Tag Archives: Wally West

Linkage: Ethan Van Sciver on the Future of Wally West

CBR reports on last week’s Spotlight on Ethan Van Sciver at Comic-Con. Among other things, he talked about redesigning Wally West’s costume and how he sees the personalities of Barry Allen and Wally West.

“I’m redesigning Wally West’s costume right now, and it’s terrifying.” While Sinestro’s costume, with its seemingly random blue color and “jester collar,” was ready for a redesign in Van Sciver’s eyes, “Wally West is the most perfectly designed costume ever, aside from Green Lantern’s costume, in my opinion.” Van Sciver said the challenge was to redo the costume without either making it less cool or more cool than Barry Allen’s and thus implying that one character is better than the other.

“I want Barry to come back and be King Arthur. He’s the most straight-laced, perfect Flash, rigid in his morality and his ethics,” making the looser, cooler, more laid-back Wally a Lancelot figure. Van Sciver told the audience “Kick me in the ass if I fail.”

So there’s at least some hope for Wally fans that he won’t be totally shoved off to the side. Maybe.

On the other hand, he also confirmed that the monthly Flash series will “stop” for Flash: Rebirth. How it will be relaunched afterward — picking up where it left off, or where Barry’s series left off — or with a new #1 — he wouldn’t say.

Flash Companion Preview: Mike Baron Interview

The following is a 1-page excerpt from the new book, The Flash Companion. The full interview appears in the second section of the book. It is printed here with permission of the book’s main author, Keith Dallas.

The Flash Companion will be available at the TwoMorrows booth at Comic-Con International this week, and should arrive in stores either next week or the week after. Orders through Amazon are shipping now.

Mike Baron: Wally West’s Fast Living (excerpt)

By Keith Dallas

DALLAS: It seemed pretty obvious that during your run on Flash you were avoiding the classic Flash Rogues. No Captain Cold, no Captain Boomerang, no Mirror Master. Instead you introduced some completely new villains… with the exception of Vandal Savage. What particular reason did you have for starting this Flash re-launch with Savage as the villain?

BARON: I can’t exactly recall, but for starters, he’s a great villain. It may also have been that I wanted to have some continuity in that first issue between Barry Allen and Wally West.

I would like to do a lot more with Kilg%re. That’s my main character that I created for Flash. He and the Chunk.

DALLAS: What was it about Kilg%re that you liked?

BARON: He encapsulates a number of science fiction ideas that lend themselves to exciting story-telling. Dark Horse took a stab at it with a movie called Virus, which is very similar in idea to Kilg%re. It wasn’t the greatest movie in the world. It starred Jamie Lee Curtis.

DALLAS: I remember that movie.

Now what was it about Chunk that you liked?

BARON: He was kind of a projection of me. The ultimate nerd.

DALLAS: [laughs] It didn’t take you long to show that Chunk wasn’t a true villain.

BARON: No, he was just an outsider who wanted to belong.

DALLAS: Is that a sentiment that you felt perhaps the readers could connect to?

BARON: Oh, yeah!

DALLAS: The other two villains you introduced during your run on Flash were Speed Demon — the steroid monster gone crazy — and Blue Trinity — the Russian Soviet speedsters. Continue reading

Classic Covers: Flash v.2 #51

I hope Dixon of Crimson Lightning won’t mind me picking up this theme. (Come to think of it, he’s probably used this cover on that blog.)

Anyway, today’s classic cover is Flash v.2 #51 (June 1991), for reasons which should be obvious to US residents.

The other characters running with the Flash haven’t been seen for a while: the three dressed in white and red are the Kapitalist Kouriers, a trio of Soviet expatriates (originally called Red Trinity) who defected to the United States and went into business as super-speed couriers. To the best of my knowledge, they haven’t been seen since Dead Heat (1995).

