Wally West: The Flash Appreciation 2019

[Rac7d*]

Yeah; I think the best we can hope for at the end of this mini is for Wally to be cleared of the crimes in HiC, reunited with Linda and his kids… and stuck somewhere out in the Multiverse the way Didio's Superman and the Titans of Tomorrow Tim Drake are. I can live with that for the time being — though honestly, I wouldn't mind getting an Exiles-like series that teams these characters up.

And frankly, I don't need Wally to be on Primary Earth; I just need him to be in publication, with a writing team that understands and respects him. And as long as he isn't dead or insane, there's hope.

Can he be cleared, when he did do it , thenhero communitnis not gonna trust him

[Spider-Ham]

HiC was planned at a time when Tom King was the golden boy that could do no-wrong. Dan Didio probably believed that it would be a critical darling, a Vision or a Mister Miracle, something that would resonate enough so he could clear Wally of his claim for "Flash". The Suicide Squad rumor was probably true at this point.
• In turn, what HiC was was one of the biggest ****-shows I've seen.Let me say, I've been reading comics for a little over 34 years, I've been following the ins and outs and all since the early internet (and what I could before), and the only time I've seen such an uniform, disastrous reaction to a decision was back at Emerald Twilight. Thing is, DC right now is in no position of having an Emerald Twilight on their hands.
• At this point, whatever fallout they had planned for Wally after HiC was probably scrapped. They had to shut fans off, and had to do it fast.
• Now, Booth is "Wally guy". Lobdell is both a yes-man and a workhorse (and I say this not in a derogatory way at all). A new plan was probably made, but it had to be one that still kept Wally out of everything else* because other writers and artists were already working on their projects. So, it's multiverse-hopping with an editorially decided conclusion.
• The reason Lobdell is in this is because he can and will work editorial mandates to a T. No other writer probably had the will or the chops to polish a turd like this one, let alone constrained by editorial mandates and on such fast notice.
* Now, Lobdell is an X-Men guy. He knows how this is gonna sound to fans. Not only he really tries to get Wally right, he basically spoiled 90% of the book before #1 it even came out to try and reassure readers, but make no mistake, it will still follow whatever editorial decided to take and/or keep Wally off the board for a while.
• Maybe (and this is a strong maybe) Dan Didio had something planned for Wally in the upcoming DC event, but because of the shitshow HiC was, he couldn't keep him on the shelf till then. (When BC leaked that this book was coming, they specifically mentioned DC trying to cool off retailers, even). So, this book is what we get.

Make no mistake, FF was never something done to "test the waters". No one ever even thought it could hate 80k (only 2 DC books sold 80k in October) and, even if it did, it wouldn't become a monthly either. This book was never anything other than a very rushed attempt at buying time and Damage Control for what is probably the most hated story of the last 25 years, and the fact that it is somehow an enjoyable story with characterization that ranges from "respectful" to "spot-on" is to Lobdell's credit. He may not be on the pantheon of greatest comic writers, but he can really polish a turd to diamond-like shine when he needs to.

*If you guys pay attention to these things, we recently had a Batman Beyond issue where the Flash is... Barry. Pay a little more attention, and look at the current Snyder Justice League: right now they have camos from different Earths and several different futures. Some Flashes appear. We have Danica, we have John Fox, we have a previously unseen version of Bart, but we have no Wally at all. There are some futures where Wally is specifically the Flash, like the Earth-22/Kingdom Come one, and he's just not there along with everybody else. Now, these issues were illustrated by at least 3 different artists (Redondo, Porter and Manapul). I don't know about Redondo, but Porter is a Wally fan, and a Manapul is a big one 2 (he tried to sneak Wally at the beggining of the New52, editorial made him remove it. His pitch for him never saw the light of day, etc). So, the fact that we se no Wally here in panels where at least an alternate of him would make sense, and the fact that there are 3 different artists drew this tell me this is no coincidence.

NO Wally West is still a mandate.

Don't get your hopes up. Don't expect anything to change. Don't expect his friends to ask where he is or the rest of the DCU to interact with him. Enjoy the mini for the next 3 months. As of right now, jack-**** has changed and functionally, we have no Wally West on the DCU.

As usual, it’s a real pleasure to read anything you have to say on this topic.

Thank you.

I also agree on your last point.

