Betrayal of the Planet of The Apes is a miniseries put out by Boom! Studios written by Corinna Bechko. Its based 20 years before Taylor fell from the stars centers around former General Aleron. Having never read the comics, but knowing the movies and stories this was quite an enjoyable read. The book starts with General Aleron and his team on the outskirts of the known world containing man and sending them back to the jungles. His orders are to clear the caverns and destroy the entrance which he gives to Lieutenant Varus to carry out. The Lieutenant goes to carry out the order as other soldiers grumble that Varus couldn’t hate Aleron even if he was human.

Now we move forward to where the story is based. Aleron now a citizen is defending Citizen Cato if front of the council for his action of teaching his pet human sign language. The council arrives at a verdict and the newest council member Dr. Zaius enters to read the verdict “not guilty”. Ursus isn’t happy with the council's decision so he has his own plan to break into Cato’s home and poisoning him to make it look like suicide. During the scuffle Cato’s human pet tries to defend against the attackers and runs free once he realizes he can’t win. Aleron comes in and breaks up the scuffle and request later the council brings the soldier to trial because he believes Cato’s death wasn’t a suicide. If this is true it breaks the one rule the lawgiver has given “ape shall not kill ape”. But now Aleron is brought to question about his past 15 year ago.

The writing is very well done and it set up the back story to present to set the future for the book. It flows right and makes the character real and easy to interact with. Because of the natural flow it's very easy to read and emerge yourself into the story. The art is very basic in colors but the line work is very well done. There is a lot of attention to detail to make the characters unique.

I loved this book, it’s a great read and if you can find it pick it. It brought back me back to the times of watching the Planet of The Ape marathons with my dad. I look forward to reading more and how this story progresses in the second issue.