Flygirl (Archie Comics)

Flygirl (sometimes spelled Fly Girl or Fly-Girl) is a super-heroine published by Archie Comics.

Flygirl
Detail of Flygirl from Adventures of The Fly #27 (September 1963) by John Rosenberger, Published by Archie Comics
Publication information
PublisherArchie Comics
First appearanceThe Adventures of the Fly #13 (July 1961)
Created byRobert Bernstein
John Rosenberger
In-story information
Alter egoKim Brand
Team affiliationsMighty Crusaders
New Crusaders

Publication history

In addition to appearing in the Fly's title in the 1960s, she also appeared in short stories in other Archie titles Pep Comics (#153, 155, 156, 158) and Laugh Comics (#136, 137, 143).

During the mid-1960s Radio Comics/Mighty Comics period, Flygirl appeared in both Fly-Man and Mighty Crusaders.

Later on, during Archie's Red Circle Comics revival in the 1980s, Flygirl would again appear in both Mighty Crusaders and The Fly.

In 2009, following Final Crisis, publisher DC Comics used the reality-altering events of the series to assimilate the characters of several other defunct publishers (the Red Circle heroes, the THUNDER Agents, and the characters of Milestone Media) into their own universe. Since Archie Comics no longer owned the rights to the Fly, DC couldn't use the character, and instead he was replaced by Flygirl.

Fictional character biography

Kim Brand was an actress rescued by The Fly from a fall from a hotel window in issue #13 of The Adventures of the Fly. Kim fell in love with the superhero. When an enemy of the Fly arranged for two simultaneous crimes, reasoning that the hero could not be in two places at the same time, Turan, one of the Fly People, appeared to Kim in issue #14.

Turan, who had granted Tommy Troy the power to become the Fly, gave Kim a ring with a fly-shaped emblem. By rubbing the ring and saying "I wish I were Flygirl," she exchanged bodies with the Fly People's dimension and became a costumed superheroine. To return to her own identity, all she had to do was utter her name.

DC Universe

Flygirl made her official DC Universe debut in the final issue of The Web. The new version of Kim Brand has no mystical powers on her own: instead she's a disillusioned Web Host, one of the applicants who got a powered suit by The Web in exchange for fighting crime under his franchise.

Halfway during her training, Kim Brand quits, retaining the suit but significantly modifying it to increase its fighting powers, and removes every brand connecting her from the Web Hosts franchise. Kim then chooses to rename herself Fly-Girl, and fight crime solo. When Doctor Zadar manages to remotely control all the Web Hosts suits, save for the original suit of John Raymond and Fly-Girl's heavily retooled one, John Raymond seeks her help, offering her the right to keep the retooled suit for herself, instead of suing her for the unauthorized modifications to the proprietary hardware and software, in exchange for cooperation. Fly-Girl, at first insulted by the blackmail, willingly accepts and actively cooperates in freeing her fellow Hosts.

Kim herself finds herself impressed by John's selflessness: however, she vocally criticizes him about his complete lack of teamwork and his tendency of put himself in the line of harm without asking for help or backup. While they're arguing, they are both drafted into the newly formed Mighty Crusaders, along with The Comet, Inferno, The Shield and War Eagle.[1]

New Crusaders

In 2012, in the pages of New Crusaders published by Archie Comics under their Red Circle imprint, the mantle of Fly Girl has been passed to Kim Brand's daughter Kelly Brand.

Powers and abilities

During the initial Archie Comics appearances of the character, Fly-Girl possessed the same roster of magical insect-themed endowments as The Fly: whatever powers the world's insects possessed multiplied to an nth quantity. Later both characters became capable of growing to skyscraper proportions or reducing to the size of an insect. These new powers were to remain during the rest of the Archie Series but were ignored during the Red Circle run.

The DC Comics incarnation of Fly-Girl has no inherent superpowers, giving her Kim Brand persona the strength of a young woman in her prime engaging in moderate-to-strenuous physical exercise. Instead, she relies on an overtly technological suit. As per the original design of the Web Host #22 suit she was given upon accepting the Web Host program, her suit was originally endowed with several abilities, including but not limited to flight, bullet-proof armor, HUD interface connected to a GPS tracker and enhanced strength.,[2] along with an up-link to the Web Lair, enabling The Web to track her and remotely disable her powers.[3]

However, disillusioned by the entire Web Host program, Brand retooled her suit, giving it a new look, eradicating the up-link abilities and enhancing its physical-strength augmentation. She is also shown carrying handheld laser weapons.

References
  1. The Web (Vol. 3) #10
  2. The Web vol. 3, #1
  3. The Web vol. 3, #3
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