Review by C.J. Bunce
Whether it’s a new run of DC Comics’ Green Arrow, a sci-fi journey like Sentient or Descender, a space fantasy like Ascender, a new take on Marvel Comics’ Wolverine, or a horror twist on superheroes like Animal Man, writer Jeff Lemire has kept us busy for the past 15 years. His unique grasp in the comics industry on storytelling and story structure brings his next movie script-styled story to comic book shops this winter in the horror tale Fishflies from Image Comics. Originally an online comic issued in seven parts and now reworked, the result combines the style of fantasy horror tale M. Night Shyamalan continues to dazzle audiences with, mixed with the creepiness of Stephen King’s The Outsider, Mike Norton’s The Revival, with a dose of David Lynch and The Black Phone. It’s a long, 384-page slow-boiling suspense-thriller about an outcast girl and an impossible new friend.
The fishflies of the title are little flying insects Lemire encountered in Ontario, one of those many swarming insect varieties that periodically arrive and take over our neighborhoods. Like a chapter from the TV series Grimm, Lemire’s story mixes ancient magic with the feel of alien invasion stories, as a girl named Franny encounters her first and only friend, who happens to be a criminal who is transforming into something… else. A new twist on George Langelaan’s The Fly?
Franny is in a household with issues, something like the family in Shyamalan’s Signs. She’s shunned and scorned at school. She’s the kind of character you hope will have some breakthrough by the last page. And she gets a satisfying conclusion in the vein of Mark Millar’s Hit Girl. But an afterword hints at more stories for these characters ahead. I think this is a solid one-and-done story. It doesn’t need a sequel.
Writer Lemire does double duty as artist here, and it works, but you may get the feeling this is plodding along at times. I decided this was intentional and a good thing, adding to the suspense. The plot has a nice figure 8 structure where all the threads come back around. The climax finds Franny and her newfound friend in a moment of near glee or well-earned joy, something you’d find in a Hayao Miyazaki movie. And it’s suffused with this intriguing, weary cop trying to find the missing girl. Franny and her friend have moments that seemed straight out of A Perfect World.
I would like to see how Hollywood would cast this.
It’s another good read from Lemire. Add Fishflies to your pull list at Elite Comics or your local comic shop. It’s also available for pre-order in its first collected edition in a hardcover from Image Comics here at Amazon.
