Quick Hits: Flash Actors in Dallas, Help Moose Baumann & More

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Some items of Flash-related news.

Colorist Moose Baumann, whose work can be seen on the iconic cover for The Flash: Rebirth #1, is is selling prints of his work to raise money to cover medical expenses for his wife’s cancer treatments. (via That F’ing Monkey and Comics Alliance)

Actors John Wesley Shipp (Barry Allen) and Amanda Pays (Tina McGee) from the 1990 Flash TV series will be appearing at Dallas Comic Con this weekend.

Comic Book Movie reports that the Flash’s home town of Central City will be mentioned in the Green Lantern movie. (via @johnnywellens)

Interview: Cary Bates on Flash, 1979-1985 – Part One

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One of the seminal writers in DC Comics’ history, Cary Bates has crafted adventures featuring comics’ greatest characters for all or part of six decades.  From his years as one of the main Superman scribes to 2010’s The Last Family of Krypton, he has left his mark on the world’s finest superheroes, experimenting with the genre and storytelling to stunning effect.

His first Flash story, 1968’s “The Flash – Fact or Fiction,” has been collected numerous times among the Greatest Flash Stories Ever Told.  But that tale is, literally, just the beginning.  After taking over as full-time writer in 1971 with Flash #209, Bates spent an amazing 14 years on the title until its cancellation in 1985.  He also authored the memorable Flash stories featured in Adventure Comics and the DC Special Series in the late 1970s.

With Showcase Presents: The Trial of the Flash set for a July release, we’ve been running annotations of Bates’ Flash issues that laid the groundwork for the Trial story and the final years of The Flash.  We’ll take a break over the next two weeks to hear from the man himself, and learn how he took a character ensconced in Silver Age sensibilities and created an emotionally-charged super-saga far ahead of its time.

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Contest: Where Was Wally West? Week Six

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With Flashpoint upon us, Flash fans across the country have been asking the same question: “Where is Wally West?”

While we do not know where Wally is now, where he will be, or how long it will be until he is anywhere, we certainly know where he was!  With that knowledge, we present the latest installment in our ongoing contest feature, “Where Was Wally West?”

On Wednesdays, we will post a panel or sequence from a classic comic featuring Wally West visiting an alternate reality, the past or a “possible future”.  Every fan who can tell us the issue, writer, artist(s) and a reasonable description of the locale/era, by Friday, will be entered into a raffle for a cool Flash prize!

Just send your responses to this email address (whereswally at speedforce dot org), and we’ll announce the winner on Monday!

So check out the image below and ask yourself, “WWWW?”.

This week’s prize is the Flash: Terminal Velocity TPB. Winners must live in the continental US or Canada.

Flash Sales Level Off in April 2011

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ICv2 has posted their sales estimates for April, and The Flash volume three appears to be leveling out at around 55,000 copies an issue…just in time to get canceled for Flashpoint. Both issues landed in the top 20 comics for the month.

For comparison, Flash: The Fastest Man Alive bottomed out at 46K before climbing slightly to 47K, then getting a Countdown-infused sales boost for the final issue, while the post-Countdown relaunch dropped to around 26K before it was canceled to make way for Flash: Rebirth.

So despite the delays, and despite the Flashpoint-induced “cancellation,” this seems to be the most successful Flash relaunch in 5 years by numbers alone. Looking at sales rankings, it’s been consistently in the top 20 — something that hasn’t been true of The Flash in a long time.

I think the credit can be summed up in two words: Geoff Johns. The Flash vol.2 took a big hit when Mark Waid left, dropping from 40K to below 30K when this virtually unknown writer took over, but Johns slowly built up the readership until it hit around 50K when he left. (Then DC decided to cancel the series, printed a fill-in that had been sitting on the shelf and commissioned a 4-issue “finale” that dropped rapidly to 40K, thus giving legions of fans the mistaken impression that it had been canceled for sales.)

Issue Rank Month Units Sold % Change
Flash v.3 #1 2 April 2010 100,903
Flash v.3 #2 12 May 2010 76,560 (-24.1%)
Flash v.3 #3 11 June 2010 68,799 (-10.1%)
Flash v.3 #4 15 July 2010 64,832 (-5.8%)
Flash v.3 #5 14 September 2010 62,063 (-4.3%)
Flash v.3 #6 15 November 2010 57,673 (-7.1%)
Flash v.3 #7 12 December 2010 56,304 (-2.4%)
Flash v.3 #8 18 December 2010 53,975 (-4.1%)
Flash v.3 #9 9 February 2011 55,980 (+3.7%)
Flash v.3 #10 18 April 2011 54,953 (-1.8%)
Flash v.3 #11 19 April 2011 54,633 (-0.6%)

In other speedster news, Velocity #4 sold an estimated 5,247 copies, almost exactly the number sold of issue #3. Apparently those who were reading the book were committed, regardless of delays.

This Week: Flash by Geoff Johns Omnibus, vol.1

When Geoff Johns relaunched The Flash with Flash: Rebirth, readers wondered why DC had let most of his first run on the series go out of print. Then they announced a new, high-quality hardcover reprint series. The first volume comes out this week.

The Flash Omnibus by Geoff Johns

Written by GEOFF JOHNS ; Art by ANGEL UNZUETA, DOUG HAZLEWOOD, SCOTT KOLINS, ETHAN VAN SCIVER and others; Cover by SCOTT KOLINS

The first in a series of hardcover volumes that collect all of the best-selling issues of THE FLASH written by comics superstar Geoff Johns, beginning with issues #164-176, plus THE FLASH: OUR WORLDS AT WAR #1, THE FLASH: IRON HEIGHTS and THE FLASH SECRET FILES #3!

In this volume, Wally West finds himself without his super speed in a darker, mirror version of Keystone City. Can a powerless Flash defeat Captain Cold and Mirror Master to save the city he loves? Plus, The Flash is shocked to learn that a strange cult is killing all the people he has ever rescued. Featuring art by fan-favorites Ethan Van Sciver, Scott Kolins and more!

DC Universe – 448pg. – Color – Hardcover – $75.00 US

Thoughts: The price is steep, but from what I’ve heard, it’s in line with the paper and binding quality on these books. It’s basically a double-length Archive book, and those typically sell for $50.

The contents were previously collected in the trade paperbacks Wonderland and Blood Will Run. To the best of my knowledge, this is the first time that the Flash: Our Worlds At War special has been collected.

Buy it from your local comic shop this week, or order it from Amazon next week!

Brightest Day White Lantern Flash Available Online *UPDATED*

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Hello, Speed Readers. Just a couple updates on the Graphitti Designs Convention Exclusive Brightest Day White Lantern Flash Action Figure courtesy of Action Figure Insider. Some good news and some bad news.

The good news is that the figure is now available on Graphitti Designs official webpage, Graphittidesigns.com. The figure is 20 dollars and is only available in limited quantities. Great news for those who could not get out to C2E2 or Wondercon to get them the first time.

Unfortunately this also means that they will not be available at the upcoming San Diego Comic Con or New York Comic Con as DC Direct exclusives. So if you were patiently waiting for these chances to grab the figure you may have to seize the day now and get one while the getting is good. The price for the figure on eBay floats between 40 and 140 dollars so I would suggest getting it from Graphitti now.

Anyone planning on picking one up now that they are available online?

 

****UPDATE****

It looks like Graphitti Designs have officially sold out of their stock of White Lantern Flash Action Figures as the link I posted earlier this morning now points to a unavailable product page. Sorry for those that missed out. Anyone else manage to snag one before they sold out?

 

–Devin “Flash” Johnson