Issue Description

A comet strikes the sun, endangering Earth-2 with radiation. Meanwhile, Barry and Iris attend a costume party on Earth 1, and the proceeds are stolen by Captain Cold. Two crimes, two Flashes! Jay Garrick and Barry Allen once again join forces as the Flash of Two Worlds!

A comet strikes the sun, touching off a solar flare of deadly epsilon radiation. The entire populace of Earth is in danger of being wiped out by the radiation. A meteorite is discovered in Arizona that can absorb the fatal radiation. Jay Garrick is tasked, by the President of The United States, to find a way to use the meteor to absorb all the radiation. When Garrick arrives in Arizona, though, he can find no trace of the meteor. Garrick, as the Golden Age Flash, travels to Earth-1, in the hopes of finding a similar meteor, on the parallel world. Police forensic scientist, Barry Allen, and Picture News reporter, Iris West, are attending a costumed Headline Makers Ball. Allen sees several party guests dressed in the costumes of notorious criminals, like the Mirror Master and the Top.

Two such "guests" truly are Captain Cold and the Trickster. Captain Cold is in the process of looting the charity receipts, when the Trickster interrupts and takes the money for himself. The Trickster is quick to disable Captain Cold's gun. Recognizing a robbery when he sees one, the Golden Age Flash intervenes, preventing the Trickster from escaping. Unjamming his weapon, Captain Cold lays an ice sheath across the floor. The Golden Age Flash skids into a wall, knocking himself out. Proving there's no honor among thieves, the Trickster flies off with the loot, leaving Captain Cold behind. Learning of the robbery, Allen investigates, as the Flash. Encountering his counterpart, the Flash is brought up to speed on the situation.

The two Flashes take off in pursuit of the fleeing felons. The Flashes find Captain Cold and the Trickster fighting over the stolen money. Captain Cold quickly freezes the Flash. The Golden Age Flash closes in on Captain Cold, only to be hooked by the Trickster. With the Trickster holding the Golden Age Flash in the air, Captain Cold is able to easily freeze him, as well. Acknowledging how well they work together, Captain Cold and the Trickster form a partnership. Vibrating at super-human speed, the Flashes shatter their icy encasements. While the Golden Age Flash gets on with his mission to collect the meteor, the Silver Age Flash pursues Captain Cold and the Trickster. The Golden Age Flash finds that the meteor on Earth-1 is much larger, and still buried.

The Golden Age Flash excavates the meteor, then breaks it up into smaller pieces. The Golden Age Flash has the meteor fragments flown back to Central City. There, he and the Silver Age Flash build a vibratory transport that will teleport the meteor fragments to Earth-2. Thanks to a story planted in the latest edition of Picture News, Captain Cold and the Trickster are led to believe the meteor fragments are valuable. The two costumed crooks show up to steal it, falling into the Flashes' trap. It's all the two felons can do to escape. The Golden Age Flash goes after the Trickster, and brings him down to Earth with a super-speed generated wind column. The Trickster, though, turns out to be one of Captain Cold's mirages.

Anticipating that tactic, the Silver Age Flash stayed on Captain Cold's trail, while leaving a path for the Golden Age Flash to follow. The Silver Age Flash confronts Captain Cold and the Trickster in their hideout. While their attention is on their old foe, the Golden Age Flash, moving so fast as to be invisible, grabs their hands and turns their weapons on themselves. The meteor fragments absorb all the deadly epsilon radiation threatening Earth-2, saving all life on Earth. Knowing that events that occur on Earth-2 also happen on Earth-1, the Golden Age Flash uses his background in chemistry to synthesize the meteor metal, for use on Earth-1, should that world be similarly imperiled.

The Flash (1959)

Publisher

DC Comics

Volume Description

The Flash Volume 1, (continued from Flash Comics).

