“The Way Home” (part 1)

Pain, or perhaps more accurately personal trauma, is incredibly difficult to judge from one person to another. What you or I may consider trivial, another person may consider life changing. Alternatively, one person's trauma may be so extreme that they cannot express it and, perhaps even if they could, others may not be able to grasp it. This part of the human condition is the focus of “The Way Home” as a scarred young man and his broken companion attempt to make their way through the most dangerous swath of Ugandan countryside.

Like Judge Dredd or Sandman's Dream, the Unknown Soldier's titular character seems to be found more and more as a vehicle for the story rather than the focus of it. In issue #13, the focus is Paul, a young man who was once one of the guerrilla leader Kony's child soldiers, who has been fortunate enough to be saved from that life. He's found himself in a camp of the Gusco organization, a place dedicated to the psychological recovery and social integration of all children scarred by the civil war, whether they be citizens or children forced into soldiery. But Paul doesn't fit into either world, having never been a good soldier and now unable to express himself or his pain to the camp's inhabitants or counselors. When he finds the man that rescued him from Kony's army, the Unknown Soldier, he recognizes a kindred spirit, a man who belongs neither to peace nor war, but unable to escape his desire for both. So Paul pushes the Soldier to take him home and the Soldier, seeing something of the entire war, and himself, in the boy, acquiesces.

The team behind Unknown Soldier continues to take on a conflict so complex that few people can understand it. They package it into characters and situations that make it comprehensible for people who have no idea what this type of conflict would feel like because they have never experienced anything remotely like it. In this case, the book shows us the alienation of terrible trauma through the eyes of Paul, a child soldier that has not only witnessed terrible things, but one that has been rejected by both sides due to his inability to participate in them.

The art of this issue is handled by Pat Masioni, temporarily taking over for Alberto Ponticelli. Masioni does an excellent job balancing out the extremes of the book, whether they be chronological, emotional or tonal. He also contributes backmatter to the book that is well worth checking out.

If while reading this review, you've been thinking to yourself that Unknown Soldier sounds like a depressing book, it could certainly be interpreted as such. How do you recommend a book like this? “Oh yeah, dude, you should totally check out Unknown Soldier, it'll crush your soul.” That doesn't sound like a ringing recommendation, but as I read this issue the room seemed to darken and when I finished it I wanted to run home and hug my wife and loved ones. It is uncompromising but, in stark contrast, makes seemingly impossible subjects accessible. For that alone it is worth picking up.

If you liked this review, be sure to check out more of the author’s work at http://madbastard.hypersites.com

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