Impulse #82

Double Visions

Todd Dezago Writer
Carlo Barberi Penciller
Juan Vlasco Inker
Janice Chiang Letterer
Tom McCraw Colorist
Digital Chameleon Separator
Joey Cavalier Editor
Impulse created by Mark Waid and Mike Wieringo

On our cover: A creature feature from Carlo Barberi and Wayne Faucher! I'm not the biggest fan of monsters in general, but these monsters look alright, I guess. I do enjoy the kid/id pun, which gives us a clue to the story inside. And Impulse looks really good here. The girl he's protecting seems a bit off, though.

Our story begins at Manchester High School, where a couple of students are running around, screaming about monsters that no one else can see. Bart, however, is still only 14 years old, and thus, is working on his eighth consecutive year of eighth grade at Manchester Junior High School. Luckily, none of his friends have aged either since 1994, so they all get to enjoy reading comics in secret during study hall. Naturally, Bart is reading his issues at a much faster pace than his friends, prompting Preston to tease Bart for only looking at the pictures.

As Roland hands Bart the next issue of The After-Life Avenger, he asks Bart if he'd like to be a superhero. Bart surprises Roland and Preston by saying it'd be too uncomfortable to be a superhero since you can't go to the bathroom in the middle of a fight with a villain, and when you do try to go to the bathroom, you can't get your uniform off quick enough. Bart then goes on to complain about the stupidity of secret identities. While he sermonizes, he's once again fiddling with Carol's broken heart necklace. Evil Eye sees this and identifies it as the necklace he saw mysteriously disappear from his grandpa's lab.

Wade then sneaks up to his friends, telling them that he was just at the office and overheard news that a bunch of high school students have been freaking out — pulling out their hair, breaking windows and more. Bart promptly asks to be excused for a bathroom break, and Preston notes that Bart does seem to need a lot of bathroom breaks, which would probably make him a lousy superhero.

Bart changes to Impulse and races over to the high school, which is surrounded by police cars, ambulances and firetrucks. Impulse asks an officer what's going on, and he says they believe they may be dealing with a hallucinogenic drug. In the meantime, they're trying to evacuate the school. So Impulse rushes inside, finding one classroom is being blocked off by a boy named Travis, who is wildly swinging a broom at nonexistent goblins. Impulse doesn't know what to make of this, but he has little difficulty taking the broom away from the teen and rushing him outside, where Travis immediately starts to calm down.

The students start to evacuate the building, but a pair of twin girls lingers behind. Shantay asks her sister, Shanela, why she did that to Travis. Shanela initially refuses to talk about it, but at her sister's prodding, she admits she's tired of the way all the cool kids talk down to her and treat her like trash. Shanela then heads into the bathroom, leaving Shantay out in the hall. Impulse quickly spots her and pulls Shantay outside before she has a chance to argue. Impulse then immediately returns to the school to try to find out what was causing the hallucinations. He sees Shanela come out of the bathroom, and he does a double take, believing he had just evacuated her. Not considering that these could be two separate girls, Impulse takes Shanela outside, asking her if she's ever had that "deja voop."

Impulse drops Shanela off in front of a group of her peers, then immediately takes off. A girl named Ashley starts mocking Shanela, calling her the monster everyone was talking about. Shanela's eyes glow green, and everybody starts running away from Ashley, now seeing her as a large green monster. Shantay sees this and pulls her sister away, while the paramedics prepare sedatives for Ashley and her friends.

Meanwhile, Max Mercury is once again meditating in the Speed Force. This time, he has somehow brought golden energy forms of some of the speedsters that have become one with Speed Force, including Johnny Quick, Barry Allen and a woman named Vi. They're discussing a being who has apparently retreated to the outer borders of the Speed Force and must have some devious agenda. The speedster in the Speed Force are confined to that area and are unable to venture into the Speed Storm to hunt down this being. Max says he's the only one who can attempt this mission, but Johnny and Barry warn Max of the dangers involved. Barry is especially worried of who would watch after Bart if something were to happen to Max.

Bart suddenly bursts in through the door to ask for Max's help at the high school. He's stunned at the sight of the Speed Force entities, who quickly disappear once Max assures them he'll discuss his plans with Jay Garrick and Wally West. Before Bart gets a chance to ask Max what that was all about, Max asks him what's going on at the high school. So Bart tells him as they run, also noting that Helen is spending a lot of time with her boyfriend, Matt Ringer. Max says he's considering moving to a new place with Bart to give Helen some space. Bart doesn't have much time to ruminate over this, because they're already at the high school, where a construction worker is trying to replace a broken window but is falling from his cherrypicker.

