The yearly swarm has descended upon the town and amongst the buzzing hordes, a friendship is formed. Your Major Spoilers review of Fishflies #1 from Image Comics, awaits!

FISHFLIES #1

Writer: Jeff Lemire
Artist: Jeff Lemire
Letterer: Steve Wands
Editor: Greg Lockard
Publisher: Image Comics
Cover Price: $5.99
Release Date: July 12th, 2023

Previously in Fishflies: Originally released on Jeff Lemire’s Substack as a passion project inspired by his childhood home, this series has been updated and has now become a monthly series.

CRUNCH

Fishflies #1 opens with a group of teenagers standing outside a convenience store that is completely engulfed in the eponymous fishflies.  They eventually goad one of their group into walking across a sea of dead bugs and go into the store.  Things then shift to a man waking up in a field, he is then immediately attacked by the flies and as he flees he remembers the previous night of how his attempted robbery of the convenience store was botched and ended poorly.  He manages to find his way into a barn where he eventually collapses from the repeated attacks of the flies.  Things then shift to a young girl named Fran.  She discovers the robber in her father’s barn, but isn’t bothered, she then goes to school.  Later that day she returns to help the robber find a better place to hide and tells him that the police are investigating the robbery.  He complains about symptoms stemming from the repeated bites from the flies.  At home, Fran interacts with her distant father while the robber continues to suffer from side effects of the bites. The next morning Fran goes to visit the robber and discovers something unexpected.

A QUIET UNSETTLING TENSION

Fishflies #1 isn’t a comic that has efficiency near the top of its list of objectives and while that might be a problem in certain types of stories, it somehow manages to be a benefit here.  Lemire does something very interesting here by having a bit of a bait-and-switch when it comes to a climactic moment.  The issue starts and establishes what could be the focus of the story. Then halfway through the reader gets what would normally be a climax to an issue or chapter, but then the issue keeps going and then suggests that the plot will be about something else.  Then the real climax hits and leaves the reader unsure of what could possibly be coming next.  What really adds to the tension though is the presence of the fishflies themselves.  Up until the last couple of pages, this would be an effective, but not very original, crime thriller set in a small town.  But, the flies add something undefinable to the proceedings.  At times they are presented as simply being there, while other times they give off the impression of having an agenda that they’re willing to sacrifice thousands of their own bodies to achieve.  This allows what on the surface is a simple story, so far, to take on a much grander feel.

HOPE YOU LIKE JEFF LEMIRE’S ART

If you’ve read any other comic that Jeff Lemire has done the art for, you probably already have a good idea of what this book looks like; a bit sketchy, a maverick approach to head shapes, shading is intense and opaque, and heavily watered down watercolors.  I wouldn’t say that Lemire’s books are well-known for being very colorful, but compared to those books, Fishflies #1 is especially devoid of color.  It’s not black and white, it’s almost like the town and landscape itself have had the color sucked out of it, leaving behind just the stain that the color had left behind.

BOTTOM LINE:  BUZZING WITH PROMISE AND POTENTIAL

Fishflies #1 should be a boring read.  It’s an opening chapter, there’s barely any dialog, and there’s really not a lot of things that happen when you look at it as a whole.  But, between the emotionless characterization of Fran, the pale color palette, the story structure, and the unnerving presence of the fishflies, there’s a tension and subtle grandeur here that is wonderful to see.  5 out of 5 stars.

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Fishflies #1

100%

100%

Phenomenal

Fishflies #1 is a great slow burn of a comic that keeps readers guessing while letting a certain amount of emptiness exist.

• Writing

  10
• Art

  10
• Coloring

  10
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