Wally West: The Flash Appreciation 2019

[Dred]

Don't you guys ever get tired of whining about same things over and over again? This is why this fandom is being called toxic now.

You need to make peace about the fact that Wally will never be important like you want him to be and move on. It's been 10 years. Giving him his kids back pretty much sealed his fate. If they wanted to market him, they would have given him Barry treatment in update, instead they decided to pander to vocal minority to shut them up.

Instead of focusing on what happened, it's time to get real expectations and think about the future at this point.

I do not get why you're hammering on the fact that the kids are some death knell here. It has everything to do with Barry and nothing to do with Wally's supporting characters. Might as well blame Linda because, oops, comics execs also don't like married characters.

[Waterfall]

you want realistic expectations okay

lets just talk about how wallys gunna die off panel next year.

Oh, there is a real possibility that he may die, but it's gonna be on panel I bet. Part of "A Flash dies every Crisis" cliche.

These guys don't just whine. They discuss comics staring wally that was published in the past,casue of the garbage they get nowadays.Wally fans are really vocal minority. Then dc managements great idea of so called heroes in crisis wouldn't have had such a backlash. They wouldn't have made wally the fastest man alive. You can hate it or love it. Wally means something to people that barry never could. He became the hero he idolised. Barry was already a hero. He didn't need to grow into anything.

No, there is a tiny line between whining and discussing. Repeating same arguments over and over again is whining. Things need to move on now. That's the status quo and it will never change. Unless Wally comes out as bisexual, I don't see why DC must put any afford on a guy who doesn't bring anything special to table now. Anything you can do with Wally, you can do it with Barry as well. Why bother?

I think it's possible to have realistic desires and expectations without some of the baseless negativity we've been seeing ("Wally's story in Flash #750 is going to suck", "The Flash Age is going to ruin Wally", "But also Wally won't appear in The Flash Age or Flash #750", "Wally's going to be killed in the next event", "Wally's kids are going to be lost forever", "But also Wally's kids are going to be back forever and ruin him", "But also he's going to be dead").

Realistically, Wally's not going to replace Barry as "THE FLASH" again any time soon and they're not going to get equal billing. He's either going to stay around in a diminished capacity as a team player, doing the same thing, like a Kyle Rayner or a Tim Drake or a Jay Garrick, or they can try something new to revitalise him and keep him relevant.

Some of the baseless negativity is "what it is". Like Flash Age, Barry Allen will be reestablished as the fastest Flash again, it'll damage Wally. Williamson implied Wally won't be involved in it so yeah, that sucks.

Being Kyle Rayner or Tim Drake of the franchise is a fate worse than death. What we should aim for is for him to get Nightwing status at least. You can't explore a lot with a character when you chain him to twins.

Nope, been at it for too long now.

Ad the fandom was deemed toxic immediately once Barry returned anyway: not liking Flash Rebirth was grounds for being banned from Geoff Johns forum way back when. This "toxic" narrative began almost before any discussion on the matter. TPTB were all "wait and see" back then. I waited, now I want to "see". ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Oh please, I've seen those days too. Right now the fandom IS toxic. DC Comics moved on, they don't give you any hope about it at all. You will never going to "see" what you are waiting. It's getting unhealthy for some people here, instead of repeating same things again, you can move on from Flash. It's not hard, that's fiction, you can pick something else instead.

I do not get why you're hammering on the fact that the kids are some death knell here. It has everything to do with Barry and nothing to do with Wally's supporting characters. Might as well blame Linda because, oops, comics execs also don't like married characters.

It IS a death knell for Wally. You can market GLs without any difficulties because they are not stuck to another character. Wally's mainstream appeal is that he's younger (20s), more fun Flash but when you pick up a comic, that's simply not the case. Wally can't bring in new readers if they don't go after what makes Wally appealing. Rebirth one-shot had the opportunity to update Wally for modern era Flash but fanboys lost their goddamn minds over the idea of Wally moving on. Because of whiny fans, they had him mope around and now he's stuck in a status quo that haven't worked for him over 15 YEARS.

I mean, have fun reading a comic about Wally's twins written by Lobdell and drawn by Booth, because we know twin stories NEVER revolve around Wally or his sidecast to begin with, they are all about THOSE TWO ONLY. If Wally gets a book with his kids, he might as well be dead or retired for me.