The worker is falling with the shattered window, and Impulse decides to catch all the pieces of glass before saving the man. Max panics, grabs the worker, and chews out Bart for not saving him first. Bart insists he had time to go back and catch the man, but Max tells him to think next time, since panic attacks like that are hard on his heart. The two speedsters then conduct a thorough examination of the high school, but are unable to find any clues as to what caused the hallucinations. Max says he needs to go see Jay and Wally, and he invites Bart to join him. Bart tells Max to say hi to Jay and Joan for him, but he refuses to see Wally, saying the last thing he needs is for Wally to tease and pick on him. (I'm really surprised by Bart's reaction here, since he has had hardly any involvement with Wally since his wedding to Linda.)

Shantay overheard some of Impulse's conversation with Max Mercury, and is rightfully worried that more superheroes will show up and eventually discover it was her sister who caused the illusions. She goes home and once again yells at Shanela for using her "ventrilopath" abilities for bad, which will surely get them both in trouble. Shanela tries to scare her sister with a monster, but Shantay waves it away, knowing it's just an illusion. She warns Shanela about Impulse getting involved with other superheroes, but Shanela sees this as a challenge.


After last month's bizarre Don Coyote story, I was very happy to return to Manchester and all our side stories. Bart's friends are getting very close to figuring out his secret identity — or maybe they've already figured it out and are just playing along for now. We got a few more hints about Max's new secret mission, and we continued the conversation of Helen and Matt. And on top of all that, we got a new villain that could pose a challenge for Impulse. What good is super speed against psychic projections?

I was a bit frustrated that Dezago made a point to say Bart is still 14 years old. He spent the past year showing Bart mature and grow up a little bit — isn't it time to say he's turned 15 already? And what was with Bart's negative reaction at the mention of Wally? They haven't even talked to each other in ages, and the last time they did, they seemed just fine. I also have to complain a little bit about the art. Barberi is getting better each issue, but in this one, he had a hard time with objects' sizes. Carol's broken heart necklace is now about a third of the size of Bart's thumbnail. It's so tiny, I have no idea how Evil Eye was able to spot it from across the room. And when Roland handed Bart a copy of The After-Life Avenger, the comic was no bigger than a baseball card. Part of this problem, I believe, has to do with Barberi's tendency to draw hands huge and fingers fat.

Impulsive Reactions begins with Joey Cavalieri thanking all the Impulse fans for spreading the word about the book through the DC Message Boards.

Link, the Hero of Hyrule, says he was a Young Justice fan who liked Impulse, but he felt he didn't have enough money to buy Impulse's solo title. But then he got the Impulse trade paperback, Bart Saves the Universe, and the six most recent issues. Now he regrets ever having passed it up.

Retri starts off by calling Impulse the best DC character ever, mainly due to his funky hair. Retri says Impulse #6 is the best issue in the series, and requests an Impulse poster.

StarmansGal says she has the DC Direct figures of Bart and Max, as well as the World Without Grownups figures of Impulse, Robin and Superboy. But she complains that those figurines made the characters way too buff.

Zortnac says you can find the original Impulse promo poster on eBay. Cavalieri apologizes that DC doesn't have any current posters to sell.

MentalGirl says she likes how Impulse is so innocent, saying he doesn't have a mean bone in his "cute little body."

Max Mercury II says he likes Impulse's legacy most of all, calling him the new Kid Flash. He also likes that Impulse is his age.

Katarhal says the one line of dialogue that best sums up Impulse was something he once said to Trickster: "You're confusing me. That's always dangerous." Now for the new ads:

Mini Oreo with Chocolate Creme.

United in the name of justice ... driven to protect mankind. Justice League Adventures.

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Monsters, Inc. Scream Team for PlayStation.

Bad guys beware! Teamo Supremo on ABC.

Hey, kids! Comics! talks about Hawkman #1, Superman #600 and Batman #600.

MVP2: Most Vertical Primate on VHS and DVD.

The next level of fruitensity. Jolly Rancher gel snacks.

As if you needed another reason to eat pizza. Tony's Xtreme Fun Stuff.

Next time, we'll conclude our Dark Horse crossover with SpyBoy/Young Justice #3.