Pay attention, as there may well be a movie franchise in this gritty and sexy comic series...

It’s 2086 and we earthlings are once again under threat by those outside forces who wish us mortals ill. The new threat comes from 'Extra Humans'. No that’s not overcrowding caused by over-population. I’m talking Humans with special powers and extra bits.

They live among us and are causing a ruckus. So who better to keep them in order but a small group of these enhanced cousins. The ‘government’ recruits key individuals and creates a special police department known as the Alpha Gods (whose very lax uniform code seems to have been designed by Ann Summers).

This series’ challenge is to have a little chat with a naughty grey potato-headed fellow called Malak, one of the Nephilim of Old Testament fame, and one of a series of biblical references in Alpha Gods. He wants to bring back these randy fallen angels to carry on their mating with women, a pleasure so rudely interrupted by the Flood Of Noah.

Betrayal is the latest series penned by Ian Sharman, who shamelessly collars catchphrases from a range of classic movies and stock sayings that link together more intriguing sections of dialogue. The story, whilst formulaic, has interesting flavours that are reminiscent of the heyday of post-modern comics and graphic novels such as Watchmen. That’s reinforced by the firm-bodied sassy babes drawn by Ezequiel Pineda, and beautiful colouring by Mauro Barbosa, who always keeps the tones consistent, making the single set-piece panels shine against the more complicated scenes.

There is some very good artwork through all the issues but they can sometimes be let down by flattened perspective, which may be due more to time/cost constraints than lack of ability.

Alpha Gods: Betrayal is a continuation of the classic heritage of teenage boy fantasy comic-fests. Teenage girls, thongs, impossibly round breasts and a nasty alien being attended to by scantily-clad beauties. It’s all there in spades, and combines HellBoy-esque sacrificial setups with the usual combat banter and backstory flashbacks, to keep the drama running. Very X-Men and Watchmen. Another nod to those and Mutant-X is the underlying teenage romance, where love is a concept the young protagonists struggle to understand, along with their individual purpose in life.

As a fan of graphic novels such as The Dark Night, Watchmen and the work of Moebius, I am, maybe, a hard reader to please. I found the story here to be too simple overall, and I’ve seen it all before. However, I was rewarded with some moments of solid classic comic book fun and I felt like a teenager... Oh that’s so wrong. You know what I mean. Don’t you?

With Scorpio Studios' acquisition of the Alpha Gods movie rights making the comic series a possible movie franchise, I would like to see more from Messrs Sharman, Pineda and Barbosa. I would also like to see the characters really show their different personalities more realistically. I’m not going to say that the women need to put clothes on because, well, that’s kind of spoiling the tradition of this type of work, and I am a bloke. But I would challenge the stereotype.

Alpha Gods: Betrayal is available from IndyPlanet.

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