A frightening take on the afterlife.
Creative Staff:
Story: Tom Peyer
Art: Greg Scott
Colors: Andy Troy
Letterer: Rob Steen
What They Say:
Chronic malcontent David Weathers dies and goes to Heaven—where everything is terrible, and everybody hates a complainer.
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers):
The second series from Ahoy Comics that I get to check out, High Heaven had me a bit wary at first as I could see it being a tale involving a lot of pot or something and a dreamlike life, which could be interesting but isn’t up my alley all that much. What Tom Peyer has crafted here is definitely interesting with what it wants to do in exploring heaven, or what may be heaven, and how it lines up with our modern view of things. The continued variation in how we view the afterlife as the decades progresses interests me since it’s changing pretty often. Peyer has a great partner in the art department with Greg Scott coming up with some great visuals throughout it to create the right kind of eerie tone at times with a look to the minimal but also some very detailed and busy sequences that really hit home in the real world. The flow of the book is great and it left me eager for more from both.
The book focuses on David Weathers, a man who has had a fairly normal life in a lot of ways but not without its losses, such as his parents already and being a fairly lonely guy. It’s not clear the real reasons for his being as alone as he is but you can extrapolate plenty of reasons as we see how people are basically abusing him. The main early focus is at work when his coworker Ben encourages him to ask out Christine since he’s liked her for a while but he’s just afraid to go the distance here. So when he actually does go out to lunch for her and confesses, the discovery that she’s actually engaged to Ben and Ben did it just to humiliate him pushes him over the edge. As a turning point in his life it’s a decent one that sets the stage and is easy to connect with. Dropping a piano on him and killing him, sending him to heaven? That’s a bit off the radar.
The time in heaven makes up the bulk of the book, however, and it’s here that things take a darker turn for David. His going on about it while in line to see St. Peter basically drives everyone nuts and earns him a reputation so that even his family doesn’t want to show to greet him. The discovery of what heaven is like has its moments where there are positives but the reality is just unsettling. The mansion is basically a college dorm room that he has to share with someone, he’s lost his genitals, and there’s just a growing sense of loneliness coming from him as he realizes how his situation is changing. The arrival of his uncle doesn’t offer much hope either but it does set up a potential for him to get out because David really comes across as someone who doesn’t feel like he belongs here.
In Summary:
I wasn’t sure what to expect going into this book but it proved to be a lot more fun than I expected it to be. David’s a sympathetic enough character but not one that you actually want to be or aspire to. His journey from horrific rejection to heaven is one that’s brief but it’s intense. Exploring the afterlife is always something that writers can do well with quirks and weirdness and Peyer is definitely digging into that here. With Scott’s artwork giving it a bleak look more often than not, and warranted as that’s how David is seeing everything in that way, it’s got a great look and the potential for a lot of strange directions to come for it. I’m definitely curious to see more of this and have hopes that it’ll be a crazy ride with some unexpected twists.
Grade: B+
Age Rating: 16+
Released By: Ahoy Comics
Release Date: September 26th, 2018
MSRP: $3.99
