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Grumpy Old Fan | Rating the late
Flash Rebirth #5
A funny thing happened on the way to writing this post about two famously-delayed DC miniseries: a family emergency resulted in my very own delay. As it happens, though, Cry For Justice was pushed back one more week.
So here we all are. Flash: Rebirth wrapped up a week after its follow-up, Blackest Night: The Flash. Cry For Justice concluded today, two months into Justice League of America’s post-CFJ storyline.
And that’s pretty much all I want to say about the delays. It’s actually been kind of fun, in a fannish way, trying to put the timeline in order. “Removing” these miniseries from the normal flow of DC events helped me focus on their merits, and particularly how they developed not so much as “events” but as stories. In this respect Flash: Rebirth faltered down the stretch while CFJ made a good effort to finish strong.
Not that I want to encourage such tardiness, DC….
MAJOR SPOILERS FOLLOW FOR FLASH: REBIRTH AND JUSTICE LEAGUE: CRY FOR JUSTICE
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Some Big Event miniseries, although steeped in continuity, turn out to be decent standalone stories. Geoff Johns’ and Ethan Van Sciver’s Green Lantern: Rebirth was one of those. However, some end up being mostly frameworks upon which to hang a series of cool moments. Sadly, Johns’ and Van Sciver’s Flash: Rebirth was one of those.
Let’s get the main objection out of the way first: I didn’t like the ending. Specifically, I didn’t like Barry not choosing to restore the proper timeline, in which Professor Zoom never framed his father for killing his mother. I especially didn’t like it because issue #6 opens with Barry and Wally talking about a) using the Cosmic Treadmill to travel to particular times, and b) the fact that history can be changed. Now, there are arguments to be made as to why Barry can’t, or perhaps shouldn’t, undo Zoom’s changes. Maybe it’s Barry’s ethics; maybe it’s Speed Force peculiarities. Whatever it is, though, it’s a tremendous dangling plot thread, and it leaves the rest of the miniseries feeling unfinished. Barry saying “I’m OK” and doing the paperwork to close his mom’s case doesn’t change the fact that his parents are dead when originally they were not (and originally they didn’t need to be). I expect Johns to revisit this at some point in the regular Flash series, but considering that it is such a big part of this story I’d have thought Johns would’ve finished it here.
To be sure, Flash: Rebirth plays with some attractive high-concept ideas: Barry as the new Black Flash (briefly, of course); Professor Zoom bringing him back; and Barry’s relationship to the Speed Force. However, it never pulls those ideas into a satisfying narrative. Although it is very similar structurally to GL: Rebirth, Flash: Rebirth is grounded in a very different set of circumstances. The Silver Age Green Lantern mythology — Hal Jordan as one of thousands of Green Lanterns, patrolling the universe under the guidance of the Guardians of Oa — had been almost completely obliterated in order to focus reader attention on the “torchbearer,” Kyle Rayner. Rebuilding all of that required some heavy-duty plotting and a generous amount of continuity gymnastics. What’s more, depending on your perspective, it might well have been righting a tremendous wrong, perpetrated at the height of the ‘90s “replacement hero” fad and therefore offensive to any reasonable standard of taste. For many fans, the events of GL: Rebirth simply needed to happen, sooner rather than later.
Not so with Flash: Rebirth, which devotes a lot of space (including a major plot point) to justifying Barry’s return. Even Barry wonders why he’s been pulled out of the Speed Force; and while that is a decent way to approach the story, it is diffused by the series’ eventual lack of focus. At first Barry doesn’t know that Zoom pulled him out of the Speed Force. All he knows is that he needs some way to acclimate to these new surroundings. Over the course of the series his questioning turns into acceptance; which again is fine for Barry, but not so good for the reader. It is not enough for Barry to defeat Zoom. It is not even enough for Flash: Rebirth to bring back Max Mercury, make Irey West the new Impulse, give Wally a distinctive costume, and return Jesse Quick’s speed. All of these things are fine in isolation, and I am sure they will provide years’ worth of super-speed enjoyment. At the end of issue #6, though, the reader wants closure which Flash: Rebirth ultimately doesn’t provide.
