1979 - Simonson's Alien (Original Art Edition Hardcover)

Alien - The Illustrated Story - Original Art Edition Hardcover
96 pages
Published by Titan Books 
Writer: Archie Goodwin 
Artist: Walt Simonson
Released on October 30 2012

"Two of comics’ greatest talents joined forces in 1979 to bring Ridley Scott’s epic Alien motion picture to the comic book page. Out of print for over thirty years, this brand new edition (released in time to coincide with Scott’s latest opus Prometheus) has been meticulously restored from original artwork in Walt Simonson’s studio — presenting for the very first time the definitive artist’s edition of the greatest sci-fi horror ever produced."

Product Dimensions: 32.9 x 1.8 x 43 cm
Shipping Weight: 1.8 Kg

As some of you may have figured out, I'm a huge Simonson fan and one of my earliest and fondest comic book memories was picking up the Heavy Metal version of this story. To see this story in its original art format was a treat. This book is huge coming in at 14" wide and 20" tall. Please don't let the price of this book scare you off, it's worth it!

The original cover to the Heavy Metal Edition. Alien The Illustrated Story was the first graphic novel to hit the New York Times Best Sellers list!

Back cover.

The original art pages are scanned directly from Walt Simonson's collection and displayed at the same size. This version of the art has all of Simonson's efforts in his full glory from whitepaper correction, paste-ups, and coffee stains from what must have been a few late nights.

There's also a two page pitch to 20th Century Fox featuring Simonson's take on the crew and the Alien, as he hadn't been granted access to that information yet.

This collection also includes Archie Goodwin's script, which was surprisingly sparse with only dialogue. And to conclude this special edition, there's an interview with Walt Simonson and letterer John Workman, as well as an afterword penned by Simonson. 

 

Cover to the Trade Paperback edition