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The Flash (1959-1985) #117-132
The Flash: The Silver Age Vol. 2 (The Flash
Written by John Broome (THE FLASH, GREEN LANTERN) and Robert Kanigher (SUICIDE SQUAD: THE SILVER AGE) and illustrated by Carmine Infantino and Joe Giella, THE FLASH: THE SILVER AGE VOL. 2 collects the era-defining adventures of the Scarlet Speedster.
Police scientist Barry Allen always enjoyed the exploits of his favorite comic book crime-fighter, the Flash. But before lightning struck his lab and infused his body with the power of super-speed, he never dreamed he would follow in his hero’s footsteps!
Fortunately for comics fans everywhere, that’s exactly what happened—and when DC’s revitalized Flash burst onto newsstands in 1956, he opened the door to a new age of excitement—a Silver Age of superheroes, spearheaded by legendary DC editor Julius Schwartz and his titanically talented team of creative collaborators. Now, for the first time, these groundbreaking Flash stories are available in an all-new series of comprehensive Omnibus editions.
Collects THE FLASH #117-132.
Police scientist Barry Allen always enjoyed the exploits of his favorite comic book crime-fighter, the Flash. But before lightning struck his lab and infused his body with the power of super-speed, he never dreamed he would follow in his hero’s footsteps!
Fortunately for comics fans everywhere, that’s exactly what happened—and when DC’s revitalized Flash burst onto newsstands in 1956, he opened the door to a new age of excitement—a Silver Age of superheroes, spearheaded by legendary DC editor Julius Schwartz and his titanically talented team of creative collaborators. Now, for the first time, these groundbreaking Flash stories are available in an all-new series of comprehensive Omnibus editions.
Collects THE FLASH #117-132.
425 pages, Kindle Edition
Published October 3, 2017
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About the author
John Broome
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There is more than one author in the GoodReads database with this name
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Bro...
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Displaying 1 - 14 of 14 reviews
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April 9, 2019More cheesy fun.
The centerpiece of this volume is “The Flash of Two Worlds,” one of the most significant issues in comics history. It introduces the concept of a multiverse, as Barry Allen unwittingly vibrates from his Earth to the Earth of Jay Garrick, the Golden Age Flash whom Barry idolizes from comic books (Jay’s Earth would later be known as Earth-2, where all Golden Age heroes reside). This is actually a great story; I like seeing heroes from different Earths interact. The multiverse idea was revelatory, even though time has proven that it can sometimes get out of hand.
Elsewhere, Captain Boomerang and The Top debut, while Barry and Wally use the cosmic treadmill for the first time. We also see the rogues begin to team up. Like the first volume, this one is generally split between wacky sci-fi adventures and more traditional rogues stories. One of my favorites was “The Case of the Real Gone Flash,” featuring the attention-starved 64th century magician, Abra Kadabra. The two stories with Barry’s childhood sweetheart, Daphne Dean, were a nice change of pace, too.
The centerpiece of this volume is “The Flash of Two Worlds,” one of the most significant issues in comics history. It introduces the concept of a multiverse, as Barry Allen unwittingly vibrates from his Earth to the Earth of Jay Garrick, the Golden Age Flash whom Barry idolizes from comic books (Jay’s Earth would later be known as Earth-2, where all Golden Age heroes reside). This is actually a great story; I like seeing heroes from different Earths interact. The multiverse idea was revelatory, even though time has proven that it can sometimes get out of hand.
Elsewhere, Captain Boomerang and The Top debut, while Barry and Wally use the cosmic treadmill for the first time. We also see the rogues begin to team up. Like the first volume, this one is generally split between wacky sci-fi adventures and more traditional rogues stories. One of my favorites was “The Case of the Real Gone Flash,” featuring the attention-starved 64th century magician, Abra Kadabra. The two stories with Barry’s childhood sweetheart, Daphne Dean, were a nice change of pace, too.
May 13, 2018
This book collects Issues 117-132 of the Flash, but that's barely sufficient to describe the massive amount of imaginative work in here. The Flash is the character who started the Silver Age of Comics because of the utter fantastical imagination applied. While this doesn't have as many firsts in it as the previous book, it does feature the first appearance of Captain Boomerang, the Top, and Abra Kadabra, and most importantly, the first-ever cross-over between the Flash of Earth One to Earth-Two.
The book is too massive to summarize. There's too many great ideas to cover them all.
