IDW Publishing 2015
Written by Chris Lewis
Illustrated by Bruno Oliveira
Coloured by Anderson Cabral
I guess it was only a matter of time before a book like this came out. Drones have gone from a curiosity to an everyday part of life and while most are used for military purposes many are civilian owned. This book focuses on the Military aspect of using drones instead of manned pilots to carry out surveillance pinpointing where IED’s and possible terrorists are located so a strike may occur with the most effectiveness. What I found interesting here is the fact that in the news we never hear of the people who operate the drones but in this book right off the bat that’s the main focus here.
I have to give credit here too because the interior artwork is rather impressive. I mean going from a regular view to one that is all in green as if through a mechanical lens or night vision it’s pretty powerful. It’s like using a dark paper and using white and green to create a negative where the dark parts are used instead of the light it’s great stuff.
Well what would any story be without a prohibited love affair? Enlisted personnel and officers shall not fraternize and all that jazz, not that I think that’s ever really been followed. Actually the whole time you see them together it’s interesting the characterization is really good and comes in unexpected ways it’s not straightforward and not quite pillow talk and well filming it well that used to be kinky but isn’t anymore. Still it’s interesting to see the behind the drones and see them from different points of view.
Then there’s the usual portrayal of a madman at some undisclosed location. Cool name Swords of Doom training camp where they will learn how destroy the infidels but seriously I would’ve like to see him smarter and more with it than getting all angry right off the bat in front of his people. Not all of the should be portrayed like this organizations like Isis have incredibly level headed people in charge to pull off what they have been. It’s easy to fall back on a religious mad man to showcase the enemy but let’s be smarter than that shall we.
When we turn our attention back to our lovebirds. Where a big man with a big beard is spotted by Lani and things get well weird after that. These folks are government workers, military personnel and the Big Beard from her reaction is some sort terrorist or person of interest as it were and when she tries to follow him she gets kidnapped. They try to kidnap Stinger as well but that goes awry since he’s military, breaking faa regulations and has a plane in the air but what happens next kind of get my goat. Now I understand that people do a lot of things for kicks but now we aren’t even sure if this is a legitimate kidnapping or some kind of game and i’m a little perplexed. I suppose that’s a good thing considering I now want to see what happens next issue and have what I just saw explained. Perhaps it’s just me but I don’t understand the fake kidnapping appeal but with these characters can it really be fake?
This isn’t your normal story, yet. So i’m here for a bit and we’ll see where it goes and how the book focuses on drones and their military importance against terrorist organizations and if those organizations have managed to gain a foothold in the U.S.. Took a roundabout manner to get me really hooked into this but it did for now.