Instead, F:R flits from bit to bit, pausing for the fanservice — especially with Ethan Van Sciver’s obsessive, careful work helping to put on the brakes — but giving only a panel or a word balloon to explaining plot points like the lab techs’ murder and Max’s return. (This attention deficit may be some kind of embedded commentary, going along with the book’s “need to slow down” message, but I doubt it.) F:R can afford to indulge itself, since Johns will probably have more room to explore all the teases and unanswered questions … but that doesn’t mean it should be so indulgent. Like its GL predecessor, F:R is destined for a long shelf life, and therefore needs to entice readers into future volumes. Unlike GL: Rebirth, though, this miniseries may leave them dazed and confused — and not in a good way. Flash: Rebirth may read better as the first installment in an extended saga, but it risks alienating readers expecting a little more immediate follow-through.
* * *
Justice League: Cry for Justice #1
Justice League: Cry For Justice has almost the opposite problem. It starts from a position of extreme continuity-grounding (which I think is a 10-yard penalty) and ends up being a half-decent superhero story. When CFJ began last July, its parent title Justice League of America was in a holding pattern and its membership was in flux. The notion that CFJ would feature a new team, and one based around the old “proactive superhero” cliché, seemed incredibly lazy; and the initial execution wasn’t much better.
A big part of reading serialized superhero fare is the rush of in-the-moment emotions. Last summer, when CFJ began, it set off some pretty raw reactions, mostly because the team spent an inordinate amount of time posing, talking, and torturing suspects. In hindsight, and specifically in light of writer James Robinson’s current work on JLA (with penciller Mark Bagley, not CFJ’s Mauro Cascioli and his similarly-styled associates), CFJ’s often-stilted drama has become easier to take.
In fact, despite the story being grounded firmly in a very post-Final Crisis, pre-Blackest Night status quo — and also leading pretty clearly into this year’s big Green Arrow arc — Cry For Justice works acceptably well on its own. By the end, our heroes have worked through the blood and angst of the early issues, and have renounced their darker impulses; and the major emotional impact has been confined largely to one Leaguer (guess who). Even an innocent supporting character’s death didn’t seem particularly gratuitous … although the destruction in Star City (already spoiled by recent issues of JLA) and Red Arrow’s maiming might arguably have been enough to send Ollie over the edge.
For those of you who might have bailed out on Cry For Justice a few months ago, the plot essentially goes like this: the supervillain Prometheus quietly puts together a comprehensive plan to torment the world’s superheroes by sending their home cities on one-way trips through time and space. To do this he hires various other villains to steal familiar items of DC technology (the Cosmic Treadmill, the Time Pool, etc.) and/or kidnap assorted scientists. Along the way, the villains kill certain heroes’ family members and friends, which motivates those heroes to seek revenge. Eventually, the heroes of CFJ figure out they’re all after Prometheus, and team up to capture him. However, Prometheus explains that they can’t stop his devices, because each has been rigged to resist any kind of super-tampering. The Leaguers realize that the only way to stop him is to let him go in exchange for defusing the devices, so that’s what they do — but only after Star City has been devastated and Red Arrow’s young daughter has been killed. These personal losses later lead Green Arrow to track down and kill Prometheus.
Accordingly, while I haven’t had a lot of time to process it more completely, Cry For Justice doesn’t really buy into the simple “get the bad guys first” premise which was its initial hook. It becomes a story about inevitability — about how sometimes nothing can (or could have) prevented tragedy; but how the consequences can still be managed. As a result, CFJ steals (perhaps unintentionally) a moment from Watchmen, but comparing the two is pretty pointless: CFJ definitely doesn’t want to be the last superhero story anyone would ever need. Judging by their treatment in the Robinson/Bagley JLA, Robinson also doesn’t want the Justice League to trade too heavily in cynicism, so only Green Arrow must deal directly with the miniseries’ aftermath.
To be sure, Cry For Justice’s closing issue hasn’t made up for the rest of the miniseries’ faults. Robinson’s dialogue is a little too arch, Cascioli’s art is pretty stiff, and characters pop in and out like moles to be whacked. Firestorm is mistakenly drawn as the deceased Ronnie Raymond in at least one issue, I’m still not sure how many Flashes were involved, and Batwoman shows up just long enough to get a participation award. The ending itself is also problematic: just how did Green Arrow got close enough to Prometheus to put an arrow through his skull, when the villain was earlier shown taking out Justice Leaguers left and right?
