The First Time Everything You Knew Was Wrong

One of the more overused concepts in comic books in the 1980s and 1990s was that of “Everything You Know Is Wrong”; which is to say, some new revelation is about to change some or all of the fundamental beliefs about a particular character’s backstory or origin. This trope gained popularity after author Alan Moore completely overhauled Swamp Thing, revealing that the titular creature wasn’t actually a transformed Alec Holland at all, but rather a newly-born plant elemental with Holland’s memories. This change opened up all sorts of new avenues for the character, and Moore’s skilled, literate writing made the series wildly popular. And so, inspired, other creators began to attempt similar transformations on other characters, with mixed (and typically lackluster) results. But that wasn’t the first time that such an overhaul of a character’s formative history had been attempted. Not, the first such story appeared unheralded in THE FLASH #167 in 1967.

The story was written by Gardner Fox, who originated the first Golden Age incarnation of the character, working here under editor Julie Schwartz. The artwork was delivered by FLASH mainstay Carmine Infantino, here inked by Sid Greene. It’s anybody’s guess what motivated this story and what these creators were thinking. This being the Go-Go Checks era, I suspect that the “camp” influence of the 1966 BATMAN television series may have played a part in germinating this tale. But at around this time, possibly in response to the encroachment of Marvel on sales or a general downturn in the business, a number of strange and premise-shaking stories began to turn up in Julie’s titles. This is still well within the bounds of the Silver Age of Comics and wasn’t a latter day revision–this was very much the work of people who had been working on the character for a long period of time. And yet, it’s a staggeringly dumb story from end-to-end.

The story opens ordinarily enough, with the Flash getting the jump on a ring of jewel smugglers that he’s been after. Following a page or two of super-speed action, the Flash finds that he’s beginning to overheat. The protective aura that absorbs the friction of the use of his super-speed has stopped functioning. After taking a quick dip in the water to cool himself off, Flash finds himself confronted by a strange little man as he emerges from the waves. This purportedly comical figure with too-large glasses and a balding hairline introduces himself as Mopee of the Heavenly Helpmates, Initiate Tenth Class. And he tells the Flash that he’s come to eliminate the Flash’s super-speed because a mistake had been made when Mopee caused the accident that gave the Flash his powers in the first place. Mopee is clearly meant to be a bit funny, but he comes across instead as just being dumb.

Mopee explains that as a Heavenly Helpmate–kind of a guardian angel–he had been ordered to descend to Earth and grant some lucky individual super-speed abilities. He chose Barry Allen, seemingly at random, and generated the lightning bolt that struck Allen and the chemicals he was standing in front of, the resulting discharge giving him his vibrational powers. But upon returning to his own dimension, Mopee was told by his superiors that everything used in the granting of such powers must belong to the giftee–and so, since Barry was working at the crime lab, he didn’t really own those chemicals he was doused with, and so his super-speed must now be taken away again. Flash actually considers this for a moment. He’s only just married Iris West, so the prospect of living a regular life is appealing to him. But in the end, he decides that he needs to keep his speed in order to help others, and asks Mopee if there’s some way that can be arranged.

After looking it up in the Heavenly Helpmate charter, Mopee tells the Flash that if he can earn enough money to buy a replacement set of chemicals within 24 hours, Mopee can repeat the original process and renew Flash’s powers. He also restores Flash’s missing speed-aura for the duration. In order to justify the cover (which was undoubtedly created before the story, as was the manner in which Schwartz often worked), Flash and Mopee place a situations wanted ad in the local paper so that he can earn the needed cash as the Flash to fulfill the bargain. The specific situation that Mopee chooses from the responses–helping a manufacturer deliver a number of parcels all across the country–winds up by unlikely coincidence being a front for the jewel smugglers from the opening to disperse their ill-gotten gains, so Flash takes a page or two out to clobber and curtail them before making his fateful purchase.

And that’s pretty much it. Flash and Mopee re-stage the original accident that empowered the Flash, and then the Heavenly Helpmate goes on his way, now hoping to be promoted to Initiate Ninth Level. And Flash realizes that as unlikely as his origin was, it actually happened to somebody else–Wally West, Kid Flash. But as startling as this story was, it was immediately ignored by everybody involved, audience and creators alike. It would be decades before it would ever even be referenced again, and there it was done to make a joke out of it. Collectively, everybody who experienced this issue unanimously decided to ignore its events completely–which was certainly for the best, as absurd as the Flash’s origin might be, getting his super-powers from an awkward angel was even more ridiculous. It turned out that Everything We Knew Was Wrong was, in this instance, Wrong.

Mopee would turn up for a one-page cameo in AMBUSH BUG #3 in the mid-1980s courtesy of Robert Loren Fleming, Keith Giffen and editor Julie Schwartz. At the time, some twenty years later, most readers were entirely unfamiliar with the story in THE LFASH #167. But that didn’t prevent Given and Fleming from making a mockery of it. Just desserts.