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If you're a fan of guns-out action movies then you're probably well aware of the subject of today's comic at hand, the one and only Snake Plissken! The hardcase mercenary main character (played by the great Kurt Russell.) of two movies that absolutely represent 80s and 90s bombastic action adventure, Escape From New York and Escape From L.A.
I'm a fan of both movies. To be fair, Escape From L.A. is weaker and on the silly side in places but still a decent movie, and the soundtrack has no business being as good as it is. Escape From New York is an almost perfect bona fide 80s action adventure CLASSIC in my humble opinion.
But we're here for comic reviews, not movie reviews, right?
I never even realized there WAS a comic book featuring Snake Plissken until I came across this beauty in a dollar box a while back. Have no doubt, I grabbed it without a second thought!
There's very little information to be had on this comic. It's obviously a partnership between Marvel and Paramount Studios, and looks like it was probably one of Marvel's various efforts to recover from Bankruptcy in 1996. It also seems to have been originally intended as a series (Or mini-series. It's unclear), but all we have is this single issue. Other than that, there's not much out there beyond creator credits and publication information.
So let's take a step back into the wild and wonderful world of 80s and 90s action movies, where the guns were blazin' and the heroes were brazen! Ready? LET'S DO THIS!
ADVENTURES OF SNAKE PLISSKEN #1
Marvel/Paramount (1997)
COVER: Dan Brereton
THE COVER:
I'm a complete sucker for a painted Dan Brereton cover! This one caught my eye and captured my attention when I saw it in the bargain bin. I'm not going to say it's Brereton's BEST cover, because it's not, but it's done with his signature style, giving us a very nice portrait of Plissken set against a flaming background in brilliant orange that really makes this cover pop. Let's get inside!
THE STORY:
**Takes place between the Escape From New York and Escape From L.A. movies.
Up and Running
SCRIPT: Len Kaminski
PENCILS: Rod Whigham
INKS: Stephen Baskerville
We begin in a smoky Chicago bar. . .an illegal "smokeasy", where people gather to smoke tobacco since the Evangelical government of the New United States has banned it. On the news, there's a story about a nationwide manhunt for a criminal known as Snake Plissken, who has managed to escape from New York, America's highest-security prison.
We follow a man as he meets with a mysterious figure in the shadows. He's there to make a deal. We learn that his contact is none other than Snake Plissken himself! It seems Plissken has recently raided a biological weapons facility and has made off with millions in engineered metaviruses. He's there to sell.
Snake senses something is off with the deal when his contact offers him so much more than any other interested buyers. His instincts prove reliable once again as Federal Police break into the smokeasy. It's a set-up!
In the confusion of the raid, Snake makes his escape.
Shifting scenes, we find ourselves in a top-secret high-tech government weapons development lab. The head scientist is introducing their nearly-completed project to a high-ranking General.
He touts it as the future of Law Enforcement. . .an autonomous combat robot known as A.T.A.C.S. It features a highly-advanced A.I. system that uses adaptive algorithms to form a predictive behavioral model of its target. . .enabling it to accurately predict the movement and actions of anyone it's programmed to hunt down.
The General orders that the A.T.A.C.S. project immediately be put into action to hunt down the wanted fugitive, Snake Plissken. The scientists protest that the project is still being tested and is six months away from live trials.
The General insists that his orders be followed. It is of vital importance to national security that Snake Plissken be taken down! The scientists reluctantly activate the A.T.A.C.S. robot and program it for its first mission.
A.T.A.C.S. immediately determines that Plissken's most likely action will be to seek revenge for being set up. We see that its calculation is right as we shift scenes to Snake Plissken confronting his contact, and he his NOT happy. The snitch is trying to talk his way out of it, but Snake isn't having any of it. He's there for payback.
As Snake forces the unfortunate snitch to drink one of the vials of stolen metavirus (which immediately begins an agonizing process of forced mutation on the poor guy), A.T.A.C.S. bursts into the room and demands Snake's surrender.
Snake has other ideas and attacks the robot, but his pistols (.666 Caliber!) barely scratch the metal monster's armor. A.T.A.C.S. switches from arrest mode into lethal force mode and IT'S ON!
