Speed Force

A few time-sensitive bits of news:

Comics Should Be Good will be chatting with former Flash writer Mark Waid next week, and will be asking him questions submitted by fans. Waid, currently the Editor-in-Chief of BOOM! Studios, wrote The Flash through most of the 1990s. Submit your questions by email to bcronin - at - comicbookresources - dot - com by December 9.

Voting is now open for the Flash fan art contest at Comic Bloc. The poll will be open for the next week, closing on December 9.

Finally, Crimson Lightning has launched a new poll for December: Who’s your favorite Rogue? (You can vote from any page on the blog.) He’s also posted the results from the last poll, Who’s your favorite Flash? Voting will be open throughout the month of December.

Superheroes-R-Us has been posting clips from the 1968 record album, Songs and Stories About the Justice League, including the album’s Flash story: “The Three Faces of Mr. Big.”

Ethan Van Sciver’s second Your Time Is Now Mine column is up. No Flash news, just ramblings. Meanwhile, the site talks to Geoff Johns about Superman: Secret Origin.

This week’s Heroes graphic novel, #113: “The Caged Bird” begins the origin story of the show’s morally gray speedster, Daphne Millbrook. (I am waaay behind on these. I’ve read a few here and there, but I really left off somewhere around the start of season 2.)

GamePro is not impressed by the “heroic brutalities” in Mortal Kombat vs. DC Universe, singling out the Flash’s tornado slam to represent them in the 12 Lamest Fatalities in fighting games.

Twenty years ago, William Messner-Loebs started a four-year run on The Flash. Seven years ago, out of work, he and his wife lost their house. Michigan Live writes about how his life has turned around since then. (via The Beat).

Another former Flash scribe, Mark Waid, talks to CBR about his arrival on Spider-Man.

Flash: The Fastest Man Alive “Full Throttle” writer Marc Guggenheim’s TV show Eli Stone has not been renewed beyond the network’s current 13-episode commitment. Update: Newsarama also has an interview about Guggenheim’s “Character Assassination” arc on Amazing Spider-Man

Flash: Iron Heights and Impulse artist Ethan Van Sciver, currently working on Flash: Rebirth, has started a weekly column at Newsarama, Your Time Is Now Mine.

Update: One more: Geoff Johns talks with CBR about bringing the Legion of Super-Heroes to Smallville.

IGN is running an interview, the Geoff Johns Marathon, in which the writer talks about just about everything he’s working on, including Flash: Rebirth (via trmnlvlctyyy at Comic Bloc). Among other things, he writes:

Right now I’m looking at the Flash with Rebirth, and I want to see how I can make this mythology even bigger. It’s already huge. The Flash has an awesome base, so cracking it open even more has been an incredible challenge.

and

The Flash has always been my favorite character since I was a kid. And it’s fun to get back to writing Wally West. I wrote him for five years. To get back to him and then write Barry Allen. Like I said earlier, I get to take what I’ve learned over the last several years writing comics and apply it to the Flash. Because I started writing the Flash almost when I started writing comics, and now I get to look at everything I’ve done to this point and see how I can apply that onto my original work on the character. I want to continue to elevate my writing, and hopefully I’ll achieve that.

Newsarama interviews artist Scott Kolins on Faces of Evil: Grundy, which reunites him with Flash and Final Crisis: Rogues’ Revenge collaborator Geoff Johns.

Finally, MTV’s Splash Page wonders why Grant Morrison can’t talk about a Flash movie, given the number of NDAs he’s signed in connection with various film projects. [Edit: Since the original page has vanished, I'm attaching a quote from the Google cache so you can have a little context. Thanks, Rockin' Rich.]

“Yeah, that’s the kind of thing I can’t talk about,” Morrison said. “Yes, I have talked to them. I’m deeply involved in those discussions. I know what’s going down with all of that, and it’s actually really exciting. But beyond that, I can’t say anything. I wish I could tell you. I’m sure announcements will probably be made at some point, but I can’t say anything.”

