She Could Fly

She Could Fly #1

by Christopher Cantwell, Martín Morazzo (Illustrator)

In this graphic novel from the co-creator/showrunner of AMC's acclaimed show Halt and Catch Fire, a disturbed 15-year-old girl obsessively searches for the truth behind a mysterious flying woman who explodes in the sky one day.

Over the course of 51 days in Chicago, an unknown woman appears publicly 11 times, flying at speeds of 120 miles per hour and at heights reaching 2,000 feet. Then she suddenly dies in a fiery explosion mid-air. No one knows who she was, how she flew, or why. A disturbed 15-year-old girl named Luna becomes obsessed with learning everything about her, even as rumors and conspiracy theories roil. As Luna comes closer to the truth--all while defense contractors, government investigators, and foreign sources creep around the fringes--she hopes that cracking the secrets of the Flying Woman's inner life will somehow lead to liberation from her own troubled mind.

"...a frightening yet commanding series that you can't help but be transfixed over."-Geek.com
"Devastating and wonderful."--Bleeding Cool
"Full of unexpected pleasures...masterful, joyful, poignant... A must-read"-G. Willow Wilson (Wonder Woman, Ms. Marvel)
"She Could Fly is a modern-day masterpiece...It's heartbreakingly beautiful and honest to its core."-Aaron Paul (Breaking Bad)
"She Could Fly is one of the best comic book debuts I've ever read. It's everything I want from a comic."-Gerry Duggan (Deadpool, Analog)

Genres: Comics, Graphic Novels, Fiction, Science Fiction, Graphic Novels Comics, Comic Book, Mystery

144 pages, Paperback

First published March 19, 2019

Reviews

[Chad · Rating 2 out of 5]

This has very little to do with a woman who has appeared flying over Chicago. Instead, it focuses on a disturbed 15-year-old girl that is obsessed with this flying woman. Somehow, she comes across a physicist in hiding who is trying to steal the device that allows the woman to fly. There's a lot of moving pieces and characters here, all of whom are dysfunctional. There's at least 10 other characters all with complications that I didn't bother to mention. It's a lot to follow as a reader. I was often lost as to what was happening with the plot, which definitely shouldn't happen in a 4 issue comic. Some people seem to like it because of how it deals with obsession and mental illness, but I found the plot too obtuse and confusing to really care about any of these characters. The art is clean, similar in style to Jon Davis-Hunt from Wildstorm and the Clean Room.

I'm a bit disappointed in this first outing from the Berger Books imprint From Dark Horse. Karen Berger being the founder of Vertigo who put out some of the best comics for adults over the last 30 years.

Received a review copy from Dark Horse and Edelweiss. All thoughts are my own and in no way influenced by the aforementioned.

[James DeSantis · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was SO many things all in one, I give the author credit on trying to tackle various subjects in just one volume.

So the story begins with a woman in the skies. She's able to fly! That's exciting. That's new. And she dies in the first maybe 15 pages of the book. Explodes in mid-air. So you expecting some superhero story will not get it here. No, this is the story of a very troubled teenager named Luna. She is dealing with the loss of the hero and with voices in her head telling her to do terrible things, she goes to do something instead horrible to herself. However, before she could, she is introduced to something that'll change her life forever.

This story is basically tackling mental illness in a interesting and very dark way. Everyone, and I mean EVERYONE, has moments in their lives when they think terrible things. You can be the nicest person in the world but horrible thoughts of killing or hurting or doing terrible things does creep up. If you say no, you are a liar. And maybe that's your dark secret. Either way, this story really focuses on Luna's unstable mind-frame while also coming back to the fact she is actually a good person.

The other side of this book deals with the person who helped create the flying woman. This is a less interesting part of the book but still engaging mostly due to pacing and his partner in crime (If want to call it that) and their dialogue and strong human emotion. Both flawed characters who do terrible things to get what they want.

