Well I may have spoken too soon in the latest installment of the Major Spoilers Podcast, when I said “if you kill of a character, that character needs to stay dead…just like Barry Allen.” Seems the Silver Age Flash is returning in DC’s Universe #0, arriving on stands today.
“That’s the point of comics – they don’t have to die, because they’re fictional creations,” said Grant Morrison, one of the writers behind the comeback.
“We can do anything with them, and we can make them come back and make them defy death,” Morrison said. “And that’s why people read comics, to get away from the way life works, which is quite cruel and unheroic and ends in death.”
I’m not sure how I feel about this. On the one hand, I think Barry’s sacrifice and permanent death is one of the greatest things about comics. One the other hand, I haven’t picked up the issue, so this could just be a temporal Barry Allen that we’ve seen in Booster Gold, and the Flash title proper making a stop in the current time line as he bounces around space-time. His “golly-gee” clean cut image, certainly didn’t win him a lot of fans during his long run, but post death, Allen seems to have stirred something in fans around the world. Then again, Barry Allen just might die again and play a major role in the Green Lantern Darkest Night saga hitting next year.
14 Comments
Oh man Stephen … you did it to me again! You should just rename this site Major Russelled …
Hopefully they won’t use bees on Wally now, taking the younger version out of the picture.
Frankly, I thought of putting a More After the Jump break in there, but this is news that has already spilled out all over the NY Daily, so why shield it from the masses (washed or unwashed). Hopefully I didn’t piss you off too much Jon.
Hopefully this is just Barry’s third visit on Wally’s worst day and not a permanent return.
Barry’s just a cooler character dead. Like Stephen said, Barry wasn’t as popular until after his death.
Kind of like Cypher from the New Mutants. People begged for him to get killed off, and then when he did, he was everyone’s favorite character.
People want what they can’t have. Like continuity.
I’m betting this is just a cosmic-treadmill Barry…unless he’s in the lightning rod the Legion had?
Peter: I’m leaning heavily toward the Lighting Saga Barry Allen. That story was left wide open, and many have speculated BA is in those rods… I’m still hoping Barry Allen turns into the Black Flash in Darkest Night.
The last time I read JLA (which was during the Lightning Saga) I couldn’t have been more confused as I am not a longtime or regular DCU reader. I’m hoping that I can “jump on” with this DC Universe #0 that’s hitting … we’ll see how that goes.
Barry is better off dead. Cant DC just leave someone dead.I am sure it has something to do with Legion of Three Worlds. The preview pic has Brainiac holding the lightning rod. Memories are good, but having Wally as the Flash is fine. Besides come one having three flashes in three different books it gets a bit much unless you gonna have Barry stay in one book. Right now we have Wally in Titans, JLA, and the Flash. When is enough enough. It is mess like this that made me stop collecting comics a while back. This is the same thing that is going to make me stop for another 20 years.
I’m still waiting to warm up to Wally as Flash and adored Bart’s short-lived series so this is good news for me. I’ll hate it when they re-kill him but this is the New DC with 87% more death and gore after all.
It would be funny if the “major character kill” we’ve been teased with for Final Crisis #1 was actually Barry Allen. “I’m back! … and I’m dead.”
It would be kind of wild if they run with this (no pun intended).
Maybe the Rouges become true Rogues – to everyone, hero and villain.
Can you imagine a revised Flash Rouge’s Gallery of Speedsters? Zoom, Inertia, Black Flash Bart, Barry, Savitar-restored?
that’s the point of comics, they don’t have to die! We can bring back whoever we want whenever we want, boldly invalidating their sacrifices and making the current holders of their mantle that much less relevant. That’s the great thing about comic books, eventually it just turns into an awful mess and you, our loving fans, will put up with it no matter what.
The problem with all of this is that Barry Allen doesn’t really appear in DCU #0. There is much to imply his presence but also enough ambiguity to put off the full reveal until presumably some time later in the pages of Final Crisis or mayber Rogues Revenge. But then the news media comes in and pretty much blows all of this build up out of the water. It would have been nice if you would have revealed this after the jump.