Monthly Archives: April 2009

Flash Signings for Free Comic Book Day

Free Comic Book Day

Saturday, May 2 is Free Comic Book Day, and comic stores around the world (okay, mostly in the US) are holding events with guests from the comics industry.  I’ve put together a list of all the Flash and Impulse-related appearances I could find:

United States

Arizona

  • Geoff Johns and Ethan Van Sciver sign at Atomic Comics in Mesa

California

  • Mark Waid and Marc Guggenheim sign at Collector’s Paradise in Winnetka from noon-3pm
  • Mark Guggenheim will also appear at Meltdown Comics in Los Angeles from 4-7pm.
  • Todd Nauck (Young Justice) signs at 4 Color Fantasies in Rancho Cucamonga

Florida

  • Paul Pelletier signs at Heroes Haven in Tampa

Maryland

  • Greg LaRocque signs at Super Villains Comic Shop in Baltimore

New York

Canada

  • Ken Lashley (Flash: The Fastest Man Alive) signs at Comic Connection in Hamilton, Ontario

Notes

The FCBD website has a list of more creator signings on Saturday. I may have missed some Flash-related names.

Free Comic Book Day

Review: Final Crisis: Legion of Three Worlds #4

Legion of Three Worlds #4

Yes, it’s actually here! This issue is a lot more story-focused than the last few, which I remember being more about showing the war between the Superman and the three Legions of Super-Heroes on one side and Superboy Prime and the Legion of Super-Villains on the other.

First: the art. It’s George Frelling Pérez. Do I really need to say anything more? Didn’t think so. The book looks fantastic.

The big events:

1. Following through on last issue’s resurrection of Bart Allen. We get a touching reunion between Bart and his cousin Jenni Ognats (XS of the reboot Legion), and Geoff Johns once again shows that he’s found Bart’s voice at last. (Quoting Disney’s Aladdin in the 31st century: absolutely perfect.) We also get some mumbo-jumbo about why Bart returned as a teenager instead of an adult, which doesn’t really make any sense (or fit with what we saw during 52 and Flash: The Fastest Man Alive, but then it’s not as if that’s been particularly consistent to begin with.)

2. Another hero returns from the dead, revealing that the Legionnaires in The Lightning Saga had at least two objectives to their time travel mission.

3. A major character’s true identity is revealed again, and it’s not the same identity as last time. (Shades of Monarch, there.)

Overall, I found it a better read than the earlier issues of the series, because it was much less scattered. I do get a sense that Geoff Johns is treating the “other” legions as expendable, making it possible to kill off “major characters” and still keep the “originals” around.

A couple of spoilery notes behind the cut: Continue reading

Flash: Rebirth #2 Preview and Alternate Cover

DC has posted a 6-page preview and both the standard and alternate covers for next week’s Flash: Rebirth #2 to The Source.

Flash: Rebirth #2 (Standard Cover) Flash: Rebirth #2 (Alternate Cover)

Read on at The Source!

Edit: Does anyone else remember the Wonder Woman Plus Jesse Quick one-shot? In it, Savitar’s former acolyte, Christina, sought revenge against him by trying to “rob him of his victory” and pull him out of the speed force against his will.

This Week (April 29): Legion of Three Worlds, JSA, Deathtrap, Rebirth #1 Reprint

It’s a big week! After months of delays, Final Crisis: Legion of Three Worlds #4 finally comes out, showing the return of Bart Allen. (He actually showed up at the end of #3). Geoff Johns’ last issue of Justice Society of America also comes out, as does the third part of the big Titans crossover, “Deathtrap.” Rounding the week out is the second printing of Flash: Rebirth #1, which sold out at the beginning of the month. Issue #2 comes out next week.

Final Crisis: Legion of Three Worlds #4

Written by Geoff Johns.
Art by George Pérez & Scott Koblish.
Covers by George Pérez

Don’t miss this issue as lightning strikes again in the DC Universe! The Crisis of the 31st century continues as a great hero falls and another returns to help Superman and the Legion combat the murderous Superboy-Prime! Meanwhile, the Time Trapper makes his move against the three Legion founders, Polar Boy’s bizarre mission comes to an end and Superman makes a shocking discovery that will redefine the terms of this war.

