What's so great about Wally West?

In basically any Flash or Flash related thread, some folks always come out of the word work to cry about how Wally West is the best Flash.

Is there any truth to it? I know some people prefer Wally's stuff (though the vast majority prefer Barry's show), but what substance is there to Barry's sidekick being better than Barry? As far as I know, most of what Wally did either isn't unique to Wally (Speed Force crap which goes for any Flash) or just stole from Barry's history by just reliving shit like fighting his rogues, doing the same super speed/time travel hijinks, having the reporter wife etc etc.

I don't see it but I'd like to think I can be proven wrong. What's so great about Wally that is unique to him? Why is he the "superior" Flash to so many fags on Sup Forums? Why was his return to comics such a big deal?

I admire his high metabolism and appreciate women who have it because it makes drawing food porn more easy

Barry also has high metabolism. It's just a generic speedster power.

Barry is bland, and Wally was the Flash for decades before being sidelined.

They grew up while he was starring in the book.

Wally's run invented the Speed Force as the concept we know it.

More than that, people grew up with Wally, and Wally himself grew with age: he went from being a young man suddenly having to take over the role of The Flash, to eventually having a loving family.

In particular, Wally's run also emphasized family and built up the Flash family.

Barry's initial run established the villains that would define The Flash, but Wally (via Waid and Johns) established the modern feel that most comic people associate with The Flash.

Wally was the flash for a long time. Also, he had the whole "overcome his weaknesses to step up to fill his mentors shoes" thing going for him, along with some other really great arcs.

See, this is all just meaningless buzzwords. It's clear you prefer Wally and think he's more interesting; why do you?

Waid invented the Speed Force, Wally was just around for it to happen. Barry and Jay invented the vast majority of their actual powers. Almost all the relevant Flash villains are from Barry. The costume and the theme of The Flash are Barry's. Why is the Speed Force more important than all of those contributions?

If the answer is seriously just "read Wally first" then that's stupid. Why get onto people for liking Barry when they probably read/saw him first before Wally?

Flash of Two Worlds did this first. It wasn't a new thing with Wally, even if they made a longer arc out of it. The Return of Barry Allen was over by Flash 80. Are those first 80 comics above Barry's hundreds just because Wally was a shitty Flash who had to stop being shitty?

He runs so fast it makes his hoohaa do a slippy no no

best reason so far desu

Barry Allen was a hyper bland "generic superhero" until Mark Waid brought him back in his run on Flash, which allowed him to stand out when juxtaposed against Wally (a character who actually had some character) and thus gained a personality

Barry Allen having anything resembling a personality is 100% an invention of the post-Wally West Flash paradigm, much like how Hal Jordan didn't become a total sub-Guy Gardner knucklehead until Geoff Johns brought him back. It's writers playing favorites with the characters they grew up reading, like how Bendis kept trying to make Spider-Woman seem important

I don't know about Wally or Barry being the best, but making them so absurdly fast has ruined storytelling for Flash in my opinion.

He's an actual character, which comics Barry is not.

Flash has been lightspeed since literally the very first issue of Jay Garrick's comic. So no, unless Flash has literally never been good you're stupid.

You don't seem to know what the word character means.

What's so bland about Barry that isn't bland about Wally? They have the same morality, ended up living basically the same life (superhero married to a reporter in a blue collar area that loves them). Wally, as a matter of fact, has no facet to his life BESIDES those things, whereas at least Barry has a cool interesting in science.

They've both been through the tragedy ringer, they've both grown as characters from the trials and tribulations their villains put them through. Is Wally a not generic character just because his humor is more modern than Barry's was in the 60s? Because Wally is such a close rip off of Barry that I don't get it.

The time when Wally was most different (the Baron and WML era) is less recommended than when he himself just became a more generic hero (Waid and Johns). Anything that's bland about Barry is just about as bland about Wally. Unless Speed Force is your only excuse, in which case Speed Force is just as much about Barry these days as Wally.

Barry Allen is the Jonathan Joestar of the Flashes. He's not particularly interesting, but it'd be missing something without him. Everything people attribute to The Flash is introduced or fleshed out after he dies, but he's still a respected character. Before 2009, it'd be rare to find someone who outright loathed Barry Allen.

