”Well, this is a superhero universe. Alien invasions are about as common as radiation causing superpowers.”
— Linkara, Atop the Fourth Wall, in his review of Red Hood and the Outlaws, issue #1
Examples of Alien Invasion in Comic Books:
DC Comics
- Happens all the time in The DCU. All. The. Time.
- In Invasion, An alliance of several extraterrestrial militaries invades earth, prompted by the supposed potential danger posed by the adaptability and powers inherent in the meta-gene present in some humans.
- JLA (1997):
- The opening arc of Morrison and Porter's title deals with a secret invasion done by White Martians masquerading as alien refugees.
- During Morrison's stint in the book, a satellite book titled JLA Secret Files and Origins was published. In its first issue, Morrison and Millar penned a tale called "Star-Seed: The Secret Origin of the New JLA", which serves as a prequel to their regular series. In the story, the Big Seven repel an attempted invasion by Starro.
- In the 1998 maxi-series JLA: Year One, which depicts the first year of the Justice League in the Post-Zero Hour continuity, the premise of the series is that the heroes fended off the forerunners of an alien invasion, causing them to join forces to operate as a team. Turns out, the true masterminds worked in the shadows to bring a true, full-scale invasion, which serves as the Grand Finale of the title.
- Superman:
- In Krypton No More, Superman and Supergirl have to fight the J'ai, a belligerent warrior race who intends to massacre planet Xonn's inhabitants.
- In Bizarrogirl, Bizarro World is coming under attack from an alien monster called "Ash'ka'phageous" and its spawn.
- In Red Daughter of Krypton, Supergirl and the Red Lanterns travel to planet Grax, which is being invaded by a race called the Diasporans whom they manage to beat back.
- In Superman: Birthright, Lex Luthor fakes one in order to smear Superman.
- Invoked in Who is Superwoman? when Supergirl is accused of spearheading a Kryptonian invasion.
- The Krypton Chronicles: Over three thousand years before the birth of Superman, Krypton was invaded by an alien race known as the Vrangs, who ruled Krypton with an iron fist for two decades until they were thrown out by a planetwide slave revolt.
- "The Super-Steed of Steel": Shortly after meeting Comet, Supergirl must stop a race of alien fishmen from subduing Earth.
- Relative Heroes: It turns out the reason the D.E.O. is using such heavy artillery to try to subdue a bunch of orphans is that one of them is an amnesiac scout for an invading extraterrestrial army, and the thing he thinks is his houseplant is another scout that has not lost her memory.
- Wonder Woman:
- Wonder Woman (1942): The Saturnians have been plotting an invasion of Earth for some time, and abducting humans to force them to help build the infrastructure to do so. They make a mistake when one of their agents nabs Wonder Woman and the Holliday Girls, leading to the derailment of their plans.
- In the final arc of Wonder Woman (2006) an extraterrestrial collective known as The Citizenry attack the earth with the intent of liquifying the majority of the inhabitants to use as food and fuel, mostly because their leader is a cruel sadistic woman. They try to start with Washington DC, which they block off from outside aid using a dome that is partially powered by stolen Green Lantern tech.
Marvel Comics
- Also pretty common in the Marvel Universe, either to individual titles or as the premise of a Crisis Crossover.
- In the first The Mighty Thor's story, Dr. Donald Blake was visiting Norway when the arrival of the Stone Men of Saturn drives him to hide in a cave, where he finds a wooden stick which transforms into Thor's magic hammer, Mjölnir... and the rest is history.
- Exiles: Played with in "The Goldberg Variation", in which the Exiles inadvertantly foil an alien invasion by buying a cheese danish.
- The 2000s crossover Maximum Security is not so much an alien invasion as an alien exile: the large intergalactic empires vote to make Earth a dumping ground for their undesirables and other galactic bad guys that have crossed paths with Earth's heroes in the past.
- Secret Invasion (2008) depicts an invasion by the shapeshifting Skrulls on two fronts: by replacing heroes and infiltrating governments, and a full-scale attack on Earth to take the planet for themselves.
- Empyre: Emperor Dorrek VIII, formerly the young hero Hulkling, leads an alliance of previously warring empires Kree and Skrull towards Earth. The Cotati, another alien race, is also setting their sights on the little blue planet.
- King in Black: Eon-aged alien deity Knull, the God of the Symbiotes, commands his symbiote army against Earth.
- One of the earliest adventures for the Fantastic Four (issue #2, back in 1962!) had them defeating the advance scouts for an invasion by an alien race called the Skrulls. The Skrulls have gone on to make multiple attempts over the decades, some more successful than others.
