Both the Alien and Predator franchises are stalwarts of '80s science fiction. Each set human beings against a malevolent alien species in a war for superiority. Although the Alien Vs. Predator film debuted in 2004, Dark Horse Comics actually brought these two characters together for the first time in the late '80s.
In 1989's Alien Vs. Predator, by Randy Stradley, Pat Brosseau, Diana Schultz and Chris Warner. This story set the groundwork for an epic rivalry spanning through decades worth of comic books, films and video games.
The original comic's brilliance comes from its simplicity. It quickly places the xenomorphs and the predators on Ryushi, a backwater planet with a scarce colony of human beings. Alien eggs are deployed and the predators show up soon after.
While the original story doesn't explicitly tell readers how the predators and xenomorphs are connected, a special prequel issue of Alien Vs. Predator fills in the blanks. The predators have a xenomorph queen held hostage and strung up in a factory of sorts. The predators harvest her eggs and seed planets with them. Then, they send their young warriors to prove their strength and skill by killing the xenomorphs with limited weaponry and resources.
Alien Vs. Predator puts the Ryushi colonizers in the middle of this conflict. The Ryushi have just discovered the crashed pod containing the xenomorph eggs and are investigating. Simultaneously, a hunting party of young predators has landed their dropship nearby and are preparing for their first hunt. While the colony residents are investigating why mysterious alien species are invading their colony simultaneously they have unfortunate run-ins with the predators and xenomorphs.
When the two apex predators finally meet, it quickly becomes a bloody showdown. The young predators are stripped of all their technologically advanced weapons for these pilgrimage hunts -- they have spears, wrist blades and single-shot, break-action grenade launchers. Claws, blades, tails and spears collide as the predators kill a growing horde of aliens. As the predators keep falling in battle, one clever survivor nicknamed Broken Tusk not only proves his skill by surviving an onslaught of xenomorphs, but lets readers into his species' code of ethics.
Broken Tusk actually saves a human named Dr. Miriam Revna from another young predator and executes him when he discovers he's taken a child's skull as a trophy -- something that is obviously frowned upon in predator society.
This interaction reveals a lot about how the Predators view human beings and their incredibly complicated relationship. Predators don't hunt humans because they think lesser of them. On the contrary, they hunt humans because they know how strong they are. Predators not only consider humans worthy adversaries, but capable allies as well.
Eventually, Broken Tusk fights alongside the humans -- once they've proved their strength and sacrifice in battle. With their help, he kills the alien queen and is fatally wounded in the process. With his dying breath, Broken Tusk breaks off a xenomorph finger and burns a small lightning bolt scar on Machinko's forehead. This is the predators' mark signifying a mighty warrior who had spilled xenomorph blood and lived to tell the tale.
Alien Vs. Predator is still one of the most iconic rivalries in all of pop culture and it was set up brilliantly by Stradley, Schultz and Warner's original story. It set the stage for the entire Alien Vs. Predator franchise and opened the door for not only one of the most iconic rivalries in sci-fi, but gave storytellers a platform to showcase how human beings stack up against and alongside the galaxy's greatest apex killers.