He was the Flash when I was 12

Yeah and now they've really gone many times past the speed of light to the point of absurdity.

You're gawking at numbers when that's not the point. The Flash will always be fast enough to save the day. The level of speed is just for fun and scale. And sometimes to show improvement in their abilities.

Hoooo boy.

Personally I find Barry Allen really formulaic. From his generic "dead mom" origin to "villain of the week", there is nothing he offers that you can't find with other ones.

With Wally, you have a viewpoint to superhero community. He GROWS UP in this clique, the guy's another uncle is Green Lantern, he spent a lot of time in Wayne Mayor as a kid, all Batkids love him etc. So when he grows up and joins the League, watching him making himself being accepted by Superman and Wonder Woman is actually pretty damn good. He grows up a lot in pages and faces a lot of challenges, something Barry never does.

Also Wally being flawed isn't a bad thing, the books never excuse his mistakes. He betters himself at the end of each challenge and that's inspiring. Barry's mistakes are handwaved almost every fucking time.

He's also a pretty easy going guy (unlike Barry) so his books are filled with friends and allies I enjoy reading about.

And last, everything you like about Flash is first introduced by Wally. He defined the modern Flash, so it's hard to write him out of Flash's lore.

Wally doesn't really know any batkid besides Dick. He's had like one conversation with Barbara in his entire life and I don't think any with Jason.

Wally's also pretty formulaic. No dead mom but every story is "power of love/lightning rod" along with the Villains of the Week.

Barry has arguably the most famous character flaw of all time in being late. He screwed up all the time. I never got this "Barry is perfect" thing. It just seems so made up by people who don't read any comics with him in them. He's retrospectively treated as flawless because of his sacrifice, but that has nothing to do with his character. Even when he was doing the deed he had his doubts.

I like The Rogues, the costume, the science theme, Gorilla Grodd, Reverse Flash, the cool uses of super speed as a power, the blue collar city beloved hero and all sorts of things about Barry that Wally stole.

I agree you can't just write Wally out of Flash lore like they did. That was never my point -- he was clearly important. But, just like you have here, I see people make lots of mistaken and downright hypocritical opinions of Barry compared to Wally while screaming to the heavens that Wally is the best Flash.

Wally's everything is a very good imitation of Barry, with the added Speed Force chicanery. If all you like is Speed Force stuff then ok, but Barry's also, by the pure retcon that is the Speed Force, super involved with Speed Force chicanery.

Well, keep in mind that the dead mom origin is only a few years old. For decades, Barry had two living and loving parents and chose to be a superhero solely because it was the right thing to do. I think that's an important thing to note.

I'm pretty sure you made a thread like this a few weeks ago, except it was just you ranting about Wallyfags.

>Wally doesn't really know any batkid besides Dick. He's had like one conversation with Barbara in his entire life and I don't think any with Jason.

Wally supported Jason when he first became Robin, and he's REALLY good friends with Barbara. They worked together in JL for a while too. He helped out Tim while he was in Keystone for a while. In short, all Batfamily has a relationship with him. Nightwing goes without saying. Only Damian has no established relationship with him.
> No dead mom but every story is "power of love/lightning rod" along with the Villains of the Week.
Power of love happens at very important moments, not all the time. He's more of a "nakama power" guy, which is rare in western comics.

> He screwed up all the time.
And he never faced any actual consequences for it. That's my problem with Barry.

I think what really divides fans is that Wally has better stories. Barry tries to imitate them in new 52 and Rebirth but it's just not as good. Godspeed was Hunter Zolomon rip off but he lacked everything that made Hunter awesome yada yada.

Barry is good but he's not really "all that" compared to Wally. He can't add the emotional weight Wally does in his stories but Wally can deal with his enemies just fine.

Being around when Oracle existed doesn't mean he got along with her. They wouldn't even qualify as acquaintances. Wally was always more fond of Starfire when it came to Dick's girlfriends.

Wally and Linda's relationship is the basis for almost every Waid story, even when it's not specifically coming back home or whatever.

>And he never faced any actual consequences for it. That's my problem with Barry.

Is this a joke? The last like 8 years of Barry's run was him in constant misery where Iris death sends him into one mistake after another.

