Flash #12
Written by Geoff Johns
Illustrated by Francis Manapul and Scott Kolins“The Road to Flashpoint” concludes as everything Barry Allen knows and cares about is lost. What is the Flashpoint? Find out in the upcoming FLASHPOINT #1!
Flashpoint #1
Written by Geoff Johns
Illustrated by Andy KubertNot a dream, not an imaginary story, not an elseworld. This is Flash Fact: When Barry Allen wakes at his desk, he discovers the world has changed. Family is alive, loved ones are strangers, and close friends are different, gone or worse. It’s a world on the brink of a cataclysmic war — but where are Earth’s Greatest Heroes to stop it? It’s a place where America’s last hope is Cyborg, who hopes to gather the forces of The Outsider, The Secret 7, S!H!A!Z!A!M!, Citizen Cold and other new and familiar-yet-altered faces! It’s a world that could be running out of time, if The Flash can’t find the villain who altered the time line!
I think it’s fair to say that anyone following this site will know that we have been rather deriding of Geoff Johns’ last endeavor, Brightest Day (and, to an extent, Blackest Night). On top of that, anyone following the site will know our dismay at the news that the Flash #12 would be the last issue, instead of letting the book be it’s own series. I personally was rather vocal in my disappointment that a potentially great title was instead being bogged down by an event lead-in so quickly after Johns’ last event, as opposed to giving new readers some time to acclimate with Barry as the Flash and to learn more about the Flash Speed Corps.
However, I have never been one to turn down a flashy event – pun intended.
Click after the cut to find out if a hypothetical door closing really does mean a hypothetical window opens.
Ok, so before we begin let’s establish a status quo. 1) I love the Flash. I used to think that running was a silly super power, but then I read a TON of Flash books and changed my mind. Now he’s one of my favorite characters at DC. 2) I really enjoyed Flash: Rebirth and the first arc of the latest volume, despite all the impressive delays. 3) I used to be a huge Geoff Johns fan, but the disappointment and annoyance from Blackest Night to Brightest Day have left me a tad bit jaded, and my excitement for Flashpoint could not be lower.
Well. That certainly turned out for the better. But that’s starting at the ending. Let’s start the beginning!
We’ll start off by taking a look at the finale to the Flash. The Flash ending at #12 is something that just should not have happened. The book was supposed to bring Barry Allen back into the DCU with triumphant form, and truly justify why he deserved to be the Flash more than Wally, or even Bart. A lot of fans felt jaded that the Flash they grew up reading was being replaced by a Flash who had one of the most significant deaths in comic book history before I was born. Justification was not just wanted – it was needed.
Unfortunately, by pushing the character into an event, Johns never ended up doing this. The Flash had a great premise with Barry using his CSI/Detective skills in crime fighting, but as it turns out this whole arc was just a prelude to Flashpoint, with the villain being Zoom disguised as a child. This has been a rather common complaint with some of Johns recent writing, but the whole situation is INCREDIBLY telegraphed: Zoom is the villain? Not shocking at all. Zoom is going to cause Flashpoint? Again, not shocking. While we might know “nothing” about Flashpoint, there are still some very obvious elements to it that we already know about, with Zoom being a distinct part of that. So despite Barry’s famous CSI skills, it turns out he couldn’t figure out what was staring the reader right in the face since Time Masters: Vanishing Point and Flash #8.
Continued belowThat’s not to say that the issue was all that bad. Our new hero from a parallel universe has a nice fight with Zoom, and when read in succession the Flash finale is a rather great lead-in to Flashpoint, with a lot of the open ended threads immediately having a pay-off. The general problem here is that Johns, a creator who brought a character back from the dead and gave him so much love and affection he became almost as popular (if not more so) as the Batman, has essentially just thrown the Flash away. This comic is all flash and no real substance (pun obviously intended). The scripted fight scenes and snappy dialogue make for a comic that reads in the same vein that a mindless summer action blockbuster like Flash Five plays on the screen. Yes, cool things are happening, but you’re not going to leave the story really caring about the characters (unless you did beforehand). You just take what you can get.
