There is a certain magic around writers who tackled “The Flash” in the last 25 or so years – each of them have gone on to do incredible things after leaving the book, and most wind up talking fondly about their time on the book. Mark Waid is no different – Waid has gone on, since his initial Flash run, to write just about every major character in superhero comics, and yet, his love of the Flash has never abated.

To celebrate Flash Appreciation Day, I called up Mark to have a chat about what it is that he loves about the Scarlet Speedster. As always, he was thoughtful, insightful, and generous with his time. Make sure to check out Mark’s other work, whether “Archie,” “All-New, All-Different Avengers,” or his Thrillbent work.

What’s your first memory of the Flash? When was the first time that character came into your consciousness at all?

Mark Waid: He came into my consciousness when I was reading “Justice League,” which was a spin-off of me reading “Batman.” It’s 1966 so it would have been one of the very first Justice League stories I ever read. Maybe issue 46 or 47, I think 47 was my first “Justice League” issue. I have to go back and look, I’m not sure that Barry Allen’s in that issue, but certainly if not that one, then one of the ensuing issues.

And from there “The Flash” 163 would have been my very first Flash comic, and that’s the one that is Julie Schwartz’s favorite cover of all time, the one of Flash holding up his hand to the reader saying, “Stop. You must read this issue, my life depends on it.” That was my first Flash issue.

That’s quite the issue to start with.

MW: That’s a great issue to start with! I know I missed a few of the ensuing ones, but from about issue 171 or 172 up, it was solid Flash every month and as a big aficionado, and of course I never ever stopped reading ” The Flash.”

As a kid … I’m 33 years old and my first exposure to the Flash was on the Super Friends show. I remember as a kid I couldn’t imagine being Superman. I couldn’t imagine having a magic ring, but I was kind of fast as a kid, and there was this very relatable element to the heroism of the Flash and I wonder if that’s something for a lot of people love about him, even subconsciously. It’s not like gaining the power to do something you can’t do already; you can just do it so much better. Was that part of it for you?

MW: Exactly, it’s not like flying, it’s not like x-ray vision. This is something that is just a natural extension of what you do. Also I think, and I’ve said this for a long time, I think there’s a thing about the Flash’s power that is a very relatable element in that nobody knows what it’s like to run clearly in a Mach 6, but everybody knows what it’s like to just miss the bus and wish they could have caught it, or feel like just miss it by this much. Everybody knows what it’s like to have homework do, it’s Sunday night and you haven’t done your report yet, and how cool it would be to be able to breeze through all those books and get it done in record time.

I think that’s part of the real wishful self out of the Flash is everybody knows what it’s like to want to be a little bit faster.

What I think is such a great aspect of the character is we see time and time again, even though he does have this extraordinary speed, he’s still too slow sometimes. There is that wonderful relatability even though his ability is so far above what we know as regular folks.

Now, when you started reading the Flash was there any inkling of Kid Flash in there or were you just mainly focused on Barry in the beginning?

MW: I was mainly focused on Barry in the beginning, to be honest, I never disliked Kid Flash but I was never really a big Kid Flash fan until, I want to say the George Perez, Marv Wolfman “New Teen Titans” days. I think that’s when I grew to like Wally and saw him as a character. Maybe, when I think about it, probably the first time I really liked Wally was in that “DC Special Series” #11, it was The Flash one shot that was all the three Flashes, plus Johnny Quick. This is 1978, or so, and that’s Flash and Kid Flash where it was drawn by Jose Garcia Lopez, inked by Wally Wood.

Continued below

Oh, my God, it is just a great looking book, and I think from there I really appreciated the character. As a grownup talking to Grant Morrison and other people about costume design, what had suddenly became apparent to me that I actually think that Wally, and I say this without one shred of exaggeration, I actually think Wally West, the yellow and red Kid Flash costume with the open hair is the best designed superhero costume of all time.

Yeah, it’s pretty close if it’s not the best. It’s right up there, absolutely.

MW: It’s right up there. That and the Silver Age Green Lantern have two of the very best designed costumes of all time because the artist was thinking. The reason you give Wally West an open top cowl is so the hair can move, and it gives you more of a sense of speed to it. It’s a really good looking design and it’s simple. There’s not a million lines all over it, it just really works.

Absolutely.

