Unfortunately, despite some beautiful landscape artwork set in a colourful and interesting world doesn’t compensate for the lack of detail and the downright cartoon feel emanating from all of the characters.
I found the first few pages did very little to set up any real character development or story. Some slightly amusing banter between the two main characters (Darius, a rookie who by his lax demeanour is the slacker type, and Captain Krieger, a strict, by the books commanding officer) leaves a lot to be desired.
Their conversation, revealing that Darius is an “invoker”, the apparent magic users of this realm, is quickly cut short but a raid if a ragtag group of pirates. After a one-sided and unexciting raid, the two fail to escape and are captured by the pirates. Although Krieger displays a unique weapon, later revealed to be a swordwhip, neither of our heroes appears to do anything particularly heroic in the raid. The pirates reveal that the reason for their raid was that a woman named Yuhai, leader of the pirates, need an Invoker to work a machine they have stolen called the Sonic Thumper. This device is quickly revealed to be nothing more than an incredibly high-tech fish lure that Yuhai intends to use to summon the most fierce of all the sharks, Galleon the Kingshark. Yuhai intends to do this not for power or control of this mighty beast, but in order to kill it and uses its fins for Yuhai’s own personal shark fin soup recipe in order to win the yearly pirate cooking competition and the Galley Guts Award that goes along with victory.
Yuhai and the pirates force Darius to activate the sonic thumper, despite his reluctance due to the fact that the pirates have captured a young woman as bait for the shark. The Sonic Thumper activates and the resounding shockwave is larger than anticipated. In the disarray, while Galleon and Yuhai engage in another rather unimpressive skirmish, Darius and Krieger make their escape while Krieger rescues Bethany, the young woman they had intended to use as bait.
The three of our “heroes” then commandeer an airship from the pirates apparent fleet of ships to make their escape. However not before Darius shows us one of his invoker powers upon two of the guards defending the airship. He creates a large plume of black smoke which apparently does more harm to himself than the guards when Krieger steps in and quickly knocks them out. Bethany, quite stricken with Krieger, leaves a coughing and sputtering Darius apparently upset over his failed attempt to impress her with his magic. But hope is not lost for Darius yet because as they board their new airship, Bethany begins to play some music and they quickly bond over their mutual love of what Krieger has described, Mudder Trash.
Although this comic shows a lot of potential as far as artwork and a beautifully designed world that I would love to see explored, the overall lack of excitement and character development kept it from being what it had the potential to be. Kingshark Fin Soup might be enough to win the Galley Guts Award, but I don’t think its enough to keep me reading Heroes of Skyrealm.