Speed Force

Salutations Speed Readers,

Last Saturday McDonald’s started it’s second Batman: Brave and the Bold Happy Meal promotion! Just like the Young Justice Happy Meal promotion from a couple months ago this set will feature two Flash-related characters: Barry Allen’s version of The Flash and Gorilla Grodd, one of the Scarlet Speedster’s greatest villains. Unlike the Young Justice promotion I didn’t feel like dealing with McDonald’s at all. So I went the evilBay route. Unfortunately when I wanted them no one was selling just Grodd and Flash (Since they come in two different sets) so I just went ahead and purchased all eight of the sets. I’m only going to show the Flash-related ones right now but if enough of you want to see the rest I may post them at a future time. Check ‘em out:

The seller was kind enough to include the Happy Meal box along with the sets.

And a couple more pics of Barry and Grodd:

As you can see they didn’t really fill in the details. Flash’s wings on his cowl are just blotches of paint and although they included the lightning details on his forearms and belt they neglected to fill them in with paint. Grodd isn’t that big of a deal, he is just missing some minor details on the helmet which I wouldn’t realistically expect anyway. Also whereas the initial Brave and the Bold line and even the Young Justice line from a couple months ago were fairly large and featured some decent details where it counted, it looks like they opted for quantity over quality this time around and released 24 different toys. Kids get more bang for their buck with three smaller toys in one package instead of just the standard one.

Just for comparison:

Yep, pretty tiny. Still not bad figures, and it is always good to see some more mainstream Flash love.

Anyone else gotten their hands on these guys yet?

Thanks for reading,

-Devin “Flash” Johnson

DC posted more of its Flashpoint writers Q&A on Friday, including Citizen Cold writer/artist Scott Kolins and Grodd of War writer Sean Ryan.

Ryan says of Grodd of War:

Since my one-shot is about one of Flash’s greatest villains, Grodd, the conflict is what does Grodd do without his archenemy. He gets everything he’s ever wanted, but there’s no more challenges in his life. He’s got everything he wants, but he’s miserable.

When asked about his favorite Flashpoint character and a “surprise” character who “will have fans talking,” Kolins says:

I am having so much fun with Cold. Geoff and I have talked many times about how great it would be for Cold to have his own monthly series. Surprise character? Flash fans will be very interested in a mysterious masked character who plays a crucial part in the story.

As for personal stories, “It doesn’t get more personal than CITIZEN COLD. Can a hero with a bad secret fall in love?”

Check out part one, part two and part three from last week, including Scott Kolins’ Flashpoint Rogues, and go onto part four of the interview.

DC has started announcing the full writer/artist teams for the Retro-Active event announced at WonderCon. First up for The Flash: The 1970s.

DC RETROACTIVE: THE FLASH – THE ’70s

Artist Benito Gallego teams up with writer Cary Bates to tell the tale of an evil attack from one of The Flash’s greatest nemeses, Gorilla Grodd. With a plan so twisted and evil launched against him, Barry must not only work to preserve his legacy, but his relationship with his wife, Iris.

ONE-SHOT • On sale JULY 20 • 56 pg, FC, $4.99 US • RATED T

As explained in the Superman announcement, each book will feature a 20-page new story and a 26-page classic story by the same writer.

Update: I just noticed that this is scheduled for the same week as the Showcase Presents collection of Cary Bates’ bronze-age Flash epic, The Trial of the Flash. Now there’s timing!

Update 2: The wording of DC’s solicitation text is slightly different:

In a new tale from classic 1970s writer Cary Bates, Gorilla Grodd unleashes his most ruthless attack yet against his nemesis, The Flash – a plan for revenge so warped and diabolical, it dooms The Scarlet
Speedster to a slow and agonizing fate that will end his heroic career and cause an unspeakable rift between Barry and his wife, Iris!

Plus: Following the 26-page lead story is a classic tale originally published in the ’70s, also written by Cary Bates!

FLASHPOINT: GRODD OF WAR #1
Cover: Francis Manapul
Writer: Sean Ryan
Art: Ig Guara

“Africa belongs to him!”

Well, Grodd’s always wanted to take over the world. It sounds like in the Flashpoint timeline he’s been a bit more successful at it.

One of the one-shots announced at The Source.