[bob.schoonover]

Can he be cleared, when he did do it , thenhero communitnis not gonna trust him

Clearing Wally is very easy. "Wow, the Speed Force explosion was actually caused by [Villain X*] who channeled Dark Multiversal Energy^TM through Wally. The channeling caused psychic echoes that paired him with the Dark Multiverse version of Wally who is afraid all the time, which is why Wally faked up the crime scene. Now that the Dark Multiverse has been tamped back down by the Crisis, Wally is in control." I mean, that's all gobbledygook, of course, but it's not really hard to absolve him using some of the stuff Snyder is doing - the Dark Multiverse, Perpetua, Luthor, the Sixth Dimension, etc. are all so highly powered that they can be blamed for literally anything and are sufficiently powerful to do basically anything

*Batman Who Laughs, Zolomon, new character Flash Who Laughs

[WallyWestFlash]

[QUOTE=BohemiaDrinker;4704219]

Actually FF sells better than Barry's book. The one higher was a conclusion to arc. (remember, main book is bi-weekly) and in the previous month, the issue above FF was the one we got Zolomon's reveal. So FF basically sells on par with Flash book, which means it performs pretty darn well. I'm assuming everyone who is getting Flash is also getting the Flash Forward as well.

Yeah. I havent looked at the numbers closely the last months, but I believe both books were basically in the same range, with Flash having one issue above one bellow FF, right?



Booth is the one guy who actually fights for Wally at DC, though. Everyone tried at some point, but Booth kept trying. Which is good on one hand because he does have a dedicated fandom and rallied some support and etc, and bad on another because he became the go-to guy for anything Wally related. That said, those of you with a better memory may recall that shortly before HiC he was complaining about hitting a "wall of silence" from the big 2, DC especially.

About Williamson, though, I understand his position. He is clearly in the Scott Snyder cell of writers, and, if I may conjecture a little bit, not happy about the whole thing. He tried to use Wally for 2 years before they let him. When he finally could, he propped Flash War like a mad man and wrote the hell out of Wally because, according to him, he knew about HiC for a year in advance. He did not prop HiC very much, though, and has been really evasive about any Wally question since. He did use the something like the phrase "at the end of the day is not my story to tell". It seems clear to me that he has no control over this and is just steering clear of it.



Yeah, if they actually said this (I didn't catch the original Booth comment about 80k, so I can't say) they were just trying to shut him up, probably. The original Flash Rebirth, with Geoff Johns at his peak and Ethan Van Sciver before he became the comics version of Chernobyl, all the publicity that DC could push, no competing Flash book on the shelves and in a healthier market than today's sold 102k. There is just no way that a book stitched together at the last possible minute and coming out of the disaster that was HiC, like FF was was gonna hit that, and everyone knows it. Hell, Im surprised with the numbers it's getting even.

In the end guys, and I've been saying this things for a while, it probably goes like this:

• HiC was planned at a time when Tom King was the golden boy that could do no-wrong. Dan Didio probably believed that it would be a critical darling, a Vision or a Mister Miracle, something that would resonate enough so he could clear Wally of his claim for "Flash". The Suicide Squad rumor was probably true at this point.
• In turn, what HiC was was one of the biggest ****-shows I've seen.Let me say, I've been reading comics for a little over 34 years, I've been following the ins and outs and all since the early internet (and what I could before), and the only time I've seen such an uniform, disastrous reaction to a decision was back at Emerald Twilight. Thing is, DC right now is in no position of having an Emerald Twilight on their hands.
• At this point, whatever fallout they had planned for Wally after HiC was probably scrapped. They had to shut fans off, and had to do it fast.
• Now, Booth is "Wally guy". Lobdell is both a yes-man and a workhorse (and I say this not in a derogatory way at all). A new plan was probably made, but it had to be one that still kept Wally out of everything else* because other writers and artists were already working on their projects. So, it's multiverse-hopping with an editorially decided conclusion.
• The reason Lobdell is in this is because he can and will work editorial mandates to a T. No other writer probably had the will or the chops to polish a turd like this one, let alone constrained by editorial mandates and on such fast notice.
* Now, Lobdell is an X-Men guy. He knows how this is gonna sound to fans. Not only he really tries to get Wally right, he basically spoiled 90% of the book before #1 it even came out to try and reassure readers, but make no mistake, it will still follow whatever editorial decided to take and/or keep Wally off the board for a while.
• Maybe (and this is a strong maybe) Dan Didio had something planned for Wally in the upcoming DC event, but because of the shitshow HiC was, he couldn't keep him on the shelf till then. (When BC leaked that this book was coming, they specifically mentioned DC trying to cool off retailers, even). So, this book is what we get.