The woman in the Flash outfit is Christina, originally a member of Red Trinity’s predecessor team, Blue Trinity. She’s had a long history of working for various villains including Vandal Savage, Savitar, and Kobra (sometimes voluntarily, sometimes not — her history with Savage is particularly twisted), but at this time she’d latched onto Wally West and was calling herself Lady Flash. She has been seen recently, albeit in a different costume, among Vandal Savage’s faction/harem in Salvation Run.

Flash Hints from Wizard World Chicago

CBR has been live-blogging the DC Nation panel at Wizard World Chicago, and reports these comments regarding the Flash. Update: Newsarama’s coverage is up, with a few more bits. I’ve tried to merge them together more-or-less in order.

“Barry Allen’s back,” a fan yelled. DiDio polled the audience to see what Flash they liked best. Jay Garrick and Bart Allen didn’t win, but Barry Allen and Wally West were both favorites.

“Flash came back and Martian Manhunter died, doesn’t that balance the scales?” [Dan] Didio said.

This is interesting phrasing, given how balance is such a central theme to Final Crisis.

– With Barry Allen back, does DC have a better plan for what to do with Barry than “what you had for Wally?”

Van Sciver: “Oh of course.”

DiDio: “Wally will be around. He’s part of the Titans team right now, and he’ll be part of that team for the foreseeable future.”

On the plus side, that again suggests that Wally West will live through Final Crisis despite Barry Allen’s return. On the minus side… who knows what they consider “foreseeable” at this point. (And they have misled us on future Flash plans before.) And it’s The Titans.

It would certainly fit with rumors that Wally may stay in the Titans while Barry rejoins the Justice League. Though it doesn’t preclude Wally staying in Justice League of America while Barry joins James Robinson’s Justice League cast with Hal, Ollie, Ray and company.

Will they bring back Bart Allen? “You have read the first issue of ‘Legion of Three Worlds,’ right?” Didio asked, and Johns hid his head in his hands.

“I haven’t read it,” [Bob] Wayne said. “It hasn’t come out.”

At that point, [Geoff] Johns put his head down and shook it, then leaned toward the microphone in front of him and said, “You’ll read it now.”

“No plans at this time,” Didio came back. “How did I cover, Geoff?”

Hmm, perhaps the carrot-dangling has officially passed from grandfather to grandson… 🙂 (This part was mashed together from both write-ups.)

Seriously, fans have been speculating as to “who was in the lightning rod” since Justice League of America #10 wrapped up The Lightning Saga a year ago. It was made clear that the Wests’ return was unintentional, but strongly implied that the Legion did manage to bring someone back. Barry? Bart? Someone else? Barry’s return in Final Crisis seems to eliminate him as a possibility, so Bart’s a strong candidate. (Looks like I’ll be adding another miniseries to my pull list this summer.)

– Any more Elseworlds? DiDio: “As a matter of fact, we have a couple in production right now… We have one story coming out from Cary Bates.”

Aside from this being big news, since they’ve been avoiding the Elseworlds name, there’s a possible Flash connection…since Cary Bates wrote Barry’s series for the better part of 15 years. Could this be a similar project to the Teen Titans Lost Annual?

– Wally’s twins? DiDio: “Montessori School,” he joked. Van Sciver: “They’re going where Nightwing’s going.”

Okaaay… I’m going to guess these were both joke answers.

– After writing Rogues Revenge, does Geoff Johns have anything else with the Flash? Johns: “Ummm… I don’t know!”

Update: There’s more Flash news from Saturday’s DCU: Crisis panel.

The Black Flash to be Traded

Here’s a quick update on the earlier post about the Morrison/Millar run getting the trade paperback treatment. Collected Editions reports that “The Black Flash” will be included in The Flash: Emergency Stop.

This is a good move, as it’s the story from that period that has added the most to the mythos. The Black Flash, the personification of death for speedsters, has shown up in two pivotal arcs: “Mercury Falling” in Impulse, and “Full Throttle” in Flash: The Fastest Man Alive. It was in “Full Throttle” that Inertia and the Rogues killed Bart Allen, just a short time into his career as the fourth Flash. The consequences of that event have spun into Countdown, Salvation Run, the current “Fast Money,” and the upcoming Final Crisis: Rogues’ Revenge.

