I’ve been rewatching the entire Alien franchise in anticipation of Alien: Romulus, and one of the wild, irrational thoughts that invariably passes through my brain as I watch these movies is, “I would know what to do in this situation.” Whether it’s staying in a defensible position in Alien or, I don’t know, maybe not always separating from your group so you’re easier to kill in each movie, you cannot help but come up with solutions for these problems as you watch. And yet, I know my confidence is completely unearned. I would crumble the first time I saw a Xenomorph and/or Facehugger. It’d be a disaster.

But of course I would. I’m not a Colonial Marine or a member of the United Systems Military or even a cat onboard the Nostromo. I’m just a guy in Alaska. I’m not built for that Xenomorph life. But you know who is, at least conceptually?

Superhero teams.

These squads could, at least in theory, make light work out of the Xenomorph hordes. Could, but rarely do, if the long history of crossovers between the two sides are any proof. Based on my count, there have been eight miniseries or one-shots showcasing these movie monsters taking on famous comic characters. 33 And in a couple weeks, we’ll get our ninth with Jonathan Hickman and Esad Ribic’s Aliens vs. Avengers, in which the Earth’s Mightiest Heroes presumably face off against the apple of the Weyland-Yutani Corporation’s eye in some sort of deadly scenario. That’s a lot of crossovers of that variety!

There’s a reason why these stories come up so often, though. Beyond the sales potential, it’s the exact type of matchup comic and Alien fans cannot help but think about already. The problem, of course, is that superhero teams will always win and Xenomorphs will always lose. It’s their lot in their respective lives, even if the latter takes out a good chunk of their prey in the process. Intellectual property is far more resilient than your average terraforming colony, and those stories will always favor the heroes for that reason. 34

But what if you played these matchups out seriously? For example, what if you replaced all the characters from James Cameron’s Aliens who head off on the movie’s mission together — meaning the marines, Ellen Ripley, and Carter J. Burke — with a superhero team, and then asked them to save the colonists from that awful moon LV-426 before returning home? How would that work out for the superhero types?

This is the exact kind of scenario I love to play out, so in honor of the pending arrival of both Alien: Romulus and Aliens vs. Avengers, we’re going to do just that. I’ve compiled a giant list of superteams and I’m going to do my best to figure out how each squad would handle the exact mission from Aliens, where you’re trying to rescue a whole bunch of colonists before being cut off, at which point you just have to try and survive as hundreds and hundreds of Xenomorphs try to turn you into lunch. Should be easy for these teams! Right?

Right?!

Before we get into the exercise, there are of course ground rules that have to be followed. If you’re going to do a thought experiment, you need to know the exact shape of the scenario. The following rules are essential to establishing that.

• This is obviously fiction, but part of that fiction is that each team would go in with limited knowledge of what they’re facing just like the Colonial Marines did
• Every superhero team is its most well-known lineup 35 and can carry a max of ten characters with 36
• Each team has to try and save the colonists. There’s no landing and turning around
• Anything that could trigger an explosion in the atmosphere processing station where the colonists are held (i.e. heat vision or most energy-based powers, presumably) is a bad idea for “you’ll nuke yourself” reasons
• That same power plant will soon destroy everything in a 30-kilometer radius so, uh, hurry
• The team cannot just fly and/or teleport off once they figure out what’s up, but they can once they’ve went through the scenario 37
• They have to stick together, at least as well as possible 38
• Lastly, they have to keep Newt alive, because she joins the squad once they investigate LV-426

That’s it. From there, it’s game on. I’ll be placing these superteams into five distinct tiers based on my belief in their ability to make it out successfully as well as how many team members might remain alive in the end, before highlighting the best-in-class example for each.

It’s a pretty straightforward exercise, so let’s get to it, shall we?

Tier 5: Game over, man. Game over.

If you’re a member of one of these teams, you’ll quickly be going the way of Stormwatch 39 for one reason or another. It’s not that these teams are bad, per se. It’s that their skill sets and powers mesh poorly with the situation, which is rescuing a whole bunch of people from a nightmare zone policed by hundreds and hundreds of perfect organisms that love to kill and have acid blood. There’s no fault in that! But it’s lights out for these crews, because no one is coming back.

Examples from this class: New Mutants; 40 Bureau for Paranormal Research and Defense; Stormwatch; 41 Suicide Squad; Quantum & Woody; Power Pack; 42 Runaways; New Warriors; Guardians of the Globe; 43 Secret Six; Metal Men; 44 Doom Patrol; Nextwave; 45 Challengers of the Unknown

“Best” in Class: Section Eight

As much as I have a soft spot for Section Eight, the group of heroic misfits from Garth Ennis and John McCrea’s Hitman, I can think of more ways that they’d die than survive. I’m a bit skeptical of how effective Bueno Excellente and his powers of perversion or Jean de Baton-Baton and his wielding of a baguette as a weapon would hold up as they face off against a hive of Xenomorphs. While Sixpack lowkey can rock some serious powers if and when the right moment hits, I’m not sure they’d get there with Dogwelder literally trying to weld dogs to the Queen.

And we haven’t even gotten to the worst part yet. Section Eight has a team member named Friendly Fire, and while his powers are elite, he cannot use them in a beneficial way. Instead of firing them at his enemies, he can only hit his allies or strategically disadvantageous things. Like, say, an atmosphere processing station. Which blows them all up.

Game over, man. Game over. If they don’t go down the Colonial Marine way, Friendly Fire would accidentally ensure that no one makes it off LV-426 alive. 46