Flashpoint #1
Written by Geoff Johns
Pencils by Andy Kubert
Inks by Sandra Hope
Colors by Alex Sinclair
Letters by Nick J. Napolitano
$3.99 / 40 pages / Full Color
DC Comics
It's a classic conceit. You wake up in another world. Its not yours, but the furniture is just similar enough that that's bothersome (That tin woodsman sure looks familiar…). It's like a painting gone crooked, begging to be adjusted. If you could just get things back to the way they were. The rightful place. Home.
That's just what happens to Barry Allen one morning as he stirs from a nap. He's still Barry, but his gait has changed. The speedster formerly known as the Fastest Man Alive finds himself without a ring, tumbling down a flight of steps. His powers are gone. No one's even heard of The Flash. Or Superman. Or the League. And suddenly people are turning to someone named Citizen Cold as if he's some kind of hero.
And wait. Is that? No. It couldn't be. It's his mother. It's Nora Allen gone gray. An image Barry never dreamed he'd see. Because Nora Allen, recent retcon or not, is supposed to be dead.
In Flashpoint, everything we know has changed, and only Barry recognizes that. He's a frenzied George Bailey in his own cruel, unfamiliar yet achingly too-familiar Potterville. It starts with his everyday life. With his family and his powers. But the changes ripple outward. That's when we meet the red-eyed Batman who stalks his rogues to the glittering rooftop of Wayne Casinos. Not only doesn't he look like our Batman, but he's the kind of vigilante who shoves crooks from great heights, only for the valiant Cyborg–maybe the brightest light in this dark new world–to catch them.
Here, Cyborg stages a kind of intervention with the Batman. In an effort the recruit the eldest and most cunning crusader to a resistance force, he summons holograms of the many strange and cynical heroes from throughout the world. We meet a number of characters that mirror both popular and obscure characters from the traditional DCU. Some seem (as of this issue) to be direct analogues of their counterparts, as in the Sandman Wesley Dodds, the Enchantress, or the well intentioned–if still sort of crummy–Len Snart as Citizen Cold. Others are mashups or distillations. The most interesting of these hybrids are the snotty subway riding teens (the usual Marvel family and a few others) who share aspects of the SHAZAM powerset. Their powers combine to summon Captain Thunder, a scarred and not so Big Cheesy iteration of Captain Marvel. Also, Tawny is a leashed tiger who transforms into BattleCat from Masters of the Universe.
The threat? Wonder Woman and Aquaman are cruel despots who've literally drowned Europe in their rise to power. Cartographers and Red Dwarf fans are especially pissed. To round out this summary, Cyborg's efforts to rally the heroes fails sort of miserably. Everyone agrees the Europe thing is a major bummer, but none of these capes really trusts one another enough to embark upon this kind of suicide mission. Cyborg is one Charlie Brown in desperate need of a Linus. Or maybe it's the other way around? I think Superman is gonna be the Snoopy.
Europe is the sad tree?
Okay. This is all very compelling. It is. But there's a problem. And it's a big one.
Well, two problems, to include the art. This is not Andy Kubert's best work. There is an awkward lack of continuity between panels on a given page, notably in the early pages with Barry's mother. Is she heavy-set? Frail? This fluctuates. Barry turns an incredibly bizarre expression as he witnesses Iris embrace another man. The overall effect is of a rushed project, and certainly not the quality we'd expect from this price point or this high a profile.
Now for the writing problem.
For an alternate world story to succeed, one of the primary ingredients is unobtrusive exposition. That's largely missing. In its place is obtrusive exposition in one of it's most vile forms. Let's call it "As you know" dialogue.
The difficulty level on such an ambitiously alternate reality tale, especially in this medium and page count is obviously quite high. So, we can forgive the trope of Barry's co-worker's bemusement at his sheer and sudden confusion. It's a free space in BINGO. You sort of get one of two, "Wait, what year is it?" moments. Or, to be more timely, "What realm is this?" moments (for good examples of how to get away with this or better yet to play it for comedy, watch Source Code or Thor.) But Barry's interrogation of his dear old mother ought to end with a van and a straitjacket. And maybe it will come to that. But that's not the worst of the expositional dialogue that left me wincing in a harsh remembrance of David Mamet's notorious memo to the writers of The Unit.
