Review – The Flash #29 (DC Comics)

Publisher: DC Comics
Script: Joshua Williamson
Art: Pop Mhan, Christian Duce
Release Date: 23rd August 2017

It’s kind of appropriate that a title all about speed never seems to settle down for very long.

Joshua Williamson’s run on The Flash has been one relentless sprint so far, rattling through a whole range of new characters and their arcs at a furious rate, but if there’s one thing that he’s along his time with, it’s making Barry Allen’s life a misery.

In much the same way that Stan Lee emphasised Spider-Man’s selfless heroism by showing how much it costs him personally, Williamson is fair putting Barry through the wringer here.

So what’s happening now? Well, as a result of Professor Zoom coming back from the fatality we saw in The Button, Iris West now both knows Barry is The Flash, isn’t speaking to him and is a murderer (That’ll be Zoom dead again), while Barry is now infected with the Negative Speed Force.

Sporting new powers to match his dark new costume, Flash is as much of a danger to Central City as any of his rogues, causing havoc every time he turns on the speed, while in his day job, samples going missing from the lab force Barry into working with his team for once, but even that’s harder than it looks.

If this all sounds downbeat, that’s because it very much is. Flash’s life positively sucks at times and a log of it is purely as a result of him trying to do the right thing.

Williamson has Barry Allen’s Everyman character nailed here, perfectly summing up how eve. a guy who always tried to do right by everyone sometimes gets it wrong and never gets an even break.

Artwise, 90s Flash artist Pop Mhan makes another appearance here alongside Christian Duce and while his rougher style isn’t as much of a natural fit as main series regular Carmine Di Giandomenico, it actually works brilliantly here, with the new, Negative Speed Force-infected speedster.

There’s been so many great titles to come out of Rebirth, but The Flash has been one of the real highlights and on the strength of this latest storyline, it’s going to be up there for the foreseeable future.

Rating: 4/5.

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