This is a highly fast paced thriller with some real great human moments. The side cast really shines here with some great in-look into mental illness amongst violence and carnage. I'm eager to see what else Cantwell writes from here on out. Looks like a sequel to this is coming out and I'll be glad to pick it up.

A 4 out of 5.

[C.E. Case · Rating 4 out of 5]

Perhaps too weird and abstract for me, but ends fantastically and violently, which makes me love it. Fans of Clean Room (Gail Simone) should like this. Also, as a severely mentally ill person myself, I appreciated that the comic "went there," and went there HARD.

[Stewart Tame · Rating 3 out of 5]

Yes, there is a flying woman. But she's not the focus of this title. This book is about seeing the flying woman on TV or in brief YouTube clips, and wondering who she is, and what it would be like if you could fly too. We’ve got a troubled teenager battling mental illness, a mother who’s not all there, a washed-up physicist and his maybe girlfriend--it's complicated. And we’ve got teams of agents working for more than one government. The best metaphor I can think of is, you know how we're taught in school about the three states of matter: solid, liquid, gas? And remember how the main difference between them is molecular activity: the more the molecules of a substance are in motion and bouncing off of each other, the less solid it gets and the higher its temperature rises? Well if we consider the story elements of this book to be molecules, then it's well on its way to becoming a plasma.

I think that may be the single geekiest metaphor I’ve ever come up with.

Anyway, the story is more about relatively “ordinary” people and their problems than it is about the flying woman. It's by investigating her that all these personalities come together and collide. There is a second volume, but we do get a decently solid ending for this one. Recommended!

[Rod Brown · Rating 2 out of 5]

A high school sophomore with OCD is having a mental health crisis as she fixates obsessively on a woman who has appeared flying seemingly unaided in the airspace around Chicago. She starts her own personal investigation of the matter and -- because plots need guns? -- finds herself caught up in the crossfire between a treasonous scientist, corporate thugs, and the U.S. government over a scientific McGuffin. Mental collapse and metaphysical foofaraw collide with a fairly stock thriller plot that builds inevitably to a big shoot-out.

The chapter headings reference Lewis Carroll, so it must be deep, right?

Well, I'm not particularly interested in the story at this point, but I have the next two volumes on hand, all lined up and ready to go, so . . . sssssuuure . . . why not?

[A Fan of Comics · Rating 5 out of 5]

Another hit from 2018!

This story is both heart breaking and beautiful. A young girl dealing with an extreme form of OCD gets mixed up in some government bullsh*t. Poor thing only wants to fly! There's a lot of different examples of mental illnesses and how sometimes its not always our fault we have it. Its a sensitive topic and this book handles it well. This book is also really gory and mature so I'd put a small trigger warning on it. My only complaint; I read it while it was coming out in issues and honestly I feel like its better in a volume. Some of where the book ends in issues can get confusing. In the back of the book it says the next arch will start in April of 2019. It would be ideal if it went straight to a volume but probably not. Overall, I'm excited for the next part!

[Dan · Rating 3 out of 5]

Kinda weird. Not sure what to make of this.

[Kamakana · Rating 4 out of 5]

010419: sometimes great art. clean, direct, vivid, detailed especially in violence/gore as resolves the story. excellent portrayal of mental health declining. of time, history, loss, dreams... only disliked that very violence/gore. i know it is visual shorthand referring to comics... but it seems too much like how showrunners try and amp their fading miniseries... blow thing up...

[Geonn Cannon · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is amazing. Dark, violent, surprising... it's not your ordinary superhero story, and the lead is not your ordinary lead character. She's all kinds of screwed up, but she still wants to save people. She's inspiring and sad and bleak and I love her. The violence in this book might put people off (seriously, a movie version is going to either have to tone things down or risk an NC17 warning. Or just put it on HBO, I guess). Definitely worth checking out!