To quote the salient portion (Emphasis is the original author's):
"ANY TIME ANY CHARACTER IS SAYING TO ANOTHER “AS YOU KNOW”, THAT IS, TELLING ANOTHER CHARACTER WHAT YOU, THE WRITER, NEED THE AUDIENCE TO KNOW, THE SCENE IS A CROCK OF SHIT.
"DO NOT WRITE A CROCK OF SHIT. WRITE A RIPPING THREE, FOUR, SEVEN MINUTE SCENE WHICH MOVES THE STORY ALONG, AND YOU CAN, VERY SOON, BUY A HOUSE IN BEL AIR AND HIRE SOMEONE TO LIVE THERE FOR YOU."
It's only really that first paragraph that relates, but the second bit is just too good not to include, right? Mamet's talking about television here, and there is more room and more means of escaping this kind of misstep in that medium. He's also being kind of a dick. But he's not at all wrong when it comes to putting in the work and treating the audience with the kind of respect we should all truthfully demand when it comes right down to it. That goes for established readers, new readers, and children.
The scene with Cyborg attempting to rally the heroes is rife with the Goofus examples in a series of beats that desperately needed the Gallant method. Trust us to glean information from the visual portion of the medium. Leave sorting out the rest to the community aspect of comics readership. It's okay for people to have questions. Questions lead to discussion. And followup discussion enhances the art. Also consider that this information, if it's truly worth conveying, could conceivably be shown in one of the scores of other limited series or one-shots under this banner, designed to offer just that.
Flip through the book. Note how many of the word balloons begin with the implied prefix of "As you know…"
"Barry, your father died from a heart attack three years ago," is a line reserved for those rare patients just shaking off a decade-long coma. Even then, that's totally not how you deliver the news. Here, it's not news. It's apparently a casual reminder to your usually sharp-as-a-tack adult son, who's just asked, quite genuinely, "Where's Dad?" Because that happens.
Some hornets' nest within me has seemingly been prodded with a rake. Let's move on.
There is an exceptionally compelling Batman reveal at the end of this issue. It's nicely teased earlier in the story. And it makes me want to read more. But the contrast of this surprise against other elements that could also have been surprises (though on a much smaller scale) leaves me with the notion that, had the buildup to this book been handled differently, I might not have launched into a diatribe about shoddy dialogue. Because my focus could've been on the inventive revelations and surprises.
Earlier this week, fellow staff writer Jim Mroczkowski mused on the "Post-Spoiler Age" and how a reader's advance knowledge of a story's plot can either take away from the eventual reading experience or proffer little ill effect whatsoever. For this reader, the vast amount of status quo changes presented in Flashpoint #1 revealed to fans prior to the book's release stunted the desired impact. It's not quite the same as marketing hype arousing hopelessly inflated levels of expectation, but it is a case of knowledge putting the reader in such a position of power over the events on the page, that it's difficult to surrender to the manipulations we actually want a story to enact upon us. You can't quite be enthralled if you can't be captured, and you can't be captured if you have the keys. Am I over-thinking this? Probably. But I think it's a fair assessment of how advance press can sort of burgle one of the purest and most fundamental joys of reading: Revelation. Not all the time. But in some cases, absolutely.
Here, spoilers likely took away some of the hypothetical pros to balance out my list of cons. Summarily, I think Flashpoint is the perfect runner. Coiled, roiling potential energy just waiting for the starter pistol. Then? I'm not sure. A poor night's sleep? A flash of a camera? Something happened to sully the execution of that run. And there's a stutter step.
Race aint over though. So. You know?
Story: 3 / Art: 2 / Overall: 2.5
(Out of 5 Stars)
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This review makes the fact that I didn’t get to read this issue sting a little less.
I like your quote.
I hope the rest of the series is better. If anyone can recover from a stutter step, it’s The Flash.
Great review Paul, I agree with almost everything you said except for the art. I’m not saying your wrong but I didn’t notice those inconsistencies when I first read it and I’ll have to revisit those scenes again. I thought I was some of Kubert’s best work. I definitely agree that the gathered heroes scene was a painful read though. The dialogue was so forced with each character introducing the next, it felt anything but natural. I also didn’t like how the series just thrust us into this new world with no sort of setup. I felt House of M (which is basically the same concept) handled it a lot better. There should have at least been some sort of setup scene in the regular DCU, it didn’t have to explain what caused the changed but it could have at least given some context to it. That being said, the ending blew my mind and at least hooked me for the next issue so I’m still on board, which surprises me since I had no interest in this series to begin with and picked up the 1st issue on a whim
I’m not a fan of the “spoilers have ruined my comic reading experience” argument used here in the third-to-last graf (I believe IGN also based the majority of their review on the same conceit). For one, it implies that the reader must have seen the spoilers. Being that you (and most other comics intelligentsia) probably are more exposed to the marketing materials than the average comic book reader I feel like there’s some significant self-selection bias with that argument.
