The Flash's Final Fling--Twice

Here's a real oddity from DC's Silver Age. In March, 1966, Flash #159 bore this cover:

That's something of an unusual cover for DC; we'd expect to see it more from Marvel (as indeed we did several times in Spiderman). But more unusual still was seeing this cover on the next regular issue of the Flash, #161 (#160 was an 80-Page Giant):

Notice, down at the bottom, that Julius Schwartz was advertising another, completely different story, also based on the cover from #159. As the splash page notes:

A couple of comments before I proceed with the review. First, it's worth noting that neither story was written by the Flash's main writer, John Broome. The first version was scripted by Gardner Fox, while the second was contributed by Bob Kanigher. Second, the stories amount to breaking the fourth wall, as announcing that you're publishing a second story based on the cover is admitting that these are fictional stories.

The Fox story starts with Kid Flash and Barry Allen visiting the offices of Dr McNider (aka Dr Midnight), an Earth-Two physician. The doc is pleased to see the Earth-One heroes, but he wonders why Barry's not in his uniform. It turns out that the Flash is no more, because he feels underappreciated:

Dr McNider puts him under and probes to find out the real answer:

It turns out that a future criminal with the improbable name of Frand Mattar had sent a bomb back in time to Central City in 1966, which would explode if a high-speed wave hit it; Mattar had a trigger that would cause this to happen and was blackmailing the authorities to force them to allow him to loot at will. Of course, there was another thing that could cause the bomb to go off; if the Flash traveled at super-speed. Thus the "chronal officer" had hypnotized Barry to make him believe that nobody in Central City appreciated his efforts, so that he would resign.

Armed with this knowledge, Flash and his junior partner travel to the future, defeat Frand Mattar, and return to 1966 just in time to prevent the bomb explosion from destroying the city. Flash gets banner headlines and the key to the city, showing that he is still Central City's hero.

Comments: Some tricky time paradox problems with this story. Wouldn't the future world know that the Flash had saved the city? And why would Frand Mattar send a bomb into the past in the first place (other than to provide Fox with a rationale for the cover)? Wouldn't a bomb about to affect a city in 3780 be more compelling to the people of that era?

However, the Fox effort is a masterpiece compared to the second story. Kanigher compares Flash's relationship with his uniform to that of a soldier and his gun.

Whaaaaat? And even more oddly, Kanigher has the uniform answer:

The scene shifts to the day of Barry and Iris' wedding. Iris has planned things so that even her perennially late boyfriend will arrive on time; she has told him the nuptials take place an hour before the actual scheduled time. But as Barry is walking to the church he spots a super-speed turtle (no, I am not kidding):

He finds himself in a super-speed dimension, where ironically that turtle is considered quite slow. But when he travels back to our dimension, he discovers:

Iris breaks off with Barry, and in the days that follow, he begins to feel like his costume has ruined his life. So he discards it:

He visits Iris in the secluded cabin where they had planned their honeymoon, but when he arrives she is being menaced by a giant bear. He tries to save her without using his super-speed, but is kayoed by the grizzly. Fortunately, it turns out that the bear is a retired circus performer. However, Iris is not thrilled at Barry's effort, and indeed, compares him unfavorably to the Flash. Barry returns to Central City, where his uniform, discovered by a passing hitchhiker, is on display at the Flash Museum:

Moved, Barry puts on the uniform again, just as Iris enters the room, followed shortly by some crooks.  As the Flash, he quickly corrals the villains.  But now Iris will know his secret identity, right?  Well, no:

Cue happy ending, with Barry back as the Flash and Iris back in love with him.

 Comments: Sweet jeebus, this is a wacky story!  Kanigher's anthropomorphizing inanimate objects works in the war stories, but it is wildly out of place here.  One thing that I do find interesting is that Kanigher gives Barry a better reason for quitting (and one that is more in line with what Lee would do with Spiderman a year later in ASM #50).

Fifty Years Ago This Month

The multiverse begins as Flash #123 goes on sale.

This story was implied by the very first Barry Allen Flash story in Showcase #4, which opened with Barry enjoying a Golden Age Flash comic during his lunch break:

That's an interesting decision by the writer (Bob Kanigher), I suppose chosen to explain why Barry quickly decides to become the Flash himself when the lightning bolt hits a page later. But it does raise some uncomfortable questions. If the superhero comics are assumed to take place in the real world, then in what world did the Jay Garrick stories take place, since Barry clearly considers the Golden Age Flash to be a fictional character.

As the Flash of Two Worlds story starts, Iris is trying to put on a show for her pet charity, a group of orphans. Unfortunately, the magician she arranged to provide the entertainment has not shown up, and it looks like the kids will be disappointed. Barry suggests that he call the police station, as he just saw the Flash over there, and perhaps the Scarlet Speedster will agree to dazzle the youngsters.

