Sunday, March 7, 2010

An ANGRY Rant about Flash: Rebirth #6!

Rejoice comic book fans, the final issue of our Lord and Savior, The SAINT Barry Allen's comeback comic is reviewed here! Just so we're all on the same page, SAINT Barry(yep, he's officially getting the BENDIS treatment now)is the most important, smartest, coolest, and dare I say, the most handsome of all of the Flash characters, and possibly the greatest character in the HISTORY of comic books. When I read a DC comic and SAINT Barry isn't inside, I die just a little bit inside... Enough talk, all hail the magnificent one, our savior, the great SAINT Barry Allen!!!

Flash: Rebirth #6(of 6): Writer: Geoff Johns. Pencils: Ethan Van Sciver.

SAINT Barry tries to catch up to the Reverse Flash, who is racing back in time to kill the SAINT'S wife prior to them getting married. The SAINT can't quite catch Reverse Flash, but is assisted by the timely arrival of that loser, Wally West. The SAINT allows Wally to think that he assisted him(we all know the truth though, the SAINT needs no help!), and the Flash and the lesser Flash manage to catch up to the Reverse Flash right before he manages to kill Iris. The SAINT grabs a hold of Reverse Flash and drives him back to the present day, where the JSA, the JLA and the lesser Flashes have gathered together to create a containment unit to hold the Reverse Flash immobile, stopping his rampage. You know, it's all good and dandy that the other heroes wanted to help, but we all know the SAINT could have easily taken care of the Reverse Flash on his own... And Doomsday. And the Mad Hatter! With the threat of the Reverse Flash finally over, the idiots in Central City decide to throw a parade for the SAINT(as well as the lesser Flashes, but who really cares about them?). From there we get a couple of epilogues... In epilogue one, Zoom, whose cell is located near the Reverse Flash tries to plot against the SAINT, in the second one, some damned talking monkeys complain about the Reverse Flash doing something unnatural in their jungle. “Doing something unnatural in their jungle”?!? I don't even want to GUESS what THAT means! In epilogue three, the mystery figure(Abra Kadabra maybe?)the Reverse Flash tried to kill in Rebirth #1(I think... It's been so long since I've read that I can't remember)swears revenge against the Reverse Flash. Epilogue four deals with the Rogues deciding to come up with their emergency SAINT Barry contingency plan... Why bother with a contingency plan? It's SAINT Barry we're talking about, I've already established that he could beat the deadly menace that is the Mad Hatter, what hope do they have? While epilogue five deals with SAINT Barry and his surprisingly young wife, Iris, making out. This issue(thankfully)ends with the SAINT arriving late to a party thrown by the JLA to welcome him back to life. AHA-HAHAHAH! How hilarious! See, he's the World's Fastest(and most egotistical)Man, but he's STILL late to his own party!!! How funny...... Ugh...

Do I even need to say what I thought about this comic? I think you should have a pretty good feel for my thoughts after reading the review... Needless to say, every page of this comic was torture. And I'm not talking slowly pulling off a band-aid torture, I'm talking being burnt at the stake while rabid dogs eat your innards torture! I don't like when a writer takes a character he's obviously enamored by(see: Christopher Yost and X-23 or BENDIS and Luke Cage)and decides to shove said character down the throats of the fans, other characters be damned. What this mini-series pretty much told us was that SAINT Barry is the most important speedster in the DCU, and that all of the other speedsters owe him their very existences. You know what part of this comic pissed me off the most(and there were A LOT of things I could have chosen from!)? The epilogue where the Rogues decide that with SAINT Barry back, they have to pull out their contingency plan... THAT was what pretty much pushed me right off the cliff. The Rogues have been battling Wally West EVEN longer then they've been battling the SAINT, but the moment the SAINT returns, they have to resort to some kind of top secret contingency plan... Why didn't they ever have to use this plan against Wally? Oh wait, I know why, because compared to the SAINT, Wally is a nobody. Never mind the fact that Wally has proudly held the mantle of the Flash for the past 25 years, and has always been able to defeat the Rogues. In the eyes of Geoff Johns and the DC editorial staff, Wally has always been some lucky kid holding the SAINT'S place, while we all waited breathlessly for the SAINT to return... With the exception of the Final Crisis debacle, I've never been more disappointed in DC.

Score: 4 out of 10.Bow down before SAINT Barry Allen!!!

4 comments:

  1. I'm getting this comic in the mail this week, so I had to skip the review for now (although I did catch the words "lord" and "savior" in the first sentence, so I'm still laughing).

    The other night I went back and read #5 as a refresher, and I have the feeling we're going to be on the same page about this mini-series when all is said and done.

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  2. Heh... Even without reading this review, I'm sure you can get a good feel for what I thought about this issue just by checking out the title, Kello! With you being an even bigger Flash fan then I am, I'll be interested on your thoughts on this mini when you get around to reading it.

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  3. Hm, I thought I left a comment on this last night, but apparently Blogger ate it. Oh well, I'll try again. :)

    The only Flash stories I've ever read were Silver Age Barry comics, so I guess I've always thought of him as being the "ultimate" or most important Flash. I imagine that would be different if I were more familiar with Wally or the other Flashes. I plan on reading Rebirth someday, after I've read more Wally stories, and it'll be interesting to see if/how my perspective changes.

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  4. Yeah, I have the opposite problem Marc. I've probably read hundreds of DC books where Wally was the Flash, and only a handful of comics where Barry had the mantle. I mean, I know who Barry is and how he "died" and all, but to me the Flash IS Wally West, which is why his harsh demotion is so galling to me.

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