The Flash is the Most Important Character in DC

Flash The CW

Now recently “The Flash” wrapped up one hell of a first season, which was full of excitement, suspense, and unabashedly fun episodes with an emotional finale and a hell of a cliffhanger. The Flash has bolted out in the whole season on top speed and only with a few stumbles. It also gave comic readers the real taste of the DC Comics that while Flash isn’t a part of the famed trinity Batman, Superman, and Wonder Woman, he is secretly the most important character in the entire DC Universe.

As a matter of fact, it isn’t even really a matter of opinion – sure, personal taste will dictate how much you enjoy any given Flash story, but really the character’s importance is about as objective as you can get in comic books.

History

The Flash made his debut in January 1940. He was the third of DC’s most-recognizable characters to be created in the Golden Age of comics, coming after but just before Green Lantern. He was also a completely different character than the one you might know now i.e. from the movies, TV series etc. He is Barry Allen.

However the first Flash was Jay Garrick

Jay Garrick

Jay Garrick was altogether a different superhero, also his origin was different and his costume goofier. But that doesn’t change the fact that he was a superhero who ran really fast. A piece of advice, you don’t have to read about his stories unless you’re a diehard fan. However there is this great thing about him, he was a part of the first superhero team, the Justice League of America.

Barry Allen

Barry Allen was the second Flash. He was the outcome of something crazy DC Comics did. In 1956 introduced an entirely new Flash. Barry Allen was a police scientist who gained his powers after getting doused by chemicals that were struck by lightning. This the Flash whom everyone is familiar with, iconic red suit and all.

Flash meets Flash

Why did I tell you all this? Because the funny part is that when Barry Allen was introduced in the 1956, Jay Garrick was supposedly discontinued. But everything changed. In an issue, Barry Allen does something in a community event and it leads him straight to another universe. There is where he meets Jay Garrick. It was then brought into knowledge that Earth-2 (where Barry meets Jay) was the universe where all Golden Age superheroes resided.

Wally West

During the first few years of Barry Allen’s tenure as The Flash, DC introduced a teenaged sidekick for the Scarlet Speedster: Wally West, AKA Kid Flash. At the end “Crisis on Infinite Earths”, West would take on the mantle of this former mentor and become the Flash of the Modern Age of Comics.

All the superhero movie zeitgeist on the whole – and the DC movie esthetic in particular – favors a certain had-edged grimness at odds with all that. The utter bigness and limitless fun inherent to most of DC’s pantheon of heroes has yet to be faithfully portrayed on film, and it’s a shame.

Which brings us back to “The Flash”. While it’s not entirely without fault, the CW’s “Flash” series is bridging this gap, bringing a sense of unbridled joy and heroism to the small-screen adventures of Barry Allen

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