Comics Fondle

Was I expecting more from All-Flash #1? Maybe. I probably shouldn’t have been. Meant to bring the existing Flash series to the return of Wally West, it turns a four page story into a twenty-two page one… most of the scenes belong in other comic books, most notably Justice League of America and this issue’s epilogue certainly belongs in the first new Waid Flash.

Waid’s writing is very competent, his first person narration from Wally creates a great protagonist (so when the issue closes with Wally apparently giving it up, the development is a bad one–first person narration in mainstream comic books is omnipresent these days and sixty percent of it is horrendous, with thirty-eight percent being laughable). Except Waid’s most engaged with the newer Wally material, not the wrap-up stuff… so the midsection is incredibly lame. Is the Flash going to kill the bad guy? No. Is the Flash going to find something interesting to do with the bad guy? No. I wasn’t expecting or asking for a scene where Wally beats a teenaged psychopath to death, but Waid denies the reader any glee at the little bastard’s punishment. If the whole point of the issue is to bring Wally back (check) and to resolve the story with the evil Impulse clone… All-Flash #1 gets an incomplete.

And for me to want that reward is a sign of Waid doing a real good job. Impulse was an idiotic character and when they turned him into the Flash last year, it was the worst comic book (The Flash #1) I’ve tried reading until Teen Titans #50. So to get, for lack of a better word, sympathy (at least to see his killer punished) for me, is a major achievement.

There’s a lot of problems with the art. Kerschl is fine, Churchill is awful. Garcia’s better… I don’t really remember Bennett and Acuña was majorly disappointing.

C

Technorati Tags: All-Flash, Comic Book, Daniel Acuña, DC Comics, Ian Churchill, Joe Bennett, Karl Kerschl, Manuel Garcia, Review, The Flash

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