Whereas with Wally, at the end of every arc shit goes back to being fixed. Even his kids being killed was undone like 20 issues later by time travel hijinks.

What emotional weight does Wally have that Barry doesn't? That seems like some meaningless platitude.

If you think Wally has better stories, sure, but what is unique to Wally about them? Aside from The Return of Barry Allen -- I'll plainly admit that one obviously only works with Wally. But everything else is just typical Flash/Speed Forcey stuff and love stories, both of which suit Barry perfectly fine.

I'm sure there are lots of Wally West threads. He's a popular character.

I'm not ranting about Wallyfags or anything, I'm asking for folks to tell me why they like Wally so much to the point where they shit on Barry for even existing anymore.

I get liking a character but hell, I don't know how many times I've seen "Barry should die" or "Barry should've stayed dead" and the like.

/thread
Same with TIM DRAKE IS THE BEST ROBIN, KYLE RAYNER IS THE BEST GREEN LANTERN and whatnot.

Wally grew up and made the flash series move forward with new characters,relationships and drama.Barrys return removed any new flash characters and Barry himself never grew,Buccelato's run had him silently narrating with a voting supporting cast and never really getting a voice of his own,Booth was even worse at this and Geoff johns kept Barry a background character for all of JL so Barry never had a chance to stand out or establish a personality or friends.Waids run is the polar opposite,flash family grew,Wally grew and even after getting kicked down a thousand time always got right back up,I've always felt Wally west is what Peter Parker is to marvel,the young kid who made it big.Look at how many spiderman fans want Peter to have a kid,because Wally proved the young teen hero becoming the responsible dad is just so damn relatable.if you take Barry out of any flash story his character doesn't change and noghing is really lost,Ztards out Wally and he becomes a different man entirely.Ive always felt Barry has the problem miles morales has,he needs to bring down other characters to stand out and even his most notable characteristics are stolen from the previous flash.Geoff johns had the right idea making Barry a stoic take no shit detective but too many writers prefer writing bland man or diet Wally and that's what makes him full

is Flash #54 by Messner-Loebs the best Flash comic of all-time

Flash #0 and maybe DCU Rebirth if you cut out all the non-Flash stuff.

Let's not generalize here. I grew up with Tim and Kyle but for me Dick is my favorite Robin and Guy is my favorite Green Lantern.

I like how you just posted a picture that was Geoff Johns ripping off Barry Allen's feud with Thawne.

I'M GONNA KILL YOUR WIFE AND YOU CAN'T STOP ME

Same shit different artist.

or the issue of Wally in the theater

> Being around when Oracle existed doesn't mean he got along with her. They wouldn't even qualify as acquaintances. Wally was always more fond of Starfire when it came to Dick's girlfriends.

user, you should stop talking about the things you don't know.

> Wally and Linda's relationship is the basis for almost every Waid story, even when it's not specifically coming back home or whatever
Basis? Sure, he develops their relationship and that's not a bad thing. Better than being a non entity like Iris, I guess.
>Is this a joke? The last like 8 years of Barry's run was him in constant misery where Iris death sends him into one mistake after another.
And when he came back from dead, all of those things were forgotten. Nothing of short happened in New 52. His Flashpoint mistake is attributed to Manhattan (even though he gave them the opportunity in the first place)

>What emotional weight does Wally have that Barry doesn't? That seems like some meaningless platitude.
His insecurities? His desire to prove himself? The amount of love he's not afraid of showing to others? DC Rebirth is still fresh dude. What emotional depth any of the New 52 Flash had compared to Wally stories? I'm waiting here.

>If you think Wally has better stories, sure, but what is unique to Wally about them? Aside from The Return of Barry Allen -- I'll plainly admit that one obviously only works with Wally. But everything else is just typical Flash/Speed Forcey stuff and love stories, both of which suit Barry perfectly fine.

You can't tell Chain Lightning with Barry either. Blitz is entirely structured for Wally West's values and invoked by his friend. All best Flash stories (and by proxy, Wally stories) are about Wally and considered best because they effect Wally, they are character driven stories.

So by your reckoning, Bart is the best speedster?

not him, but obviously

>the theme of The Flash are Barry

>Waid ruined Flash stories forever

He's flawed, he has some pretty good stories, a nice gallery of rogues and has a distinctive voice. Also, it's relatable for most of the folks: he's a big fanboy and often fuck ups things with the best of his intentions because he's impatient as fuck.

