Analogous to train powertrains :). The great characteristic of electric motors is the large torque generation at standstill, compared to combustion engines. We all tend to look at power output for engine comparison, but it is Newton's second law that provides the acceleration to achieve the end velocity: force (or torque) does that. Power equations just make the computations easier, especially if torque is a function of rpm and if there are gearboxes with selectable gears.
The four stroke petrol (gasoline) engines provide zero torque at standstill and a pesky amount of torque at idle. Two-stroke engines, diesel pistons, gas turbines, electric motors all provide more torque at standstill or idle. Ships have 2-stroke diesels for all the torque that the propellor must provide. Trains indeed use the combustion engine-torque motor combination for better torque control for heavy trains, the alternative is a slipping clutch which has obvious drawbacks. Cars now have combustion - torque combination with batteries to regenerate energy that would otherwise be lost from deceleration.
So if we treat your question as a design question, we can see the reasons why electric motors were successfully applied in other vehicles: to overcome a dominant design issue. In aircraft there are three dominant design issues: weight, weight and weight. And safety. An aircraft that is too heavy simply will not fly. Sure a B747 freighter can lift a tank, but the skin is made from aluminium, the engines are twin axle gas turbines (high torque, low weight!), and everything in the aircraft has been designed for low weight first.
Aircraft don't need slip clutches, the air itself does that already. They just need a light way to create a lot of torque and output power. They also need redundancy: if you have one gas turbine providing electricity for four motors, and the turbine fails, all four motors stop. If you have 4 separate gas turbines, failure of one of them is not catastrophic. For preventing failures aircraft need simplicity. Converting kinetic energy to electrical to aerodynamic propulsion is too complicated.
All of this will be a different story once we can generate electricity in huge amounts from light weight fuel cells, but we haven't cracked that nut yet.