Originally Posted by
Waterfall
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.