Each Friday, we'll be letting a different DC.com writer share what they'll be reading over the weekend and why you might want to check it out. Here's this week's suggestion for a perfect Weekend Escape!
 

Welcome to the weekend, discerning readers. This Friday, we’d like to offer you a superhero comic with a little bit of class. Super-villain punch-outs are always a lot of fun, but perhaps you’re looking for something with a little bit more weight to it. A comic, if you will, that punches back. Remember those early Vertigo days, when humble heroes were reinterpreted for modern, complex audiences? Books which had our costumed protagonists examining their own identity and place in the world they endlessly save? Well, DC’s still in the business of making those, and one of them just so happens to be The Flash Vol. 1: Strange Attractor.
 

THE PREMISE

The last time we left our scarlet speedster in Jeremy Adams’ delightfully redemptive romp, Wally West, the fastest family man alive, was on top of the world. Absolved of the horror of Heroes in Crisis. His mentor Barry Allen’s full blessing and ringing endorsement to continue as the new Flash. Reunited with his wife Linda and twins Irey and Jai, and even welcoming a third child into the family—the newborn Wade West. For a character who’s spent a decade down, Wally’s stock couldn’t be much higher.

Which means, of course, that it’s time for the fall.

Nobody’s ever really understood what the Speed Force is. Least of all Wally West, despite his reliance on it every time he wants to break the sound barrier. So, when the Speed Force stops behaving like it should, what is Wally supposed to do? Even closer to home, the happy life Wally has built has its foundations tested. Linda hasn’t been herself since the new baby came, feeling more and more like a ghost in Wally’s breakneck wake. One of his kids, having witnessed the trials of the Flash his entire life, isn’t sure he even wants to be a superhero. But how does he tell that to his dad? The entire West clan is about to learn that no matter how fast you are, there are some problems you can’t run from.
 

LET’S TALK TALENT

In much of his modern work for DC, Simon Spurrier feels like a temporally displaced transplant from the “British Invasion” era of Vertigo Comics. In the past few years, he’s helped relaunch the Sandman Universe with The Dreaming, given us deeply moody, character building backup stories on Ram V’s operatic Detective Comics, and is currently in the midst of what may well be the definitive Hellblazer run of our generation. Like putting Moore on Swamp Thing, or Morrison on Animal Man, or Milligan on Shade the Changing Man—don’t you want to see what a guy like that can do with The Flash?

Long time Wonder Woman fans may recall Brazilian Mike Deodato from his ’90s run with William Messner-Loebs, temporarily passing the tiara to Artemis of Bana-Mighdall. But if you haven’t checked out his work since then, Deodato has seriously leveled up his craft in the decades since, pushing the boundaries of what comics can visually accomplish in each issue of this volume, setting a brand-new breakneck pace for the series.


REASONS TO READ

  • The Flash Gets Vertigo: Though often fantastical to the point of evoking the psychedelic sequences of 2001: A Space Odyssey, the foibles of the Flash in Spurrier and Deodato’s hands are deeply human in a way few teams handling the super speedster have tackled before. Familial expectations, postpartum depression and making room for one’s self in a world constantly in peril are all dealt with as weightily as the failure of the Speed Force in a way that makes The Flash a truly mature title, in ways far beyond any gore or nudity might mark it.
     
  • Flash Family Album: Wally is the star here, but no matter who your favorite Flash is, this creative team doesn’t forget about them. Every member of the extended family from Max Mercury down to Bart Allen—and, yes, plenty of Barry as well—gets their character defining moments, especially if you stick with the series past this first volume. Once you start this run, you’ll be so swept up in the company that you’ll whiz right past the finish line.
  • Explosive Art: Mike Deodato clearly had a mission statement to ensure this comic didn’t look like anything else on the shelves—and in the way it illustrates the unraveling of the fundamental laws of the universe, it succeeds by every possible metric. The Flash’s use here of everything from panel borders and layout bleeding unnervingly off the pages in grids that make you feel like you’re only seeing one facet of a multi-dimensional shape to Trish Mulvihill’s boundary-pushing colors often make this comic feel like it fell from another plane of existence. This is a singular work of art.
     
  • Screaming in Space: Science fiction and horror in comics are so often like chocolate and peanut butter. Two great, storied genres each distinct and respected within the annals of comic book history. But when married together, if you can find the balance, that’s when they truly sing. This intersection is right where the latest incarnation of The Flash series is.
     

WHY IT’S WORTH YOUR TIME

Wally West fans want Wally West to be happy. After everything he’s been through, he’s earned it. And yet, the great Wally West comics have always been about tribulation and victory at a price which weighs heavily on its hero’s soul. In that aspect, Spurrier and Deodato’s The Flash Vol. 1: Strange Attractor bears much in common with the staggered and often costly character growth Wally West endured in his original epic Flash run from 1987-2009.

Wally West deserves happiness, and here, despite all he faces from the universe and his own family life, he manages to achieve that happiness. But for a compelling story, Wally West also deserves a challenge, and this volume’s got more of those for our Flash than all but the Fastest Man Alive could possibly keep up with.
 

The Flash Vol. 1: Strange Attractor by Simon Spurrier, Mike Deodato Jr. and Trish Mulvihill is now available in bookstores, comic shops, libraries and digital retailers. You can also read it in full on DC UNIVERSE INFINITE.

Alex Jaffe is the author of our monthly "Ask the Question" column and writes about TV, movies, comics and superhero history for DC.com. Follow him on Bluesky at @AlexJaffe and find him in the DC Official Discord server as HubCityQuestion.

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