BHOC: THE FLASH #278

So after a bit of a bumpy road as a reader over the preceding year, where I wasn’t able to consistently get copies of the issues, my new Stationery Store outlet made it possible for me to once more become a regular reader of THE FLASH. The character had been my absolute favorite as a young kid, and even though my attention was at this point more focused on FANTASTIC FOUR and the Marvel books as a hot new thing to me, I never lost my affection for this series. At this time, though, the book was in a time of transition. Longtime editor Julie Schwartz had been replaced by Ross Andru and in an attempt to bring the series up to date with the times, storylines began to include more contemporary situations while still featuring the typical fast-action and colorful costumed super-villains. In all honesty, this isn’t a period that I really love, but it was definitely a necessary step to keep the book viable, regardless of how well I feel they executed some of it.

The big thing that had happened that would cast a pallor over the storylines for the next several months was the sudden and unexpected murder of the main character’s wife Iris Allen. I missed the two issues in which this shocking event happened, so I was still reeling from the idea a little bit moving into this issue. One of the things that was appealing to me about THE FLASH was that it was stable, about a generally-contented married couple one of whom is also a colorful super hero on the side. So this change wasn’t to my liking, but it had happened, so I tried to get on board with it and see where the story would take us. Anyway, as we enter into this story, the opening blurb reminds us that Iris’s killer is still out there somewhere, giving Flash an objective to chase down. To do so, his first move is to hunt down one of his old foes, Captain Boomerang.

Captain Boomerang is one of the sillier enemies of the Scarlet Speedster–a man who can circle the Earth in an instant being befuddled by a guy who tosses boomerangs by hand, at speeds far less than that of sound. But that said, i always liked him–I didn’t really care that he was absurd, I sort of liked that in my Flash villains. Anyway, after bursting in on Boomerang’s latest heist-in-progress, Flash questions him: was he the Captain Boomerang who was at the costume party where Iris was killed? And this is why I love this character–Boomerang admits that he was, that he was there pickpocketing the other patrons. The idea is so low-rent that I simply adore it. What’s more, Boomerang tells his flashy foe that he wasn’t the only genuine Rogue in attendance that night, there were a bunch of them. Flash races off without confiscating the gems Boomerang has stolen nor bringing him in to the law, a turn of events that disturbs the Captain a little bit. Flash has more important matters on his mind.

The next morning, Barry Allen’s new friend Detective Frank Curtis finds the Police Scientist already at the crime lab. Barry tells Frank that he’s been undergoing deep self-hypnosis to see if he could recall anything else about the night Iris was killed. Barry had been injected with what should have been a lethal overdose of LSD that night–it was only his super-speed powers that allowed him to survive it–and he’s worked out that it was the partier in the Sandman costume who was mock-shooting the assorted guests who likely injected him with it while playing out his shtick. Frank also has news about the prime suspect for Iris’ murder, escaped convict and test subject Clive Yorkin. Turns out that Yorkin was dyslexic, so when the Nephron Project’s conditioning attempted to wire his brain to be repulsed by criminal acts, his dyslexic mind did the opposite and became addicted to violence instead. I don’t know that this is really the way dyslexia works, but two points for Cary Bates for trying to make this plot point feel legitimate. Anyway, Yorkin is out there in Central City somewhere, and until Barry can catch up with him, there’s no way to get the full story.

A quick break at this point for this full-page ad touting the impending release of ACTION COMICS #500. This seemed like a massive thing to my young self–the first comic book to ever reach issue #500. It looked to be a big deal, and so I was primed and ready, determined not to miss it when it came out in a few short weeks.

And since it runs here again, I might as well also show you this bespoke subscription ad for THE FLASH which recaps recent events in the series. DC did one of these for every book in their line, though they only tended to run inside the titles they were advertising. Which makes a certain amount of sense–but wouldn’t those readers already be the ones who were up-to-speed on recent events and following the book? Might have been smarter to mix them up a bit more across the line.

After a bit more investigating, which leads Frank and Barry to the Sandman costume that Barry’s would-be killer wore the night of the murder, Barry’s watch blinks red and he makes excuses to split from Frank so that he can become the Flash. And now we learn why the speedster hadn’t worried about Captain Boomerang’s loot: it’s all fake, decoys that Flash had put into place around Central City knowing that his money-hungry Rogues would make a play for it. Now another jewel heist is in progress, and racing there, Flash finds that the heister is Heat Wave, the fiery felon. What’s more, Flash isn’t messing around, and he races straight through Heat Wave’s flames in order to clock him–he wants answers about Iris’s murder and he’s only just keeping himself in check. But before he can get them, Flash is startled by the sudden appearance of the sought-after Clive Yorkin, who bursts into the room, drawn there by the intense emotional energy being given off by Flash’s rage. This gives Heat Wave the opportunity to get the drop on the hero and try to make a run for it.

Heat Wave is momentarily able to stun Flash, leaving only Clive Yorkin between him and freedom. But there’s something that he doesn’t know about Yorkin, which we readers only learned a few pages earlier: exposure to the Nephron Process has turned Yorkin into a kind of emotional vampire, one who is drawn to high-intensity emotions and why drains them out of his victims in order to feed his own need to self-satisfaction. Yorkin grabs Heat Wave, and in instants the Rogue is down, his skin turning blue and aged-looking, his vigor and vitality being sucked right out of him by Yorkin’s touch. It’s a pretty impactful and horrifying moment by FLASH standards of the day.

Barry doesn’t want Heat Wave killed, though, so he launches himself in a flying kick that knocks Yorkin away from his half-dead enemy Heat Wave. But as Flash turns to render aid and assistance to Heat Wave, Yorkin takes the opportunity to make a run for it. You wouldn’t think that this would be a huge problem for the Flash, but by the time the speedster makes it outside, he’s lost track of Yorkin. Which is a real problem. because Yorkin leaps out at his scarlet pursuer and grabs him–in a grip that Flash can’t seem to vibrate his way out of. What’s more, Yorkin’s touch fills Flash’s heart with overwhelming fear–fear that Yorkin begins to feed off of just as he had with Heat Wave. Flash is facing a similar fate–and that’s where the story is To Be Continued. This was a very solid outing for the story, advancing several plot threads while giving a good amount of action and drive and being slightly more contemporary than the title usually was. The art still suffers a little bit from Alex Saviuk being still a relative newbie whose style isn’t quite as gritty as the material is calling for, but it all works well enough for what it is.

And the issue closes out on that week’s new Daily Planet promotional page, in which the aforementioned ACTION COMICS #500 is spotlighted. And as usual, it also contained a gag strip by fan cartoonist Fred Hembeck as well as another installment of Bob Rozakis’ popular Ask the Answer Man column. This time, Bob winds up listing the features that appeared in NEW COMICS #17 as well as plugging DC SUPER HERO SPECTACULAR, a project that fell apart before publication and whose proposed contents were used elsewhere. That was a typical state of affairs for DC in the post-Implosion period.