I know I really didn’t see any of the spoilers. The most I knew about flashpoint was that people’s costumes would be different and that Hal Jordan wasn’t green lantern. I certainly didn’t expect a lot of the differences with many of the characters. Certainly didn’t see the Batman reveal coming, but I also didn’t expect the Citizen Cold thread that he may or may not actually be a hero, the Captain Marvel/Thunder stuff, nor that heroes don’t work together in the flashpoint universe.
As for the crux of your main argument — that the writing is weak — I’d suggest that (1) Barry’s conversation with his mother shows more of her concern that Barry is not well and that you may be reading too much into that one and (2) the conversation with the heroes is with people who not only don’t get along but don’t have a Justice League to coordinate. I’d be willing to accept the “as you knows” as not just for the reader, but for the audience of superheroes around them. Consider Pied Piper’s interaction with Citizen Cold. To me that sounds like someone trying to make sure everyone around them knows that they can’t really trust this alleged hero. Maybe I’m just being a Geoff Johns apologist, but I liked the comic enough. It’s not as good as Sinestro Corp #1 or Blackest Night #1, but I think it is a better showing than the majority of Brightest Day issues.
My favorite part was when the kids Captain Planeted and He-Man showed up…
I personally liked it and want to see where it goes but I full heartedly agree that Barry’s Mom should of put him in a padded room or at least gotten angry or worried about him when he starts acting all crazy asking about his Dad and such. There could of been much better ways to get across the a lot of the information that they tried to parse out but at the heart I still want to read this arc because I find this world interesting and want to find out more about it!
But if they kill off Barry Allen again I’m gonna be pissed.
@redlibertyx I can only relate my own reading experience, and while the advance information quibble is truly a minor one, it played a large enough role in my experience that I felt it was necessary to touch upon it. I concede that, given my job, I’m more likely to pay attention to DC’s Flashpoint Friday reveals than many fans, I honestly don’t have any insider knowledge of this particular event that wasn’t also made available to every fan on DC’s Source Blog and the back matter in several DC comics leading up to the event. Again, I don’t like the argument about marketing hype inflating expectations, but when it comes to story points, I do feel the advance information had a measurable effect on my enjoyment. Contrast this with Fear Itself, which was largely ambiguous in its buildup (with the glaring exception of a few Worthy character reveals made starkly apparent in the pages of Marvel comics.)
All this being said, the more important factors are those expository sequences and the surprisingly disappointing visuals. Take or leave the notes on marketing, as they may not apply to all. Just my perspective, and one that I think is a shared experience with enough readers to be worth mentioning.
nice review and interesting perspective. i do agree that there was a lot of “as you know” which in retrospect makes me ask the simple question…why couldn’t we have seen all of that Aquaman and Wonder Woman set up in some sort of issue #0? That would have been an interesting story on its own. They both have minis so they are going to deal with it there, but that seems pointless to do that much backstory explaining in the first issue. Maybe they should have kept the readers in the dark and talked about it like it was a known issue (to the characters) and let us discover on our own?
Spoilers didn’t play into it for me since i didn’t pay attention to much of the press leading up to this. I mostly skimmed through it and looked at the images.
I thought the art was very well exetued mainstream-generic.
I couldn’t figure out how in the first few pages the police stated that there was a big, potentially deadly fight going on. Then, those two characters are at the meeting without any reference to the fight that must have just happened. Loved BattleCat.
Other than the longer-than-expected heroes ranting against one another when Cyborg gathered them with Batman, I thoroughly enjoyed this. It gave just enough about this new world for a #1 issue while leaving open-ended questions to discuss for the rest of the series. Didn’t notice anything wrong with Kubert’s art either, but then again, I’m not very good at noticing the subtle changes in a character’s apperance from panel to panel.
I just look at it as another alternate reality that we’re just getting to know as Johns slowly reveals his hand. Great stuff from Johns – a step up from his average runs on the last arcs in Flash and GL so far.
