Home Sick Pilots #14 // Review
There’s a colossal ghost battle continuing to tear across the west coast. The dead are restless. The living can only look on as things get progressively messier and messier in Home Sick Pilots #14. Writer Dan Watters continues to carve his way towards the end of the story with the aid of artist Caspar Wijngaard. The enormous energy of two huge forces colliding remains kind of fun as the story winds its way to its big conclusion in June. The visuals continue to appeal, but the story seems to be losing momentum as the series slowly draws close.
The Old James House lurches. This is kind of alarming. Normally this would be totally understandable. The sudden shifting in a house SHOULD be cause for alarm. Given that massive forces have been colliding amidst blood, the dead, and a very itchy military, it is strange that something altogether more mundane might be some cause for alarm. The living tries their best to cope as massive forces work on each other. The military approaches, fully ready to do whatever the hell it is that it CAN do against a massive supernatural collision.
Watters’ tale of massive ghost-propelled Kaiju has a tremendous amount of charm. Too bad Watters isn’t doing a whole lot with the premise. Somewhere in recent issues, there’s been something of desensitization amidst the continued percussion of two massive forces doing all those things that huge monsters do. The emotions and concerns of the living don’t feel quite as profound as they had in issues past. Everything seems to be caught up in the kinetics of the conflict without a whole lot of insight into the emotional lives of those caught in the midst of it all.
Wijngaard continues to make everything look really, really appealing. The pastel coloring of everything gives the big confrontation an ethereal feeling that casts a pleasing haze over the horror and the drama of confrontation between forces of great power. The visuals DO feel a bit repetitious, but that doesn’t make them any less potent.
The chains. The teeth. The massive wreckage amidst approaching tanks and military helicopters. It all looks beautiful, punctuated as it is by the occasional palm tree in the background. And then there’s the blood and the looks of concern. Wijngaard balances personal emotion against big aggression from another plane of existence. Again. Too bad there’s been so much of that in the course of recent issues...not enough modulation. There is reason to believe that the whole thing could end with a powerful smack at the end of the story next issue. Still, Home Sick Pilots has been stuck on a single track for so long that it’s difficult to imagine it picking-up momentum at the end without a seriously jarring change of pace that might compromise the finality of the conclusion at the end of the fifteenth issue. Home Sick Pilots has been fun in its 14 installments so far. One way or another, it’ll be nice to see it end in the fifteenth chapter.