Incidentally, several months ago the Black Flash made an appearance in Something Positive as the only Flash villain that Davan MacIntire likes. The presentation almost makes it look kindly as it carries a dying Flash away. (Warning: while that particular strip is “work-safe,” the webcomic and the commentary often feature adult language, situations, and offensive humor.)

Change in the Wind: New Creative Team…New Direction?

Could the Flash be running toward another relaunch? Fans have been speculating for months, ever since rumors surfaced that Silver Age Flash Barry Allen might be returning in Final Crisis.

There are certainly signs that point to change.

Sales on The Flash have continued to drop since last summer’s relaunch brought Wally West back from limbo and introduced the Flash Family.

Barry Allen has indeed returned, off-panel in April’s DC Universe #0 and (reportedly) on-panel in next week’s Final Crisis #2.

The miniseries Final Crisis: Rogues’ Revenge is clearly going to be high-profile — quite possibly higher-profile than the ongoing book.

The book has been relaunched twice* in as many years. Flash: The Fastest Man Alive, launched in the wake of Infinite Crisis with Bart Allen as lead, lasted only 13 issues from 2006–2007. The revived Wally West series, picking up at #231, will hit 13 issues by the end of the current storyline. If DC stays true to form, it’s pretty much due.

Then there’s the setup. Fan response to the Flash Family has been mixed at best. While some love Iris and Jai West, others would rather see them as normal children, and still others would happily throw them under the bus. (And yes, I’ve seen that sentiment expressed on message boards.) DC might (rightly or wrongly) conclude that the twins are a liability to the franchise.

Today’s Flash #241 features part 4 of Tom Peyer’s 6-part “Fast Money.” The storyline is scheduled to wrap up in #243, due in August. Signs initially pointed to Peyer writing the book long-term, but DC’s September solicits show a new creative team after the story concludes: writer Alan Burnett and artist Paco Diaz. With a title like “This Was Your Life, Wally West,” things don’t look too good for the current speedster.

There’s no official word yet on whether Burnett replaces Peyer as the regular writer or whether Peyer will be back after a couple of issues, though Peyer’s MySpace page says he’s “writing six issues of The Flash for DC Comics with artist Freddie E. Williams II” (emphasis added). Update: I contacted Tom Peyer through MySpace, and he confirmed that #243 is his last issue:

Flash #243 is my last issue. We went into it with no set time I’d be leaving, which is why we seemed so cagey about it, and we parted friends.

My next mainstream work is for Marvel Apes, which is kind of like Marvel Zombies but they’re apes; please check it out in the fall.

What’s still unclear is how long Burnett is scheduled to be on the book. The situation is eerily similar to early 2006: early in the stages of a cosmic “Crisis” crossover, a new team comes on board with a final-sounding storyline. The write-up even echoes the earlier story’s title, “Finish Line.”

Edit: And, on top of all that, editor Joan Hilty is leaving the book for Vertigo.

So what does all of this mean? No one (outside of DC’s offices) knows yet… though there’s plenty of speculation. Will we see another relaunch with Barry Allen taking over for his successor? Or a new direction for Wally, perhaps without the twins? Will Wally and Barry share the lead? Or will Rogues’ Revenge lead into a second Flash ongoing with Barry?

*In point of fact, since Geoff Johns left the book in 2005, no creative team has lasted longer than half a year. Joey Cavalieri penned Flash v.2 #227-230 marking time until its cancellation for the Bart relaunch. Danny Bilson & Paul DeMeo wrote the first 8 issues of Flash: The Fastest Man Alive before being replaced by Marc Guggenheim, who handled writing chores for the 5 issues leading up to its tragic end. Mark Waid wrote the transition, All-Flash #1, and Flash v.2 #231-236. Poor reception led to him leaving, with Tom Peyer coming on board in Flash v.2 #238. And then there’s Alan Burnett on #244.