A Quick (and Confusing) History of The Flash

To borrow a phrase: Comics are weird.

I've been reading DC comics for a long time and that means a long time getting my head around DC's long and messy continuity. You've probably heard that DC occasionally does a "reboot" of its continuity but that's not entirely true. That would be too simple. One of the best ways to understand the history of DC Comics' fictional universe is by following a character through it from inception to modern incarnation. Many people have done this before and often they seem to focus on Supergirl. It makes sense. The history of Supergirl is like a fever dream.

But for my money, the history of DC continuity is easier to explore through The Flash, and when I say easier, I mean simple in the least simple way imaginable. And for no other reason than I feel like it, let's examine the history of The Flash and the DC Universe.

Jay Garrick

The first character call himself The Flash is Jay Garrick. Garrick was created by Gardner Fox and Harry Lampert in 1940. Jay Garrick is a university student who gets his powers from inhaling hard water while taking a smoke break in a chemistry lab. An origin story that could only come from the 1940s.

Jay Garrick joins the original super hero team, the Justice Society of America, and uses his super speed and blue jeans to be a classic hero of his era. Perhaps his most distinct trait is his hat, a World War I helmet that he modified to resemble the hat worn by Mercury in ancient depictions.

Jay Garrick appeared in an anthology series called Flash Comics, then a solo title called All-Flash. At the height of his popularity, Jay Garrick appeared in three regular publications: Flash Comics, All-Flash, and All Star Comics (the title that featured the JSA). But after the end of the second world war, super hero comics began to decline in popularity and between 1948 and 1951, all three of his book were cancelled.

Barry Allen

As the version of the character featured in numerous live action and animated TV shows, a plethora of straight to DVD animated features, and now a couple of major movies, Barry Allen is the version of the character most people are familiar with. Barry Allen was created in 1956 by Robert Kanigher and Carmine Infantino.

Barry Allen is one of a number of characters who, during what is known as the Silver Age of Comics, was an updated recreation of an earlier character. Barry Allen is a forensic scientist who is doused by lightning-struck chemicals and develops super speed. Barry Allen would also be the first Flash to become associated with the Speed Force, a... Well, what exactly the Speed Force is changes depending on who's writing and what they need, so let's just call it the true source of Barry Allen's power and move on.

Barry Allen becomes a member of the Justice League, a staple of the DC universe, gets a side kick called Kid Flash. But before we talk about Kid Flash, we need to talk about how things get confusing. The creation of Barry Allen acted as a retcon for the DC universe. Barry Allen calls himself the Flash and dresses in red with a lightning bolt motif because he is inspired to become a hero by his favourite comic book super hero: Jay Garrick.

Jay Garrick was removed from the continuity of the DC universe as an actual hero and all his comic books became in-universe comic books. While characters he teamed up with like Superman and Batman remained real. And then...

Flash of Two Worlds

In 1961, Gardner Fox wrote a story called 'Flash of Two Worlds' which introduced to DC Comics the idea of a multiverse. In this story, Barry Allen meets Jay Garrick by travelling to an alternate dimension in which all the events of the comics featuring Jay Garrick were real and had happened around the time of their publication but Jay Garrick had since grown old and retired.

The idea of the multiverse is one reason DC Comics can be so hard to keep up with and it all began with this comic. After 'Flash of Two Worlds', many other writers took the opportunity to use the multiverse for team ups with older characters that had not been featured in comics for some time. Characters that had been in print constantly, like Batman and Superman, were given doubles from Jay Garrick's world - called Earth Two - as a way to explain why they had not aged in the decades since their creation. They were not the same characters, and the Earth Two Batman and Superman had grown older, like Garrick.

Crisis On Infinite Earths

While the multiverse thing was great for explaining how characters seemed to be immortal and gave writers opportunities to come up with interesting new versions of characters, it also made DC Comics hard to understand for new readers. Everybody knows who Superman is. He's the guy in movies and cartoons and old serials, but why are there so many Supermen in the comics?

