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Fly, The - Outbreak (Trade Paperback)
Released by: IDW Publishing
Released on: October 70th, 2015.
Written by: Brandon Seifert
Illustrated by: menton3
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Dr. Martin Brundle, son of a certain scientist who decades back created a teleportation device that melded his genes with that of a housefly, continues to experiment in the same field you'd expect him to. He's married to his wife Beth and their relationship definitely has some kinky spark to it, but she's nonplussed about the fact that he insists on wearing a condom during every part of their sex life. Why? It's not that he doesn't want kids, it's that he's 'got buggy genes.' Tests show that he's clean but he will not risk it. He doesn't want to create more human/fly hybrids.
And then there's the matter of Anton Bartok, a man that Brundle did make into a monster. Beth argues that he was already a monster in his own way but Brundle knows what he did. He keeps Bartok in a lab cell where security monitors him but when Anton escapes, it goes south and fast. Brundle's experiment, in which he tried to tone down the effects of the fly genes in Bartok, instead had the opposite effect and now there's a dead security guard to prove it. Brundle confronts Bartok but it goes poorly and before you know it, there's a firefight and an unexpected exposure that's sure to have long lasting and horrific results.
Later, Beth video chats with her husband. He's been quarantined and the military officers that oversaw the operation wouldn't tell her why. She's understandably concerned about her husband and so he explains to her what happened. The last injection that he gave to Bartok didn't 'fix' his fruit-fly genes but instead enhanced them. When Bartok lost control and went on the attack, Martin and a few others were exposed to his blood and possibly contaminated by it. She presses him with more questions but he logs off suddenly.
From here we see Martin confront Major Vurvin and Doctor Mayweather. They want him to develop a cure but in order to do that he needs to be left alone. They oblige and he gets online with Beth again, telling her that he's got the telepods he needs to do his research and that he's quarantined on a facility in North Brother Island (if you're not familiar with the history of the Brother Islands, check it out here - fascinating stuff!). He levels with her about the reality of the cure he thought he was close to and then we cut to a cafeteria where Martin eats alone. The 'normals' don't want anything to do with him, they figure he has to be infected, but a lone nurse, Martin's assistant Noelani, sits down to talk to him. Martin explains the way that the mutation spreads after she starts asking him about it. As he explains the different stages of the mutation taking effect, we see another inmate in the quarantine station exhibiting said signs - a beautiful redhead easily capable of manipulating some of the men around, maybe even the guards, into satisfying her hyper-sexuality brought on by contamination.
When that guard she fucked starts showing signs of super strength and unusually aggressive behavior, it's obvious that things are spreading. Martin talks to Beth online again, but just as she's about to give him a show of her own, he's interrupted by Noelani, the nurse he had spoken to earlier. She knows he's got some pent up desires and aims to take advantage of them, but she's also showing other symptoms.
Martin is understandably feeling some guilt over what is happening. Noe wakes him from his nightmare, and the medication that she's on now seems to have calmed down the uncontrollable sexual impulses she showed in the last issue. Martin heads to the men's room to do what he needs to do and finds a mutated man hiding in the stall - Ross.
From here we bounce around a bit. Martin tries to sort out what happened and how while Noe does what she can to assist him, like a good assistant should. He tells Noe what he misses about the wife he's essentially kicked out of his life until he gets this mess sorted out and then we see how he's going about trying to do just that. Martin suggests taking Ross and the others off of the medication that is controlling them so they'll be blissfully unaware of what's wrong. Martin has a bit of a moral conundrum to deal with here. He knows what he's responsible for, and he knows the only way to really cure the infected is to pass the infection on to another living person, but a talk with Noelani has an effect on him. He comes up with an idea, one that might work, but those military doctor guys in the masks aren't really liking his plan. And on top of that? Their 'patients' are starting to evolve into what they think will be the final form of their mutation.
As the 'hatching' takes place, Martin falls into a bottle. Then the lights go off, and the door to the ward opens up…
At this point, pretty much everyone in the hospital where Martin Brundle has been locked away has turned into some sort of fly/human hybrid, and with that transformation come an increased libido and super strength. Beth has shown up just in time to get Martin off of the island but wants to save an intern she knows named Erik - but they both know that's not going to work and they take care of it accordingly.
Martin, however, wants Beth to get to safety so that he can deal with this and ensure that she doesn't get hurt in the process. Beth's not having any of it… and then they run into Noelani. She wants off of the island too but she's now more fly than human. The Brundle's aren't having any part of that and they let her know this - she can't leave the island while she's infected, and so Noelani, knowing what she knows, asks Martin to 'fix' her. And in a way, he does.
The human-fly hybrids that Martin Brundle has unwittingly created are wreaking havoc in the abandoned hospital where they were quarantined. Now almost entirely fly himself, Martin is punishing a certain assistant who was trying to do harm to his wife Beth. Before he kills Noelani she's able to convince him he can do some good.
Meanwhile, Major Vurvin and Mayweather, his right hand man, are armed and ready to take out anyone and anything they need to in order to maintain the peace. Mayweather meets a nasty fate while a freed Noelani hands Beth an assault rifle. She's good with guns. Beth tells her 'I'm here to save him, not kill him' but she doesn't realize how far gone her husband really is. Noelani, after her last altercation with Martin, realizes what he is now, whether Beth wants to see it that way or not.
When Martin, in fly form, shows up in the room the two women are debating in, with a 'friend' along for the ride, he tells them of his plans to create more like him, to make a few tweaks and create a new race - but Beth doesn't want to be like him… and she makes that perfectly clear.
This final issue wraps up the mini-series quite well, though to be honest it feels a little rushed. What happens here is appropriate and effective and most importantly in keeping with what was laid down in the issues prior, but it happens fast. You're left both satisfied with the resolution but still wanting a bit more… something. Maybe a bit more with Martin and Beth in the last few pages would have upped the impact of the consequences of their collective actions and made for a more involving read but this is still a solid book. Seifert has, from the first issue, done a good job of getting us into the heads of the three core characters and in keeping the supporting players both necessary to the story and interesting to learn about. We're not shortchanged on that here and the sense of tragedy and sacrifice that has always been a part of the movies lingers large over this comic book version as well. It works.
Menton3's artwork is as interesting and eerie and weird here as it's been since the get go, but in the last few pages he gets to go wild not only with some really bizarre (but interesting and eye catching) choices in layout but with some great character and creature design as well.
Now that it's over with, yeah, this is a series that fans of the eighties Cronenberg/Wales The Fly movies should have no trouble at all enjoying in terms of both the story and the art. It would have been easy to screw this up, to churn out something riddled with clichés and stereotypes - Seifert and menton3 didn't do that, they took things in their own direction while keeping things in the spirit of the material that inspired it. And that makes for a pretty cool comic.
In addition to reprinting the pages of all five issues of this mini-series, this TPB also includes a cover gallery that collects the covers for all five issues as well, including the variants that were available during its original run.
