The Flash is horrible at time traveling. He’s cosmically bad at it. Don’t let this man anywhere near a timeline, a time machine, or any artifact that could manipulate history. Trust me, it will end poorly for everyone.

He’s so notoriously dreadful at it that it’s little wonder filmmaker Andy Muschietti decided to incorporate it into the very first Flash movie. He didn’t even wait for the sequel to have Barry break everything. The movie is inspired in part by Flashpoint, an iconic storyline where the Flash’s time traveling tears the DC Universe apart. But while Flashpoint may be the most famous example of this, it was hardly the first time the Flash has done it. In fact, here are six other times the World's Fastest Man really screwed things up by messing with time.
 

1) Barry Allen Breaks the Timeline IN HIS FIRST APPEARANCE

How soon did Flash start messing with time travel? It all began during his first appearance in 1956’s Showcase #4. It’s like Barry couldn’t wait to start causing trouble. Showcase #4 contains two Flash stories, “Mystery of the Human Thunderbolt,” which tells Barry’s origin, and “The Man Who Broke the Time Barrier,” which featured Barry Allen’s first foray into time travel.

The Flash battles a criminal named Madzen, who comes from the distant future. After defeating him, Flash decides to use his super speed to return the crook to his own time. Does Barry handle this responsibly? Absolutely not! Using his super speed, the Flash grabs Madzen and runs into the timeline.

The problem is that to travel through time, he first needs to get through a physical barricade called the “time barrier.” Does Barry vibrate through the barrier, or go around it? NOPE! He shatters it completely, destroying a piece of the timestream. I hope that wasn’t important.
 

2) The Flash Wrecks the Past with a Massive Time-Earthquake

Have you ever heard of the butterfly effect? The idea is that something as small as a butterfly flapping its wings can have a major effect on its surroundings. This idea is explored in multiple time travel movies, where characters are warned to be mindful of their surroundings in the past. Anything as minuscule as stepping on an ant could cause massive changes to the future.

But if you’re Barry Allen, you just ignore all of that and cause a massive earthquake. In 1960’s The Flash #120, Barry Allen and a research expedition team accidentally wind up in prehistoric times after an earthquake vibrates their molecules into the past.

Barry decides that the only way to send everyone home is to duplicate the earthquake. And so, the Flash vibrates the ground, creating a massive earthquake that vibrates everyone home. The problem is that we all know that the Flash doesn’t need to create earthquakes to time travel, so this seems excessive. I have to think that Barry just wanted to show off to everyone. Maybe demonstrate that he has the ability to cause earthquakes, just so none of them try anything like stealing his bagel or maybe leaving his name off of some super important research. Still, if a butterfly flapping its wings can change the future, I can’t even imagine the damage Barry’s earthquake likely caused to the timeline.
 

3) Flash Sends His Girlfriend’s Nephew Back in Time to be Hunted by Prehistoric Creatures

1961’s The Flash #125 contains the first appearance of the Cosmic Treadmill, a device Barry built to help him travel through time. In this issue, Barry’s discovered that a group of aliens are invading the Earth in the far future after going back to 100 million B.C. to neutralize Earth’s radiation, which prevents the people of the future from using their atomic weapons.

The easy solution would be to travel to the past to restore the radiation THEN travel to the future to stop the aliens, but Barry Allen has never used time travel responsibly. Instead, he sends his girlfriend’s prepubescent nephew into the past, while he goes to the future to deal with the aliens.

Hey Barry, you have a time machine! That means there’s no need to split up!

In fairness, his girlfriend’s nephew is Wally West, the speedster known as Kid Flash. However, the young lad still finds himself hunted by prehistoric monsters during his journey into the past. Luckily, he survives, but if I sent my girlfriend’s nephew into the past to be hunted by monsters, I wouldn’t have a girlfriend anymore. Barry should count himself lucky that Iris never found out.
 

4) Oops! The Flash Accidentally Creates His Worst Enemy by Forgetting to Wash His Costume

When a scientist sends a time capsule into the future in 1962’s The Flash #139, the Flash offers to put one of his spare uniforms into the device. Unfortunately, that time capsule winds up in the year 2463, where it’s found by an unnamed criminal (later books would call him Eobard Thawne). The criminal takes the costume and discovers that it still has traces of super-speed wave patterns on it. Maybe Barry should have checked for that BEFORE SENDING HIS SUIT INTO THE FUTURE.

Using the super-speed wave patterns, the felon’s able to duplicate the Flash’s powers and become the Reverse-Flash. Yes, Barry is responsible for the creation of his worst enemy. Every horrible thing that Thawne has ever done could have been avoided if Barry had just washed his costume before sealing it away for hundreds of years.
 

5) Flash Uses Time Travel to Get Out of a Promise he Made to his Fiancée 

1965’s The Flash #156 features a war on the planet Gyr where the alien Drdons seek to possess the most dangerous weapon of war—Barry Allen’s time traveling. (After reading this list, can you blame them?) The Drdons force the Flash to travel back in time, ensuring that they win one of the war’s most pivotal battles.

I shouldn’t have to say it, but this is a pretty irresponsible use of time travel. Barry complies, but turns on the Drdons, helping the rebels win the war.

Making this not-great situation a whole lot worse, the people of Earth learn the Flash’s secret identity during the conflict, so Barry decides to reverse time so everyone would forget, because that’s his solution to everything. To top it all off, before reversing time, Iris made him promise that he would reveal his identity to her on their wedding night. Barry agreed and sealed the promise with a kiss. Well, it turns out that Barry lied, but that’s a story for another article.
 

6) The Flash Kills a Man Before His Birth, Shattering the Timeline

How bad is Flash at time travel? He’s so bad that he once managed to break the timeline without time traveling. In 1983’s The Flash #324, Barry Allen accidentally kills the Reverse-Flash during an intense battle. Now to be fair, the Flash did this to save the life of his fiancée Fiona Webb. However, this act has major consequences for the space time continuum.

The Flash is put on trial for Reverse-Flash’s death, with the prosecution arguing that the hero could’ve stopped the villain without killing him. During the trial, Barry learns that a juror named Nathan Newbury is actually a time traveler who’s come to the 20^th century to fix the mess Barry’s caused. Newbury tells the Flash that killing the time traveling Reverse-Flash years before his birth upset the timestream.

“Since his death was never supposed to occur in your time period, it became a dangerous cosmic anomaly,” he would explain in 1985’s The Flash #349. “The flow of time and the course of history was rendered erratic and unstable from that moment on.”

I’ll give Barry a pass for this one, since he was trying to save someone’s life, but it’s still wild that Flash has the power to break the timeline even while remaining in the present day.
 

As you can see, Barry should have learned his lesson long before Flashpoint. Perhaps he’ll prove more perceptive in The Flash, which should be racing into theaters…right about now!

The Flash, directed by Andy Muschietti and starring Ezra Miller as Barry Allen, is in theaters June 16th. Visit our official Flash hub for more news, interviews and videos about the Flash!

Joshua Lapin-Bertone writes about TV, movies and comics for DC.com, is a regular contributor to the Couch Club and writes our monthly Batman column, "Gotham Gazette." Follow him on Twitter at @TBUJosh.

NOTE: The views and opinions expressed in this feature are solely those of Joshua Lapin-Bertone and do not necessarily reflect those of DC Entertainment or Warner Bros., nor should they be read as confirmation or denial of future DC plans.