[My reviews are generally for me/my memory and can therefore contain spoilers. They're typically not here to provide you with a reason to read or not read something.]
Note: I read this via the second massive omnibus (on Kindle). The plan is to review each trade/mini-series/whatever as I finish them, rather than the whole omnibus or every single issue.
Okay, so, for this miniseries, I think I figured out how exactly they were included in the omnibus. These four issues were all just Predators: Welcome to the Jungle, focused on Drake for the most part, as well as his interactions with Noland. After those four issues in the omnibus was Predators: Backup Stories #1-4, which is backstory for Royce from Predators. I guess those were spread out across these four issues instead? The covers for these issues having Royce on them was really confusing as I was reading through since it was solely focused on Drake, so it would make more sense if that was the case. The Royce parts were presented as one ongoing story without breaks for issues. Either way, I couldn't find listings here for either of those subtitles, and when I went to the omnibus page to maybe just add them to a review there, these four issues were related/suggested reads. I don't know what happened with the titling, but whatever.
THIS review will cover Drake's story and Royce's backstory. My review for the adaptation of the movie and the sequel is here.
Spoilers, but Drake is the dead soldier that the group finds in the beginning of the Predators movie, with all those booby traps. I actually really liked him. I could have done without so much Noland, but Drake was fun to root for.
The art was solid. No real complaints. Some pretty brutal deaths for Drake's friends. No punches held there.
It was nice to get some background for Royce as well. He's definitely not kind and friendly in Predators, but he's honestly worse than the movie portrays him. He owns up to "mistakes" that he's made, and he does try to avoid killing women and children in this when wiping out a whole small village, but bro is pretty unfeeling overall.
And now finally, we have reached the conclusion of this story, where in the end...... the main character dies. Well, that wasn't a shocking twist at all, considering how this character doesn't appear in the movie whatsoever. It also doesn't help that this is usually how all Predator stories end, but hey, I am willing to see if these comics can change or not. Either way, this series is now over, so what is the moral lesson of the day? That you can apparently get away with making Predator stories without the Predator actually being there...... because that was what the second story turned out to be. Yeah, he did somewhat show up at the end there, but one short cameo doesn't count, and you know that!
Issue #4
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
Not a bad series, but it doesn’t really add much. The stories could’ve been interesting, but of course if you’ve seen the film you know where everything is leading. I have to say that the second one didn’t feel like it was intended to do anything other than show what a badass Royce is supposed to be in the film.