Update (June 15): A lot of people are landing here today, since the book just came out. Here’s a more recent article including a link to a preview of the issue.

Hey Speed Readers, it is that time again. However, before I begin I would like to make one thing very clear; I don’t post these entries to brag or show off I simply post them to share. I know that there are other collectors like myself who may not have acquired a certain piece yet or are curious about how it looks out of the box and since I’ve never really been a mint on card collector, I’m happy to oblige them.

With that said I’m going to begin a new set of articles tentatively titled “Off The Shelf”. Basically it will be me finding an older piece or a group of related pieces from my collection and showcasing them since it is hard to do that under the banner of “Recent Acquisitions”. I know the title isn’t very original or memorable but I’m open to suggestions. I just keep the majority of my collectibles on a bookshelf so I thought the title made sense.

Speaking of “Recent Acquisitions” I recently acquired over 20 new collectibles and that means a lot of ground to cover. I’m going to split up the entries to spread out the content a bit and not have a million photos in one post, but this is just the beginning. I’m going to try and get something new up at least twice a week.

Now on to the fun stuff:

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Today’s guest post is the fourth in a series of interviews by Greg Elias on The Art of Speed.

Between stints working the Gotham City beat with Robin, artist Freddie E. Williams II took his talents to Keystone City and the home of the young West family.

First teamed with Mark Waid, Williams hit his stride when Tom Peyer took over as writer.  Ringing in a mind-bending new villain, the wrath of Grodd and the challenges of high-speed fatherhood, Williams and Peyer brought Flash from Keystone to Gorilla City and into the Speed Force.

In addition to his work on Robin, Williams has handled art duties on Seven Soldiers: Mister Miracle, Final Crisis Afterman: Run and JSA All-Stars.  Though his time on Flash interiors ended with issue #246, he contributed the cover to issue #248.

We spoke with Williams via email about his time on Flash, including the design of new villian Spin, the joy of gorillas and learning to love the lightning.  He shared some of his techniques, as well as some original art!

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Some big releases on the DC side of Heroclix for their 75th Anniversary Set coming later this month including several Flash-related releases that are sure to rock the socks off of Flash and Heroclix collectors alike. First up Heroclix.com released a preview yesterday of the Monarch of Motion, Barry Allen in his first solo release in his traditional uniform. We had previously seen him in his dying form from the climax of Crisis on Infinite Earths, his Blue Lantern uniform and even in a few team ups with Wally, Green Lantern, and Superman. But this is the first time we are getting classic Barry and I’m pretty elated.

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Sony has released a set of screenshots from DC Universe Online featuring Gorilla Grodd battling the Flash and other heroes.

Some recent sightings of Flash history around the web.

4thletter!’s 4×4 Elements series looks at what made “Blitz” work.

Two more Flash moments appear in Comics Should Be Good’s list of 75 Memorable Moments in DC History: Barry Allen’s sacrifice in Crisis on Infinite Earths and the first Superman/Flash race.

Bleeding Cool noticed a similarity between the universe-changing conclusion of Spider-Man’s “One More Day” and a story point in Flash’s “Hell to Pay,” and asked, “Where was the outrage when Wally West did the same thing?” Hmm, on one hand you have someone who makes a deal with the devil to retcon away 15 20 years of stories and create a new status quo that has lasted three years so far. On the other hand, you have someone who makes a deal with the devil for the sake of a story, and he finds a way to beat the Devil at his own game the next issue. Yeah, they’re totally the same.

Random Happenstance’s series on 1999′s JLApe event continues with a summary of the Flash installment, featuring Max Monkey and Chimpulse.

The Hooded Utilitarian, after reading Flash: Rebirth, decides to go back and read some Silver-Age Flash starting with Showcase #4.

Remember the Gaslight Flash custom action figure by Sillof? In the time since that post, he’s expanded the Victorian-era Justice League set to include a Gaslight Legion of Doom…which naturally includes Flash villains Captain Cold and Gorilla Grodd.

You can see more pictures of these two, as well as Sinestro, Bizarro, the Joker, Black Manta, and the heroes at Sillof’s Gaslight Justice League & Legion of Doom page.

Image used with permission. Thanks to the Irredeemable Shag of Once Upon a Geek for prompting me to go back and look at these again.