He plays a game of tennis with himself, and then tries the Indian fakir trick of climbing a rope, only to disappear suddenly:

The Flash finds himself suddenly in a field outside the city. But not Central City, as he quickly discovers. Although some of the landmarks look the same, the signs in the metropolis indicates this is Keystone City. But isn't that where... on a hunch, Barry looks into a phone book and sure enough:

So he visits the Garrick residence, where we learn that Jay has aged since his Golden Age adventures and that he has married his former girlfriend, Joan Williams. Barry explains that he knows all about Jay's adventures as a superhero, and gives his theory:

Barry has further thoughts on how Jay Garrick ended up as a fictional character on his own world:

That's interesting because Fox himself was writing this particular tale, in place of usual Flash scripter, John Broome. Note that this maintains the implication that Barry Allen's stories were taking place in "our" world, since Gardner Fox was a real person. This would be maintained as the official story for years, although it was eventually discarded in a 1970s Flash tale, when we learned that our Earth was Earth-Prime, while Barry was from Earth-1 and Jay Garrick from Earth-2.

This concept of multiple Earths became very popular in the DC universe for years, as it gave writers and editors additional "outs". If a current story contradicted another one from years ago, well that old story took place on an alternate Earth. It also gave them an opportunity to play "What if" games without quite admitting that these were "imaginary stories".

Of course, it also caused uncomfortable questions as well. For starters, since Batman, Superman and Wonder Woman had appeared in or were mentioned in several Justice Society stories, did that mean that the Golden Age appearances of those stars had also not taken place on Earth 1? DC was not yet ready to confront the implications of those questions, and would continue to dodge them until near the end of the decade.

As it happens, Jay Garrick has been debating coming out of retirement due to a series of strange robberies. We learn that three Golden Age villains, the Thinker, the Fiddler and the Shade are responsible. They have recently escaped jail and are hoping to defeat their old nemesis.

The individual Flashes split up and combat the Thinker and the Shade, but are defeated. They combine forces to face the Fiddler, but his fiddle controls them:

But they manage to plug up their ears with small jewels, and make quick work of the trio.

Afterwards, Barry returns to his own world and has an idea:


This story led to many more, including the annual JLA/JSA teamups, nearly annual Barry Allen/Jay Garrick pairings, as well as stories featuring the GA Green Lantern and Hal Jordan. It is, as I mentioned in an early post on this blog, one of the five most important DC comics of the Silver Age.

Update: Aaron reminds me of an interesting tidbit about that Flash issue that Barry Allen is reading at the opening of Showcase #4. If you look closely at the cover, especially this panel from an earlier page:

You will see that he appears to be reading Flash #13. The amusing thing is that's not what Flash #13's cover looks like:

You see, Flash Comics back in the Golden Age was an anthology title, like Action or Detective in the Silver Age, and Flash alternated covers with Hawkman, with the latter appearing on the odd-numbered issues all the way up to #87. In fact, that cover could not have appeared as on the covers featuring the Flash, the little inset picture was of Hawkman, and vice-versa.

Jim notes that there were two GA and Silver Age Atom teamups as well, but no pairings of the 1940s Hawkman with his 1960s counterpart. I suspect the problem there was that the two characters were simply too similar to make for an interesting combination.

Is Barry Allen A Pervert?

That's what these Russian spies apparently think:

More Homages

My blog buddy Allan at Gorilla Daze has a post up on a cover that is an obvious homage to this famed cover, from Flash #123:

One of his commenters asked if that Superman cover was the first homage to the Flash of Two Worlds cover. I responded that this one was earlier and pretty obvious:

Some obvious similarities there; the central figure, the two people speeding towards him with an object between them so they can't see each other.

The GCD points out that the Flash #123 cover is an homage itself:

It has the same key elements, but one major thing is different; there's no particular reason for the two German soldiers not to know about each other, whereas in the other two covers, there is obviously quite a surprise awaiting the two men who are on a collision course.

It's interesting to note that the scene shown on the cover of Flash #123 has little to do with the plot. Indeed, it seems shoehorned in the story just to justify that image. Barry and Jay are actually aware of each other in that sequence, even though it doesn't appear that way. In Flash #147, on the other hand, it comes as a big surprise to both the Flash and Professor Zoom to bump into each other.

A couple more swipes that I noticed recently:

Obviously inspired by this Mystery in Space cover:

While the next issue of Mystery in Space had this cover:

Which clearly begat this one:

Flash #133

Strangest feeling, you say? You might look down at your feet and notice that you are being turned into a puppet!