Make no mistake, FF was never something done to "test the waters". No one ever even thought it could hate 80k (only 2 DC books sold 80k in October) and, even if it did, it wouldn't become a monthly either. This book was never anything other than a very rushed attempt at buying time and Damage Control for what is probably the most hated story of the last 25 years, and the fact that it is somehow an enjoyable story with characterization that ranges from "respectful" to "spot-on" is to Lobdell's credit. He may not be on the pantheon of greatest comic writers, but he can really polish a turd to diamond-like shine when he needs to.

*If you guys pay attention to these things, we recently had a Batman Beyond issue where the Flash is... Barry. Pay a little more attention, and look at the current Snyder Justice League: right now they have camos from different Earths and several different futures. Some Flashes appear. We have Danica, we have John Fox, we have a previously unseen version of Bart, but we have no Wally at all. There are some futures where Wally is specifically the Flash, like the Earth-22/Kingdom Come one, and he's just not there along with everybody else. Now, these issues were illustrated by at least 3 different artists (Redondo, Porter and Manapul). I don't know about Redondo, but Porter is a Wally fan, and a Manapul is a big one 2 (he tried to sneak Wally at the beggining of the New52, editorial made him remove it. His pitch for him never saw the light of day, etc). So, the fact that we se no Wally here in panels where at least an alternate of him would make sense, and the fact that there are 3 different artists drew this tell me this is no coincidence.

NO Wally West is still a mandate.

Don't get your hopes up. Don't expect anything to change. Don't expect his friends to ask where he is or the rest of the DCU to interact with him. Enjoy the mini for the next 3 months. As of right now, jack-**** has changed and functionally, we have no Wally West on the DCU.

Great post.

I know this is kinda weird to say with Wally's current situation but I'm happy with the Flash Forward series itself.

Its Wally's first solo series in a decade, and imo is written and drawn well. And Wally is written in character and is (mostly considering the situation) written like himself.

Maybe it's just because with all that's happened the last few years I was expecting more crapping on Wally and this is actually portraying Wally decently. The bar is low but it still remains that I am currently able to pick up a Wally solo series and it's actually good so I'll take it.

[BohemiaDrinker]

I know this is kinda weird to say with Wally's current situation but I'm happy with the Flash Forward series itself.

Don't get me wrong, I am too. Honestly, a little baffled that an enjoyable comic could be made in the middle of this mess, sure. But I'm digging it.

[Jekyll]

Don't get me wrong, I am too. Honestly, a little baffled that an enjoyable comic could be made in the middle of this mess, sure. But I'm digging it.

Agree! It’s been a pleasant surprise given the current slop that DC is trying to sell these days.

[Kyer]

[QUOTE=married guy;4704323]

God, reading this depressed the **** outta me because I know it's true.

Yeah. One of the things I found out fairly quickly when I joined this site is that BD is one of the comment makers to listen to. He/she knows their stuff.
It's doubly depressing because all my fears about the Young Justice show's Wally also came to pass and you just know that any Flash movie if that is still on will like as not be devoid of any mention of Wally unless it is the DC52/TV show one. Things have really not improved since 2011--John's one Rebirth story was the one golden ray of light in a really dark storm.

The only difference between 2011 and now is that in 2011 I was willing to give give Flash a shake for one book on the strength of Manupal's art plus the rumors that he wanted to bring in Wally. 2019 and even another alternative Superman story has failed to make me want to go shopping. I've never purchased less comics merchandise let alone DC books.

It's depressing alright. Kind of wish they'd just sell the character to another publisher if they hate him so. Max Mercury too. Make Max his former mentor in a new book with another publisher. I'd go for that as long as Wally remained fundamentally Wally. Seriously, life is getting too short to wait for DC to get morals.

[BohemiaDrinker]

Yeah. One of the things I found out fairly quickly when I joined this site is that BD is one of the comment makers to listen to. He/she knows their stuff.

Thank you, Kyer. It's "he".

