There is no denying the link between home and the heart. If you’re fortunate, home is a place of refuge and restoration after devastating events. Image Comics Home Sick Pilots has hinted throughout the series that for Ami home is a place for heartbreak and heartaches. Issue # 4 of the series marks a turning point in the relationship between Ami and the Old James House – when home is the problem takes on a new meaning.
Home Sick Pilots # 4
Writer: Dan Watters
Artist: Casper Wijngaard
Using the term turning point is probably wrong for this relationship. It was interesting to see how easily Ami had come to accept her current condition. Bringing what once was part of a home back home seemed like a mission that called to her. She never asked how did the other ghosts, the “items,” come to leave in the first place? And why do they belong to the house? Dan Watters continues to deliver an emotional tale of a scary old house and of home.
The battle between Buzz and the Maxwell monster (that’s what I’m going with since we don’t know learn anything about this “enemy”) allows Casper Wijngaard to take over the issue, balancing out the loneliness with action. The length of the battle and the damage the two combatants cause hints at the previously mentioned shift in the relationship with the House and Ami. Prior to this battle, Ami was responsible for returning “lost items” to the Old James House. Now, the House has allowed Buzz to meld with it temporarily in an effort to return Ami. Something has changed with the structure.
This issue sees Buzz provide explanation of the Old James House’s activities. In revealing the House’s ability to shift, keeping the two friends hidden from one another, he reveals the House has the ability to show what it wants to who it wants, concealing parts from Ami, which isn’t the basis for a solid relationship. Meanwhile, Ami’s emotions on the black pages allow Wijngaard to illustrate wall cavities or The Space Between.
Issue # 4 may have seen the turning point for Ami and the Old James House in more ways than one. Both Buzz and the Monitor(s) (me again) seem interested in retrieving some of it’s prior possessions. Also this issue shows that Ami’s safety takes precedence over retrieving Ghost # 6, Ami’s original mission. Is the Old James House choosing what stays and what goes? They say it’s the little things that make a house a home.