As hinted at in our review of the issue, Teen Titans #26 reveals at last the New 52 origin of Kid Flash, a.k.a. Bart Allen.
Stop reading now if you don’t want to find out.
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SPOILERS!
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In the pre-Flashpoint DC Universe, Bart Allen was the grandson of Barry Allen and Iris West, born in the 30th century to which his grandparents had relocated. His inherited super-speed caused him to grow rapidly, and he was raised in a virtual reality environment to keep pace with his hyperaccelerated metabolism. His father and aunt were executed on false charges by a corrupt government (it had been infiltrated by Dominators), and his grandmother broke him out of custody and brought him to our present day, where Wally West was able to figure out how to stabilize his metabolism. (This is the long version. You can tell it shorter easily.)
In the New 52 DC Universe, Bar Torr was the son of missionaries killed by the Purifiers, black-ops enforcers of an oppressive government. He witnessed the killing at the age of seven, hiding to protect his baby sister Shira, and their childhood was spent in petty crime on the streets of various planets. Eventually he turned her over to an orphanage for protection, and went on to infiltrate the organization that had killed their parents. He was too young to fight, but a perfect candidate to be an expendable smuggler…until a piloting accident granted him super-speed. He killed a bunch of the Purifiers, then went on to lead a rebellion against the Functionary…until he nearly killed his sister, who had become a soldier on the government side. He abandoned his cause, turned state’s evidence, and in a witness protection program, was sent into the past with a false name and false memories as Bart Allen.
Divergence
At Long Beach Comic Con, Scott Lobdell mentioned that he wanted to change Bart’s origin because the whole point of the New 52 was to be able to deliver something new and different, and he thought that it was important to follow through on that promise even two years into it. Well, he certainly delivered something different.
But I also find it interesting to see which elements he kept:
- From 1000 years in the future.
- Parent(s) killed by a corrupted government.
- Simulated memories up until his arrival in the present day.
To be sure, they’re not the core traits I chose, which is probably why I have trouble seeing him as the same character. I suppose he isn’t, at that: he’s Bar Torr.
Reaction
It’s an interesting enough origin, I suppose, if you’re setting someone up who wants to atone for past deeds…but it could work for any power set. There’s nothing in his story that has any thematic relation to speed. Barry’s and Wally’s origins feature lightning (and Wally’s is related to his dream of being a hero). Jay Garrick’s golden-age origin is fairly generic, but his New 52 origin ties him to the Roman god Mercury. Bart Allen’s classic origin, with the accelerated childhood in VR, ties directly into his speed and his impulsive nature.
The other problem is, the way his history is presented here, it reads as if the rebellion he led was just, and his betrayal of it actually seems worse.
Maybe it’s that I just finished a massive project to re-read and comment on Les Miserables, but it’s like watching Enjolras lead his followers almost to victory, then change his mind because he saw his brother among the soldiers*, and betray everyone at the barricade to save his own skin.
Or imagine that when Luke Skywalker discovered that Darth Vader was his father, he turned on the rebellion and helped the Empire take it down, and spent his life trying to make up for all the people he killed when he blew up the Death Star.
“I have to atone for the fact that I led a rebellion against an oppressive regime” just doesn’t seem like an effective character hook. It only works if you make it clear that the regime was right all along, and neither the framing sequence nor Bart’s narration gives any indication of that. Maybe this isn’t the whole story, and something next issue (or, heck, last issue – I’m not a regular reader of the book) will shed some more light on it.
*Interestingly enough, in the book there’s an implication that one of the soldiers is Enjolras’ brother, and he kills him. It’s perfectly ambiguous as to whether he’s speaking literally or metaphorically.
@SpeedForceOrg that origin bummed me out because it seems like more and more the new 52 are ‘heroes’ trying to atone for past sins. Boring.
Just playing devil’s advocate here for a moment, but how is that any more boring than “I have powers, so let’s go pick fights with supervillains”?
I don’t personally have a problem with either, but IMO anything that helps differentiate Kid Flash from Adult Flash is good: it keeps him from just being “Flash but younger”, which is why I always hated Wally’s origin (but not Wally as a character)
. @SpeedForceOrg looks at Kid Flash’s new origin. I am unimpressed. SPOILERS!
Hmm, cool new origin. “Bart” goes more deeper than we thought.
@SarangaComics @SpeedForceOrg Lobdell strikes again.
It occurs to me that this origin actually solves the “Bart is immune to timeline changes” discrepancy. This isn’t Bart. It’s a new character with his name. The pre-Flashpoint Bart is still a part of the speed force after the events of Kid Flash Lost — unavailable to the rest of the universe, but still unchanged by the alteration of history around him.
Okay, quick fix: Turn Bar Tor into inertia and bring back our Bart from the Speedforce. Oh and have our Bart be the one who fixes the 52 universe!
OMG yes! I couldn’t agree with you more! While there are elements of the New 52 that I find interesting, I just can’t get lost in them like I did with the old universe.
I think the whole bar tor is ridiculous. His power isn’t from the speed force….but a alien energy that is so very similar to the naturally occuring speed force? And they never even bothered to further explain or even try. This was a horrible editorial decision. So stupid. So what some alien made a ship probably a warp speed ship and it crashed and that how he got speed? Why is the warp engine similar to speed force energy? Why why why why.
Ionic One, you’re my favourite – I’ll take that fix. Anything but this bunch of grimdark nonsnse. Lobdell’s reasoning for a new origin assumes that change for the sake of change is good. What we now have is a Bart bathed in blood, tormented by horrible memories, and yes, an illogical idea of what it means to do the right thing – his u-turn makes no sense at all.
Anyone remember that nutty, charming kid who had high school friends, compelling enemies and a sharp-as-a-tack mentor.
My take on why Bar Torr’s rebellion is something to atone for is that the cause was just, but they committed atrocities in the process, on the order of nuking cities full of Functionary-sympathizers. Or at least, that’s what I tell myself to have it make any kind of sense.
Re: Ionic One, it appears that Bar Torr (light spoilers ahead) is both Inertia and Kid Flash. In one of the previous issues, he appeared wearing Inertia’s colors (though in this one, he seems to be going for Cobalt Blue). Perhaps we’ll see time-travel stories that pit Bart vs Bar Torr in a struggle for who gets to define their life.
The only comfort I have is that thanks to Young Justice and Justice League, more people actually know Bart and Wally as they should be rather than as they are (or aren’t, as the case may be) in the comics.
I thought that the representatives of Witness Protection made it clear that, with Bar’s testimony, they also made changes in the Functionary because it was corrupt. So essentially, Bar was responsible for righting the wrongs he did AND that the Functionary had done. I’ll re-read it, but that’s what I remember.
So where’s the real Bart?
He’s immune to changes to the timestream, like Eobard became.
So where are they, so as to fix this new 52 crap?