[Lee]

Yes, it is. Exposed hair, top and boots one color, pants and gloves a secondary color, ligtining motif. Apart from the custom emblem, you can take Wallace's current costume and turn it into Wally's in about 45 seconds in Photoshop, with no skill required. Because it's the same costume.

You said "literally", so I took what you said literally (as I said in my reply). Literally speaking, it's not the same costume with the colours swapped. Very similar, but not literally the same.

Again, you're the one hung up on this "similar to Barry" thing, not me. I'm not against going crazy with it, at all. But it should represent the adult, accomplished, baddass hero that he is. It shouldn't look "Flash-Lite".

Walter West looks like a badass accomplished adult hero. Kingdom Come Flash looks like a badass accomplished adult hero. John Fox (One Million) looks like a badass accomplished adult hero. Godspeed looks like a badass adult Flash character. They each break at least one of the rules you've laid down.

Yes, and no. The design is solid AF, I agree, and the updates in the 90's indeed were subtle. But some aspects of it look dated now. Mainly, in Wally's tenure, we have the first update (Chrome color, white eyes, no wings on boots, V-Shaped belt), and 2 ou opf those four elements were reversed ( white eyes and chrome color were discarded).

The boot wings were brought back for the "Wally and kids" run (then removed again in Flash Rebirth).

The Flash year one suit "updated" mainly the boots (no wings), the belt (M-shaped) and put an outline on the emblem (which is now a staple for Flash emblems, I guess). It's still basically the same silver age design, but gets rid of the dated aspects.

I think you're reading too much into how Howard Porter drew the belt, zigging one way instead of zagging the other. That's the kind of detail artists are never going to be consistent with. By the end of Flash: Year One, the costume still had all the busy lines of the New 52 suit, which is the main problem. The emblem is better when it's not embossed too - it's another thing artists struggle with and are inconsistent with. The Year One mask does look better though, with the Silver Age cut and no chin strap.

It's called "pattern recognition".

There's a difference between saying "I'm not optimistic about X, because of Y and Z" and "the Wally story in Flash #750 sucks, even though it hasn't been published yet, I haven't read it and know absolutely nothing about the creative team, plot, or what era it's set in". There's a difference between saying "I think The Flash Age will ruin Wally" and "The Flash Age will ruin Wally".

You used some pretty words here to confirm what I said.

No 2 Flashes have ever been in equal footing? Then, it's about time. Again, DC screwed a popular character. It bit then in the ass. Not my role to be understanding or take scraps.

"Realistically, Wally's not going to replace Barry as "THE FLASH" again any time soon"

That's fine.

and they're not going to get equal billing.

That's not.

He's either going to stay around in a diminished capacity as a team player, doing the same thing, like a Kyle Rayner or a Tim Drake or a Jay Garrick

That's fine. Can we give him a costume that is not specifically designed to make him seen as inferior, and write him correctly? If so, good.

If Wally stays around in a diminished capacity, then by definition he and Barry aren't getting equal billing and they're not on equal footing. One is the star, the other is a supporting character.

Yeah, that's a fallacy. "Let's maker him White Lantern. It will make him different and relevant. Then we can make him Green Lantern again. Then he just vanishes, whatever".

When Kyle was the White Lantern, he actually had a book, so maybe it wasn't the worst thing. It didn't pan out long term - conceptually it didn't really seem designed to work for more than a couple of years. The whole Green Lantern line kind of collapsed after Geoff Johns left, but the problems were there beforehand. Basically, DC got greedy, expanded the line too much without maintaining the level of quality and didn't have an exciting enough creative team to take over the flagship book after Geoff left.

On the other hand, some makeovers do work, like Nightwing and Red Hood.

If Wally is commercially a different Flash, with a different personality, that doesn't appear as much, but does so when it makes sense, that's just fine. More, it's pretty much all of what fans have been asking. But that position has to be built from Wally, not from Barry's leftovers. If Wally is the one no one really remembers, with an inferior uniform, doing **** that removes him from the larger universe? That's just crap. And it's what being done with the excuse of "relevance", now that "No Wally" just doesn't fly anymore. It's no different than PTSD killer Wally, pacemaker Wally, forgotten by everyone Wally.

I have no problem with Wally being seen on a story by story basis. But proper Wally, not what they've been doing.