As the story begins a very successful governor is finishing out his term, but he has one last thing to do. Under the influence of a beam from the prison created by Abra Kadabra, the governor pardons the malevolent magician. But surprisingly, Abra's intentions are not to resume his life of crime:



And how does he achieve his desire of fame and fortune? By putting on a puppet show that becomes all the rage. Iris drags Barry along:

And Barry is not pleased when he sees the act:

So Barry decides that the way to protect his reputation is to wage a one-man war against crime:

And before long, Abra Kadabra's former boffo show is bombing:

And in retaliation, Kadabra turns Flash into a puppet, as shown on the cover. Worse still, he incorporates the real Scarlet Speedster into his act, to complete the humiliation:

But Abra made one critical error; while he turned the rest of the Flash into wood, he left his brain intact. So Barry uses his control over his brain to send "spare" molecules down into the rest of his body, filling out enough so that he can actually walk under his own power. He gets revenge on Captain Creampuff and then decks Abra Kadabra. But how can he restore himself to normal? Simple, just reverse the polarity:


Comments: A pretty wacky tale, although as usual the Infantino and Giella artwork makes up for the weakness of the script.

The backup story in this issue is the terrific Secret of the Handicapped Boys, which I reviewed awhile ago.

Three Extremely Lame Bits About Kid Flash

I have mentioned in the past that I really like the Kid Flash stories from the Silver Age; they were mostly "moral" stories, where Wally West (and the reader) learn a life lesson.

But I must note that there were three extremely lame points about Kid Flash that have to be covered in any detailed examination of Wally, who went on to become a long-term, significant character in the DC universe.

First, the origin. Now given that DC had decided to go with the youthful sidekick to the adult hero, the origin posed a bit of a problem. Remember, that Barry Allen had gained his super-speed via a freak accident. A bolt of lightning had hit some chemicals in his laboratory, and the combination had given him the "Fastest man alive" abilities. It's a million-to-one shot, but you know how it is, every bolt of lightning has to hit somewhere, right?

But hitting twice in the same spot? Lame:



Okay, so now they've accomplished what they wanted, which was to generate a sidekick for the Flash. But after awhile they realize that Kid Flash would be more effective (and distinctive) as a character if he had his own uniform. But do they just have him put something together himself? Not on your life:



In the story, Barry had been thinking about designing a new uniform for Wally, but before he could actually get out a needle and some thread, an alien weapon had automatically turned his thoughts into reality. No, I'm not kidding:



I seem to recall that Kid Flash later came up with some method of making his hair look brown instead of that rather distinctive carrot-top, as a secret identity bit of protection.

Now the last lame bit affects the Flash as well. Yep, I'm going there, to the story that undeniably ranks as the worst Flash story of the Silver Age. Now, when contemplating the awesome awfulness, remember that comics of the 1960s were still thought of as throwaway entertainment. The idea that adults 40+ years later would be be analyzing these stories would have seemed laughable to the people producing these comic books.

In Flash #167, we learned that the odds against the lightning bolt that gave the Flash his super-speed were even higher than we had thought:



And in fact, Barry apparently gained his superpowers from Mopee:



Leaving one obvious question for the readers:


But anybody logically looking at it would say that not only were the odds high against the lightning bolt that hit Kid Flash being random, but that the odds of it happening in front of the only other person in the world with super-speed were, well, about 3 billion to one. Which means that we have to assume that Mopee, or another one of the, gag, "Heavenly Helpmates", gave Wally West his Kid Flash powers.

Trivia Quiz #28: Barry Allen Flash

1. Who told Barry Allen, "You're my best friend, Barry!" and after that story never appeared again in the Silver Age?

2. What Flash villain was inspired by a competition to represent a game company?

3. What Flash villain had the reverse name of a famous outlaw?

4. What Flash villain passed up a lifetime in another dimension with beautiful women waiting on him hand and foot?

5. What college did Barry Allen graduate from?

Crime As Crack

I was just reading Mark Engblom's latest post on Flash #126's Doom of the Mirror Flash, when this part of the post popped off the screen at me:

In "The Doom of the Mirror Flash", the Mirror Master escaped from prison and into Orinocas, a dimension populated entirely by attractive women. By all rights, the story should have ended right there, but Mirror Master soon grew bored and yearned to commit crimes on Earth once again.

No, not the part about the attractive women, that was bolded in Mark's original. It's that bit about "yearned to commit crimes". This was actually a fairly common theme in the DC Silver Age, especially in the adventures of the Flash, that criminals were not criminals because they sought an easy way to the good life. Rather, they were compelled to steal, almost as if it were an addiction. Here's how the Mirror Master describes it in that story:



But he finds that the women are so cooperative that there's no thrill in it for him:



Beautiful women at your beck and call and unlimited wealth are not enough. What would explain this compulsion not only to commit crimes, but to face a challenge in doing so? Isn't it obvious that this is like an addiction?

Obviously the Mirror Master, like many crackheads, enjoys his drug of choice. But what about the criminal who wants to break free? Just like a junkie, he does not find it easy:



And of course, any sensible 12-step program recommends complete abstinence; if you fall off the wagon, you may not be able to get back on:



If anybody has some other examples of criminals acting as if crime were a drug, please put them in the comments. I plan to add to this post over time as it's an interesting topic. For the most part, criminals do have normal motives for the crimes they commit: to obtain wealth and power.

Update: Here's a very specific instance from Detective #76:



Update: When the Crime Doctor returned in 1980, Michael Fleisher remembered that aspect of the character.