Of course they didn't address 30 year old shit when they were introducing what was ostensibly a new character to the audience.

Wally being a flirt with any girl isn't being friends. They never met when she was a Batkid and only very rarely interacted when he was in the JL and she was Oracle. My point stands even if you can find one of the like 3 times they were ever in the same room together.

Why do people think Barry has no insecurities? The dude is awkward and shy -- something Wally's never had problems with. Wally's "proving himself" thing was done by issue 79, like I said.

DC Rebirth is a weird one. That emotional moment was more fan catharsis due to being strung around by DC. That has less to do with who Wally was as a character and more to do with DC being blind idiots and coming around after awhile. I'm not saying Wally doesn't have emotional impact as a character. That'd be silly. What I'm saying is it's not exclusive to him as compared to Barry. The most famous scenes in Flash history are Barry in shock after he killed Thawne and his speech as he died to save the universe. Those are some of the most emotionally heavy moments in comics history, certainly in Flash history.

I'm not saying Wally's a shit character. I'm trying to suss out why the fact that people liking Wally means Barry has to be a "boring" character.

Chain Lightning could easily be done with Barry instead of Wally. All it was was time travel. All you'd have to do is swap out the Crisis on Infinite Earths part with basically any other major event. The vast majority of the story was fighting Cobalt Blue, a perfectly interchangeable villain.

Blitz is itself a ripoff of Barry's old stories, or an homage I guess, if you're being generous. Johns has no subtlety in making Zolomon just another Thawne -- but with a different background.

All the best stories, besides Return of Barry Allen, could swap Wally and Linda with Barry and Iris just fine. That's my point.

Oh, also this

Where'd you get that from?

I like Bart plenty but I don't get your point. I think it's obvious I favor Barry, but I like all of them.

Jay was a jock superhero. Nothing but the color scheme and superpowers survived his run.

The Arrowverse, Barry pretty much has bits of Wally's personality.

*in the

Wally has bits of Barry, like his morals and heroic principles.

Hell, TV show Barry isn't like Wally or Barry. Wally was never the whiny, incompetent, irresponsible baby TV Barry is.

>Wally's also pretty formulaic. No dead mom but every story is "power of love/lightning rod" along with the Villains of the Week.

Not really, no. It's more of the "My parents are shit, I always wanted to be with my hero and I'm going to make it. Fuck yes! But I clearly need help of my friends because I screw my life so many times because I just run into the villain of the week and get kicked because, well, I have some very huge insecurities.... Let's chills and make fun stuff for a while, yes?"

But ok, it's as you said.

>Wally being a flirt with any girl isn't being friends.
Are you a moron? Do you even bother searching for the context of the scene? Wally was very beloved in superhero community, especially in batfamily, and that's a fact. Even though he clashes with Batman a lot, they have a complex relationship beyond that. You should really keep quiet about this because clearly you are not well informed.
> The dude is awkward and shy
which comics rarely acknowledges and lets him get all the pussy.
I will give you this: he really doesn't know how to approach people and keeps things to himself a lot. But that's not going to be a flaw that will be improved on, people around him will chalk it as "barry being barry"

> Wally's "proving himself" thing was done by issue 79, like I said.
no, it really wasn't. you'd know this if you read the books.

>What I'm saying is it's not exclusive to him as compared to Barry.

>what is flash #0.
dude, you clearly didn't read enough wally stories to make conclusions about his character.
>Chain Lightning could easily be done with Barry instead of Wally.
No you couldn't, because main point of that story was about Wally's growth.
> Johns has no subtlety in making Zolomon just another Thawne
Holy shit, if you think Zolomon is Thawne rip-off you are clearly a troll dude.

He used an overly derivative description of Barry and I used one of Wally. There's obviously more intricacies to both of them.

All of this.

I get that the superhero community, aside from maybe Batman, loved Wally. They loved Barry too. That's not really the point. And yes, like I said, you know of one of the few times they've interacted. Kudos? Do you think he's best friends with Hawkman because they had a team up once?