[Helen · Rating 4 out of 5]

I was honestly very pleasantly surprised by this graphic novel. I loved the unique story line and how the story developed. Usually, illustrations that are hyper realistic like this are not my favorite but I thought that it really complimented the story. The depiction of OCD was excellent and how it tied into the story made it feel like an added bonus and not a plot device. I am very much looking forward to future works in this series!

[Dakota Morgan · Rating 3 out of 5]

There's a lot going on in She Could Fly and very little of it immediately makes sense. By the end, Christopher Cantwell has spun a decently intriguing story about mental illness and government conspiracies, but if you pick up She Could Fly expecting some kind of superhero tale, you're going to be sorely disappointed.

Luna, a young girl in the throes of mental illness, is obsessed with news stories about a "flying woman." When that woman explodes in the sky, Luna's life is thrown for a loop. Meanwhile, a physicist in Canada is trying to sell the flying woman's secret technology to the Chinese. Meanwhile meanwhile, the US goverment (I think?) is trying to stop the technology from being released in the wild.

These three storylines collide eventually in a mostly satisfying (and unexpectedly bloody) fashion, but the first issue doesn't make it clear at all what's going on. It doesn't help that scene shifts occur mid-page, an odd editing choice. I was also shocked at the reveal that Luna is a 15-year-old - Martin Morazzo's art makes her appear at least 35. The art in general is an acquired taste. She Could Fly spins a few too many plates, though its pacing is fast enough to make it easy to ignore your own confusion.

[Adam Stone · Rating 3 out of 5]

A teenager whose mental illness has her convinced that she's evil and will eventually hurt everyone she loves, becomes obsessed with a flying woman, and then entangled in a web of espionage surrounding her death. It's a great setup for a book. I loved the art, and felt like the author had a tight grip on each of these characters. Unfortunately, it didn't flow well for me. A few times I thought I might have missed a page when the action abruptly turned from one scene to another. And I felt that the ending wrapped up way too fast, given the setup.

I'm still going to check out the next chapter "Lost Pilots" as it comes out, but I'm not as excited as I was when I finished reading the first issue.

I recommend it for readers looking for a realistically portrayed mentally ill female protagonist, and people who miss the feel of early 21st century Vertigo books.

[Kirsten · Rating 3 out of 5]

Oh man. So I really loved the first quarter or so of this. The way the graphic novel medium works to show Luna's obsessive thinking is incredible. Sadly, I felt that this suffered from too much plot. The final quarter was incredibly confusing, and Luna as a person just got lost in the action movie-ness of it. This felt like a missed opportunity.

[Amanda [Novel Addiction] · Rating 4 out of 5]

Dark, but definitely good.

[Alex Sarll]

I couldn't even tell you quite why I was cynical about this one going in – perhaps the title felt a little bit too easily empowering? And that despite having enjoyed the little other Cantwell I've read (though I've never seen his main claim to fame, Halt And Catch Fire). Whatever it was, I was wrong – this is excellent. A woman is seen flying above the streets of an otherwise realistic Chicago, a phenomenon met with about the mixture of wonder and 'Huh' which you'd expect in a world much like ours. But she's a phenomenon and an inciting incident, not a lead character. The story follows a scientist connected to her, now in hiding; the spooks trying to track him down; and most of all, one schoolgirl who's fascinated by her and then stumbles on to her trail. Which turns out to be a merciful if limited escape from her usual obsessions, because the poor sod is haunted by intrusive thoughts, horrible visions of fire, death, attacking her family. Reading this, I realise that comics are a natural match for catching the ghastliness of that condition, and I'm surprised I can't recall anything earlier which made it quite so key to a story. It helps, of course, that Martin Morazzo has just the right style for it, able to lull you into the comfortable everyday scenes, plunge from there into a horrific vision, and pull back to reality without ever leaving the reader unclear at the end of a scene as to which bits of what we saw actually happened. He was already the selling point for horror anthology Ice Cream Man, but his work here feels more fluid, less forced - perhaps just because he has more to work with. The protagonist, under attack from her own mind, is contrasted with her grandmother, who through a combination of Buddhism and possible senility is being liberated from the shackles of the self; it's a contrast which could easily have come across hideously 'Aaaaaah', but somehow it works – think of it as the difference between rote plays by people who think it's easy doing Albee, and yer actual Who's Afraid Of Virginia Woolf. Once the characters' paths intertwine it doesn't quite maintain that initial momentum – maybe more of an early Superman leap than true flight? – and for a time the story ends up in more familiar thriller territory. When it wraps up, with a lovely afterword in which Cantwell talks movingly about the dream of flight, it served also to remind me how long it had been since we'd seen any of that in the comic proper, how much it had been eclipsed by ground-level concerns. But for all that, still some quality comics.

