Year in Review: 2023

Another year has already come and gone. Superhero fatigue may be setting in, but that didn't stop the film studios. Marvel produced four films: Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania, Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3, The Marvels and Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse. All of them were fairly decent, but Spider-Verse was by far the best. DC countered with four films of their own (the most they've ever produced in a single year): Shazam! Fury of the Gods, The Flash, Blue Beetle and Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom. The Shazam sequel and Blue Beetle were nice, little movies, but The Flash was offensively bad. I don't think I've ever been angrier with a superhero film. (I still haven't seen the Aquaman sequel yet, so I'll reserve judgment on that.) As I said earlier, a little bit of superhero fatigue may have set in with general audiences. Only Guardians and Spider-Verse appeared on the top 10 box office list (Barbie was No. 1).

But what about Bart? Well, thanks to Jeremy Adams, we actually got a bit more Bart than I was expecting. Impulse was a part of the One-Minute War, which lasted quite a while. Unfortunately, Bart didn't have too much to do after that. New Flash writer Si Spurrier has used Bart ... a tiny bit. And he's made a couple of quick cameos in the Beast World event, but that's it. Yet another quiet year for our guy, which is a shame since this is the 30th year of Bart Allen stories.

Best Story: The Flash #800

Spurrier's run has just begun, and it's quite intriguing, but Impulse's involvement in it has been quite minimal. Beast World is really fun, but Bart's role in it is even smaller. So that leaves us with Adams' run. One-Minute War started strong and had some memorable moments. But the longer it went, the worse it became, ultimately falling apart for a unsatisfying, inconsequential ending. The brightest spot of the year came with a short story in the anniversary issue. It was a delightful blast from the past, reminding the world of how wonderful Impulse stories can be.

Best Writer: Mark Waid

For the first time since 1997, and the fifth time overall, Impulse's creator is the best writer of the year. And it was all for one small, silly story. But the story had heart and was true to Bart's character — something Spurrier hasn't been able to grasp yet. Adams' story was too clunky and frustrating, but he did have a few gems scattered throughout — especially Bart and Max running off into the sunset. But at the end of the day, you just can't beat the best, and when it comes to Impulse stories, no one is better than Waid.

Best Artist: Todd Nauck

Nauck claims this award for the second year in a row and the sixth time total. And once again, he wins for doing very little work. But what can I say? He's my favorite artist! I always wanted him on a solo Impulse run, and this short story gave me a tiny taste of what that could have looked like. Roger Cruz did some solid work on the One-Minute War, especially when compared to those horrible covers by Taurin Clarke. But nothing could beat Nauck's wonderful trip of nostalgia.

Best Supporting Character: Kid Flash

Bart did some nice moments with Max — both under Adams and Spurrier — but those moments were few and far between. Their beautiful run into the sunset would have been the perfect ending for both of them. But then they were denied that, and Max was promptly trapped in a hellish nightmare realm, while Bart was busy playing with sticks in the park. Seriously. Still, though, those were meaningful moments and I feel a little guilty about passing on Max this year. But that's because Bart's relationship with Wallace West was so unexpectedly entertaining. The two made the perfect pair with Bart getting to act like a big brother for the first time in his life. It was so natural and successful, I'm a little stunned that when Wallace got his own series (Speed Force) he was paired with Avery Ho instead of Bart. Maybe nobody realized Spurrier was bringing Bart back. Oh well. Just one more missed opportunity for my boy!

Best Villain: The Fraction

I feel like I'm cheating a little bit by naming an entire group of villains instead of an individual. But I really didn't have any other options here. Spurrier's story is still going, so I couldn't even tell you exactly who or what is responsible for Max's latest disappearance. So that leaves me with the Fraction. I guess I could single out Miss Murder, who seemed to be the perfect antagonist for Impulse to defeat. But Bart didn't really beat her, and she ultimately didn't do that much, despite hanging around for most of the One-Minute War. The Fraction was a really neat concept — an invading alien force that used their connection to the Speed Force to conquer an entire planet in a matter of seconds. Unfortunately, Adams couldn't come up with any unique members within the Fraction besides Miss Murder (which is why he kept using her throughout the story). Everyone else was bland and completely indistinguishable from the rest, and yes, that does include that one guy who was secretly a speedster. Such a waste of potential. However, the Fraction were quite a formidable force and even an embarrassingly large team of speedsters and time-travelers weren't enough to actually beat them. The best our heroes could manage was to redirect the Fraction to another planet, where their reign of dominance presumably remains unchecked.