House Ad

Starring Barry Allen as the Flash and Wally West as Kid Flash. After 4 try-out issues of "Show case" - the first being #4, which is widely accepted as being the comic that launched the Silver Age - the Flash returned to star in his own title with #105 in 1959. The numbering of the title continued from the Golden Age "Flash Comics," which had come to an end as Super Heroes went out of fashion in the early 1950's. When Police scientist Barry Allen was doused with a variety of chemicals along with a bolt of lightning, the accident endowed him with Super Speed, and he donned the famous red Flash uniform we are all familiar with. Barry was seeing reporter Iris Allen, and to ensure he kept his identity as the Flash a secret from his girlfriend, he always turned up late for their dates. During his Showcase appearances, the Flash had battled the first of what was to become his rogues gallery when he clashed with Captain Cold, and his range of costumed opponents was about expand almost as rapidly as his uniform expanded from his ring when it came into contact with air. In his opening issue, the Flash battled the Mirror Master, and in the following issue, readers were introduced to Gorilla Grodd, Solovar, and the inhabitants of Gorilla City in a trilogy of tales that ran through issues #106 - 108. Also starring in #106 was another costumed villain, the Pied Piper. The Mirror Master obviously proved a hit with fans as he was back in #109 for a re-match and in #110 the Flash encountered the Weather Wizard for the first time. The Trickster brought his tricks to Central City in Flash #113, while Captain Cold returned in #114 and another Captain - this time Captain Boomerang debuted in #117.

However, it wasn't just super villains the Flash was encountering in the early issues of his own series. In #110, Kid Flash made his debut, when Wally West was caught in a freak duplicate of the accident that had given Barry his super speed. Wally's original costume was a duplicate of Barry's (only smaller of course) but sidekicks were "in" at the time and Wally would often feature in back up stories in the Flash as well as sometimes teaming up with his mentor - such as in #120. Later (#135) Wally would receive his more familiar yellow and red costume, which would serve him for the best part of two decades. Shortly after the introduction of Kid Flash, the Flash encountered Ralph Dibny, the Elongated Man in #112. At first, Barry thought the Elongated Man was a criminal, but by the end of the lead story in this issue, Ralph was exonerated, and the two men became firm friends. Editor Julius Schwartz was developing a number of friendships across the books he edited and chief among them was a friendship between Green Lantern and the Flash. The two first teamed up in Green Lantern #13 and the friendship was cemented during several shared adventures including the ones in Flash #131 and #143.

The most far reaching team -up of Barry's career was to come about in the classic Flash #123, "Flash of Two Worlds" in which the Scarlet Speedster met his "hero" Jay Garrick, the original Flash from the Golden Age of comics, and the concept of Earth Two was launched. Subsequent team ups between the two Flashes included the reintroduction of the Justice Society of America in #137's "Vengeance of the Immortal Villain," as the heroes pitted their wits against Vandal Savage. In the meantime, the villains just kept coming, as Abra Kadabra - a magician from the future made his debut in #128, Heat Wave made things hot for the Flash in #140, and the Top put him in a spin in # 141. However, it was the introduction of Eobard Thawne - the Reverse Flash (or Professor Zoom) in #140 that would have the most far reaching and long lasting effect upon Barry Allen's future.

When Barry and Iris finally got around to tying the knot, (#165), the Reverse Flash tried to take his place at the altar. Although Barry foiled his arch -foe on this occasion, history would repeat itself later in the series. After the death of Iris (accidentally shot at a costume ball), Barry was about to get re-married. Thawne was about to kill his fiance, but in order to prevent that happening, Barry snapped the neck of his enemy - an event which led to the two-year plus "Trial of the Flash," which concluded the series and led to the seeming demise of Barry Allen in Crisis on Infinite Earths.

With science-based stories by the likes of Gardner Fox, John Broome, and Robert Kanigher, and the sleek angular artistic lines provided by Carmine Infantino, the Flash became one of the most popular and attractive books in the DC line throughout the Silver Age and indeed its impressive 246 issue run. The series ended with issue 350 and was continued a little more over a year into The Flash Volume 2.

Collected EditionsFlash Archives Vol. 1 (#105-108)Flash Omnibus (#105-132)Showcase Presents: The Flash vol. 1 (#105-111)Flash Archives Vol. 2 (#109-116)Flash Archives Vol. 3 (#117-124)Showcase Presents: The Flash vol. 2 (#120-140)Flash Archives Vol. 4 (#125-132)Flash Archives Vol. 5 (#133-141)Showcase Presents: The Flash vol. 3 (#141-161)Flash Archives Vol. 6 (#142-150)Showcase Presents: The Flash vol. 4 (#162-184)Absolute Green Lantern/Green Arrow (#217-219 & 226)Showcase Presents: The Trial of the Flash (#323-7, 329-336, 340-350)

Please first Sign In before leaving a review.

Status: Not in Collection