[Joe Kraus · Rating 4 out of 5]

I’ve been off graphic novels for a while now, but this one grabbed my eye on the sale table at Comics on the Green.

I’m glad it did.

I forget sometimes what graphic novels do that neither novels nor films quite can. In this one, we get the internal, novelistic sense of Luna, a teenage girl trying to come to grips with what seems like homicidal urges. She’s fascinated by – inspired by – reports of a woman seen flying across the city’s sky. Then, as she is watching, the woman explodes. That’s not quite cinematic, which is also a feature of the form. It would work differently to see a real woman hurt so badly. As a comic, though, it suggests that disaster without quite forcing us to see it as flesh and blood.

So, from the start, this is a work that feels as if it ought to be a graphic novel. Maybe someone will someday adapt it for the screen, but it ‘plays’ like the best of what a comic can be.

In other words, this is a genuine exploration of a troubled girl. And she’s caught in a larger, troubled world. Her mother is caught in a religious fervor, unable to see Luna’s pain. Her father is a tradesman unable to sense what she’s going through. And her grandmother, returned from a long time away, is equal parts immersed in Eastern religion and suffering from rising dementia.

Throw in a physicist on the run with his sometime girlfriend, sometime hired prostitute, the competing government agents chasing him, and a school social worker projecting her own emotional disorder onto someone else, and we have a world as broken externally as internally.

The whodunit of this is less compelling than the characters, but that’s not quite a complaint. The government agents after Phil get confusing – especially in a late-issue shoot-out where I can’t follow most of what’s happening – but the first half of this is so beautifully rendered that I’m absolutely still on board with the project.

I remember the peculiar awe when I read Maus, my first real graphic novel, and realized artists could sometimes tease out a sense of real human pain all the more poignantly for being comic art.

This isn’t Maus, but it is compelling. Luna aches, and we feel that ache. She yearns to know what it would be like to fly, and we feel that yearning too.

[Kyle · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was a tough one to rate because I loved the artwork, I loved the message, I loved the subject matter, characters, style…… but I found the storytelling was so tricky and disconnected to the point where I was struggling to piece together the details. And the violence was a little too graphic and unsubstantiated.

Still I really enjoyed this one; I found it to be an atypical and challenging read.

3.5/5

[Ryan Mishap · Rating 2 out of 5]

Such a great concept that I have been eagerly waiting for this and then I was so disappointed. Wastes the concept with brutal, over-the-top violence and gore and cheap jokes.

This could have been an emotional, relevant, compassionate tale instead of a crass crime yarn. Sigh.

[Valéria. · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was A LOT of things mixed together, but not in a bad way. Lots of action, lots of blood and weird stuff, flying, killing, lying, running.. It was fun and interesting. The way Luna described all those thoughts she has in that one specific panel was amazing.

[Devon Munn · Rating 3 out of 5]

Decent read. Had a couple funny jokes and whoa that ending was wild

[Jonathan Lee B. · Rating 4 out of 5]

She Could Fly is an onion in an onion.

