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I am not the fondest fan of the aerial dogfight shooter franchise of games.
Heck, I even totally passed on the recent release of whatever that aerial shooter was on all systems… what’s its name… I forget.  Anyway, don’t feel all bad and all if I don’t get all hopped up and excited over a title about aerial combat since I don’t even seem… HEATSEEKER! Yeah, that was the name of the game, Heatseeker! See? I knew I’d remember it sooner or later.

Anyway the latest from Antarctic Press, Wes Hartman takes you into the unfriendly skies with his new 5 issue mini-series Sky Sharks (drawn by Fred Perry). This is only a preview, so no score for now.

After a rather uninspiring intro, we are thrown into a strange alternate future where prop power still reigns, even as it looks like aircraft technology has reached modern (or near modern) proportions.
Now stop me if you’ve heard this one before.

The birth of aerial flight came in both hope and fear as the technology was given it’s trial by blood in the deadly skies of the Great War. Strapped into plywood and canvas coffins that flew, they took to the air (sometimes never returning to terra firma as their coffins became Viking funeral pyres midair).

The squadron of this series was born during this conflict, the best of the best. They were made to push the technology to it’s farthest reaches, and beyond.  And like any good living entity (or Poke’mon), they worked to evolve their aerial mounts.  Working to innovate the technology into a stronger and more efficient killing machine in the dark art of modern warfare.

Aerial superiority over the enemy.  Aggressive against the enemies of truth, justice, and the American Way.
Superman’s creator work in the PR department of this squadron or what?!?

Time passes, as it often does.

The Great War fell away and was soon replaced by conflicts wearing many different faces. The face of peace, the face of small strife, the fact of civil war, the face of international conflict.  And as the fact of the conflict shifted and changed over time, so did the technology of the time, until we have come to this day and a strange hybrid technology that still utilizes the ancient prop power of old with the aircraft of a modern era.

As for the squadron?  They still remain.  Now an Independent Air Force for Hire (surprise, surprise) they fight the (snicker) “evils” of “Air Pirates”, “Mercenaries”, and “ne’er-do-wells” that darken the skies.  Please feel free to drop any series names if this seems familiar to you.

The preview is short, mostly told during a typical day taking on alternate universe… “Nazis”?!? Oh, sure, I haven’t played my bulk of alternate reality WWII shooters slash RTS games… I missed Nazis… not.

Sure, it could be WWI German hybrids… but that’s digging way too far just for a generic enemy.  Shame if that’s true.  Anyway since it’s not all about the “evil” of the series let’s meet the different teammembers, and their quirky quirks (one’s a human calculator, one’s a “cowboy”, one’s the token female cast member (not the female I think is possibly on the cover—that‘s female, right?), one’s the tough main starring hero character… uh-huh). Sorry. I rambled on abit.

It’s only 7 pages (and one page intro) so it’s not much to base a full review on, but if this is any indication as to what this is about (or will be about)… well, let’s hold off until I read the full issue.

Full review coming in the days to come. Hang tight on that, eh?

Sky Sharks © & ™ 2007 Wes Hartman & Fred Perry

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