Barry being awkward has been a thing forever, thus the bow ties, the being late, the pun based humor. He's a big science dork, that's as core to his character as anything, and that's plenty to work with, just as much as Wally's insecure "taking over the family business" thing is.

The end of The Return of Barry Allen is Wally getting over being compared to Barry. It comes up a couple times (most notably Blitz), but his usual response is to not even acknowledge it because it's not a problem for him anymore.

Flash #0 is a very sweet one shot comic but it's not a major arc. Barry could just as easily go back in time and give himself a pep talk as a kid, too. It might not be as resounding because Wally had a shitty childhood, but it'd probably work better now with the whole dead mom thing.

The main point of that story is cool speed force flash family shenanigans. What do you mean Wally's growth? Unless you mean that one bit about how he has to try something different from Barry because he isn't Barry, but that's not really a big deal or even an overarching part of the whole story.

Hmmm Zolomon is someone who was initially friendly with The Flash, but felt wronged by his actions and turns to a life of crime, abusing his new super speed powers to cause Flash untold trauma and hardship because he blames the Flash for his ruined life.

Obviously there's shit in the details, Thawne was a bad guy from the get go and a lot more two dimensional, but they serve the same fucking role. Zolomon's whole schtick of beating up and hurting the people closest to Wally because he's faster and more powerful is EXACTLY what Thawne did.

> i know wally all about from wikipedia and general circlejerking: the post

look, it's okay that you are walking around main issues and making up shit to fit into your arguments but you still can't prove barry's new 52 run failing at every aspect of wally and not carrying any of the emotional depth. barry doesn't even have a sidecast, they tried to make him a roommate to hartley (wally's bff) and they did nothing with THAT. that's how lame barry's side cast is.

> aside from maybe Batman

If you read the comics, you would know Batman helped him out at remembering his past and they still respect each other hence why Wally went to him first in rebirth.

It's okay to be uninformed user.

>Is there any truth to it?

You understand the issue with asking for an objective answer to a subjective, opinionated question? But I'll take a go at it, none the less.

A lot of people love Wally compared to Barry for the same reason a lot of people love Terry or Dick compared to Bruce. Are they similar? Absolutely. Is the former better than the latter? Not particularly. However there a very specific novelty with comes with the fact that Wally isn't Barry - that Wally isn't the Flash, at least not yet. It's interesting to take a character like Barry who is by his own right whole and complete, strip him of his demeanor, his experience, his talent, his success, and have him crawl, stumble and climb not only back to where he was but have him surpass where he was at the start. That is, in its most bare simplistic sense, the story of Wally West to many of his fans on this board.

Now with that being said it's not impossible to be a fan of both Barry and Wally. Some would argue that Barry doesn't have a personality and that's just petty. But while Barry has character, he certainly doesn't have that "rite of passage" charm that Wally has. When people think of Barry they think the Flash, and not too much else, but when they think Wally they think the kid who wanted to be the Flash, the guy with the chip on his shoulder who as something to prove - to himself if not anyone else. And when you take that goofy, loveable oaf who just tried his hardest live up to his uncle's name, and have him play ball with the big boys like the Justice League and against the rogue gallery, creating the speed force, breaking records and redefining the legacy his uncle started, you capture an essence that people are drawn to in the Flash, an essence of triumph that you really only find with Wally West.

>tfw the one person in the world that only liked The Flash in Baron through Messner-Loebs run, Morrison/Millar and Time Flies

I guarantee you I've read more Wally comics than you. I mean the fact that I can respond to any issue mention with knowledge of what you're talking about shows as much.

Batman knew something was wrong and then fixed it. And he was angry about it, none the less. Batman and Wally do not get along and most of that is on Wally not liking Bruce. Every time the dude mentions him it's either to belittle himself (because insecurity to other heroes is still a major part of his character) or to talk about how fucked up he thinks Bruce is.

Half his post-Teen Titans with Dick involve him talking about how he doesn't want Dick to end up like Bruce, after all. Like that time Dick almost killed the Joker OH WAIT I MUST'VE WIKIPEDIA'D THAT

>It's interesting to take a character like Barry who is by his own right whole and complete, strip him of his demeanor, his experience, his talent, his success, and have him crawl, stumble and climb not only back to where he was but have him surpass where he was at the start. That is, in its most bare simplistic sense, the story of Wally West to many of his fans on this board.

