In case you haven’t seen this already…Washington artist Jessica Lynch was filming a rainstorm from her second-floor window last week, when she was struck by lightning. Incredibly, not only was she uninjured, but the camera got the whole thing on video.
Lynch sells T-shirts online at Slow Shirts, and has started offering lightning-bolt temporary tattoos with orders. Wired has an interview.
There is no indication that she gained super-speed from the experience.
ComicMix reports that the 1990 Flash TV series starring John Wesley Shipp has been added to the DC Comics Network on Xbox Live Marketplace. This means you can watch episodes on your Xbox 360.
It was a fun show, one that had its cheesy moments and its dramatic moments, elements that worked and elements that didn’t. I never could understand why Amanda Pays disappeared into occasional-guest-spot limbo after the show ended.
When it finally came out on DVD in 2006, I rewatched it for the first time in years. I was happy to find that most of the things that bothered me about the pilot episode this time through were the same things that had bothered me when I was a teenager watching it for the first time.
I did a little digging around, and found that while the show doesn’t seem to be on iTunes, (it seemed like a good bet, with all the DC animation added recently) it is available as a download from Amazon Unbox. I also managed to find two seasons of Justice League, one season of Super Friends, and Justice League: The New Frontier on Unbox (but, oddly, no sign of Justice League Unlimited).
(Thanks to Esteban Pedreros for reminding me I need to post this!)
The Flash (or Kid Flash) appears in two DVD sets being released this week, as well as one upcoming release and a whole set of digital downloads.
The review by Comics Worth Reading reminds me that Teen Titans season 5 is out on DVD this week. This features the episode, “Lightspeed,” in which the animated version of Kid Flash goes up against the Hive Five and makes a special connection with Jinx. While it’s never been made clear just how Teen Titans relates to Justice League Unlimited, they did cast Michael Rosenbaum, the voice of the Flash on that series, as Kid Flash.
I’ve got this one on pre-order. At the time it aired, I wasn’t watching the show, but I made a point to watch “Lightspeed” and enjoyed it. I’ve since seen the other 4 seasons on DVD, and I’m really looking forward to seeing the fifth.
Comic Bloc poster BESTBUY points out that The Batman season 5 (2007-2008) is also out this week, featuring several episodes with the Justice League as well as “A Mirror Darkly,” in which Batman and Robin team up with the Flash against Mirror Master.
He also mentions the upcoming DVD release of DC Superheroes: The Filmation Adventures, set for August 12. These are cartoons from 1967, featuring DC’s classic cast of heroes, the Flash included. I’ve never seen them myself — my experience with DC-based animation starts with the early 1980s and Super-Friends. From what I understand, these originally aired as part of The Superman/Aquaman Hour of Adventure. Update: Check out my review of these cartoons.
Finally, Blog@Newsarama reports that iTunes now has a number of classic DC cartoons, including Super Friends and Season 2 of Superman: The Animated Series. That’s the season that includes “Speed Demons,” the episode that introduced the DCAU Flash in 1997.
Thinking about it, it was probably Super Friends that first introduced me to DC’s heroes. I certainly was watching the show long before I started reading comics. I remember very little of the cartoons now, except for the general tone, and a few moments like Superman trying to pronounce Mxytzptlk, or me getting confused as to why Cyborg’s voice was so high in the commercial (by the time he was introduced, I’d started reading The New Teen Titans) — it turned out they’d run one of Wonder Woman’s lines over a picture of his face. And while I remembered the additional super-heroes like Apache Chief and Samurai, I’d completely forgotten the standard Hanna Barbera additions like Wendy and Marvin, or the Wonder Twins and Gleek, until I started reading commentary about the show online a decade later. I still can’t bring to mind any of their voices, though I imagine Marvin sounding like Shaggy from Scooby Doo