I first experienced your writing as the writer of “The Flash” as I think a lot of folks did. You came into “The Flash,” what was it, about six years after Wally became The Flash?

MW: About six years after Wally became The Flash. It was issue 62 so it would have been about five years and change, I guess. Give or take.

Yeah. In that time Barry obviously has his very tragic and heroic end, or I guess not end. He had a comma in his sentence, not a period, and so you’re coming into this character that obviously there are certain traits that are there, but to you, when you’re taking over that book. What is different between Wally and Barry? What are you saying, “these are the things I have to accentuate about Wally to give him his own identity?”

MW: The number one thing I focused onto Wally that made him unique was that he was the very first sidekick in comics to ever fulfill the promise. Right? That’s a line I took from editor Brian Augustyn, but that’s exactly it. Bucky didn’t grow up to be, at least at that time, this is 1992, Bucky didn’t grow up to be Captain America. Nightwing didn’t grow up to be, Robin didn’t grow up to be Batman, you know. Toro didn’t grow up to be the Human Torch, but Kid Flash grew up to be The Flash.

Playing off that, it was really a subtle nod to the idea that in a way he and I shared this commonality of, all I ever wanted to do growing up was be part of comics. I didn’t know whether I was going to be a write or what, but I wanted to be a part of comics. All Wally ever wanted to be since he was old enough to know what he wanted to be was a superhero. That’s it. That made him also fairly unique among superheroes that he grew up like a child star almost. Like one of these child star’s whose parents are, you know-

Monsters?

MW: No, like movie stars. Like Carrie Fisher talks about hanging around with, you know, Debbie Reynolds was her mother and all these famous actors and actresses were just like the aunts and uncles, and that was her family growing up. To Wally it was very much the same way. It’s the people he knew growing up, but they were not the Hal Jordans and the Jay Garricks. They weren’t removed legends of history, they were people that he knew growing up and idolized and just wanted to be part of that club and he got to be part of that club.

Yeah, I’ve heard that before, I’ve read that before, but hearing you say that, he must have been … not only is his dream coming true, but his dream comes true because of the death of somebody he really cares about, so he must have a very complicated relationship with his own legacy, and that’s part of what makes him so interesting.

MW: I always thought so. I always thought that was part of it, that it wasn’t a very graceful handing of the baton, it was a real strong streak of tragedy to how he basically ended up taking the mantle, but he did it out of honor. I mean, that’s the thing. In that sense, there is a sense of tragedy to it, but there’s also … how lucky is he to be able to honor the man who meant most to him by doing the thing that he loves the most. Most of us don’t get that. It’s not like, oh my dad died and I have to take over the family business which I never really wanted to do. This is, I always wanted to be a superhero growing up and now I’m taking over the mantle for Barry, and it is sad and it is tragic and I miss him, but this is the best way of honoring him, by filling his boots.

Continued below

Yeah, and it’s interesting. I guess Wally’s transition into being the Flash is one of the smoother ones in terms of sidekick or new heroes stepping up because everyone knew him already. It’s not Kyle Rayner waking up with a ring and all of a sudden he’s the Green Lantern. Everybody knew Wally already, and everybody knows why he’s doing this. He’s kind of like the perpetual little brother in the Justice League and I love that about him. I love watching him exceed the expectations of those around him.

MW: Yeah, I love watching him impress Batman or Wonder Woman. It’s not that they thought lesser of him, but still, they always loved Barry and oh, my God, this kid is even better.

Right, and that’s an interesting statement there. This kid’s even better. I think that there’s been a lot of push back, we’re not even talking post-reboot, but I think once Barry came back in “Final Crisis,” there was a lot of push back against the idea that Wally was the best, because Barry is back, and he’s the real Flash. I think that one of the more interesting parts of Wally’s history is that in many ways he did exceed Barry’s shadow. He made something all his own. Was that important to you to not make him into just the second Flash, but the best Flash?

MW: The best Flash. Here’s the thing, I never sat down at the keyboard and said, All right, what am I going to do this month to show him outpacing Barry, or show him in a way that makes Barry look like a dope. That was never the intent, and in fact that kind of grew out of the way Wally attracts me. It came out of the way the stories were told. It was never an objective to make Wally even cooler than Barry. Some of it just comes from the fact that, with all due respect to Barry Allen, Wally West just is cooler because he’s funnier, and he’s wittier. Barry, for all I love Barry, Barry is still like your uptight uncle.