[Joaquin · Rating 1 out of 5]

The first issue of this four part mini series really hooked me. The art was not particularly great but had its own unique cool style going on. Luna(the 15 year old mentally ill girl I thought this story centered ), I found really interesting and a character I'd really like to follow and see where she ends up and of course there is a flying woman who could be used as thing connecting many different groups and individuals to the story and each other in an interesting way while still not being the focus of the plot per se.
Buuuuuuutt! That was only the first issue coz as the plot progressed more characters were introduced and just left at that not diving deeply into them. Even Luna became a sort of side character at some point. In the end the book left me confused, slightly bored and most of all disappointed because this first issue screams wasted potential. It's like oh that's nice and that too and what about that, that could definitely lead somewhere..... but it never fully commits to any of the ideas or characters( granted it's only four parts. so why just not make it longer ). Reluctant to read the second volume

[gelowmichael · Rating 4 out of 5]

The complexity and the mystery this graphic novel has made this more interesting and can't wait for the next sequel.

There are certain parts that you may be lost all throughout the story because of some shifting scenes and dialogues.

The whole concept is mysterious and quite beyond gory. Gory in the sense that for example, shooting in the head. The way the scenes are depicted was quite exaggerated but this adds up the gory and complexity of the story.

Thank you Dark Horse Comics for providing an ARC for honest review.

[Gacela · Rating 3 out of 5]

Me parece curioso que varias de las reseñas que he leído destacan que en esta novela gráfica les gusta más el tratamiento de la “enfermedad mental / locura” que la trama, que encuentran más deslavazada o caótica. En mí ha sido al revés, me gusta mucho la historia, me ha interesado mucho la trama (y de hecho me ha dado algo de rabia que no era un volumen único como pensé por error, sino que la historia sigue, y tengo muchas ganas de ver por donde tiran). Y sin embargo en el tratamiento de la salud mental veo mucho menos que destacar. Me chirría que el enlace o la forma de mostrarnos la locura de la protagonista y de algún otro personaje también con problemas de salud mental, sea -oh, sorpresa totalmente inesperada- su agresividad más o menos taponada, que se vea a sí misma haciendo daño de formas especialmente gores y cruentas aquí y allá. Cansada, cansada, cansaaaaaaada... de que por lo visto la sociedad sólo sepa ver la locura desde el supuesto peligro imprevisible que conllevaríamos según el imaginario colectivo (desmentido por las estadísticas que demuestran que somos mucho más víctimas de violencias que ejecutores de la misma, en cuyo porcentaje estamos incluso por debajo del ratio habitual). AY.

Le daría solo dos estrellas o dos y media por eso, la verdad; pero luego la historia me enganchó y me parece original mezclar la trama de la chica voladora con el resto, por eso subí a tres. Pero a la vez tengo ese AY dentro y la sensación de oportunidad taaaaan desaprovechada.

[Cale · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a pretty challenging book that probably should come with trigger warnings (suicidal thoughts, murderous thoughts, some intense violence, and a surprising amount of sex), but manages to deal with some pretty serious issues in a thoughtful and occasionally entertaining manner.
The flying woman is more a MacGuffin than anything else- she's a mystery our teenage protagonist Luna is fascinated with, and the mystery of her death ends up leading to multiple storylines pulling together into a very violent climax.
Don't get the impression that just because the lead character is a high-schooler that this book is intended for that audience. It deals with mental health issues in disturbing manners, and violent imagery is common throughout the book, even when it may not be "real" within the story. The challenges of mental health not just on the affected individual but everyone in their wake is a pivotal theme, and something that I haven't seen successfully explored in graphic novel format before.
So what I came into the story expecting, and what I left having experienced are VERY different things. But that just means the book did a good job of surprising me, and using its medium in creative ways to explore difficult concepts. It's definitely worth a read; just be warned that it is not an easy read.

[Genevieve · Rating 3 out of 5]

I was really happy with how it started off.
It started off with a girl with obsessive compulsive disorder having obsessive thoughts about a mysterious flying lady. I liked the representation of mental health and was really happy to see the struggle of such a character with a clueless family. There's also a hint of early Alzheimer's for one of the family member. I liked how they introduced the subject: it's violent, raw and hard.
But then it got weird. Turns out, this story is not exactly what you think it is. It became completely... crazy.

