Tag: Kid Flash

With ‘Teen Titans: Together’ wrapped, Kami Garcia + Gabriel Picolo look to the future with a book tour, more graphic novels

Fans of the Young Adult graphic novel series will be happy to learn the team will next focus on a new series with Kid Flash and Blue Beetle.

Kami Garcia and Gabriel Picolo’s Teen Titans: Together arrives in stores today, wrapping up the Young Adult graphic novel series that started about eight years ago — back when DC was using the DC Zoom and DC Ink imprints for their graphic novels aimed at younger readers. In each volume, Garcia and Picolo slowly reintroduced each member of the Teen Titans, from Raven to Beast Boy to Raven AND Beast Boy, then Robin and Starfire, with the final volume bringing everyone together.

“This series changed my life,” said Picolo. “We’ve shared so many unforgettable moments with fans around the world, and we’re excited to celebrate this final chapter together. I see these characters as my friends. The more I draw them, the more fun it gets. Some of my favorite moments came from drawing these characters the same way I’d draw my own friends just hanging out, and Kami and I are always blown away when fans show up in cosplay inspired by those everyday looks from the books.”

The series out-survived its imprint, proving to be mega-popular and critically acclaimed.

“Teen Titans has been one of the most rewarding creative journeys of our careers,” said Garcia. “We’ve loved telling stories with these characters and watching readers connect with Raven, Beast Boy and the rest of the Titans over the years. We grew alongside these characters, and these characters grew alongside the readers who embraced them from the very beginning.”

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Wally West can’t stop running

Tom Bondurant recounts the history of Wally West, from reluctant superhero to generational avatar.

For many superhero-comic readers of the 1980s and ’90s (not to mention viewers of the Justice League animated series in the 2000s), Wally West was the Flash – the fastest man alive. Created by John Broome and Carmine Infantino for January 1960’s The Flash issue #110, Wally gained super-speed just as his idol did, by being doused in Barry Allen’s laboratory chemicals and struck by lightning. Today Wally has become a symbol of DC Comics’ superhero legacies, so much so that his role in 2016’s DC Universe Rebirth special signaled a wholesale return to a previous timeline. However, when editorial fiat dispatched him in 2011, Wally had arguably done everything he’d set out to do. Indeed, Wally’s history includes a couple of prominent retirement periods already. Now he’s inherited Metron’s Mobius Chair and Doctor Manhattan’s powers, but the question still remains: What’s left for Wally West?

Wally started out as Kid Flash, sidekick and sometimes backup-feature star. At first he wore a kid-sized Flash costume, so his more familiar duds (acquired in March 1963’s Flash #135) represented a significant step in his development. He was a charter member of the Teen Titans from its primeval beginning (June-July 1964’s Brave and the Bold #54) to its February 1978 dissolution (Teen Titans #53). Shortly thereafter, in 1978’s DC Special Series issue #11, writer Cary Bates and artist Irv Novick had Wally tell his family that he would only be Kid Flash through the end of his college career; and upon graduation, he’d retire from superheroics.

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