Shenanigans & Tomfoolery

I can’t talk about The Flash: Rebirth without first talking about my tremendous expectations for the title.

Geoff Johns and Ethan Van Sciver turned me into a huge Hal Jordan fan (a character I previously had zero interest in) with Green Lantern: Rebirth and that book and its pure comic booky-ness stands as one of my favorites of the last ten years or so. Johns’ own run on The Flash taught me how rich the Flash and his world is and now he’s my favorite superhero bar none. It’s been almost ten years after that run ended and Johns is taking another stab at an ongoing with the Scarlet Speedster starting with The Flash: Rebirth mini series. With partner in crime Ethan Van Sciver on art, the “Rebirth” pedigree on full display AND my favorite superhero, I absolutely expected this to be my favorite book of the next ten years. After many, many delays, the last issue was finally released recently and I was, sadly, left a little cold.

Spoilers ahead.

The first issue showed a lot promise. A number of interesting questions and compelling mysteries were raised and we had what was, I assumed, a new villain origin in the series’ opening. There were plenty of nods to the Flash universe and being re-introduced to a lot of these characters made me very excited about getting back into this world of speed and excitement. Van Sciver was at the top of his game here and his dense, ultra detailed pages in this issue more than deserve repeated viewings. Not many artists would redraw the same perspective panel six times just to get the feel of a moving POV shot but Van Sciver did just that in the first two pages of the issue. His subtle expressions, his brilliant storytelling, his amazing portrayal of speed, it’s all just a wonder to behold. The series was off to a promising start but it didn’t take very long for things to go sour.

One of my biggest disappointments story-wise was that who I thought was a “new villain” just ended up being Professor Zoom. Eobard Thawne again? Really? I don’t have a problem with the revolving door that is death in comics anymore but him being the big antagonist in this series is so easy and obvious a choice that when he’s finally revealed at the end of issue #3 it’s less of a bang and more of a whimper. Worse yet, once it’s established that he’s the main villain in the story, the list of suspects behind the murder of Barry Allen’s mother is narrowed down to one. This is one of the bigger mysteries introduced in the story back in issue #1 and who else was it going to be but Eobard Thawne? The fact that it’s so obvious and that it isn’t confirmed until issue #5 causes the reveal to lose any kind of emotional impact on the reader and fall flat in its face.

Similarly, the finale fails to deliver as Professor Zoom once again races to kill Iris in the past and Barry and Wally take him down by simply racing him back to the present and trapping him in some device that cuts him off from the Speed Force. After issue #5 sets up the final conflict, I was already kinda disappointed by the series but I hoped to at least see a high speed throwdown between two speedsters in the vein of “The Return of Barry Allen” or “Blitz.” Instead, we get a 2-3 page race through time and a deus ex machina device that definitively ends the fight. And then the second half of issue #6 contains nothing but a bunch of teasers for, presumably, upcoming storylines in the new Flash ongoing. The series just doesn’t provide a conclusive ending and a lot of things are left up in the air.

There are a couple of additions to the larger Flash mythos that are interesting as well as a couple of character “re-brandings.” The biggest of these changes is that Barry actually created the Speed Force when he first gained his powers. It’s a retcon that is confusing at times (we know Max Mercury was tapping into the Speed Force before Barry was even born) and one that gives perhaps too much importance to Barry over other speedsters but it’s something that could have interesting implications in the future, specially considering Professor Zoom now generates his own “negative” Speed Force.

Max Mercury is back, Wally gets a new costume and Liberty Belle becomes Jesse Quick once again but the most bittersweet of these character changes happened with Wally’s kids. I think the dynamics between Irey and Jai, twins with different variations on speed powers, was never fully realized and with Irey taking up the mantle of Impulse and Jai now powerless, it’s something that’ll most likely never be fully explored. Still, I’m looking forward to seeing how Irey fits in with the rest of the Flash family now that she’s Impulse, particularly with Bart and Max.

And what of the art? To gauge the decline in art quality you needn’t look further than the covers. The first few covers are all amazing but the last few one aren’t. I love the cover to issue #5 but more because of its concept than the draftsmanship contained therein. Ethan Van Sciver is an amazing artist but one that absolutely needs to take his time to deliver and, in spite of numerous delays between issues, it seems like he still didn’t have enough time to meet his high standards. The first issue was amazing as I’ve said before but, slowly, the quality in art starts to decline. The poses become more stiff, the backgrounds more sparse, the pages less sophisticated, etc, etc. Delays in monthly comics have never been a huge issue with me and, in this case in particular, I would absolutely have preferred it if Van Sciver had taken his sweet time to finish this book, even if it took another three months for it to happen. I just hope that, in future projects, he’s given enough lead time to provide pages on par with what he’s done in the past. The artwork is never terrible but the decline is steep and noticeable and it’s disappointing.

Disappointing is really the word to encompass this entire review. Perhaps my expectations were too big to ever be met but some of the problems with this series cannot be ignored. The predictability of the story and the decline in artwork made The Flash: Rebirth a frustrating read at times and considering the pedigree of both Geoff Johns and Ethan Van Sciver it can be downright upsetting. It has its moments (Barry racing Superman in issue #3) and I suppose it’s a good introductory read for newcomers to the Flash universe but to a big fan of the character and a huge fan of Johns’ run on the title, The Flash: Rebirth is… disappointing.