Seems silly to keep the name “wonder woman” when she’s supposed to be a despot in this world. i guess they “wonder” what country she’ll invade next? urgh
@PaulMontgomery I can definitely concede the visuals. The first time through I really didn’t notice it, but when I read it again this morning to see if my second time through would match yours and other negative reviews I’ve seen online, I felt the art didn’t work in a lot of places. Especially on the page where it is revealed that Iris isn’t married to Barry; Barry’s face is all out of whack. It’s not terrible, just inconsistent like you said.
But I still think the expository stuff is explicable.
I think the difference with Fear Itself is that I know so little about the story that the stuff I know about it (i.e. the Juggernaut is in it) makes me want to avoid it at all cost. So I think that marketing/publicity thing is a double edged sword.
yikes, not good then, hey paul.
I really enjoyed it, though I do admit to being easily amused and pleased. As a reviewer I can see how the “as you know” bits could get old quick, but to me it’s just a way of introducing the status quo of the story to the reader, and I wasn’t bothered by it. I thought the art was beautiful, though to be fair I’ve never seen Kubert’s previous work.
When it comes down to it this could’ve been a horrendous book, but the simple fact that there is a Captain Marvel(ish) character found in Captain Thunder, I’ll stick around and keep reading.
I may buy this. Stopped buying comics, but Johns never disappoints!
@Superyan Well…
I guess I’m not nearly as offended with the “as you know” storytelling mechanism as I should be. With that being said, I didn’t love the cyborg led meeting in the middle of the issue. However, i’m willing to cut Johns some slack since I will surely know more about all the characters as the story progresses. I’m sure all my questions will be answered in due time. As for the reveal with Batman, I thought It accomplished it’s intended purposes; getting the reader to care about what happens next.
I was undecided on if to get this or not. And based on this review I’ll give it a miss.
Nice review, Paul. You pretty much nailed my problems with the issue. It sort of creeps up on you… you can let the first couple “as you knows” slip by, but there’s a point where the issue just seems to be made up of awkward exposition that the various characters would never actually say to one another, and it becomes hard to ignore.
It did make me wonder: We’re waking up in a changed world, which is a classic sci-fi story conceit. But FLASHPOINT is also an event, and its one in which non-regular readers might buy in. So… how do you show the changed world, while ALSO trying to bring the reader into a world they may NOT exactly be familar with? That’s tricky. I’m actually surprised at the angle they took here. It may have made more sense to set at least half the issue in the world we’re supposed to know before moving into something entirely different.
in the comics industry, this is also an “event.” Thus, the publisher may be thinking that people
That said, my son (10) requested I buy him a copy of this book, and I did, and he was thrilled by it. I don’t think he got the entire significance of all the changes (being familiar while not up-to-speed on everything DC), but he was thrilling to the danger and mystery of the changed world, and also I think that feeling of being on the inside of something big and special. So I’ve gotta give it up to Johns & co. for that.
d’oh! extra leftover line in the middle there. Stupid lazy editing… ignore that stray line… 😀
I was dissapointed with this issue. The art had some potential, like that double spalsh of the league at the begining, but the more i looked at it, the more i thought, well I’ve seen better from Kubert, and i think it mostly had to do with the faces, lots of inconsistencies, as paul mentioned with Barry’s mom.
The Batman/Cyborg meeting in the middle bothered me like it did some of you. I didn’t really see why so much exposition was need for so many characters. they may have importnace later, but this seemed too much for this scene. it could have been a couple of pages and that was it.
The reveal will keep me reading, not sure how i feel about it, but it’s a different take that’s for sure.
I also want to add that I agree with Paul that this is sort of a stutter step. It doesn’t mean the entire series is going to be bad. This was very much a set-up issue, and some of the setting up was just awkwardly executed.
I like the basic conceit of the world, and I like this as a nice twist on the Batman story. Here, Batman is a character who needs to be saved, and who can also bring everyone together. And he also has a clear motivation for putting the world back as it was. It’s a simple story, but it can be an effective one, and the seeds planted here are solid.
@daccampo I agree with that for sure. If I seem exceptionally harsh in my review, it’s because of the potential. The great concepts make the execution that much more disappointing. I will continue to pick up the issues in the main series (for now) and I’m still eager to try several of the tie-ins, including the Batman and Superman series, as well as the pirate Deathstroke.