One of the bad things about the Flash ended up working out for the best, however. Due to all the delays (that Manapul explained were out of his control), Scott Kolins came in to collaborate with Johns again, and he did a tremendous job. In fact, anyone who has read Johns’ previous (and very character-oriented) run on the Flash will probably already be fans of Kolins. This just goes to reinforce that. Kolins has evolved a lot over the years as an artist, now showing off a much more three-dimensional style that really brings the artistic creations to life in the title. Kolins, who gets the privilege of illustrating Zoom in full “freak out” mode, easily balances the Speedsters intense dynamic in a much more updated fashion, showing off three characters who move faster than the reader’s eyes can follow. While Manapul comes in at the end to take over the final moments between Barry and Iris, it’s really Kolins that is the true hero of this title. This is a great looking book, and as someone who is a huge fan of the work Kolins and Johns did ten years ago it’s great to see the team back together.
Now we can move on to Flashpoint.
Flashpoint is perhaps the surprise issue of the year. I don’t feel it’s editorializing too much to note my massive excitement for Marvel’s Fear Itself and utter disinterest in Flashpoint, if only because this goes to illustrate my point when I say that I really enjoyed Flashpoint.
Flashpoint begins after the fact – Barry wakes up and the world simply is. Since the Flash was the prelude to Flashpoint, Flashpoint simply gets to begin with a brief “reminder” of who Barry is and why he matters before launching straight into the new world order. And what a world it is! To put it lightly, Brightest Day felt like a heck of a lot of regression for the DCU as a whole, playing off of things that were already comfortable and familiar for the readers without really bringing anything new to the table for the various characters who returned. Flashpoint, on the other hand, is just pure imagination. Since this is a brand new reality with brand new rules, it allows Johns and Kubert to fully redesign the DCU, changing the characters and their powers, as well as adding in a few new ones. There are new characters, new rules, and reading Flashpoint is very much like getting into DC for the first time – everything is brand new, albeit eerily familiar.
One of the biggest parts of Flashpoint already is simply trying to figure out what’s going on with a lot of the characters. The Flash has never existed in this world, and – just as the banner says – everything has changed. Shazam is no longer one hero, but a group of kids who all form into one powerful God with a kick-ass tiger. This is arguably the single most interesting done to Shazam and his extended family since 52, and the same can be said for various other characters that appear. The Enchantress appearance even goes so far as to offer a tiny little nod to a previous Johns story that some of you may remember called Day of Judgement, which is an amusing thing to see here. We’ve also got characters like Farooq and the Outsider, whom we’ve never even seen before, just jumping into the pages of the title as if we’ve known them for years, which adds an extra added dimension to the title. Not only are we seeing characters we know and love reimagined, but we’re also getting some brand new characters to go along for the ride, some of whom may have a lasting effect in the DCU – and honestly, new characters is what DC really needs right now.
Continued belowThis is probably the biggest and best part of Flashpoint: it is SHOW, as opposed to just TELL. There was always the possibility that, in a world where new readers are king, DC and Johns would spend far too much trying desperately to explain why there is a new world, as opposed to just having it happen. This is going to be a short event with a gratuitous amount of tie-ins, so since DC isn’t going to be spending long in the Flashpoint universe there was a fear that through the character of Barry Allen, the narrative of the title would focus on Barry continuously asking people what’s going on and then having Character X explain for three panels why something has happened. No. The things that have happened already have happened, and we only learn new plot elements because Barry (or Batman, to be honest) stumbles across them with information that character has never been given before. Yes, there is exposition in regards to the new world, but it’s not an obnoxious play-by-play that drives a point home that can be gleaned from reading the first five pages.