Some highlights including Captain Boomerang trying to execute the Flash by tying him to a giant boomerang...twice! You have the Top imprisoning the Flash in an atomic grenade. You have a brilliant Flash and Green Lantern team-up. And then an encounter with an interdimensional TV producer whose trying to cause mayhem on Earth in order to create entertainment and won't let the Flash stop them. You have the Flash and Kid Flash travelling back in time to prehistory. The best one is Flash #125 which has aliens planning an invasion in the 23rd century and to accomplish they remove all radiation from the Earth during pre-history. So Kid Flash travels back to pre-history while the Flash runs to the 23rd century. It's massive fun.
The Kid Flash stories are all fun. They're kid wish-fulfillment as he uses his powers to solve crimes and problems in his hometown of Blue Valley, although in addition to his Flash team-up, he battles the Weather Wizard alongside Elongated Man, who also appears in many Flash stories.
Bottom line: if you love imaginative stories filled with fun and amusing uses of superpowers, memorable villains DC is using to this day, this book is for you. It contains the stories that laid the groundwork for the DC Universe.
The book is too massive to summarize. There's too many great ideas to cover them all.
Some highlights including Captain Boomerang trying to execute the Flash by tying him to a giant boomerang...twice! You have the Top imprisoning the Flash in an atomic grenade. You have a brilliant Flash and Green Lantern team-up. And then an encounter with an interdimensional TV producer whose trying to cause mayhem on Earth in order to create entertainment and won't let the Flash stop them. You have the Flash and Kid Flash travelling back in time to prehistory. The best one is Flash #125 which has aliens planning an invasion in the 23rd century and to accomplish they remove all radiation from the Earth during pre-history. So Kid Flash travels back to pre-history while the Flash runs to the 23rd century. It's massive fun.
The Kid Flash stories are all fun. They're kid wish-fulfillment as he uses his powers to solve crimes and problems in his hometown of Blue Valley, although in addition to his Flash team-up, he battles the Weather Wizard alongside Elongated Man, who also appears in many Flash stories.
Bottom line: if you love imaginative stories filled with fun and amusing uses of superpowers, memorable villains DC is using to this day, this book is for you. It contains the stories that laid the groundwork for the DC Universe.
May 21, 2019
I thought this volume was a whirlwind. Sometimes it's a little overwhelming to read so much of the Flash at once. Especially since it's from the Silver Age. I feel like my vocabulary has recently changed to things like 'Great Scott!' and 'Golly gee!' I'd forgotten how odd the feel of the series in the 60s was. Everything gets explained by semi-science and there's not much development of the characters. At times, it was quite boring because it was the same villains with the same weapons secretly finding a way to escape from jail. The adventures of the Flash were often monotonous. I did like that they tied in the original Flash from the 40s that was Jay Garrick. Even though they restarted the series, they made his history relevant by putting him on a separate Earth in another dimension that vibrates at a different frequency. I will also say that Flash's powers never cease to amaze. He can do a lot more than run fast. He can time travel, travel interdimensionally, breathe in outer space, vibrate through solid objects, and a whole heck of a lot more. I did like seeing Kid Flash again every couple of issues. I swear that he and the Silver Mask, Eddie Farrell, had an implicit gay love. And I totally shipped it, by the way. I'm glad that Barry held true to Iris through all the stuff with Daphne Dean, but when is he going to put a ring on it? In fact, I noticed that Iris wasn't all that prevalent in this volume. I liked seeing some of the villains like the Weather Wizard, but they were mostly the same ol' guys. All in all, it wasn't a bad book. Not for the time period, at least. It was just obvious that it was mostly for children. I recommend this graphic novel to die-hard Flash fans.
November 5, 2024
The Flash: The Silver Age Vol. 2
Barry Allen continues to protect Central City as the Flash, while finding time to make new friends as well as outfit new enemies.
The artwork is of its time, but already we begin to see experimental work involving directing the labelling in different says to create a dynamic page to engage readers more quickly.
Barry Allen continues to protect Central City as the Flash, while finding time to make new friends as well as outfit new enemies.
The artwork is of its time, but already we begin to see experimental work involving directing the labelling in different says to create a dynamic page to engage readers more quickly.
August 21, 2023
The Flash continues to impress me with fun stories, creative uses of Flash's powers, good writing, and great art!
June 5, 2021
This is the period of time in this series where they’re trying so many ideas, characters and plot structures to see what works. As a result, some of them work better than others and those are the ones that I recognise from more recent Flash stories.
