Speed Force

With issue #6 hitting stands today, the Flash creative team of Francis Manapul and Brian Buccellato are featured in two new interviews, one over at Newsarama and the other at PopMatters.

The Newsarama piece discusses the reintroduction of Captain Cold, the new character Turbine, as well as the vision for Speed Force as it appears New 52 version of Flash.  They also discuss the pacing of the title, noting stories will be told in one-to-two issue sets for the next few months.  The article features preview pages from issue #6, out today, as well as the first announcement of a new Flash Annual, due before issue #12 hits stands.

On their upcoming portrayal of the Speed Force:

Manapul: Inside the speed force itself will be quite different. I think before, it’s always been portrayed as just these speed lines and light and stuff like that. We really want to make it a world that’s fully realized, you know? And when the Flash enters this world, we want the readers to be in awe just as much as Barry Allen is.

It’s really going to be quite different visually.

More after the jump, including selections from a new interview with PopMatters.

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Hey Speed Readers,

Beginning today, February 20th, 2012, participating Sonic Restaurants nationwide will begin offering Justice League Tots along with their Wacky Pack Kid’s Meals. The website specifically states that the Justice League Tots are only available with the purchase of a kid’s meal, but I went to McDonald’s a few times when they were running the Young Justice promotion and just purchased them straight up without buying the kid’s meal. So that may be a possibility.

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Bleeding Cool has just posted a report from this weekend’s Megacon in Orlando, Florida.  Within, there appears to be the first acknowledgement of a possible return of Wally West in the New 52 DCU:

That led us to a young man that asked about Wally West…[DC's Dan Didio and Eddie Berganza] said because there were de-aging Barry, they didnt want him to be the same age as Wally. Plus they didnt want to take away Wally’s kids and family or make him a teenager again, especially with Bart already in that role…Their answer was that they are simply focusing on establishing the characters they started out with in this new 52, but not saying those other characters don’t exist or aren’t around in some way. They understand that everyone’s character is someone’s favorite. They just ask us Wally and Donna [Troy] fans to be a bit more patient with them and those characters will be seen once more.

Haven’t seen this corroborated elsewhere as of yet, but it is still early in the day.  Watch this space for more!

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

The Fwoosh has the first look at the San Diego Comic Con 2010 Exclusive Starro the Conqueror set featuring the original Justice League of America. This of course includes Barry Allen, the second Flash:

Big surprise from what I was expecting. Compared to past Infinite Heroes offerings this one takes the cake, especially in terms of articulation. The Fwoosh has more photos of the complete set at their site. You can get to the main article HERE.

-Devin “The Flash” Johnson

With only two weeks left in the contest, I’d like to take some time to highlight some of the entries we’ve received so far and will all be passed on to Arrobasilver for consideration:

Ryan cleverly combined elements of the Blue Lantern and The Flash:

While Adam Komar from Conroe, TX had the interests of those conflicted between light and dark in mind with his concept:

Cape Sandlin incorporated a variation of The Flash logo itself into a modest but visually stunning piece of work:

And Aaron Rivin Rivin took a more traditional approach to his concept: [Edit: Images removed because they were plagiarized (see comments).]

Kevin Allen from Rochester, MI described his concept as: “This is a ring he would wear when giving an interview, or at the opening of a new wing of the Flash Museum. It is a ring he would only take out for super important events. As such, it takes some of the elements of his normal ring, but also adds a few style choices to make it look more regal and important.”

And Joey Forlini delivers with a simple yet engaging piece framed with elements of The Fastest Man Alive.

And that’s only a few of the great submissions we have so far. Thanks for all the entries. I look forward to seeing even more of all your great work, so get those submissions in while you still can. You can visit the Official Contest Page HERE for details on submissions and such.

-Devin “The Flash” Johnson