Fellow Flash blogger Dixon of Crimson Lightning writes about catching up on his Flash comic index and launching a new feature, “Fast Talk,” all about the technobabble with which the Flashes breeze past the laws of physics.

Wizard Magazine’s 2009 preview, shipping in December, will feature an interview with Geoff Johns in which he talks about Flash: Rebirth. (via Comic Bloc’s BESTBUY)

That Flash neon sign coming in June? Comics Infinity is offering pre-orders for 10% off. (via aeryncrichton)

Aspen Studios’ planned tribute to founder Michael Turner has been making the rounds at The Pulse and elsewhere, and Newsarama has followed up with a short interview with Vince Hernandez.

The Pulse interviews Brea Grant, speedster Daphne from Heroes. Anyone else notice that they still keep dressing her in red?

Finally, Comics Should Be Good has a list of the Top Five Flashes. I’m sure most Flash fans will find something to disagree with in this list.

A few more bits:

Mark Waid appears on tonight’s LA Ink. Should’ve posted this earlier!

Final Crisis Annotations: Rogue’s Revenge #3 completes the series.

Fortress of Baileytude examines Flash Secret Files #1, which reminds me of a couple of past blog posts: Comic Coverage’s parody of an endorsement in Smoking Superheroes, and my response that looked into the slow process of removing Jay Garrick’s smoke break from his origin.

Next month, Graphic Audio is releasing an audio book of the prose novel The Flash: Stop Motion by Mark Schultz.

Everyone seems to be talking about Richard Donner’s suggestion to give the Superman movie franchise to Geoff Johns. (via CBR, Newsarama and more)

As if two Flash comics on one day weren’t busy enough, there was a third Flash released on Wednesday: the a new version of the web animation plugin, Flash 10.

Incidentally, the last 24 hours have been the busiest yet on this blog. Note to self: write more reviews!

Good news for Flash fans in Austin, Texas: Scott Kolins will be signing copies of Final Crisis: Rogues’ Revenge #3 (and anything else fans want to bring) at Austin Comics on Wednesday, October 15, from 4pm to 7pm. More info at Comic Book Conventions.com and at Comic Bloc.

Today’s Lying in the Gutters has a couple of covers from the upcoming Top Cow Velocity series, both by Madame Mirage’s Kenneth Rocafort.

Wizard has a retrospective on Grant Morrison, including his brief run with Mark Millar on The Flash.

In local news, my review of Flash #244 has become the first post on this blog to pass 700 page views.

It’s often fun to look at the weird search terms people sometimes use to reach a site, but for the most part the terms showing up in the log here have been pretty straight-forward. The weirdest is probably “steampunk ambush bug.”

That said, to the reader who searched for “rogues revenge 4 spoilers” — I hope that was a typo, and you meant Rogues’ Revenge #3 (due out this week), because it’s only a 3-issue miniseries.

Newsarama spoke with Ethan Van Sciver at Mid-Ohio Con this weekend, and he talked about Flash: Rebirth. Some highlights:

But this is not just about Barry Allen’s return; this is about the Flash’s rebirth. This is the entire Flash legacy, all of the friends and neighbors, and bringing them all back and giving them a purpose and a new sort of lease on life. So even though Barry Allen has already appeared in Final Crisis, and was brought back in Final Crisis, which saved us a little bit of work, you’ll still see many long-lost friends. And you’ll be happy to see them again — some for the first time in ages.

And on Wally’s new costume:

He will have a very interesting and exciting new costume that will establish his own unique identity in the Flash Universe. When you see it, it will be instantly familiar. Nobody’s going to freak out. It’s not suddenly blue. He’s not reverting to the costume he wore as an infant, or as Kid Flash. It’s just a handy new look that fits right in, just like everything I’ve done. I just try to keep everything so that it looks like I didn’t create it. It was already there.

Howard Porter talks to Newsarama about the injury that nearly destroyed his career, and how driving a school bus helped him start drawing again.

Also at Newsarama, Mark Waid talks about his new comics at BOOM!, including a fourth issue of Potter’s Field.