to go see this in a movie theatre. In fact Skybound Entertainment is developing the sci-fi property Port of Earth ”” based on the namesake comic book series launched in 2017 by creator Zack Kaplan, Top Cow Productions and Image Comics ”” for television with Amazon Studios.

Even though it took quite a license with sociopolitical reality, I am high on the story and the interior art by Andrea Mutti for Port of Earth #9. Though this issue was an interesting read, I have low expectations as far as collecting the whole series however Port of Earth #9, should have some value once production starts.

Port of Earth comes with two covers:Â Port Of Earth #9 Cover A Regular Andrea Mutti Cover;Port Of Earth #9 Cover B Variant Andrea Mutti Cover

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(W) Zack Kaplan (A) Andrea Mutti