While crossovers are part and parcel of comics, some don’t quite mesh until you see it all in action. Tarzan On The Planet of the Apes is definitely one of those. While it’s a pretty natural idea to see such famous properties clash, the question comes how do you bring them together: do you send Tarzan to the future, or apes to the past? The answer is fairly simple though, you just do both stories. To their credit: Tim Seeley and David Walker do a great job of superimposing the narratives of both properties on top of each other, it’s hard to beat an opening that involves Tarzan showing up to stop ape troopers from exterminating the remains of mankind, or apes traveling to the past to avert their own present.

I’ll cop to not being familiar or as interested in Tarzan, as I am the Planet of the Apes, but the comic does a great job of spotlighting what makes both sets of concepts so iconic. After all, you can’t ask for a better opening than Tarzan swinging through the future and fighting apes. That said, Seeley and Walker instill a great deal more complexity than you’d expect into what could have been a simple mash-up. The impact of the advanced apes upon Tarzan’s own time, and in contrast how Tarzan fits into a world where he’s even more of an aberration than he is at home is explored.

Fernando Dagnino also does a great job of establishing the tone and feel of the two different worlds. The characters from the Planet of the Apes remain true to the look of the original movie, while Tarzan and his world has a different feel as well. Sandra Molina similarly adds a great deal of texture with the colors at play in the issue. Even with two different time periods that are both in the jungle, there’s plenty of little things that distinguish the two. That said, the comic is most definitely worth the time and the money. As mentioned earlier: crossovers tend to fit into pretty easy categories, and they can be fairly forgettable at worst. All things being equal though, if you’re gonna pick up a comic this week, you’ll definitely be getting a pretty wild story with Tarzan On the Planet of the Apes.

4 Ape Soldiers out of 5