At this point it's practically a given that Wally's history in the DC Universe is going to be restored. And hopefully DC will fix the damage they did with Heroes in Crisis.

I'd rather have an evolved Wally West who can sustain a spin-off series, like Nightwing. But if the majority of fans truly want Wally to be "the '90s Flash" who shows up alongside the other speedsters once a year as a bit of fan service, I'm confident their wish will be granted.

[Lee]

Some of the baseless negativity is "what it is". Like Flash Age, Barry Allen will be reestablished as the fastest Flash again, it'll damage Wally. Williamson implied Wally won't be involved in it so yeah, that sucks.

There's a big difference between a character being damaged and a character being ruined. I don't think Barry becoming faster than Wally damages Wally, but I can see why others might. Ruins him though? That's hyperbole. If anything has ruined Wally, it's Heroes in Crisis. But, like most things in super-hero comics, there are ways to fix it.

Being Kyle Rayner or Tim Drake of the franchise is a fate worse than death. What we should aim for is for him to get Nightwing status at least. You can't explore a lot with a character when you chain him to twins.

I'd like for Wally to get Nightwing status. But unfortunately there seems to be a lot of resistance to that. Kyle Rayner struggles as "the other Green Lantern", Tim Drake struggled as "the other Robin" ("Drake" doesn't fill me with much confidence, but at least they're finally trying) and Wally struggles as "the other Flash". I honestly believe that the only way out of it is for him to have his own super-hero identity, like Nightwing, with a premise that can stand on its own.

The twins get in the way of Wally being the "cooler and younger" guy in the Flash famiy. But they do present an opportunity for an Incredibles style "family of super-heroes" series, which is something DC doesn't have right now. It was rejected the first time around, because readers didn't want "The Flash" to be a team book. But the concept might be better received as a spinoff title, and fill the gap left after DC aged up Jon Kent.

People were really digging Superman with a 10 year old son, digging the Super Sons kid adventure book. Maybe there's more room for that kind of thing in 2020? It could hearken back to the original Wally West stories of the 1960s, which were more about a super-hero as a good citizen helping out in the community, rather than life-or-death fights with super-villains.

[Rend20]

I'd rather have an evolved Wally West who can sustain a spin-off series, like Nightwing.

Does Wally happen to come from the Batman Franchise?

Because that is why Nightwing is able to sustain a spin-off series. How many Bat-related on-goings do we currently have? Like seven or eight? And how many from the Flash Franchise? We have the main book. That's it. Anything aside from changing Wally's character to the point it's unrecognizable isn't going to fix that.

So put him in a team book, let him make appearances in other books where it makes sense, and allow him to play a part in an event every blue moon. Just let him be Wally and don't treat him like crap.

[Lee]

Does Wally happen to come from the Batman Franchise?

Because that is why Nightwing is able to sustain a spin-off series. How many Bat-related on-goings do we currently have? Like seven or eight? And how many from the Flash Franchise? We have the main book. That's it.

I never said it would be easy. At the very least they would gain a "new" super-hero in the Flash IP, rather than two versions of the same character.

Currently DC are publishing "The Flash" (twice a month), "Flash Forward" (mini-series) and "Flash Giant" (every two months, 2 new stories + reprints).

Not a big enough property that a second title is guaranteed to sell, but big enough to give something a try every once in a while. I think Wally is worth the effort, while there's enough of a fanbase that still cares about him, rather than having him fade into the background like Kyle Rayner and Tim Drake.

[Dred]

It IS a death knell for Wally. You can market GLs without any difficulties because they are not stuck to another character. Wally's mainstream appeal is that he's younger (20s), more fun Flash but when you pick up a comic, that's simply not the case. Wally can't bring in new readers if they don't go after what makes Wally appealing. Rebirth one-shot had the opportunity to update Wally for modern era Flash but fanboys lost their goddamn minds over the idea of Wally moving on. Because of whiny fans, they had him mope around and now he's stuck in a status quo that haven't worked for him over 15 YEARS.

I mean, have fun reading a comic about Wally's twins written by Lobdell and drawn by Booth, because we know twin stories NEVER revolve around Wally or his sidecast to begin with, they are all about THOSE TWO ONLY. If Wally gets a book with his kids, he might as well be dead or retired for me.