So that wraps up 30 years of Impulse stories! Considering all the nonsense poor Bart has been through — aging up, aging down, "dying" and being brought back, and disappearing from all media for months at a time — I'm actually a little surprised that he's still around. Just when I think DC is finally going to say, "No more Bart Allen!" someone brings him back for a cute little supporting role. And as long as that keeps happening, I'll keep this blog going.

Next time, we'll return to Spurrier's mysterious story with The Flash #5.

Titans: Beast World #3

Part 3

Tom Taylor Writer

Lucas Meyer Artist

Romulo Fajardo Jr. - Colorist

Wes Abbott - Letterer

Ivan Reis, Danny Miki & Brad Anderson - Cover

Björn Barends, Mirka Andolfo, Clayton Henry & Marcelo Maiolo Variant Covers

Chris Rosa - Associate Editor

Brittany Holzherr - Editor

Paul Kaminski - Group Editor

Superman created by Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster.

By Special Arrangement with the Jerry Siegel Family.

Our cover shows Amanda Waller preparing to unchain the Wolf Batman. It's well done, and it's an intriguing idea. But that doesn't happen in this issue. There are a couple of nice variant covers, but they don't feature Impulse, so let's skip ahead to the very brief role Bart plays here.

Even though this story takes place before the Central City tie-in, it came out after. So, sometime before Bart was turned into a lizard and then a bee, he was in Kahndaq with Wally, helping to rescue bystanders from the ferocious rampage of the Lion Black Adam battling Starfire and Donna Troy. At one point, Starfire destroys hundreds of the Beast Boy Starro spores, prompting Bart to say, "Hey, it's raining burning horrors." Donna warns the speedsters about the spores, but Wally says they can't catch them. Bart confidently adds, "That's not gonna happen." And then Impulse and Flash race off the pages of this issue.

Wally and Bart are absolutely right. There's no legitimate reason they should ever be infected by the spores. Not only are they too fast for them, but they could easily vibrate through, if needed. As fun as it was to see Bart as a lizard, it didn't make much sense — especially in the context of this issue. Why would Bart randomly leave Wally's side to race back to Central City? This is a really fun event — I just wish there was better coordination between all the titles.

Well, that's it for 2023! Next time, I'll hand out some rewards before seeing what Bart will get up to in 2024.

Titans: Beast World – Tour: Central City #1

Cover by: Mikel Janin

Variant Covers by: Taurin Clarke and Cully Hamner

Editor: Chris Rosa

Group Editor: Paul Kaminski

Man, DC really loves creating the most awkward titles possible. Regardless, Beast World is a very interesting event. It began with Beast Boy transforming into a Starro to defeat a similar creature known as the Necrostar. But before he could back, a villain known as Doctor Hate took control of his mind, causing the Starro-Beast Boy to flood the Earth with spores that turn people into mindless animal/human hybrids. Impulse can be seen in the background of the first issue of this event, but he doesn't say or do anything, so I decided to skip it. He does, however play a slightly larger role in this tie-in issue, so here we are.

Our cover shows Wally, Irey and Irey's friend, Maxine, battling a bunch of animal/humans. Maxine is Animal Man's daughter, so it's only natural that she'd play a big role in a story like this. However, I would prefer to see more members of the Flash family out here. It's a perfectly serviceable cover, but not very exciting. And, as usual, none of the variant covers feature Impulse, so let's dive in.

Written by: Si Spurrier

Art by: Scott Koblish

Colors by: Hi-Fi

Letters by: Hassan Otsmane-Elhaou

The untitled main story bookends several separate stories by different creative teams. We open with Barry trying to have a romantic evening with Iris, but he's still suffering from the debilitating headaches that have plagued him ever since that strange rainbow phenomenon showed up above his statue. Irey suddenly bursts through the door, telling Barry what's happening in the city. Barry initially refuses to help, until he learns that one of his old foes, Godspeed, has turned into a man-sized hornet with super speed. After a quick pep talk from Iris, Barry dons his costume and races off with Irey to contact the rest of the Flash family. (This begins the side stories, but we only care about one of them.)