- In their very first encounter with the Skrulls, Reed Richards and co. replace the Skrull scouts and are taken to the Skrull mothership. The team show the Skrull spies some pictures of "Earth's forces" (actually, clippings from comic books) that frighten the aliens so much they decide to call off an invasion. Ironic enough, in the ensuing decades (years, in in-universe time), Earth will have enough manpower for real to repel alien invasions many times over - which they do and did.
Other publishers
- True to form, Astro City has dozens of these; they tend to be split between background context in flashbacks and "live" events during the course of the main story.
- In "Confession", the city is taken over by the Enelsians after they manage to get many of the city's heroes imprisoned.
- In "Doing Battle", the alien Imperion leads an army of half-protoplasm cyborgs to conquer the world and restore his lost honor.
- "Her Dark Plastic Roots" starts with an attack from the Torori, who want to turn humans into slaves and foodstock.
- Madame Majestrix leads an assault on North America on the same day that the Silver Agent is scheduled for execution.
- The Mrevani attack Romeyn Falls in "The Sky's the Limit".
- Buck Godot: Zap Gun for Hire: An alien race attempts to invade New Hong Kong in "Field of Screams". It goes very badly for the invaders.
- In the third issue of The Flintstones comic, aliens invade Bedrock, but turn out to be on Spring Break, but still mess up the place so the Loyal Order of Water Buffaloes have to kick them out.
- In Nelvana of the Northern Lights, an alien invasion was as initiated because of the annoyance of Earth's radio broadcasts but later it was revealed the aliens were being manipulated into attacking Earth.
- Paper Girls: Four newspaper delivery girls confront an alien invasion of their midwestern suburb on the day after Halloween, 1988.
- Paperinik New Adventures:
- This Italian Disney series features the Evronians, a hostile species of H.R. Giger-inspired aliens, planning the invasion of the Earth. The main thing standing in their way? Donald Duck in a superhero suit.
- It also features the Xerbians in the role of the good aliens. Sadly the Xerbians are the survivors of a previous Evronian invasion and have little military power left (their help is more attempting to Fling a Light into the Future). Then there's Xadhoom, a Xerbian who had missed the invasion due an experiment that made her a Physical Goddess and wants to exterminate the Evronians to the last...
- The Scrameustache: This happens a few times:
- The Stixes tried to invade the Earth, more specially Quebec, in the third album.
- The Kromoks invaded Aktarka with the help of Zirka, an alien scientist.
- The Stixes' invasion of the Galaxian's home moon through a Trojan Horse ploy.
- Sonic the Hedgehog (Archie Comics): in the distant past, Mobius, then known as "Earth", was home to humanity, who killed an envoy of the Xorda race. In revenge, the Xorda invaded Earth and bombarded the planet with Gene Bombs with the hopes of devolving humanity back into a primitive state. In doing so, they inadvertently created the Mobian races (such as Sonic, Tails, Knuckles, etc.). When they discovered that they hadn't succeeded in wiping out life on Mobius, the Xorda invaded again, this time intent on destroying the entire solar system it inhabited.
- Star Trek: Early Voyages: Played with in the two-part story "The Fallen". The Chakuun Cohort General tells Gabrielle Carlotti that they periodically attack Federation colonies on behalf of the Tholian Assembly because the planets in question are Tholian territory, which is realigned every eight years. They regard humans as not only aggressive alien invaders but a primitive, arrogant child race. However, the retribution is definitely disproportionate as 100,000 people were killed in the attack on the Jubal colony alone.
- Star Wars: Invasion: The series focuses on the early days of the Vong's relentless invasion of the galaxy.
- At the beginning of Strikeforce: Morituri, Earth has been besieged by alien Planet Looters for four years. Humanity is so desperate that they develop a process of giving super powers to humans; the only drawback is that the hosts die in less than a year.
- Suske en Wiske: Aliens attempt to invade Earth in "De Gezanten Van Mars", "De Stervende Ster", "De Wolkeneters" (The Envoys of Mars, The Dying Star, The Cloud-Eaters)
- Tragg and the Sky Gods: The Yargonians who return to Earth a generation after their first visit represent an expansionist, exploitive regime that seek to turn Earth into lebensraum and enslave the locals with their mesmegas, i.e., hand-held Mind Control Devices.
- In IDW's The Transformers Megaseries, the Decepticons take a combined approach to invading planets. They follow a six-phase infiltration protocol that gradually softens up the local population in preparation for Phase Six, an all-out assault that annihilates the locals and strips the planet bare of its resources.
- Warlord of Mars: Some took place - the second series opens up with Mars being invaded by aliens lead by an human just like Carter. Dejah Thoris prequel has her thwarting an attempted invasion by vampire aliens from Saturn. And at least in one possible Bad Future, this trope is inverted when Mars is invaded by Earth forces.
- Wild's End Tells the story of mysterious, mechanical aliens invading the English countryside. Their motives are unknown, but they are aggressive with their classic death rays.