Notes: It’s finally coming out! Also, we saw Bart Allen return to life as Kid Flash at the end of issue #3, so with any luck, this issue will shed a little light on why he’s a teenager again.

Justice Society of America #26

Justice Society of America #26Written by Geoff Johns
Art by Dale Eaglesham & Nathan Massengill
Covers by Alex Ross

Featuring three painted covers by Alex Ross depicting the entire Justice Society of America! In a very special day-in-the-life story of the JSA titled “Black Adam Ruined My Birthday,” the team celebrates the birthday of one of their own — Stargirl! Don’t miss this momentous issue.

Retailers please note: This issue will ship with three covers by Alex Ross that can be ordered separately. Please see the Previews Order Form for more information.

32 pg, FC, $2.99 US

Teen Titans #70

Teen Titans #70Written by Sean McKeever
Art by Joe Bennett & Jack Jadson
Cover by Andrew Robinson

“Deathtrap” Part 3 of 5! Straight from the pages of Vigilante #5, the team gets roped into Jericho’s insane plot to take out both Titans teams. But how can they fight back against a menace who can possess their bodies? Continued in Titans #13, on sale in May!

32 pg, FC, $2.99 US

The Flash: Rebirth #1 (Second Printing)

Flash: Rebirth #1 (thumbnail)Written by Geoff Johns
Art and covers by Ethan Van Sciver

Through the decades, many heroes have taken the mantle of The Flash, but they all ride the lightning that crackles in the wake of the greatest hero the DC Universe has ever known, the man who sacrificed himself to save the Multiverse: Barry Allen!

Following the events of Final Crisis, Barry has beaten death and returned to a fast-paced world that a man out of time wouldn’t recognize. Or is it a world that is only just now catching up? All the running he’s done before was just a warmup for the high-speed race that he and every other Flash must now run, because even though one speedster might have beaten death, another has just turned up dead! From Geoff Johns and Ethan Van Sciver, the visionaries responsible for the blockbuster Green Lantern: Rebirth and The Sinestro Corps War, comes the start of an explosive and jaw-dropping epic that will reintroduce to the modern age the hero who single-handedly birthed the Silver Age of comics! DC history will be made, and the Flash legacy will be redefined!

1 of 5 · 40 pg, FC, $3.99 US

Notes: I’ve talked about this at length (as has just about everyone else!). Check out my review of the issue, or contribute to the open speculation thread.

As usual, there’s a possibility that a Flash will show up in Trinity.

Farewell, Geocities

After years of rumors, Yahoo has finally decided to close Geocities sometime this year.

I can’t say I’ll miss GeoCities itself — but there are still a lot of sites connected to comics fandom hosted there. Some are kept current, some are old but still contain useful information, and some are snapshots of an earlier era of online fandom

It was a time before MySpace and Twitter and Facebook. Before Google and Wikipedia. Before “weblog” was shortened to “blog,” back when discussions took place not on forums but on IRC, newsgroups and mailing lists, and even having an email address meant you were kind of weird. Everyone with a website belonged to 2 or 3 webrings, fan sites handed out awards to each other regularly, and Jonah Weiland’s name always appeared in front of “Comic Book Resources.” It was still worth asking your local store for a copy of Comic Shop News, because it wasn’t just a digest of last month’s Newsarama articles.

At the time I started Flash: Those Who Ride the Lightning (on a server provided by my college) in the mid-1990s, a lot of comics fan sites were on Geocities, including several that I helped out with. The first profiles I made of Flash villains were written for the long-gone Scarlet Speedster website, and I remember contributing bios to an Impulse site at one point as well.

Of course fan sites appear and disappear all the time. I watched a lot of fan sites die out during the late 1990s as people graduated from schools, started jobs, went into the military or just stopped posting. As various Flash sites fell by the wayside, I expanded the scope on my own site to fill the gaps they left. (Evidently I had too much time on my hands.) After a while it was kind of a last-site-standing situation, until Dixon relaunched Crimson Lightning (originally a review site) as a blog a few years ago. It’s nice to see a resurgence of Flash fan sites lately.

As for the sites still on Geocities today: some, especially the ones that are still active, will no doubt move over the next few months. Others will simply vanish, taking with them a piece of fandom history.