Invitation to the Speedster Ball

Starring: Julien "Jules" Jourdain as Circuit Breaker, Hartley Rathaway as Pied Piper & Bart Allen aka Impulse as ... ?

By Al Kaplan

Lettering Hassan Otsmane-Elhaou

Edits Andrea Shea & Chris Rosa

Circuit Breaker (a new hero connected to the Still Force) and the Pied Piper have figured out how to combine their powers to pull Beast Boy's spores out of infected people and destroy them. Their efforts are abruptly interrupted by the arrival of Impulse, who has been turned into a very large frilled-neck lizard.

Circuit Breaker creates an "energy lasso" of sorts to wrap around Impulse's neck and ride him like a small horse. The Pied Piper, however, can't use his sound waves to lure the spore out like the others, to which he remarks, "That kid could never hold a steady beat." The Impulse lizard goes wild and tries to buck off Circuit Breaker, but the self-proclaimed "rodeo queen" manages to hang on.

The Pied Piper then receives word that the Flash family is meeting up at Iron Heights, so he suggests they forget about trying to extract the spore from Impulse and focus on "herding" him back to the rest of the speedsters.

We then return to the main story, where Animal Girl decides to experiment on the Lizard Impulse by trying to turn him into an ostrich. The process would have worked — had Impulse been able to stay still long enough. Poor Bart is grotesquely split between the two animals before being reverted back to lizard form.

Jay, Wallace, Avery, Irey and Jai are all present, but Wally has apparently chosen to work with the Titans during this crisis. And Barry is struggling to contain the Hornet Godspeed, who can move fast enough to essentially turn himself into a swarm. For some reason, Irey believes the best way to stop Godspeed would be for Animal Girl to turn them all into wolves with Barry as the alpha to lead the pack. Everyone points out how stupid that idea is, so Jai offers an alternative — bees.

And for reasons I'll never understand, everyone agrees with this plan and willingly ingests Beast Boys spores. Animal Girl turns Barry, Jay, Bart, Wallace, Ace, Hartley and Jules into giant bees, but leaves Jai and Irey as humans just because. The bees quickly close in on Godspeed and vibrate to create heat, which burns away the spore inside him. Animal Girl then gives Iris the powers of a queen bee so she can control all our bee heroes and direct them to rescue the infected civilians and slowly burn out their spores one by one.

This may be a fun event, but this tie-in issue didn't quite do it for me. Mainly because the ending was so forced and unnecessary. Turning everybody into bees accomplishes nothing! These heroes are much stronger in their normal human form! If they were already infected, and there was no possible way to remove the spores, then that'd justify this silly ending. But, no — they all had to willingly infect themselves. Well, all except for Impulse, that is. Don't ask me how he became infected — I had assumed that speedsters would have been too fast and/or able to vibrate through the spores. Bart just gets to be special, I guess.

His design as a frilled-neck lizard was pretty neat, I'll admit. I just wish they did something more with him. I also was a bit confused by his size. Bart must have been over 10 feet long in that lizard body. I'd say that's an inconsistency with this event, but this issue in particular didn't have much consistency. Some of the animal hybrids still had more or less human bodies with the heads and arms/legs of animals. Others, like Captain Cold's polar bear, completely changed into an exact copy of an animal. Some of the infected people got smaller. Some got bigger. Nobody really seemed to iron out exactly how these Beast Boy/Starro spores affect people.

The inconsistencies didn't stop there. In one story in this issue, Jai looked about four or five years older than he did elsewhere in this issue, and his muscles didn't inflate when he used his powers, like they did just a few pages later, when a different artist was drawing him. Look, I get not wanting to be the "bad guy" and tell the artist to redraw a couple of pages, but in cases like this, I think any good editor would have to make that call.

Next time, we'll continue this event with Titans: Beast World #3, which technically takes place before this Central City tie-in, but wasn't published until after it came out (speaking of editorial annoyances).