@Paul
I’m going to sort of disagree with your “as you know” criticism. I say “sort of” because I think Johns felt he had to put that info in there in that way but found a creative way to spin it and disguise it. Especially when Cyborg is pointing out the recent European disasters. This is expostion dressed up to read as a motivational speech. “Look how many people died! We have to do something!” A moderately thin veil I’ll grant you that but not without a certain amount of craft. Your criticism of Nora’s dialog can be defended in a similar fashion.
It would appear to me as if Johns saw a need to deliver key bits of info to the reader. to fit his neds he built a construct to make the exchange smoother than it might have been otherwise.
Was there a way to do it better? Yes. Is it what Mamet describes in the quote, “a crock of shit”? No. It’s average writing at worse.
Nonetheless, I enjoyed your review as it was thoughtful and strove to be objective.
I’m going to have to just come out and disagree. I loved this book. I guess I am not jaded enough to be irked by the exposition, I was more enthralled by the concepts introduced in this alternate world. The possibilities got me excited, and actually made me look forward to picking up tie ins I was luke warm on before.
If anything at all, that proves this first issue was a success. It has made me actively want to learn more about various characters by purchasing their tie in stories.
As you know,
REMY ZERO!
@PaulMontgomery I don’t think you were exceptionally harsh. It’s a valid criticism, and you’ve got Mamet backing you up. 😉 Of course, Mamet wasn’t talking about this very specific type of story, but that still doesn’t mean it isn’t clunky. The story itself is bogged down. I LIKE the concept of “Citizen Cold” being “good” possibly only as a ruse, but… all we are is TOLD that here, and that loses power and momentum.
I think the various miniseries and one-shots may fare better than this issue, as they will each have a whole first issue to set up the world of their character(s), and so the writers can take the time to employ more subtle devices. Knowing this is the “spine” of the series, I think Johns went out of his way to drop a bunch of nuggets to show the breadth of change, rather than only those changes essential to drive the story forward.
@GKFinns Call me whatever you like. Just not jaded.
Sue me, but I liked this issue. I didn’t think it was as poorly written as some of you. Some of the dialogue was a bit cumbersome, but other than that I thought it was good. I thought the art was good, and I didn’t notice inconsistencies on one reading. I’ll take another look tonight.
But what this issue DID do is what any first issue of an event should do – it make me want MORE. I want to know what happens next. I want to know what caused some of the characters to turn out the way they did. Why things are so different from the normal DCU. I was EXCITED to see what came next. So, in that regard, I would call this book successful, whether you think the writing was well done or not.
The other thing is that this is a jumping on point for many. Some will be comic readers who don’t know much about DC; others may be completely new readers. I think for a big event like this those readers appreciate expostion. Otherwise, they don’t know why things are significant.
Pretty accurate review. I never like the moments where all the characters intoduce themselves, so this one didn’t seem especially bad. I reall can’t get into Kubert’s drawing style. DC should have gone with a newer, fresher artist (similar to what Mavel has done with thier last few events).
Despite the excessive exposition, I am excited with where this is going.
Compared to Marvel’s Fear Itself, I found Flashpoint has done an amazing job of making me look forward to more, as well as making me want to delve into the tie ins.
Fear Itself I find it hard to even call a mega event. It’s more like a Thor event that potentially has other characters in it. In one issue of Flashpoint I have an idea of what the threat is, and who the major players are, as well as the secondary and even potential tertiary characters. And it ended on a WTF awesome cliffhanger moment that I live for in these kind of events.
Compared to Civil War and Secret Invasion, Fear Itself hasnt had a single issue end on a major WTF moment, and really, nothing awe inspiring has really happened. It might be because I am not a huge Thor fan, but I shouldnt have to be for a company wide mega event. But Flashpoint IS what I expected from the debut issue of a mega event. It succeeded and more in its primary goals: To entertain me, and make me want to see more of the event.
Not to turn into a Marvel vs DC rant, but since these are the two mega events of the summer and beyond, I am confident in saying round 1 has clearly gone to Flashpoint.
@PaulMontgomery
Er, jaded isn’t the right word. I guess nit picky? That isn’t quite it either. I dont know, but I enjoyed the book and the flaws you spoke of never once cropped up in my mind.
I think you were kind to the writing and bit tough on the art. Go figure.
Sigh… At least we have the Geoff Johns Flash Omnibi coming out soon.