We’ve got a hit Flash TV show and a planned movie in the works with a whole other actor so there’s no wonder The Flash is one of the hottest comics these days. Lets take a peek at the latest issue to determine… is it good?
The Flash #42 (DC Comics)
The issue opens with Barry arriving at the scene of a prison break. Three inmates have escaped and one of them his Barry’s father. It all seems fishy but Barry is not going to believe his dad had any part in it. Not yet anyway. The issue follows Barry as he tries to figure out where his father is and how he broke out all the while a mysterious yellowed Flash-like character buzzes in his ear.
Robert Venditti and Van Jensen write a pretty good story here with some detective work and plot thickening elements to boot. I can’t say it’s the most well-paced story ever as it opens with a ton of exposition instead of just showing us the prison break; considering the break itself is a bit of a mystery that makes some sense, but the opening dialogue reads a bit clunky.
Classic Todd MaFarlane fat guy.
The story itself is a bit cliched too as we have a very clearly painted innocent father who only broke out for good intentions. At least that’s the impression so far and while it’s nice to see they’re trying to preserve Barry’s father as innocent, and thus prove the family itself is good, it’s a bit boring. On top of this, yellowed Flash character (Reverse Flash I know) is a bit of an annoying prick. We see him do things to mess with people and it’s more obnoxious than threatening.
The art by Brett Booth is pretty spectacular and it’s not hard to see Todd McFarlane influenced his work. The chubby cop (pictured above) in particular screams McFarlane and nearly every panel is doused in fine line work with great detail. One segment has Reverse Flash slowing down time to mess with Barry’s Dad and the slanted panels help imbue a sense of time coming to a halt around them. It helps that the color palette drops too, but frankly every Flash moment looks fantastic. Blur effects are used nicely too and you’ll be remiss to find a single Flash centric panel that isn’t beautiful.
This dude is annoying.
Is It Good?
This is a by the numbers sort of story with some nice detective work to keep things semi interesting. If not for the spectacular art though this would be a skippable issue at best.
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