The Flash #756 // Review
The Reverse-Flash is back, and he's bringing some friends, in The Flash #756, written by Joshua Williamson, with art by Christian Duce, and colors by Luis Guerrero. Previously, Barry Allen was forced to team up with his former nemeses, the aforementioned Reverse Flash (Eobard Thawne), and Godspeed. In the end, they all managed to work together to defeat their common foe, the time-powered-being called Paradox, but Thawne proved as untrustworthy as ever and snapped Godspeed's neck right in front of the Flash out of spite. Now, Reverse-Flash is on a mission to finally take Barry down, and he's gathering an army of familiar faces from Flash's rogues' gallery to do it. Does the Flash stand a chance against such an assemblage of dastardly fiends? As always...yes, he's the star of the book. It's not likely they're going to kill him...again.
This issue, while exciting in a sense, serves as mostly filler/prologue to everything this arc is promising. Yes, you get a classic series of "you son of a bitch, I'm in" kind of recruitment scenes, but there isn't much substance to them. Every scene is just Reverse Flash showing up, followed by little-to-no convincing of each villain that they should be on his team, and they all join, because the least trustworthy guy in the world tells them he's seen their future. It's a pretty flimsy plot, but the readers are expected just to accept it because it will lead to Flash fighting all of his coolest enemies at once, and who doesn't want to see that?
The Barry Allen side of the story isn't any more compelling than Thawne's, unfortunately. It mainly consists of him telling his proteges to hang back and not get involved with his conflict with Reverse-Flash because he's too dangerous. Three guesses on how that turns out, and you'll only need one because the outcome is as predictable as it gets. Williamson does manage to provide a moment of intrigue when he reveals Barry's secret motives for turning the younger speedsters away, though. Still, only time will tell if he will successfully expand on that idea.
Duce's art is as sleek and pretty, as usual, making him one of the better Flash artists of the last decade. And that's saying a lot, considering Scott Kolins and Howard Porter are among those ranks. Guerrero's colors lend themselves well to Duce's work, adding up to the most attractive and dazzling aspects of this issue. It would be nice to see this team stick around for the entire arc, but it's not likely, considering the biweekly schedule.
As opening chapters of stories go, this one could have been stronger, but there is a lot of potential, considering the sheer magnitude of the concept of the Flash taking on this many of his biggest threats all at once. Couple that with the surprise ending to this issue, and the readers could be in for a major treat. Cross your fingers and hope against hope that Williamson has something fun up his sleeve.