The introduction of differently problematic characters put this little girl in the middle of a huge conspiracy/political war.
At first, I thought the setup was just like running away from the actual confrontation. I thought there was a lot of missed opportunities for opening a dialogue to actual issues.
After reflection, some could argue it was a way of abstractly and surprisingly pushing the impact of mental illness to another level.

Overall.... it was weird. But weird doesn't necessarily equal bad. It's not what I was expecting, nor what I wanted. But it got me thinking and the more I thought about it, the more sense it made. I'm not disappointed with the outcome. I'm curious to see the next arc!

[TinySalutations · Rating 2 out of 5]

I don’t understand what this is supposed to be. It is not really about a flying woman, who we really only hear about. It’s about a girl with severe OCD with intrusive thoughts that idolizes a flying woman she sees in the news. She gets caught up in a conspiracy about the flying woman with sketchy scientists and shady government agents. I think it did a fairly good job of showing a little understood side of OCD/intrusive thoughts, but it was very gory. I didn’t like that, but I’m not sure how to do it differently and still portray it well. Maybe a different art style (I disliked the art style in general anyway). I care for someone who struggles with this a ton and it is rarely discussed in a humanizing way like this.

The cover got me, because it said it was by the same creator as “Halt and Catch Fire”, which is one of my all time favourite shows. Definitely top 10, probably top 5. If you, like me, are considering this hoping for some of that “Halt and Catch Fire” brilliance, then I suggest you move along to something better.

[Rick Ray · Rating 2 out of 5]

A girl suffering from mental health problems fixates on a woman who has been spotted flying around the city. Her layman investigations get her connected with a scientist seeking the flying woman's ability to fly, and the ensuing crossfire between the corporate powers and the government who all seek information into the phenomena. There's a lot happening in just four issues, and the overstuffed narrative ends up shrouding the underlying story about mental health. On face value, I kind of expected this to be a more substantive take on superhero delusions (in similar vein to Alan Moore's Miracleman or Paul Jenkins' The Sentry), but the brevity of the story did not help at all.

Martin Morazzo's artwork isn't really all that appealing to me, though I can appreciate the way it works with the story. Tonally, this comic has a fair bit in common with W. Maxwell Prince's Ice Cream Man series, and Morazzo is doing his best work on that book. So if you're a fan of Morazzo's work, this might still appeal to you.

[Wm · Rating 2 out of 5]

Thank you, pseudonymous part-time comics writers! Knowing that a comics writer was/is a screenwriter always makes me suspect that they can't currently get anything produced, so they're slumming in comics as a back-up. I love the comics medium so much that wish I didn't know.

Anyway, it's an impressively ambitious story, with great art set against a crowded, hard-to-read comics font; some of us are older readers, eh? Would have been 3 stars with better legibility.

A bit melodramatic the way the internal insane thoughts cut in and out of the main story. Cutting into a scene as late as possible and out as early as possible is usually great advice for pop culture storytelling, but this technique feels too heavy-handed here. In particular, early scenes end up feeling incomplete, like they're in too great a rush to get us to the action later on.

[Chen · Rating 4 out of 5]

I could tell from the very beginning this is a very special one. I think I first heard about it at NYCC two years ago before it came out. It was from Berger Books who usually do unique things, it was the first comics from Halt and Catch Fire creator Christopher Cantwell, and it dealt with mental illness using some light sci-fi setting. 

So while I never seen Halt and Catch Fire (don't yell at me, I know,) I was very curious about this one and finally got it at this year's NYCC. 

And I truly do love the way they portrayed Luna's illness. A brain that won't stop and will send her way these images she really doesn't want to see.I do think it's a story that stands out and I'm very glad that there's a volume 2  which I now need to get my hands on..