The solution to this was a universe spanning event called Crisis On Infinite Earths which ran in 1985. The even is frequently called the first reboot of the DC universe, but that term isn't quite right. It was an in universe simplification and the short version is that a new all powerful villain was destroying all the realities of the DC universe one at a time, and a collection of heroes from across the multiverse team up to stop him but by the time they do, only one universe remains, a universe recreated from five universes with a combined history and cast of characters.

In this new, multiverse free, single Earth called New Earth, some characters like Supergirl simply ceased to exist, while others, like Jay Garrick, had their history retconned. This is why Crisis on Infinite Earths is not really a reboot. Many of Jay Garrick's original stories remained canon to this new universe, but no longer occurred on Earth Two.

Jay Garrick in this era became my favourite version of the character. A semi-retired old man superhero, and a mentor to the younger super heroes, and an occasional team mate of the younger Flashes. But mostly the grey haired Garrick hung out in his home in Keystone City with his wife Joan. He becomes retroactively connected to the Speed Force and that helps keep him physically younger than his actual age, but he's old enough that he's considered the slowest of all the Flashes. 

But what became of Barry Allen in this New Earth? Well, he died in the crisis. Again, it's not really a reboot because Barry Allen remained a character who lived and died, and his death inspired his Kid Flash to take up the mantle of The Flash.

Wally West

The first Kid Flash was introduced to comics in 1959, created by John Broome and Carmine Infantino. He is the nephew of Barry Allen's wife, Iris West. Wally received his powers the same way Barry did and in the same place. While visiting the police station Barry worked at, lightning strikes a selection of chemicals that wash over Wally West and give him the same connection to the Speed Force.

Wally West was a member of the Teen Titans in its various incarnations up until he took over the title of The Flash from Barry during 'Crisis On Infinite Earths'. He not only takes the name, but also dons Barry's costume. Wally West became the third character to go by the name The Flash and keeps that name into the modern day.

Bart Allen

 The character Bart Allen was created by Mark Waid and Mike Wieringo in 1994. He first appears with the super hero name Impulse and a white and red costume. Bart Allen is a character who I just don't have time to explain in full, but what you need to know is he's Barry Allen's grandson from the distant future travelled back in time. He was raised in virtual reality because the Speed Force made him physically age at super speed. Also, after travelling back in time, he lives with Jay Garrick. He joins Young Justice, then the Teen Titans and becomes the second Kid Flash and the side kick of Wally West.

And then later on he decides he'd also like to become The Flash and spends a while in a remarkably similar costume to his predecessors and with the same name.

Let's Stop and Recap
We have four characters called the Flash, the first is Jay Garrick who has a distinct costume and existed as a comic book character within the comic book universe, then in an alternate universe, then in the main universe as an old man. Barry Allen is the second character called The Flash who died when the multiverse was recreated as one universe. Wally West is the third The Flash, taking over for Barry and initially putting on Barry's costume. Finally, Bart Allen, who is the second Flash's grandson from the future, becomes The Flash. The Flash is aided by two versions of a side kick called Kid Flash, one is Wally West prior to becoming The Flash and the other is Bart Allen prior to becoming The Flash. Oh, and eventually the multiverse is recreated, including an Earth Two (That is not the same as Earth Two from pre-Crisis on Infinite Earths) but Jay Garrick remains on New Earth and as a part of its history.

Final Crisis

Final Crisis is... A bad comic full of good ideas that don't pay off nearly as well as they should because it is largely an incomprehensible incoherent mess and the whole thing is overshadowed by the presence of a vampire Superman that might have been the stupidest thing in DC Comics history if not for the death and return of Batman that occurred a little later. All you need to know about it is that Barry Allen comes back to life and resumes being The Flash.

Also Bart Allen, who was dead, comes back to life at this point but as Kid Flash again. He joins the Legion of Super Heroes in the future.

And for a little while, you have Jay Garrick as old retired Flash, Barry Allen and Wally West operating as The Flash independently, and Kid Flash in the future. And a multiverse with other versions of the Flash running around. And then Barry ruins it.

Flashpoint and The New 52

Speaking of bad comics. Flashpoint is a not that good comic that is about the Flash running so fast that he breaks time and stops being the Flash, but remembers being the Flash and what the world was like before he broke it. Then he becomes the Flash again, runs so fast that he fixes time only he fixes it wrong. The new remade and not quite the same universe was called The New 52 and it is a period of DC history where basically everything sucked for about 5 years.

