Is The Flash going to break continuity again?
This issue posits the question: if a fight between two speedsters is super boring because it's just like a fight between two people who move at normal speed, how boring will it be if everybody in Central City can move at super speed?! My guess is super-duper boring! But since that question is actually the surprise twist ending, we'll have to wait until next issue to find out just how boring a city full of speedsters winds up being. Also you probably shouldn't be reading my reviews if you're worried about spoilers. These reviews (and the subsequent commentary) are meant to entertain people who have already read the issue. It's for people who just put down their DC Comics book and wondered why they don't have an easy means to end their life so decide to go online to see if anybody else thought the comic book they just read was also tremendously shitty. Not that this book is tremendously shitty! It's actually written pretty well. It's just that I've learned that maybe The Flash comic book isn't for me. I like the idea of The Flash but if the only way to make his way too overpowered powers interesting is to give his enemies the same powers, it's fucking boring. Or what about the other way to go with The Flash: time travel! I usually like time travel stories but only when the writer puts some thought into them and has an interesting point to make or some surprise twist at the end. But comic book time travel is the fucking worst. Person A from the future comes back in time to make sure Person B in the past is stopped before becoming super powerful in the future. Or some slight variation of that. Sometimes the time traveler is in the present and goes back to the future to change time so the present is better. How about letting The Flash be super awesome at saving Central City because he's unstoppable but maybe give him problems at work. Or maybe give him syphilis and, due to his metabolism, he goes crazy before he can even diagnose himself or get the cure! How about a story where he seriously burns the roof of his mouth because he ate the really hot pizza too quickly? Anything but more "The Flash battles other speedsters" crap.
The Commentary!
Last issue ended with some jerk named August indiscriminately being given super speed powers. It's not fair. I've gone down to the driving range in every storm over the last five years and I have yet to be struck by lightning. I've been hit by plenty of golf balls though. I suppose I don't have to stand in the middle of a driving range to be struck by lightning while twirling around holding a couple of five irons in the air.
August had to be struck by lightning or else he would have been struck by a bullet. And since the name of the issue was "Deus Ex Machina", it would have seemed an inappropriate title if he were killed instead of saved miraculously. I probably would have been pretty angry about it for a few minutes before moving on to the next comic book and some fresh outrage. There's nothing worse than stale outrage! It's weird how it constantly needs to be refreshed for me to feel anything at all!
Oh god! Holy shit! More blasphemies and exclamations! I just realized that Detective August's last name is Heart! August Heart! You can't make this shit up! Except it is made up. And every time anything happens in which somebody feels the need to exclaim "You can't make this up!" or "You can't write this kind of thing!", I feel the need to point out that yes, you can make that shit up. That's exactly the kind of shit that gets made up all of the time. And the bit of reality you just proclaimed made reality so much better than fiction? Probably already a plot point in about five thousand pieces you've never read.
Anyway, I don't think I was done marveling at Williamson's ability to come up with the cheesiest fucking name I've ever read. Just say it out loud a few times. Whew. That's good cheese!
"August Heart" also sounds like a good name for a female masturbation novel.
Dude! You have to learn how to walk before you can run! And you have to learn how to run before you can generate mini-vortexes with your arms!
August guesses that The Flash is actually Barry Allen because in this version of Barry's origin story, August Heart was right there in the room! But it's okay if August knows Barry's secret identity because how could a guy named August Heart ever betray a friend?!
While Barry gets his panties moist showing off all of his speed powers to a possible sidekick, Wally West is practicing his speed powers on his own. It's going to get really confusing having two Wally Wests in the DC Universe. I need to think up a cool nickname for one of them! How about Wally West and Nerdy Ginger Freckle Boy? That's enduring and not at all offensive, right? Like calling a red haired person "Red" because why bother learning their name when you can just give them the same nickname every other redheaded person has been given by unimaginative morons? Maybe I'll just call them both Wally and not give a shit about who gets confused.
Iris is busy investigating the break-ins at STAR Labs by a group hilariously called The Black Hole. That's slang for an anal sphincter!
What Iris means by "attention he deserved" is "be exploited by a newspaper in the hopes of getting more subscriptions so that the paper can charge more to advertisers and maybe Iris will get some sorely needed name recognition as a print journalist!"
August and Barry have lunch to discuss super-speed tactics.
August: "I don't need science! I can just punch people super fast!"
Barry: "Now hold up a second there, God! Have you ever considered the force you would create with a super-speed punch? You've got to calculate those things perfectly or your fist will go right through a skull!"
August: "Wow! My algebra teacher was right! I would need to know algebra to be a cop!"
Barry: "Oh, August, you silly goose! Algebra is the least of your math and science worries now! You're in science fiction bullshit territory now!"
August: "Well, whatever. At least we don't have to worry about due process anymore! Super powers are awesome!"
Oh Barry! Batman would be so disappointed in you.
Iris calls Barry and August and is conveniently kidnapped by The Black Hole during the phone conversation. Stupid kidnappers! You never kidnap somebody while they're in the middle of a cell phone call! Amateurs! Now Barry and August have a jump on saving Iris. I bet Barry is all, "Let's go save her!" And August will be all, "What do I care about a stupid reporter? Due process, remember!"
Iris manages to save herself because the kidnappers were even more amateurish than I first realized. Although her solution is to jump out of a moving van into traffic so luckily The Flash just happens to be passing by to catch her. I hope she doesn't put all of the variables together like a real journalist could and realize the only person who could have known she was being kidnapped was August Heart! And I guess Barry but that's too on the nose for a reporter of her skill level.
The Black Hole manage to shoot The Flash with their new technology which is the same old new technology that is always being developed by some alien race or mad scientist. It's that whole weapon that steals powers thing and it's become a total crutch in superhero comic books. And it rarely matters how a character's powers differ from other characters because the weapon always works on anybody with superpowers. And since it's technology and I'm an idiot, I can't come up with any logical reason for a weapon like that to not exist or explain how it totally couldn't work at all! I suppose I also can't think of any arguments like that because the weapons are never explained in enough detail to develop a counterargument. They just absorb powers. Duh!
And then Speed Force lightning strikes nearly everybody in Central City. That's going to confuse the fuck out of tourists.
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