Regardless, I love seeing all of this series start to come together.
Also, Carmen Infantino’s art is generally fantastic, but all of his children have the faces of 40-year-olds and it’s very distracting.
Regardless, I love seeing all of this series start to come together.
Also, Carmen Infantino’s art is generally fantastic, but all of his children have the faces of 40-year-olds and it’s very distracting.
June 29, 2024
Some really fun silver age Flash stories from the start of his career. The art by Camine Infantino looks great (at the start) especially in the few issues inked by Murphy Anderson. Murphy was the perfect inker for Carmine...giving some needed tightness to Carmine's creative pencilling. I will say, Carmine's art drops off in the last few issues in this volume. It gets rushed and sloppy.
One thing I admire about these stories is how Broome, the main writer, manages to create and utilize Flash's every growing rogue's gallery of foes. A hero is only as interesting as his villains and Flash had the best rogue's gallery of any hero of this time aside from Spider-man. You can see how big a difference it makes when you compare him to Green Lantern who might be a more interesting hero but didn't surround himself with interesting foes and his stories suffer for it. Flash - in comparison - has Mirror Master, Captain Boomerang, Captain Cold, Grodd, The Trickster...and now we get The Top and Abra Kadabra added. All thanks to the genius of Broome (and Carmine).
In this collection you also get one of the most famous comics ever - the Flash of Two Worlds where Gardner Fox had the brilliant idea of dipping into the golden age heroes by saying there were multiple Earths and bringing back the original Flash Jay Garrick. This idea has spawned...a lot. Look no further than the current MCU movies (the multiverse) to see its lasting impact.
You also get a little Elongated Man and some cute Kid Flash stories (looking forward to the story where they finally change his uniform so he isn't just a smaller Flash).
Overall - one of the better Silver age collections you can get. Great art, great villains and some fun stories. They are a bit silly but it was the Silver Age.
One thing I admire about these stories is how Broome, the main writer, manages to create and utilize Flash's every growing rogue's gallery of foes. A hero is only as interesting as his villains and Flash had the best rogue's gallery of any hero of this time aside from Spider-man. You can see how big a difference it makes when you compare him to Green Lantern who might be a more interesting hero but didn't surround himself with interesting foes and his stories suffer for it. Flash - in comparison - has Mirror Master, Captain Boomerang, Captain Cold, Grodd, The Trickster...and now we get The Top and Abra Kadabra added. All thanks to the genius of Broome (and Carmine).
In this collection you also get one of the most famous comics ever - the Flash of Two Worlds where Gardner Fox had the brilliant idea of dipping into the golden age heroes by saying there were multiple Earths and bringing back the original Flash Jay Garrick. This idea has spawned...a lot. Look no further than the current MCU movies (the multiverse) to see its lasting impact.
You also get a little Elongated Man and some cute Kid Flash stories (looking forward to the story where they finally change his uniform so he isn't just a smaller Flash).
Overall - one of the better Silver age collections you can get. Great art, great villains and some fun stories. They are a bit silly but it was the Silver Age.
December 31, 2023
It was on sale and if you know me I never turn down anything that is on sale. Let's be honest here: Flash has some of the dumbest villains on record. I mean, The Top? The Thinker? The Fiddler? Anyway, since there's no war going on involving America, (officially, that is) The Flash deals with a lot of interstellar, interdimensional foes, and that's okay with me.
April 17, 2018
Historically interesting
It's fun to see the original meeting Barry and jay as well as belong as Ted man. Recommended for fans of the TV show
It's fun to see the original meeting Barry and jay as well as belong as Ted man. Recommended for fans of the TV show
September 13, 2018
The flash is my favorite superhero. From a fan of watching the show, these comics helped learn the orgin of the characters and how the became.
February 6, 2019
Great Silver Age fun. This stuff has aged well.
September 7, 2022
Uh, yeah, not sure I finished this one. Put it down so that I can get credit for reading lots of books. Reading lots of books shows that you’re really smart. Even if they are comic books.
June 16, 2024
I love Golden, Silver and Bronze Age comics and there’s some fun stories in this collection but, boy, there’s also a lot of mock-science to explain away things.
August 1, 2025
Not to speed through
I really enjoyed reading these adventures of the Flash and Kid Flash. I loved the time travel one very much.
I really enjoyed reading these adventures of the Flash and Kid Flash. I loved the time travel one very much.
Displaying 1 - 14 of 14 reviews