You can't market GLs. One of the biggest problems with the GL Franchise is there's been no room for anyone to shine except maybe one or two at a time. And that was when they had two ongoing comics, which isn't a guarantee going forward.

Wally's mainstream appeal is nothing, because Wally's mainstream appeal is equally absconded by Barry. There isn't really a situation where they'd want to use Wally instead of Barry outside of his time as Kid Flash (which, going forward, I imagine Wallace will take every bit of screen time for). Having kids in comics affects nothing in the mainstream. You can adapt a character with kids to other media without adapting the kids. Wally can't bring in new readers because the only inlet of new readers is the dang movies and tv shows -- all Barry centric. Comics are incredibly niche, but because of that they can tell stories that aren't as generic as the stuff that gets adapted elsewhere

The only thing whiney fans did in comics was get him to come back at all, and even then that's because a fan had power (Johns) more than anything else.

Like seriously, you're saying it's impossible to write a comic with Wally having kids and it not be about Wally. That is demonstrably false. Kids can be supporting characters. Fantastic Four has been doing it for decades. Superman and Batman are running around with kids right now. You hate the kids, I get that, but these absurd lies about how the kids mean all these grandiose things that can not be overcome is so preposterous. Was Barry unable to be Flash because they introduced a Kid Flash? They're freaking sidekicks. Wally's even had a sidekick before. The Flash has balanced half a dozen speedsters in the same comic before. Sure, it's a different relationship -- but isn't that a good thing?

If the ONLY value Wally has is to repeat the same kind of storytelling from the 90s/early 00s then, frankly, he's no different from Barry. DC has already expressed that the reason they don't care to use Wally is because they find him too similar to Barry. Taking away one of the unique avenues that he has that Barry doesn't even touch -- personal growth and the passage of time along with it, which has naturally led to him forming a family -- is kind of just saying that you might as well use Barry.

[Jekyll]

Don't you guys ever get tired of whining about same things over and over again? This is why this fandom is being called toxic now.

You need to make peace about the fact that Wally will never be important like you want him to be and move on. It's been 10 years. Giving him his kids back pretty much sealed his fate. If they wanted to market him, they would have given him Barry treatment in update, instead they decided to pander to vocal minority to shut them up.

Instead of focusing on what happened, it's time to get real expectations and think about the future at this point.

Ah a troll *Yawn* have you received your 10 seconds of attention?

[king81992]

There's a big difference between a character being damaged and a character being ruined. I don't think Barry becoming faster than Wally damages Wally, but I can see why others might. Ruins him though? That's hyperbole. If anything has ruined Wally, it's Heroes in Crisis. But, like most things in super-hero comics, there are ways to fix it.



I'd like for Wally to get Nightwing status. But unfortunately there seems to be a lot of resistance to that. Kyle Rayner struggles as "the other Green Lantern", Tim Drake struggled as "the other Robin" ("Drake" doesn't fill me with much confidence, but at least they're finally trying) and Wally struggles as "the other Flash". I honestly believe that the only way out of it is for him to have his own super-hero identity, like Nightwing, with a premise that can stand on its own.

The twins get in the way of Wally being the "cooler and younger" guy in the Flash famiy. But they do present an opportunity for an Incredibles style "family of super-heroes" series, which is something DC doesn't have right now. It was rejected the first time around, because readers didn't want "The Flash" to be a team book. But the concept might be better received as a spinoff title, and fill the gap left after DC aged up Jon Kent.

People were really digging Superman with a 10 year old son, digging the Super Sons kid adventure book. Maybe there's more room for that kind of thing in 2020? It could hearken back to the original Wally West stories of the 1960s, which were more about a super-hero as a good citizen helping out in the community, rather than life-or-death fights with super-villains.

I'd argue that Kyle was doomed as a character when his girlfriend got killed and put into a fridge. A blow like that, especially early on in the series makes a character look impotent and the power ups/ upgrades he got later felt like DC was only pretending he was going to be relevant.

Tim was undermined when writers started shifting him into a darker character and making him into Batman lite. Damian's creation and push played a role in Tim's fall from popularity, but the decisions of Johns and his successors before and during the New 52 damaged Tim and the YJ cast.