I don’t care what they do to him in the comics today, or what have you. He’ll never escape the curse of, oh, Barry Allen. The crew cut guy with a bowtie who is kind of dull.

He’s a cop.

MW: And I wouldn’t want to change that because that’s who Barry was, but still he’s a cop and he’s very much by the rules, and he’s very introverted. I mean, that’s the other thing, too. Very clearly introverted human being. It was Iris’s job to be the extrovert. Imagine a party Iris and Barry would go to where Iris would be working the room and Barry would be in a corner. You know?

Right, yeah. As you’re developing as a Flash writer, you introduce Bart Allen/Impulse into the equation. Do you think that The Flash is a character that always works best in generations?

MW: I really do. I think there’s something about the idea that power that ability runs in the family. No pun intended. A little bit of a pun intended. I think that’s also because the Flash as a character has a bit of a legacy of harolding a new age in comics. I mean, the original flash, Jay Garrick was not the very first superhero, but he was the very first single powered superhero. He was the very first superhero in comics who was specialized. This is my one power and this is what I do really well. Before that, everybody was a giant muscle man who could fly and also have heat vision, or whatever.

Then of course Barry Allen kicked off the silver age and so there’s something about the idea that when there is a new Flash it means sort of a new era for comics. I like that idea a lot.

We see Wally as the reaction to Barry in some ways. Barry is the introvert, he’s a little bit uptight. Wally is the more carefree, wittier component. What was it about Bart that you felt you had to create to counter Wally? What were the couple of traits that you felt Bart really needed to have?

Continued below

MW: I really wanted Bart, at least at first before we really accentuated the naivety of the character, which was something that sort of came later, but at first we, Brian Augustyn, and I really wanted Bart to be just like young Wally, which would make Wally insane. In other words, he doesn’t like Bart, but he doesn’t really understand why and he doesn’t see what everybody else can see plainly, which is that you don’t like him because he’s exactly like you.

Yeah.

MW: That was the original goal. Once we spun him off into his own book, which came very quickly and unexpectedly, that was not the plan. I mean it was just … DC decided, “hey, we need an Impulse book,” and so they put it on the schedule before we got to issue 100. Bart had been in the comics for 6 months and he got his own book, so we had to really think hard about, “okay, young Wally is a cute idea, but it needs to be deeper than that if it’s going to carry its own series.” What do we do with that? Like I said, we came up with the idea of making it more about his naivety, more about his relationship wit Max Mercury, and more about the idea that a genuine kid is a superhero doing kid stuff and being involved in kid level threats.

Yeah, I use Impulse as an example all the time as my lamenting the state of comics today, because there are so few new characters that come out that can carry a book in their first six months, or their first year. How many issues did the original Impulse run last?

MW: Like 89, 90, something like that. It lasted quite a while.

Yeah, a new book doesn’t last that long anymore. Books don’t go that high anymore. It just doesn’t happen, and I think it’s a real shame for a lot of reasons.

Anyway, I don’t want to keep you for too much longer, but I do want to run something by you. I have thought this, and a lot of people have thought this. Do you watch The Flash t.v. show?

MW: Oh, my God yes, are you kidding me? Yes. It’s the highlight of my week.

It’s so great. It’s incredible how right they got it, but I really think that, even though the character is called Barry Allen, they’re really showing us Wally West Flash stories. Do you agree with that?

MW: Yeah, I would say very much Wally’s personality, very much. Very much the spirit of fun and engagement that Wally has. Yeah, I feel very much like it’s a nice hybrid of Barry and Wally.

Yeah, every week I talk to a few of my friends and we say, I can’t believe I saw this on TV tonight. I can’t believe we’re going to see Earth 2 tonight, you know? That’s insanity, that’s just not something that should happen on television, and it’s a great thing that it is.

Any final thoughts, any final thoughts on The Flash, what makes him so great, why you love The Flash so much?

MW: Again, it’s the primacy of the superpower. The idea that, like I said before, everybody knows what it’s like. Everybody wants to feel faster and everybody knows what that runner’s high feels like when you get moving. It’s just something so simple and sleek about that character that I … I don’t know, I will love The Flash until the day I die.