Realizing he's not doing much damage, Snake decides to make a run for it. A.T.A.C.S. pursues him into the nearby alleyways, but loses him. As the robot searches, he's taken by surprise as Snake goes on the attack! Hitting A.T.A.C.S. from above and jamming a pole into its eye, it looks like Snake has disabled the robot hunter!
As Snake leaves the area, A.T.A.C.S. reboots itself. . .but something goes wrong!
In the meantime, Snake makes his way toward safety and meets a woman who recognizes him. He takes a bit of a breather and she gives him a high-tech knife she claims can cut through almost anything. Just what Snake needs!
Snake continues on his way, but quickly discovers the robot hunter is back up and running, and still after him. Snake sets another ambush, but this one doesn't go as well. Even severely damaged, A.T.A.C.S. overpowers Snake. . .but it hesitates when it's time to deliver the killing blow!
We shift scenes back to the government weapons lab, where they have been monitoring A.T.A.C.S. during it's first mission. The scientists are frantic! Something has gone terribly wrong.
When A.T.A.C.S. rebooted itself, the A.I. model of Snake Plissken downloaded in it to predict the target's behavior and actions has overridden the original programming. In effect, A.T.A.C.S. has now become a version of its target. . .Snake Plissken! And they've lost control of it!
Back in the dirty alleyways of Chicago, A.T.A.C.S. backs off of Snake. It talks to its target. It explains how it was programmed to think like Snake Plissken, but the A.I. was TOO good. Now it has BECOME Snake Plissken, and they are no longer enemies. . .
Unfortunately for the newly-awakened A.T.A.C.S., Plissken doesn't much like the idea of a robotic copy of him wandering around. He grabs one of A.T.A.C.S. own guns and blasts the robot with it, finally taking it down!
As A.T.A.C.S. sputters and dies, it asks Snake why he did it. Snake's answer is simple: He doesn't need the competition. And with that, A.T.A.C.S. is finished.
Snake heads back to the woman he met to return her knife. She asks Snake where he's headed next. He doesn't know, so she suggests maybe Cleveland might be nice (And that's where we find him at the start of Escape From L.A.)
The End.
THE REVIEW:
And there it is! The one and only issue of Marvel's Adventures (Adventure?) of Snake Plissken.
Let's break it on down!
So basically what we have here is an extended chase/fight scene between a killer robot and Snake Plissken. It's like a finished product that started with a quick elevator pitch of, "Hey, man. . .Terminator versus Snake Plissken, right? RIGHT?"
And it works. To be fair, it's an extremely simple story. Not really much to it at all. Just pretty much all out action with very few breaks, but you know what? I've said it before and I'll say it again. . .not EVERY comic story has to be a masterpiece of finely-crafted fiction. Sometimes you just want to read an action story about a killer robot chasing somebody. And here we are.
Unfortunately, it also feels a little generic. I like movie tie-in comics because they fill in little story gaps, they expand or continue the story beyond the screen. I'm a big fan of Star Wars comics for those reasons. Here, we get minimum effort toward either thing. Yes, it fills in a little about what Plissken was doing between movies. Yes, it gets a little bit into the super-Right wing Evangelical government dystopia Snake lives in. But those moments are few and far between and I just wanted a little more.
On the art side of things, it's solid. You can instantly peg it as 90s art with just a glance, but I like the heavily-inked style of it. It's not the greatest art out there, but it serves the action-heavy story well.
CONCLUSION
Overall, I found this comic to be a decent little piece of bargain bin junk food. It's pretty good while you're reading it, but not very memorable in the long run. I'm not sure if an entire series could have been built around the concept of single issue Snake Plissken stories. Maybe it's better we just have this one single issue to enjoy.
If you want to read this one, you'll probably have to do some serious bin diving. I've only seen it one time in all the years I've been Longbox Junkin' and bargain bin spelunkin'. I guess you COULD just skip the work and buy it online. I see it's "worth" about nothing, so it should be easy to grab.
While doing a bit of research into the VERY little information to be found on this comic, I discovered that there is actually ANOTHER Snake Plissken comic series! It's a 4 issue mini from Crossgen called "John Carpenter's Snake Plissken Chronicles". I don't have any issues and have never seen it in the bins, but if you're a Snake Plissken fan like me, then you might want to keep an eye out for that one, too.
And that's it for the one and only issue of Adventures of Snake Plissken. . .a nice little nugget of Longbox Junk. So until next time, always remember that comics are worth more than money!
