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THE FLASH #201
(Best of the Week!)
"Ignition Part One: Driven"
Highly Recommended (10/10)
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DC Comics
Writer: Geoff Johns
Artist: Alberto Dose
Colors: James Sinclair
Letters: Kurt Hathaway
Editor: Joey Cavalieri
Price: $2.25 US/$3.75 CAN |
It seems only fitting that a comic about DC's fastest super-hero would be able to turn on a dime. For about four years, Geoff Johns, mostly accompanied by regular artist Scott Kolins, has provided classic super-heroes with a modern feel in the pages of The Flash, but the departure of Kolins, not to mention some pretty drastic happenings in the book, have set the stage for a complete status quo change, and while I loved what Johns was doing with his previous take, I was blown away by the first issue of this revamp. It's got a feel that reminds me of Unbreakable, as a normal man discovers his heroism, with the added bonus of layers that have meaning for the reader but not for the character thanks to a well-established back story. And though I'm sorry to see Kolins go, Dose's style is dead solid perfect for this new approach, bringing a little more dirt, a little more street, to the look of Keystone City, and completing the blue collar-ization that Kolins and Johns began.
Throughout Johns's run, Keystone City has been a character in the book as much as Flash, his supporting cast or the Rogues. Keystone moves to the forefront for this issue, as we see what a Keystone without the Flash looks like. It's not apocalyptic, but there's a tinge more darkness, as criminals openly flaunt the law (by speeding... how ironic) and one of the Rogues in particular seems to have taken on more brutal crimes aimed at police officers. Wally's new job plays nicely into the industrial vibe that Kolins and Johns gave the book, in addition to introducing two interesting new supporting cast members.
I'll be honest, I already miss some of the elements of Johns's prior run, including Wally's relationship with cops Chyre and Morillo, the more four-color nature of some of his adversaries and a brighter, more optimistic tone overall. This approach has more in common with the no costumes, realistic approach that we've seen over at Marvel, but I'm surprised to find how well it works here. I actually got goose bumps seeing Wally talk to Captain Cold in his civilian identity, because I knew that these men were supposed to be adversaries, and that Cold was a dangerous person, but to Wally, he's just another stranger. Ditto for some of the conversation between Wally and Linda that references the Flash, as neither of them have any idea just how much that costumed character used to be a part of their life.
Nothing, however, compares to the chills I got during the sequence where Wally rediscovers his powers. Dose's portrayal of a car crash in freeze frame is spectacular, and Johns's description of Wally's viewpoint during the whole thing just adds to the feeling of power in amidst the relatively normal setting we've seen before. In addition, it says a lot about the tone of the book and Johns's overall style that despite the darker and more realistic tone, Wally's thoughts of saving others are second nature, that his heroic core remains intact.
Dose's work is a big change from Kolins's work, and that includes visual redefinitions of the various characters. Morillo, Chyre, Linda, Wally, Len Snart... they're all recognizable as the same people, but they've been modified to a different style. Some I like better (Linda looks fantastic), most I like at least as well. What I especially like, though, is that Dose brings the city to life as much as Kolins did, with detailed and gritty buildings and machinery, a feeling of a city that lives and dies on oil, grease, cars and machinery. James Sinclair backs that up with a color palette that reinforces the dark, the cool blues in the diner, the browns on the street and the burnt orange of a sunset that comes too early into a city where sunlight has to filter through any number of buildings.
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