The New 52 and Flashpoint is often called a reboot, but again it's not really a reboot because while it makes a lot of changes - specifically reducing all of DC comics history to 5 years of in-universe time - a lot of the pre-Flashpoint events are still considered to have happened. While many characters received completely new origin stories divorced from the pre-Flashpoint timeline, some, like Batman, kept a condensed version of their history where all the major plot points still happened in some similar fashion and resulted in a similar character.

As pertains to our friend The Flash, Barry Allen became the one true Flash, the first Flash of his world, created in the same lightning bolt chemical bath. But his origin is only just being explored now, and I haven't read it yet. But what's important is Barry Allen still exists and has never died and has had some adventures like he did pre-Flashpoint but the specifics are unclear.

Our old friend Jay Garrick was removed from existence and recreated on the new Earth 2 (that's three versions of Earth Two now). This new Jay Garrick is the only Flash of his earth and is given his power by the god Mercury before Mercury dies. He appears with a variety of other characters from the Golden Age of comics re-imagined as modern heroes and the comic was one of the better books in the New 52... For about a year or so. Then it too sucked. But all you need to know is Jay Garrick exists but he is entirely unrelated to any of the other Jay Garricks despite having the same name and same home dimension.

Bart Allen also gets recreated in The New 52 as part of the new Teen Titans group but that comic pretty much sucked from beginning to end and it's the worst version of Bart Allen and it's not worth talking about. But he's still a fast running kid from the future.

Wally West Again

And in case you were worried this was getting too easy, let's talk about Wallace "Wally" West. This version of Wally West was created in 2014 and is the latest character to take the name Kid Flash. Wally is also a nephew of Iris West and gets his powers through some time travel shenanigans that involve a future Wally absorbing some Speed Force off a future Barry Allen, but then dying and in his moment of death sending his power through the Speed Force back in time to empower his younger self. This Barry Allen joins the Teen Titans formed by Damian Wayne and, tragically, is a pretty dull character.

Since the Bart Allen of the New 52 is Impulse and the old Wally West was written out of continuity following Flashpoint, Wallace West is the now the only canonical Kid Flash in present DC Continuity. 

Rebirth

In 2016, DC Comics had a company wide relaunch, not at all a reboot, but an announcement that they were positioning all their titles in a new editorial direction focused on character stories rather than world building stories. Also, they stopped trying to be edgy and mature and started being fun again. In general, it was a not-quite-admission that the New 52 sucked and they were going to try and go back to how things were before without rebuilding their universe again.

Once again, this story was focused on The Flash (since Barry Allen was responsible, in universe, for the New 52 timeline*) and specifically on the original Wally West emerging from the Speed Force with knowledge of the pre-Flashpoint timeline that nobody else had. Wally West convinces Barry and the Justice League and the Titans (a group made up of the grown up original Teen Titans) that he is telling the truth and a friend and resumes being The Flash in this new continuity.

Once More With Feeling

Okay, so that more or less brings us up to speed on The Flash and the history of the DC Universe. Just so you understand, let me recap these characters.

Jay Garrick was the first Flash who received his powers from inhaling hard water. He was a member of the first super hero team, the Justice Society, and a member of the first shared superhero universe. Right up until he wasn't. Then he was a comic book character appearing in in-universe comic books. Until he wasn't, and he was a super hero in an alternate reality called Earth Two, one of many earths in a multiverse. Until he wasn't, and he was an old super hero who began his career in the 1940s but retired and became a mentor to younger characters from the 50s onward. Then this Jay Garrick stopped existing entirely** and Jay Garrick became a new young character empower by the god Mercury and a hero on Earth-2, contemporary with the rest of the DC Universe.

Barry Allen was the second Flash, getting his powers from lightning charged chemicals. He is inspired by comic books about Jay Garrick, then meets the real Jay Garrick on Earth Two, then history is rewritten and he's inspired by the old Jay Garrick. He takes Wally West as a side kick and then dies. Then he comes back to life. Then he rewrites history by running so fast he breaks reality then running so fast he puts it back together. Then he is the sole Flash of Prime Earth until he isn't when the old Wally West pops back into reality after being removed from it for a few years.