Still, as reliant as it is on previous stories, and as much as it does to set up both the current JLA run and the aforementioned Team Arrow plot(s), CFJ doesn’t feel transitory. Rather, it describes a somewhat old-fashioned supervillain’s plot; and once that plot has been resolved and the threat neutralized, the story is over. (Said plot might have been thwarted by the JLA’s time-honored “Fox Maneuver” of switching opponents, but that’s probably beside the point.) While many of CFJ’s featured characters are now official Justice Leaguers, the regular JLA title has independently explained why they joined. Even Green Arrow’s current state of mind can be explained pretty simply in upcoming issues of his own arc.
So why read Cry For Justice, when DC has already shown that it can get along with the book being significantly delayed? I think it comes back to the idea of closure. By not just following Prometheus’ plot, but actually getting rid of Prometheus, CFJ lets the reader move on, even if the characters still have unresolved issues. Again, this is the opposite of Flash: Rebirth, where the main character has found peace but the reader may feel otherwise.
It feels very odd to laud Cry For Justice basically for doing something as basic as resolving its major plotlines. I don’t know if CFJ’s early chest-thumping lowered my expectations so significantly, but here we are. Moreover, considering DC’s recent track record of open-ended event miniseries — and especially the notion that this miniseries was playing so heavily with the current DC landscape — its eventual resolution was (this will be a poor choice of phrase) a pleasant surprise. Cry For Justice is far from perfect, but in the end at least it managed to be interesting.
- March 4, 2010 @ 02:00 PM by Tom Bondurant
28 Comments
LouW
March 4, 2010 at 3:27 pm
I wondered how Olliver found Prometheus’ hideout also, but the answer is in the latest Justice League issue, which did not make sense until I read Cry for Justice: The Shade helped Ollie find Prometheus. Two halves of a whole story.
Simon DelMonte
March 4, 2010 at 5:32 pm
Wow. You gave CFJ a good review. I thought that was impossible. The amount of hate being sent DC’s way for what happened to Roy and Lian is off the charts. I guess it’s good to see someone approach it with a little nuance.
Wally East
March 5, 2010 at 6:34 am
Things wrong with Cry for Justice:
* Jay Garrick and Prometheus stand face-to-face. Prometheus shoots Jay. Sorry, but no.
* The devices at each city were linked to the heroes that lived in those cities. No one brought up switching cities.
* Prometheus getting shot at the end. Surprised? Sure. One DC creator claimed (directly to me via twitter) that Ollie could shoot him because Prometheus hadn’t downloaded the proper info into the suit. That’s quite a leap and it’s one that a reader shouldn’t have to make. The scene would’ve worked better if he weren’t wearing the suit.
* Lian’s death meant nothing. Nothing. If Ollie had to choose between saving Star City vs. saving Lian, that would’ve been something — something more interesting to deal with in the future between Ollie and Roy, too.
* “We’re loosing.” Way to pull me out of the story, editors. Yes, it’s a small thing but it was jarring.
* History or not, I still have a problem with superheroes murdering people.
As a Wally fan, Flash: Rebirth just left me sad and annoyed. I mean, could Barry have been elevated any more than he was in this series? He IS the Speed Force? Ugh.
brianobx
March 5, 2010 at 7:57 am
I might be the only person who enjoyed Flash:Rebirth.
I’m ready to see Captain Cold and the Rogues take on Barry and see how low they are willing to go.
And I’m really ready for a bad ass version of Gorilla Grodd .
Will Flash strive to become what Green Lantern has become and support it’s own mega event?
The only thing I’d do different is modify Wally’s mask to show his red hair. A reverse Kid Flash design.
I’ve had 0 interest in Justice League of America ever since the relaunch.
Nitz the Bloody
March 6, 2010 at 10:18 am
Did anyone else get the impression from Cry for Justice’s final scene that the big moment– Ollie killing Prometheus– was just the violent reaction of a sore loser? Prometheus pulled off his big scheme and killed thousands upon thousands of people, then got away scot-free in the end– thus proving that the Cry for Justice team completely failed to be ” pro-active and hard on super-crime “. That Ollie capped him in the forehead ( or whatever the equivalent for ” capping ” is for bows and arrows ) doesn’t change this at all.
