Taking Off Once Again With She Could Fly: The Lost Pilot #1
by Josh Davison
[*Mild Spoilers Ahead!]
Luna has been going to numerous therapy sessions since the shootout at her house. She’s been going through ERP (Exposure Therapy) to cope with it all. She’s been discharged from the mental hospital and back into her high school. She’s been embarrassed and worried about what others think about her, and she continues to use her ERP. It’s been dubiously successful. Luna’s parents have been stung by the shootout too, and they aren’t sure how to help Luna. Meanwhile, Dana Church has gone missing, Verna meets with some questionable people, and Bill is being interrogated on Mayura’s flying machine.
She Could Fly: The Lost Pilot #1 follows up the darkly beautiful first miniseries effortlessly. With the same themes, characters, and distinctive art style, this first issue of Lost Pilot has me just as excited for the new tale.
Luna is as compelling and relatable as ever. Her fears, concerns, and trauma are handled in an all-too-human manner that anyone with anxiety, OCD, and/or depression can recognize.
It’s a little saddening that things have only gotten worse for her since the first series, but it’s far from surprising. While the ending was big and bombastic in a way the rest of the story wasn’t, it’s handled in a realistic manner in this issue. A shootout is a severely traumatizing thing. Watching people die in your house isn’t something you just get over–especially when one of the casualties is a family member.
If there’s a drawback to Lost Pilot #1, it’s that the conspiracy surrounding Mayura makes some of the plot threads harder to follow. You have to quickly reacquaint yourself with the characters from the first story, and some of them come and go very quickly. Thankfully, there is the handy-dandy recap page, but even that can only help you so much.
Martin Morazzo’s artwork captures the grounded yet terrifying world Luna lives in perfectly. The writing translates seamlessly into what you see on the page. You understand exactly how she sees the world, even when it gets surreal or scary. Miroslav Mrva’s color art sets the perfect restrained-yet-dark tone for Luna’s story.
She Could Fly: The Lost Pilot launches this next chapter with another issue of pain and suppressed hope. Luna’s mental state has deteriorated in the last year, but she’s still latched onto the story of Mayura and her flying machine. It’s a comic with deep emotional resonance and humanity, and it’s easily worth a recommendation. Give it a read.
She Could Fly: The Lost Pilot #1 comes to us from writer Christopher Cantwell, artist and cover artist Martin Morazzo, color artist Miroslav Mva, and letterer Clem Robins.