The Flash #3 (legacy #803)

"Angles"

Writer: Si Spurrier

Artist: Mike Deodato Jr.

Colorist: Trish Mulvihill

Letterer: Hassan Otsmane-Elhrou

Cover by: Mike Deodato Jr. & Trish Mulvihill

Variant Covers by: Mike Deodato Jr. & Trish Mulvihill, Ramón Pérez, Christian Ward, Matt Taylor

Superman created by Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster.

By special arrangement with the Jerry Siegel family.

Editor: Chris Rosa

Group Editor: Paul Kaminski

Our cover shows the Flash being unraveled by a nearly-forgotten villain — the Folded Man. It's creepy and mystical, which is a perfect representation of Spurrier's story. Of course, the real question is just how much the Folded Man is involved in all this, or is he merely a red herring? Anyway, as usual, none of the variant covers feature Impulse, so let's get to the story.

We open with the Flash and Mr. Terrific examining an odd rainbow light that appeared over a statue of Barry Allen. They're completely stumped, so Wally calls in Max Mercury, revealing that he's been occasionally becoming "unstuck" from reality. Max matches the resonance of Wally's aura and becomes "unstuck" with him, theorizing that they haven't entered an alternate reality, but are merely viewing their universe from a different angle. Suddenly, a violent explosion begins heading right toward them. Wally guesses (correctly) that this is someone running. Max helps Wally relax and take them back to normal reality, where they find the runner was our lovable Impulse, announcing world-shattering news: pumpkin spice pickles.

From Bart's point of view, Wally and Max suddenly appeared out of nowhere. But he's immediately distracted by the rainbow light and vows to poke it with a stick — despite Max's objections. Wally and Max discuss how much damage Bart caused to the other plane, merely by running up to them, which causes Max to worry about the consequences of using their powers. Wally says he recently met a group of god-like aliens that mentioned The Stillness, which Max has never heard of before. Max also tells Wally about his vision of a wounded bison, which he interpreted as the Speed Force being in distress.

Bart interrupts his stick-hunting to explain his real reason  for coming here. While visiting Grandma Iris for her brownies, Iris told him that Barry has fallen into a deep depression and won't even leave his bed. Bart tried to talk to him, but Barry just yelled through the door that Max and Wally were at the statue. Max suggests they become "unstuck" from reality again, ordering Bart to stand watch and not poke anything.

This time, Max and Wally go to a different place, apparently inhabited by dead creatures. They're abducted by the Folded Man, who takes them to a place where several other speedsters seem to be trapped. They warn Wally and Max to leave before their vibrations are frozen, and the whole group is spooked by the arrival of three red, spiky aliens called the Uncoiled. Max and Wally try to run, but they can feel their connection to the Speed Force fading. So Max transfers all his energy to Wally, telling him to send help and let Bart know he's proud of him.

Max's boost sends Wally to a blank, white world with just the Folded Man to talk to. He tells Wally there's nowhere left for him to go, but to his amazement, Wally simply walks away to a new plane of existence. This one is a beautiful garden full of statues of Wally's friends and family. Wally is so overwhelmed by the tranquility of the place that he doesn't notice the statues are moving. In fact, he actually begins to lose his memories. As he sits down to enjoy the peace, the Impulse statue picks up a stick.

A real stick pokes Wally's cheek, catapulting him back into the real world. Bart hastily apologizes for poking the rainbow light, even claiming it was an accident. He then realizes Max is missing. Wally can't bring himself to say anything. Bart puts his face in his hands, while Mr. Terrific consoles him.

Poor Bart just can't catch a break. He was denied his peaceful run into the sunset. And now he has been separated from Max once again. It's just not fair!

It's also not entirely fair with how Bart's been portrayed in this series. He's acting too young and idiotic. It would have been nice had he intentionally put his stick in the rainbow because he could feel something was wrong. It also would have been great to have seen his interaction with Barry. Oh well. I guess there's still time for Bart to do something interesting. The art and story are still engaging and unique. I just hope this mystery actually goes somewhere and doesn't peter off.

Next time, we'll begin the Beast World crossover.