Generalzod33
March 6, 2010 at 11:08 am
I think a more proper comparison would be between Flash: Rebirth and the Legion of 3 Worlds. Both had to be jam-packed with “wrong-righting” and re-establishing anew status quo within an extremely small time-frame, and both were also plagued with delays (which doesn’t bother me. I read enough books to let stuff like that slide.)
I’m curious to know whether anyone, at the end, will be able to figure out where any of this stuff eventually fits together into a single tapestry i.e. Flash Rebirth, then CFJ, then Blackest Night, then reformation of JLA, MEANWHILE the Super-books?
Once again, not a biggie for me, but it’s always interesting to read Fanboy rage when the pieces don’t fit well…
Sean
March 6, 2010 at 11:10 am
Re: Nitz
That may have been an aspect. That being said, I’m sure the death of his grandaughter, the dismemberment of his son, and destruction of his home city were the paramount things in Ollie’s mind. Getting “beat” couldn’t hold a candle to any of that.
DougG
March 6, 2010 at 11:22 am
I’m with brianobx…I enjoyed Flash:Rebirth. The last issue’s steam was let out because of the tardiness, but the series is very solid, overall. It grabbed my attention and I’ve been going back and buying older Flash trades and singles to catch up with.
Nitz the Bloody
March 6, 2010 at 11:53 am
Re: Sean
I know that all pushed Ollie beyond his limits, but from the perspective of the audience, those events and the subsequent reactions came across as way too overblown and silly to have any dramatic impact ( most notably because Roy and Lian weren’t even part of the story until it was time for them to be respectively dismembered and killed ). The sheer audacity of the melodrama in Cry for Justice made it go right back to being as serious as Silver Age comics, where the battles between heroes and villains were like gentleman’s sports with no serious repercussions.
Since that’s the impression I got, it followed that if it’s all a sappily -written game, then Ollie picked up the chessboard and cracked open Prometheus’ skull with it.
Undead
March 6, 2010 at 11:54 am
I think my problem with Flash Rebirth is that I expected it to assure me that Wally wasn’t going to be pushed aside and Barry made the main Flash. Instead it went and didn’t exactly that by basically making Barry Jesus, Barry created the speed force, barry inspired Jay Garrick ect. and at the end of it all I still don’t care any more about barry than when it started.
On a positive note i do actually like wallys new costume.
Mr Reimer
March 6, 2010 at 11:55 am
Awesome Rebirth column. http://www.comicbloc.com/forums/register.php?a=act&u=37142&i=10966268
I’ve been going to this site for a while now!
Bevbos
March 6, 2010 at 3:18 pm
I thought F:R was great. It set up a huge future epic to come, which is exactly Johns’ formula and one he’s quite good at. The delays were irritating, yes, but you could say that about a lot of things. I think the only real irritating aspects were that Flash: Blackest Night really was the next 3 issues of F:R, and really should be advertised as such, and that Thawne comes off as a bit 2-D. But one assumes we’ll get a real “Thawne Origin Story” at one point…. I don’t think anyone could be picking up F:R for a done-in-one story. On that level, sure, it was disappointing.
As for CFJ… well, the whole thing could have been done in 2 beautiful issues, that’s the problem. Also, it faced the perennial Justice League problem of having the JLA beaten by an opponent that could have been easily taken down by almost any of the individual league members… stretching that out over 7 issues just made the conceit worse.
cn
March 6, 2010 at 3:27 pm
I never saw the point in bringing Barry Allen back. He was the one super hero death that had finality for 25 years and it meant something. Wally was a terrific Flash who organically took on the legacy. Unlike the sales gimmick of Kyle Rayner, Artemis, or Jean-Paul Valley. Which justified the return of Hal Jordan.
Michael M
March 6, 2010 at 3:27 pm
CFJ failed IMO to do anything except put Green Arrow into another melodramatic plot that will no doubt drag on. I am so tired of James Robinson’s attempts to be DC’s Mark Millar.
