Air v.2: Flying Machine
Written by G. Willow Wilson
Illustrated by M.K. Perkar
Colored by Chris Chuckry
Lettered by Jared K. Fletcher
Published by DC/Vertigo
After it was recommended to me, I went to the library to check out the series Air, about an acrophobic airline stewardess who gets caught up in a massive conspiracy. Vol. 1 wasn’t available, so I went straight into vol. 2, which was maybe not the best idea. There’s clearly some groundwork that I was missing when reading this book, but it was still mostly entertaining and worth a look.
Flying Machine collects issues six through ten of the serial, and finds our heroine Blythe allied with a still-adventuring Amelia Earhart. After Earhart’s history unfolds, much of the plot revolves around a mysterious ability called Hyperpraxis, an ability at which Blythe is naturally gifted, which allows the bending and folding of physical space. A country called Narimar, which may or may not exist, comes into play, and Blythe’s love for a mysterious young man named Zayn underlines her every action.
G. Willow Wilson sets up a pretty compelling conspiracy, played with a supernatural bent, and she teases out new information at a good pace. Conspiracies too often suffer from giving no consequential data, leaving the reader to feel like the mystery won’t ever actually pay off. X-Files and 100 Bullets, I’m thinking of you. In Air, Wilson feeds out more clues and more solid discoveries, yet keeps opening new doors to keep readers enticed.
Blythe’s character is hard to read from this one volume. The plot drives much of the book, leaving her attraction to Zayn unclear, and the concept of the naturally gifted adept is well-trod territory. The conspiracy plays out nicely, but there’s not quite enough here to see if Wilson has anything new to say about the concept of the concept of the adept.
Solidly unremarkably, M.K. Perkar’s artwork carry Wilson’s story effectively, despite occasionally inconsistent illustrations and sometimes choppy pacing. Silent reaction panels often carry too much weight, giving a herky-jerky effect to many pages. Perkar, however, carries readers outside conventional reality convincingly, showing readers the edge of reality and the gridlines beneath our universe in a creative manner.
A few people, in mentioning this series to me, have compared it to the television series Lost. For me, it’s a wasted analogy; I’ve never seen Lost (take it for what you will, most of you probably have seen it), but Air is a compelling supernatural conspiracy saga. It’s not really my bag, personally (which is to say, I’d probably enjoy it over a single-volume, but might not have the interest to follow it for several years), but there is no doubt that Air v.2: Flying Machine is put together in a mostly dramatic manner and is a worth a look for fans of supernatural mystery.