I don't think that the twins keep Wally from being the 'cooler younger guy'.A story about a 'cool young dad' who fights crime with his kids is untapped potential when you consider that Wally still has a strong fanbase despite all the derailment DC put him through. There are two obstacles to this: the stupidity of DC's writers/ editorial and the twins lack of popularity with Wally's fanbase.

[BohemiaDrinker]

Ah a troll *Yawn* have you received your 10 seconds of attention?

Wow, wow.. Waterfall may be annoyed by the discussion, but he/she is not troll. It's someone who's been here as much as the rest of us and has contributed to the discussion plenty of times. Even I and Lee, who heavilly disagree on this stuff, are doing so from a respectful perspective. No need for escalating, folks.

[Rend20]

At the very least they would gain a "new" super-hero in the Flash IP, rather than two versions of the same character.

Which doesn't mean a whole lot if DC won't do anything with it.

Wally's issues isn't that he's called The Flash. It's that he's an adult speedster whose popularity infringes on that of the character (Barry) they want to push. Changing his hero name doesn't do anything to solve that in my opinion.

I think Wally is worth the effort, while there's enough of a fanbase that still cares about him, rather than having him fade into the background like Kyle Rayner and Tim Drake.

But the current editorial grouping doesn't think he's worth the effort.

The only way they would let him 'thrive' is if his hero name, powers, and personality were all drastically changed to the point he isn't "Wally West" anymore. It's why I wouldn't be shocked if Flash Forward ends with him in the Mobius Chair so they can get him out of the way until they can properly kill him off during the next crisis/event.

I'm not entirely against change as long as it helps his character and the character remains relatively close to the one I've grown attached to over the years. But making drastic changes to the character just so Barry can be more special isn't something I can get behind.

[Dr. Ellingham]

I have no problem with Wally being seen on a story by story basis. But proper Wally, not what they've been doing.

It took this post to really crystalize what you're after, for me. Up to this point, it was a bit of "huh?"

Basically, Wally should remain the same identifiable Flash we all remember - even if that means fewer appearances.

Versus morphing him into something different just to fit the editorial strategy and give him a spin-off rationale - something like Lightspeed the multiversal Ghost Boy, the plucky superfast entity or something.

I'm with you on that. A 90s analogy - Hal Jordan should've returned to being a Green Lantern eventually, regardless of what DC did with the Kyle GL comic itself. Not bastardize him into the Spectre, or a super Green Lantern, or whatever hokey idea came along.

[BohemiaDrinker]

It took this post to really crystalize what you're after, for me. Up to this point, it was a bit of "huh?"

Basically, Wally should remain the same identifiable Flash we all remember - even if that means fewer appearances.

Versus morphing him into something different just to fit the editorial strategy and give him a spin-off rationale - something like Lightspeed the multiversal Ghost Boy, the plucky superfast entity or something.

I'm with you on that. A 90s analogy - Hal Jordan should've returned to being a Green Lantern eventually, regardless of what DC did with the Kyle GL comic itself. Not bastardize him into the Spectre, or a super Green Lantern, or whatever hokey idea came along.

I thought I was clear from the get go. Sorry about that.

But yeah, having the character be himself is way more important for me than he having a monthly, but being something completely different.

[Dr. Ellingham]

I thought I was clear from the get go. Sorry about that.

No worries, it may have been reading comprehension.

While I'm on board with that mindset, I think most fans want to see their favorites on the regular, versus once every couple of years via flashback stories or crossovers. We all want what we want, of course. But I think those fans outvote us on this. For them better a mediocre concept with Wally if it means a viable role, versus once every 2 years in prime form.

In turning down a later Star Trek film, Leonard Nimoy once said "If you would use me, use me well."

For me, it's that - unless it's on the level of Waid or Johns, I really don't care what they publish. (But I know I'm in the minority there.)

[Cmbmool]

Wally West 100% deserves to be the Nightwing to Barry’s Flash. I mean it’s long overdue and could make an interesting story arc. In fact, the idea of Wally West with kids does present a Generation type of storytelling style that very few DC heroes can deal with. Honestly the entire Flash Family could be a generation style team. I mean wasn’t there supposed to be an anthology Flash Series centered on the Speed force ?

I mean with the overall concepts of back up stories in comics: Why not have Wally and/or Barry train kids and prove how they would do it better than the likes of Batman, Superman and/or Green Arrow ?