See, I agree that's a good story. But that story is done and told by Flash #79. He's got the girl, he's got the powers, he's overcome the hurdle of living up to his mentor both emotionally and heroically (defeating Barry's ultimate nemesis).

>Now with that being said it's not impossible to be a fan of both Barry and Wally. Some would argue that Barry doesn't have a personality and that's just petty. But while Barry has character, he certainly doesn't have that "rite of passage" charm that Wally has. When people think of Barry they think the Flash, and not too much else, but when they think Wally they think the kid who wanted to be the Flash, the guy with the chip on his shoulder who as something to prove - to himself if not anyone else. And when you take that goofy, loveable oaf who just tried his hardest live up to his uncle's name, and have him play ball with the big boys like the Justice League and against the rogue gallery, creating the speed force, breaking records and redefining the legacy his uncle started, you capture an essence that people are drawn to in the Flash, an essence of triumph that you really only find with Wally West.

See, that's not my issue. I like Wally plenty, have read his runs! He's a great character. My issue is this weird shit where in any Flash thread Wally fans come in, call Barry boring, lame, a Wally rip off and blah blah. I kind of understood it as just bitter tantrums over his erasure. But it's still fucking happening. Anytime Barry cracks a joke he's "RIPPING OFF WALLY." They incessantly say anything people like about TV Barry is just Wally.

....if you read the comics then why are you trying to make up facts?

it's not that i don't like barry allen. far from that. but there are thousands of heroes with barry's dilemmas and wally's story very different compared to them.

>nd when you take that goofy, loveable oaf who just tried his hardest live up to his uncle's name, and have him play ball with the big boys like the Justice League and against the rogue gallery, creating the speed force, breaking records and redefining the legacy his uncle started, you capture an essence that people are drawn to in the Flash, an essence of triumph that you really only find with Wally West.

nailed it.

>See, that's not my issue. I like Wally plenty, have read his runs! He's a great character. My issue is this weird shit where in any Flash thread Wally fans come in, call Barry boring, lame, a Wally rip off and blah blah. I kind of understood it as just bitter tantrums over his erasure. But it's still fucking happening. Anytime Barry cracks a joke he's "RIPPING OFF WALLY." They incessantly say anything people like about TV Barry is just Wally.

But that's true. The fact that Barry is portrayed by man who are in their early twenties show you that they are ripping off from Wally West.
When Barry joined JL, he was a newly married man. Now he's treated like a little child by Bruce in DCEU for no reason other than trying to make him a Wally-lite clone.

I didn't make up anything. You scoffed at me comparing Zolomon to Thawne when that's literally all Johns was doing. Most of Johns' run was bringing Wally's life closer to Barry's. Reverse Flash killing his family and all.

I haven't kept up with DCEU because it has been and still looks like trash, so I can't comment on that.

Barry cracking a joke doesn't make him like Wally. That's inane. Any regular person can crack jokes. But if Barry does it he's suddenly appropriating Wally's rich, totally original history. When it's exactly the fucking opposite.

Literally Wally West made Barry Fallen The Flash.

Is this that same autist who was whining about Barry and Wally both having the name Flash?

Nah I don't care about that. Jay was The Flash first, anyhow, if that was even a thing.

At least you aren't that retard then.
He went a few threads bitching about how Wally and Barry both being called Flash somehow devalues them, that Wally should have different name for no good reason and that them being called the same thing is confusing.

I can't get into Flash past Nu52. In short I guess I blame Bally. Feels like a big "fuck you" to my childhood. There being two racially different Wallys is fucked up, even as comics go.

No doubt It's only a matter of time before Wally vanishes forever and is permanently replaced for the sake of "diversity".

Dude must not have read many comics. There's been multiple Batmen, Supermen, Green Lanterns and Flashes for ages.

...

We all know who's REALLY to blame, don't we, Eobard.

De-aging an older character means they're ripping off a younger character. Modernizing an old character means they're ripping off a newer character.

When Dick is Robin they're ripping off Tim.
When Barbara is Batgirl they're ripping off Steph.
When Barry is Flash they're ripping off Wally.

Have I missed any yet? This nonsense.

Hey, when Jay was a kid over in E2, were they ripping off Wally there too?

