Tag Archives: Grant Morrison

DC Nation (Friday) – LIVE!

It took me a while to get into this panel, but I’m here now!

Featuring: Dan Didio, Jim Lee, Grant Morisson, Geoff Johns and J. Michael Straczynski with fans dressed as Darkseid, Green Lantern and Wonder Woman.

4:32 Whew- made it in!

4:32 Grant Morrison is talking about the Joel Schumaker Batman movies & liking the “obscene rubber costumes.” Alfred: “I took the liberty, sir….”

4:33 Onstage: Dan Didio, Jim Lee, Geoff JOhns, Grant Morrison, JMS, with Darkseid, a female Green Lantern, and…Gypsy? [edit: it’s new-costume Wonder Woman]

4:34 Batman and the Kathy Kane Batwoman Costume…wait, Batman’s *wearing* the costume?

4:35 Grant’s talking about liking to create new characters for the Batman universe

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Speed Reading: Two Worlds, Comic-Con, Gulf Auction and More

Some Monday morning linkblogging…

Flash…

Comics Should Be Good’s Year of Cool Comics spotlights “Flash of Two Worlds” — or more precisely, the Grant Morrison/Mike Parobeck retelling of the story from Secret Origins #50. The story was recently reprinted in Flash: The Human Race.

Speaking of CSBG, Brian Cronin reviews Flash #1-3 and settles on “delightful.”

Comic-Con…

Will Comic-Con International leave San Diego? Publisher’s Weekly has a good round-up of the situation.

Now that the full schedule for this year’s convention is online, I’ve updated my Flash at Comic-Con post. I’ve also added a couple of items to my Tips for Comic Con.

…and Beyond!

A group of webcomics artists have put together a Web-Comics Auction for the Gulf Coast benefitting the Colbert Nation Gulf of America Fund. (via The Nerdy Bird.)

With ComiXology making waves, Comics Worth Reading checks on the status of other digital comics platforms like Graphic.ly and Longbox.

In light of Death’s upcoming appearance in Action Comics, Comics Alliance rounds up the long history of Sandman and the DC Universe.

Update: Let me add two more here: Collected Editions has worked out the Blackest Night reading order for the trades/hardcovers, and Once Upon a Geek has also taken a stab at Death in the DCU.

Review — Flash: The Human Race

Flash Week continues at Collected Editions with my guest review of Flash: The Human Race. The trade covers the second half of the year-long Grant Morrison/Mark Millar run: The Flash must run in a cosmic race or else the Earth will be destroyed, but even afterward, death comes for him in the form of the Black Flash. Finally, rounding out Grant Morrison’s Flash solo stories is a short from Secret Origins which retells the classic “Flash of Two Worlds” in modern Post-Crisis continuity.

Review: Flash — Emergency Stop

Flash Week continues at Collected Editions with my guest review of Flash: Emergency Stop. The trade covers the first half of the year-long Grant Morrison/Mark Millar run with art by Paul Ryan and covers four stories:

  • Emergency Stop (Flash vs. the Suit)
  • Through the Looking Glass (Flash vs. Mirror Master)
  • Still Life in the Fast Lane (a focus on Jay Garrick)
  • Three of a Kind: Part Three (a courtroom drama dealing with the aftermath of a Flash/Green Lantern/Green Arrow team-up)

Read the review at Collected Editions, or order the book at Amazon.

Surprising Flash Fact: Wally West has More Experience than Barry Allen

I had an odd thought while reading The Flash #2* last week. Francis Manapul draws Barry and Iris in a way that makes them look fairly young, and I remembered someone’s remark that the cowl on Wally West’s new costume makes him look older than Barry, even though Wally used to be Barry’s younger sidekick.

Then it hit me: No, Wally isn’t older than Barry Allen (even with time travel) but when you factor in his earlier Kid Flash career, he actually has more experience than Barry at this point!

No, Really!

Wally West became Kid Flash very early in Barry Allen’s Flash career — only six issues into his solo series! Flash vol.1 started with #105, picking up from where the Golden Age Flash Comics left off, and Wally was struck by lightning in Flash #110, back in 1959. He didn’t retire as Kid Flash until very late in Barry’s career, in New Teen Titans #39 — just one year before Barry vanished in 1985.**

So Wally West has been running around for most of Barry’s career plus his own!

Team Player

During his JLA run, Grant Morrison is one of the few writers I can remember really building on the fact that the original Titans grew up as super-heroes. I don’t recall it being a plot point, but Morrison mentioned it in an interview, or possibly one of the Secret Files books, and it clearly factored into his characterization of Wally West. He might not have been as old as Superman, Batman and Wonder Woman, but he’d been working with a team longer than they had, and he was a consummate professional.

Wally wasn’t the rookie on the team by any stretch. That honor went to Green Lantern Kyle Rayner.

Of course, neither Wally nor Barry can hold a candle to Jay Garrick, who has been speeding since 1940!

*Yes, I do still plan on reviewing it. It was just a busy week, and for some reason, it’s been hard to sit down and write it.

**These are of course the real-world publishing dates. The fictional DC Universe would use a vague “X years ago” timeline that always seems to change, but usually compresses everything from the dawn of the Silver Age onward into a 10-15–year period.