‘A GOOD RUN’ GN Review – The Flash: A Celebration Of 75 Years: Various (DC Comics)

Day Eleven of the graphic novel review a day here at Tripwire and today it’s The Flash: A Celebration of 75 years, published by DC Comics.

Unlike Batman and Superman, the Scarlet Speedster hasn’t got the same level of attention as the other more iconic DC superheroes. However, with a TV series and now a film in the works, that has probably already began to change.

This book begins in 1940 with the Origin of The Golden Age Flash by Gardner Fox and Harry Lampert and moves up through the years, so we get a number of the classic Gardner Fox, John Broome and Carmine Infantino tales from the 1960s. It also reprints a few of the less well-known Flash stories from the 1970s and takes us up the present day with the New 52 title via the death of Barry Allen in Crisis on Infinite Earths in 1985, DC’s Flashpoint crossover and Geoff Johns and Ethan Van Scriver restoring some dignity to the character with The Flash Rebirth from 2009.

It is intriguing to witness what begins as pretty primitive work which grows in sophistication to become one of DC’s best Silver Age books thanks to the brilliant work of Broome, Fox and Infantino. It lost its way for a few years but ironically Francis Manapul and Brian Buccellato’s New 52 run managed to capture some of the sparkle and heart of the Silver Age Flash comics. It has had its ups and downs and currently after their work, it is in a bit of a lull but the character’s long history proves that it can attract some of the best creators in the business.

This 470 page hefty hardcover offers an interesting history lesson about one of DC’s most mercurial creations and if you’ve not read stories like Flash #123, The Flash of Two Worlds, or Crisis on Infinite Earths #8, then this is a great celebration of 75 years of the various Flash iterations…