This story was beautiful to look at but had no depth. Schlock and Awe.
ScottyQuick
March 6, 2010 at 3:59 pm
“Even an innocent supporting character’s death didn’t seem particularly gratuitous”
Killing an eight year old to give her grandpa angst isn’t gratuitous?
EJ
March 6, 2010 at 4:50 pm
The way I read it Barry couldn’t change the past it’s not that he didn’t want to, he remarks to Wally when they are chasing Zoom that the Proffesor found a way to change the past even though it flies against everything they thought they knew.
To me Johns is clearly laying out a bigger storyline with this plot point that will play out later in his run, he’s made it clear that he plans on doing the same type of longterm storytelling that he did on GL with the new Flash ongoing.
Flash-Rebirth to me was a completelly different story than GL-Rebirth both had some similar traits but overall GLR was about bringing some light back into the DCU with Hal at the helm and the reforming of the GLC. FR was about Barry finding his place back in a world that he didn’t think needed him and rebuilding the Flash family and bringing back the speed and fun that was Flash. As you can see by the way Barry acts in BN he is back to how he used to be and that is all thanks to him facing all the questions after his return and finding his footing.
Meanwhile CFJ was a horribly written piece of garbage, which basically ruined all the credibility that James Robinson had after his Starman run. Honestly i’ve read few things in my near 20 years of comic reading that are as bad as that mini-series was, it had no redeeming value and it’s one of Didio’s biggest failures since he took over.
logan
March 6, 2010 at 6:01 pm
I know I’m probably in the minority on this, but Flash Rebirth lost me with that double page splash of the Flash Family running into action. Not that I don’t totally dig on a supporting cast, but just plausibly, how many people moving at light speed becomes rediculous.
I get Green Lantern, yeah there are a few thousand folks with his powers, but GL’s are all fundamentally different, and they’re spread out across the universe. But seriously, there were like 7 people running at super-speed. What situation, crisis, villain, etc. would ever call for more than one person who moves that fast?
Maybe two. Three’s cool, as I like sidekicks, Kid Flash is pretty sweet, and Jay Garrick fills the role of the older mentor. But isn’t it a little pointless and masturbatory to have Max Mercury there too? Impulse AND Kid Flash? I get that fanboys get attached to their continuity bites and side characters, but for someone new to funny books, or possessing the deductive powers of logic, it’s kind of silly.
Also, what’s with the J. Quick/Impulse “Girl Power!” line? Nobody straight’s said that since ’96. To each his own I guess.
Ozwell
March 6, 2010 at 6:43 pm
I can’t say I either really liked or disliked Flash Rebirth, because I didn’t understand why it was even necessary.
If the idea was to simplify or explain Flash continuity than I can’t say it helped much.
Barry reappearing in the Final Crisis book and that was enough for me.
I’m not crazy about DC’s rebirth stories on principle.
I wonder if the whole retelling and rehashing of origin stories ever gets new readers into a series.
It seems to burden top talent with creating a book that’s essentially raking over old coals when they could be doing something new.
fred
March 6, 2010 at 6:43 pm
cry for justice was a more enjoyable read than flash rebirth. It also sets up a great new arc with green arrow.
Ninjazilla
March 6, 2010 at 7:39 pm
what happens when there is no one else left to bring back?Barry Allen Bucky Jason Todd….
stealthwise
March 6, 2010 at 8:30 pm
Cry For Justice still sounds like the most retarded thing that DC has put out since Dogwelder in Hitman, and at least the latter was meant to be retarded (and funny).
Nick
March 6, 2010 at 9:26 pm
I just felt both of these were awful. I appreciate the Green Arrow push but I felt it came off too forced. We didn’t need 7 issues. This could’ve been done in 4 or just have it highlighted in Green Arrow’s own book. Also, I love Prometheus. He was a terrific character. Why bring him back just to kill him? Seems like a waste of potential.
Now the Flash stuff, to me, is just a matter of over doing it. Do we really need 8+ super speeders in the DCU? I just don’t get it. I hope the regular Flash series makes me a little more interested in Barry because I felt so indifferent towards him. The series confused me to no end which I think is one of the downfalls of the Flash title. It comes so prepackaged with heavy, heavy science and speed force “boo hickey” that it alienates people. I’m hoping the regular series streamlines the franchise a bit more.
