Anime fans will get a kick out of this book... giant robot suits, a shapely young heroine, otherworldly technology and plenty of action. But clarity and substance are in short supply. The premise and the character (yes, singular, as the reader doesn't get a sense of the other players in the story at all) fail to grab me. Though I'm pleased to see the guys at Dreamwave branching out into more non-Transformers titles, Sandscape isn't going to be one I plan to follow.
On a desert planet, a war is being waged. A rebel army known as the Sercotian militia uses giant suits of armor to stave off attack from the more heavily armed Paren Army. When the Parens mount a surprise attack at a Sercotian base, a young mechanic named Valeri is caught in the middle of the chaos, piloting a suit of armor that's not entirely co-operative. She gets pinned down, stuck in the sights of a Paren sniper, and her only consolation is the radio-communicated voice of an ally.
Kang's artwork is in keeping with the usual sci-fi anime style. There's plenty of detail to be found in the alien technology that's at the forefront of the visuals. The men have razor-sharp hair and the women have perfectly round breasts. In other words, the art doesn't do much for me, and at times, it's difficult to make out exactly what's going on. I did enjoy the design for the Paren armor, though, as it was boasts a creepy quality. The colors are crisp and bright, but take on an appropriately dark look in the final pages.
The script doesn't helpt to bring much more clarity to the action, unfortunately. It takes two or three reads of the book to get an idea of who the good guys are and who the bad guys are, I found. I have to admit, though, that the issue's cliffhanger struck me as being rather clever and chilling. Kato injects some interesting military strategy and psychology into the storytelling.
Ultimately, though, he doesn't give the reader a reason to care about the conflict. The politics of this war are vague at best. It's rather difficult to understand or even care about a war if one is unaware of the reasons for the conflict. That's the case here. Furthermore, the horrors of this particular war are all "off-camera," so it's difficult for the reader to connect with its impact on the characters. Suits of armor go down; we don't see people being hurt all that much.