Wally West is the third Flash and the first Kid Flash and also gets his powers from an accidental electrified chemical shower. After Barry dies, he becomes The Flash. Then he sort of dies. Then he comes back to life. Then he stops existing. Then he exists again. He might be the only person who has remained one person from pre-Crisis on Infinite Earths and pre-Flashpoint to the present.

Bart Allen is from the future and he was Impulse, then the second Kid Flash, then the fourth Flash but only for a little while until he sort of died. Then he came back to life as a teenager and became Kid Flash again. He was raised in virtual reality because his super speed made him age to a teenager in a couple of years, but then they fixed that and he was raised by Jay Garrick. Then he was a whole new Bart Allen and a terrorist from the future with his mind wiped but that comic sucked so bad that everyone decided to pretend it doesn't exist and he hasn't been seen since*** so let's not talk about it.

Wallace West is the third Kid Flash and the second Wally West and he has only been around in comics for a few years. He has never been The Flash and isn't very interesting in general. He's the only person to be called Kid Flash after Flashpoint, even though the old Wally West is still around as The Flash.

And that's it! Now you know the history of The Flash and how he has changed as the DC Universe has changed and continuity has adjusted through in universe major events.

I will now take questions.

*Actually, it was Doctor Manhattan from Watchmen editing the timeline because... Reasons.
**Old man Garrick, Grandpa Flash as I like to call him, does make a brief appearance after Rebirth, inside the Speed Force like Wally did, with full memories of the pre-Flashpoint timeline, but he doesn't hang around.
***I'm told Bart Allen is back to being Impulse in current Young Justice comics but they probably take place on a different Earth to the rest of the DC Universe... But not Earth 2. And not Earth One. Oh, and Earth One is different to Prime Earth. Look, nobody said this was simple.

Is Cyberpunk Transphobic and Ableist?

There has been a lot of talk about the cyberpunk genre, lately, and its more troubling aspects, all stemming from a series of problematic revelations about the 'Cyberpunk 2077' video game being developped by 'CD Projekt Red'. What particularly caught my attention is an accusation that cyberpunk, a largely techno-phobic genre, is ableist in its condemnation of people using cybernetics to enhance themselves, and potentially transphobic for similar views on gender reassignment surgery. That is a great observation worth exploring.

Note that I am not talking about the video game 'Cyberpunk 2077'. The video game has some very troubling elements that read as transphobic and racist. But, come on, this is from the same studio that created a "collect women as sex trading cards" minigame in one of their titles. We shouldn't be this surprised and we certainly shouldn't be treating them as if they've earned the benefit of the doubt.

Anyway. I am henceforth talking about cyberpunk as a genre of fiction.

And I am going to explore it through Shadowrun, because it is the expression of cyberpunk I like the most and can speak the most about. It is also a super popular version of cyberpunk, having been around for 30 years in RPGs, novels, and video games. It's big enough and has been around long enough that I feel it's safe to call it an influential franchise within the genre. So, for the purpose of discussion, let's examine Shadowrun as a stand-in for cyberpunk more broadly, while ignoring the fantasy elements that are not applicable to the genre as a whole.

Is cyberpunk technophobic? Yes.

More broadly, cyberpunk is future-phobic. The conditions that birthed the cyberpunk genre are 1980s counter-culture that looked with trepidation at the economic and political reality of the world: a dawning digital age of right wing (read: socially conservative, economically liberal) economics and politics in which the global power was shifting to east Asia. And all of that meant alienation. Corporate domination would alienate us from our personal lives, an Asia dominated economy would alienate us from our national (read: western) roots, and technology would alienate us from our humanity. Thus was born the tropes of wage slaves corp drones, Japanese mega-corporations (or megacorps), and cybernetic augmentation. Cyberpunk does not want you to put pieces of metal into your body.

Is that ableist? Is its view of surgical transformation transphobic?