We've met before here, by the way. I joined ComicBloc shortly after it became the 10th level of Dante's inferno. (But I left quickly, as well).

[Dataweaver]

Clearing Wally is very easy. "Wow, the Speed Force explosion was actually caused by [Villain X*] who channeled Dark Multiversal Energy^TM through Wally. The channeling caused psychic echoes that paired him with the Dark Multiverse version of Wally who is afraid all the time, which is why Wally faked up the crime scene. Now that the Dark Multiverse has been tamped back down by the Crisis, Wally is in control." I mean, that's all gobbledygook, of course, but it's not really hard to absolve him using some of the stuff Snyder is doing - the Dark Multiverse, Perpetua, Luthor, the Sixth Dimension, etc. are all so highly powered that they can be blamed for literally anything and are sufficiently powerful to do basically anything

*Batman Who Laughs, Zolomon, new character Flash Who Laughs

It needn't even be a villain. But yeah; something like this could easily absolve Wally of the HiC-up. It's very much the same story of thing that Johns did for Hal in Green Lantern: Rebirth, recasting everything that Hal did from Emerald Twilight to his death as having been manipulated by the Parallax fear entity. Substitute “infected by the Dark Multiverse” for “possessed by the Yellow Light Entity”, and you're all set.

Personally, I suspect the infection began sometime before HiC; possibly as far back as the start of the Flash War, when Wally's memories of his former reality returned.

[Cmbmool]

[QUOTE=Kyer;4705287]

It's depressing alright. Kind of wish they'd just sell the character to another publisher if they hate him so. Max Mercury too. Make Max his former mentor in a new book with another publisher. I'd go for that as long as Wally remained fundamentally Wally. Seriously, life is getting too short to wait for DC to get morals.

DC Can't sell classic Wally West off to a different publisher ? Can they ?!?

[SuperiorIronman]

[QUOTE=Cmbmool;4705619]

DC Can't sell classic Wally West off to a different publisher ? Can they ?!?

As for that; it's complicated.
Selling Wally West to another publisher basically involves removing him from the Flash label so anywhere else he goes he can remain a speedster but nothing about him can reference The Flash nor anything associated with that character. You loose a slew of backstory content that way and probably even the costume. This also means there might actually be a blind spot in what DC and by extension Warner Brothers can sell seeing as you could loose access to sales on Wally West's book and he held the title for a considerable amount of time. What's left of reprints would be that. And for that matter it also doesn't mean the newer publisher would get that either. It having elements in the book still owned by DC that have subsequent reprints go the Transformers route and edit him out like they did with Spider-man once upon a time.

So basically it's something they could do but a lot of work to basically delete him from the universe rather than just leave him be and wait for the copyright to lapse.

[Dr. Ellingham]

"Wally West" is one of the secret identities of one of their most lucrative IPs. They would never sell any aspect of one of their core IPs, because it could lead to usage entanglements later on. And - they're currently using both Wallace and Wally now. I'd expect that to continue.

So yeah...there's literally no reason to entertain such a risk for something that has almost no marketable value - selling off an alternate secret identity of a famous character.

[WallyWestFlash]

wally_west___the_flash_by_mad_54_dcwn21t-fullview.jpg
1char.

[married guy]

wally_west___the_flash_by_mad_54_dcwn21t-fullview.jpg
1char.

I'd love to see THAT make an appearance on Young Justice next season!

[skyvolt2000]

[QUOTE=Cmbmool;4705619]

DC Can't sell classic Wally West off to a different publisher ? Can they ?!?

To a certain point you can or you can lease him out.

Christopher Priest & Stuart Moore (and someone else either at DC or Marvel) got the rights to their creations.

Priest-it was Xero (made after Milestone left, he was still doing Justice League Task Force, Quantum & Woody, Steel and one year before the Panther run).

Moore it was Blood Hound.

While Priest has yet to do anything with Xero. Moore took his to Dark Horse and reprinted his run EXCEPT for the two issue crossover with Jason Rusch Firestorm.

The other way is doing with Marvel is doing with Star Wars-IDW does books for them. Although I think that is more due to access to places Marvel is not at yet.

Now in Wally's case-what would you call him? He would look like Wally but could not be Wally. It would be a case of the fake versions you see in comicsgate books or early Image books.

You know it's him but he is never called by his name.