Issue Description

Picture New reporter, Iris West, listens to her husband, police forensics scientist, Barry Allen, talk in his sleep. It was in this manner that West learned that Allen was, secretly, the Flash. This night, all Allen speaks of is his old childhood sweetheart, the actress, Daphne Dean. A late night phone call interrupts West's eavesdropping, and awakens Allen. Master Villain calls Allen threatening to reveal his secret identity, if Allen doesn't meet him in the next five seconds, as the Flash. Allen bolts out of bed, puts on his costume, and races out to confront Master Villain. The Flash races into the pre-arranged meeting site, a phone booth. As soon as the Flash answers the incessantly ringing phone, Master Villain appear in the booth with him. Master Villain teleports out of the phone booth, then transforms it into one large, standing brick, which he shatters.

Moving faster than the eye could see, the Flash vibrated his molecules so that he could slip beneath the street, prior to the phone booth transformation. Coming up behind his foe, the Flash violently shoves Master Villain to the ground. Master Villain counterattacks with an energy fist. After knocking the Flash to the ground, the disembodied fist waits for the Flash to get up. The Flash flees, with the energy fist in hot pursuit. The Flash runs all the way to Metropolis, where he locates Superman, in his guise as Daily Planet reporter, Clark Kent. Vibrating his molecules into insubstantiality, the Flash runs right through Kent. Kent barely feels the impact of the energy fist. Kent merely gives pause, to mention a strange tickle at the back of his neck, to his companion, Daily Planet reporter, Lois Lane.

Back at home, the Flash, as Allen, fends off the amorous advances of Dean, while trying to help her regain her memory. Allen meets up with West, at the next-door neighbor's house, for an evening spent playing Bridge. Unbeknownst to Allen, Fred and Ethel Sands' youngest son, Barney, created Master Villain. Unbeknownst to Sands, an alien life form, drawn to and fueled by Sands' imagination, inhabited the drawing of Master Villain, and brought the character to life.The Allens return home. West is fuming as all Allen talked about the whole night is Dean. Upon seeing Dean sleeping on their couch, West's anger escalates. West is scolding Allen when she turns to see him wearing his Flash costume. Turning back, West sees Master Villain standing in her living room. The Flash attacks Master Villain only to have his super-speed momentum turned against him.

The Flash finds himself spinning like a propeller, generating hurricane force winds. West takes cover behind the couch. Astonsihingly, Dean sleeps through the entire battle. Master Villain hurls the Flash out the window. The Flash is spinning so fast that the shards of glass literally melt on impact, from his super-speed friction. By the time the Flash recovers, Master Villain is gone. The Flash hears Master Villain's voice coming from the Sands home, only to discover that it is actually Barney Sands' voice. Sands confesses that he created Master Villain. Sands has created an adversary to deal with Master Villain, called "Super-Hero". Unfortunately, Sands has been unable to get Super-Hero to come to life. Sands, though, is unaware that it was an alien life form that brought Master Villain into the real world.

Master Villain issues a challenge for the Flash to come fight him. The Flash arrives for their duel, dressed as Super-Hero. Masquerading as Super-Hero, the Flash begins beating a life size dummy of Master Villain. Master Villain feels every blow that "Super-Hero" lands on the dummy. "Super-Hero" begins spinning the dummy above his head, causing Master Villains to do the same. As the dummy falls to the ground, so, too, does Master Villain. The alien animating Master Villain abandons it's charade. The alien sought only an alleviation to it's great boredom. Suffering a beating at "Super-Hero's" hands, though, wasn't part of the plan. Sands is relieved that Super-Hero came to life to deal with the threat of Master Villain. West discovers that Dean is playing Allen for a fool. Dean's "amnesia" is a ruse, part of a greater scheme she's initiated, involving Allen.

The Flash (1959)

Publisher

DC Comics

Volume Description

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

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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)

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