Well, let's begin with gender expression. How does the cyberpunk genre feel about your gender expression, or, for that matter, however else you want to express yourself? Well, as a genre that takes half its name from a counter-culture and aesthetic (punk) that was big at the time, and on the whole radical and transgressive, it should come as no surprise that cyberpunk does not care how you dress, what colour your hair is, how you style it, whether you've got piercings, and it sure as hell doesn't care what pronouns you go by (in fact, cyberpunk thinks gendered pronouns are boring and you should be using slick street slang like "chummer" to address people) or your sexual preferences. The only thing it does care about is your coming down on others and trying to force conformity on them. That's the punk in cyberpunk. Its identity politics are radically liberal.

Now let's hone in on the question of cybernetics. In the 5th edition rules of Shadowrun, the alienation that comes from altering your body with technology is represented in a mechanic called essence. You start with 6, and every augment takes it down a bit. Computer in your head? Maybe 0.5 essence. Flamethrower implanted in your arm? Maybe 1 whole essence. Replace your nervous system with wires? Like, 3 essence.

Gender reassignment surgery? None. In fact, most simple cosmetic surgery (basically anything you can get done today) is 0. Even metatype reassignment, essentially race change surgery, is 0 cost to your essence. If all you're doing is trying to make the human you feel like become the human you look like, cyberpunk doesn't care.

What about a new heart? A new arm? A replacement foot? So, it's a little less clear but again, if what you want is a replacement functioning piece of yourself, that's also 0 cost. If you're in an accident and lose your arm, you can have a genetic copy custom made to replace it and you lose none of your "humanity" score. What we would just call medicine gets really no judgement from cyberpunk. Cyberpunk does not think you should die because you have a bad heart or failing liver. Oh, and modern prosthetic are basically not mentioned, nor are external assistant devices like wheelchairs. They are not relevant.

(Quick aside: within Shadowrun, you can get cheaper medical surgeries done to fix or replace limbs and organs with universal "off the shelf" bioware and this does cost essence which does cloud the issue a little. This is arguably because class warfare is of more interest to Shadowrun than transhumanist questions, especially in its most recent years. Either way, nobody is saying it's perfect.)

Where cyberpunk takes issue is in the technology of enhancement. You don't lose essence for seeking medical treatment, you lose essence for saying "Hey, I'd like to have somebody chop my arm off and replace it with a metal arm with gold plates and neon lights and transforms into a machine gun because that'd be awesome and fashion means more to me than my humanaity." Cyberpunk sees that as alienating you from your humanity because you are, in the genre's terms, literally transforming yourself into something inhuman. This is frequently compounded with the notion that augmentations will make you more valuable to corporations because they make you a better worker. And again, those megacorps are alienating you from yourself. Johnny Mneumonic (to use a non-shadowrun example) cuts out a piece of his head and his memories of childhood for his job as a data courier. Technology meets corporate greed and destroys the human individual, deprives him of a part of himself.

The trope of "cyberpsychosis" where you replace so much of yourself with machine that you go crazy is the extreme expression of this anxiety at the heart of the genre.

So, on examination, I'm not sure the argument that cyberpunk is an inherently transphobic or ableist genre pans out. Cyberpunk has no interest in condemning you for trying to be the best version of you, the version of you that you are comfortable being, the version of you that can live the most fulfilling life you can, but that's on the basis that if you go beyond what is human to become part meat, part super advanced machine, you're no longer being you. Be complete, just be completely human, says Shadowrun.

And you can disagree with that. You can be in favour of transhumanism and think "human" means a lot more than flesh. That's not really cyberpunk, though. It might look cyberpunk, but cyberpunk is more than an aesthetic. Star Trek sometimes includes transhumanist elements and it is even positive on them, but it's not cyberpunk.

Cyberpunk questions transhumanism, it is cautious of it, it sees the potential of abuse and alienation in technology. To be critical of cyberpunk and to be fair about your critical analysis, I argue that you need to engage with cyberpunk beyond individual pieces. And in that way, I'm not convinced that cyberpunk, as a genre, when looked at as a whole, has anything much to say at at all about gender or medical prosthesis, let alone condemnation.