Of course, the double edged nature of that is that some of the enjoyment of Flashpoint is still rather contingent on the reading of the Flash previously. While Flashpoint is certainly accessible for anyone who might happen to wander into the comic shop accidentally, there are some major scenes and moments – specifically with Barry’s mother – that are really only that much more powerful if you saw Thawne taunt Barry about it incessantly in the Flash #12. Further moments as Barry realizes this is not his world are also pay-offs for dangling threads from the Flash finale, specifically the date that all of this happens, a rather large moment left open between Barry and Iris at the end of Flash which ends up being rather sad in the pages of Flashpoint. Its basically along the lines of the old saying about having to trudge through mud to get to the better land.
Flashpoint as a whole is much better in the creator department than other recent outings. Johns has done a much better job at writing this than the Flash, and that’s based solely on one issue. The Flash was easily telegraphed, but Flashpoint less so. Yes, we know that things will be different, but so far everything in Flashpoint ended up being a pleasant surprise. As much as I love to pretend I could’ve seen a lot of it coming, the title and it’s alt-universe persona does end up being very fresh. One of the unfortunate things about comics in general is that when you read so much of them so frequently, it all begins to blur together in familiar patterns. Since Flashpoint’s whole purpose is to be starkly different and contained to itself, it actually ends up being that much more entertaining due to how unpredictable it is, and its the first thing Johns has written since the Sinestro Corps War days that really feels as exciting as you know he can do.
Meanwhile, Andy Kubert is just killing it in the art department. The Kubert name is a famous and prolific name indeed, and if you see any Kubert’s name on a title you’re basically obligated from a love of the medium to grab it. This is no exception to the rule. The title is gorgeous. DC gives the book extra pages to really let Kubert go to town on some splashes, from the opening hero parade to Batman swinging through casinos to our collection of alt-world heroes gathered on a roof – it’s all filed with hyperactive detail and a great eye for the visual medium. Kubert even manages to nail some emotional scenes that had really been visually lacking in the regular Flash title, with Barry’s reunion with his mother – a scene that could’ve really fell flat – playing off incredibly well thanks to the layouts Kubert provides, with heavy emphasis on the main reunion really delivering. This is a brand new world, with brand new toys to play with, and Kubert has the exciting opportunity to really design his toy box here. It’s pretty special to watch a creator go to town like that, especially as much as a talented guy like he does.
Continued belowIt’s a long and sort of roundabout way of saying it, but the long story short of it is that this is the way to begin an event. Just as Fear Itself brought all of it’s major players and mysteries right to the forefront with an oversized issue, Flashpoint gives you a couple extra pages to show us our new world, establish that it’s odd, and then bring things together at the end for a nice one-two punch for fans with a great cliffhanger. The downfall of Blackest Night ended up being that Johns kept relying on “game changing” cliffhangers per issue, and it got over-done rather quickly. If Flashpoint can maintain it’s pace for the entire five issues like this, leaving all the excess elements for the gratuitous amounts of mini’s that are coming out, Flashpoint could really work to help get an extra splash of outbound creativity into DC, a universe that has become rather known for trying to pull things back to basics. It’s exactly what I wanted to see.
So what are we left with? The Flash was ultimately full of disappointment, as Flash: Rebirth promised a lot of future stories that we may never see now. However, as much as I would prefer the Flash ongoing to continue on, or to even have Flashpoint just happen in the pages of Flash, the actual first-issue of the mini has ended up being a good pay-off. Pushing through the Flash helped improve the reaction to Flashpoint, and getting to read a story that basically lives solely in the re-inventive land of “alternate reality land” is exciting to a reader who has gotten a tad bored of the same old day-in day-out superhero existence. Not to bash the genre, but as fun as superhero comics are (and I will continue reading them forever), they do get to a point in some cases where a title or franchise just seems repetitive, or even “safe.” Flashpoint doesn’t feel safe at all, and that is what makes it exciting.
I suppose we will see what happens. I had high hopes for the return of Barry Allen, and while I’m not sure exactly what’s coming (and really, who does?), Flashpoint should certainly be very fun to watch unfold. I just wish it didn’t come out at the expense of an ongoing title DC should always have in their arsenal.
Final Verdict: Flash – 5.0/Flashpoint – 7.5