These books are the reason why I read Jonah Hex and Secret Six
DidioForever
March 7, 2010 at 4:50 am
I think it would have been better to compare Flash:Rebirth to Captain America:Reborn.
Both had a similar theme, both came out around the same time-scale and both shared a similar spoiler-but-not-really-a-spoiler conundrum.
Just a thought, really
AirDave
March 7, 2010 at 2:26 pm
My two cents…contrary to what anyone at DC might believe 1) lightning doesn’t strike twice; and, B) lightning can not be bottled. As incredible as Green Lantern; Rebirth was…immeidately following it with Flash: Rebirth doomed it to failure right from the get-go. Maybe waiting a year or two, or bringing Barry back some other way might have worked better. I had to pass on Flash: Rebirth simply because his death meant something. Any attempt to bring him back, kinda undoes the whole point of his death for me. In my universe, Bucky is dead, Jason Todd is dead just like Uncle Ben and Gwen Stacy…
Alan Moore cursed both James Robinson and DC for the screenplay of League of Extraordinary Men – among other adaptations. From his writing, it is evident that Robinson is struggling to overcome this curse since…DC’s not so much worried about curses…fan’s curse all the time…
UnkleFreak
March 7, 2010 at 5:33 pm
My opinion is that Robinson totally dropped the ball on Cry for Justice, It went from Meh issue till issue 5 and then he had on opportunity to really kick things up. Then anti climatic release schedule, with JLA revealing the end of the story. The art was the only reason i finished the series. And even that let me down at the end. Cry for justice was simply a travesty at the end. As far as Super group books JLA needs to be put out to pasture for a couple of years and leave it to the JSA for a while. Kobra vs JSA did more for DC hero groups than Cry for justice. All it did was make me Cry for my money back.
Rebirth was all set up for Johns in the future of Flash. The fact that I remember Barry from the 80′s its nice to see him back. And it has been implied that Barry was the lightning bolt that created the Flashes for years. Johns implication that he IS the speedforce is nothing new at all. While we expect something Game Changing From Flash: Rebirth this was simply an introduction of Barry back to the DCU and all the new Readers that did not experience him over 25 Years ago. Many of my friends who had not idea who Barry was or what he was like enjoyed the series but were left scratching their heads. Those of us who loved Barry were happy to see him back but disappointed that it did not move his character more forward. But i guess we will see what happens in the future if this was a successful relaunch.
DidioForever
March 8, 2010 at 10:22 am
@AirDave – You’re entitled to your opinion, but FYI Flash: Rebirth hasn’t follwed straight after GL: Rebirth at all – GL Rebirth was 4 or 5 years ago!
And personally I think people tie way more meaning to Barry’s death than there actually was. Uncle Ben didn’t die in a 12-issue event series from the 80′s, y’know? Yeah, It was a “heroic death” but boody hell so was Superman’s! At the end of the day, the only difference between Barry’s death and Connor Kent’s is the length of time he’s actually ‘stayed dead’. That’s actually it.
paulski
March 8, 2010 at 3:18 pm
Sensational article, mainly because it echoed a lot of what I felt myself about the 2 series.
Flash:Rebirth started off in a blaze of glory with great writing and artwork in the first couple issues and then… ground to a halt, both in pacing and lateness. And the ending just seemed… blah. One of Geoff’s few misfires.
Cry For Justice? Now that was a really strange animal. Yeah, hokey writing and dialogue at times, but it really accelerated over the last 3 issues to the point where I was nearly out of breath at the end. It’s a tragedy that Cascioli couldn’t do the whole storyline himself because his work is GORGEOUS, so the book suffered from a bit of Infinite Crisis-itis. And the book did seem to completely change tack after the first couple issues. But overall I thought it was a winner, because it’s actually got me interested in Green Arrow again and I’ll be having a look at upcoming issues as a result. Far, FAR from perfect but not the abomination others are making out.
Dude
March 8, 2010 at 4:24 pm
I wonder if the CFJ storyline was all a set-up to get GA into prison…with this whole SuperMax movie idea floating around. It would be pretty cool to throw him into a new Suicide Squad…