I think he's mostly talking about the process of making movie Barry significantly younger than the rest of the Justice League and kind of like a kid looking up to adults is the exact same vibe Wally had on the JL. He was younger, less experienced, and less respected than everyone else on the team (Except kyle, I guess) and had a lot of insecurity about that.

That seems to be the direction they're going with Miller, which is far closer to Wally from a personality perspective than Barry. It's not just age, but relative age and how it characterizes him.

> When Dick is Robin they're ripping off Tim.
I have never heard of this.

>When Barbara is Batgirl they're ripping off Steph.
Batgirl of Burnside was a poorly written Steph comic, you know this. Larson corrected it so far though.
>When Barry is Flash they're ripping off Wally.
Depending on the context, yes. Like said, Miller being the youngest of the big 7 is Wally's gimmick. Being a good friend to Cyborg is Wally's gimmick. Bruce and Barry are equals on JL and it's actually Bruce who is inspired by Barry for the most of time.

Now Bruce will treat Barry like a new Robin.

>> When Dick is Robin they're ripping off Tim.
>I have never heard of this.
You clearly weren't around when Teen Titans or Young Justice S1 were on the air.

>Flash #0 is a very sweet one shot comic but it's not a major arc. Barry could just as easily go back in time and give himself a pep talk as a kid, too.

I think that's the point. He could have, but he didn't. Wally did, because that's in his character, and it has weight because we know he didn't have a great childhood. You keep saying Barry could do the same things, but he doesnt. That's what makes them different. You can't discount Wally stories just because it's possible Barry could do the same.

Actually, it is VERY out of character for Wally to time travel for personal reasons. He hates time travelling. He only does it to get back to his own time when he gets flung through the time stream, or when someone else is fucking with time and he has to stop them.

That moment only happened because Waid had to do a #0 like everyone else at the time, but had already basically done a Zero Year style story with the first issue of Born to Run.

It's actually far more in Barry's character to go through time for personal reasons.

The point is that Wally West isn't naturally a better character for these kinds of stories. The vast majority of them would work for Barry, too, he was just dead at the time.

They're pretty interchangeable as The Flash aside from a few things, it's just a matter of whether you like science dork or class clown more as a character.

He's been the main Flash again for 7 years now and yet he hasn't given us anything like that.

The most emotional thing happened so far was Wally's return to his life, think about that.

Maybe, just maybe "this could work for Barry too" isn't a good excuse.

He didn't do it voluntary, to be fair.

1) he's not a boring ass scientist

2) he's kind of an underdog, because he has to live up to Barry, but also doesn't want to outshine his legacy

3) 4) he was one of the best parts of JL cartoon.

I mean, when your writers are Manapul and Venditti, what do you want?

-Nostalgia
-He had a legit character arc
-He had to WORK at being as good a Flash as he considered Barry was, it got a little monotonous at times but never got as bad as Bruce bemoaning his parents.
-He was a decent guy.
-He had been a superhero for more than half his life, he grew up in it and was the first of his peers to actually take over from his mentor (barring the odd times Dick did it), this made him unique.

-The kids though were a mistake IMO, maybe they were trying to replicate an Incredibles vibe? I dunno.

I wouldn't call Wally 'better' than Barry but he had more layers than Barry which made for more interesting stories and to be honest I think it shows since when Didio (?) had a boner to bring Barry back & when they did it seemed to be "Yay Barrys back!...now what do we do?" then immediately saddled him with the Mom murder impetus.

I can't say I preferred Barry being dead but I liked his post death role as the hero that EVERYBODY (in comics) missed, even Bruce admired his decency.

I like the Flash Family emphasis on Wally's run and the fact that Family didn't always meant blood relatives but the people that care for you and help you when you most need it.

Wally grew up in a broken home, the West family save for Iris and Ira West were horrible people, and Wally's mom and dad were the worst people. That said Wally could have become a super villain ala Daniel West later on but he didn't, he overcame his shitty home situation and in part it was also thanks to Iris West looking out for him.

What makes Wally different from Barry? Barry is more straightlace and corny and for the longest while he had the bland generic superhero personality (like Mar-Vell) but then they made him more of s geek and a sweetheart.

In comparison Wally was more jaded (and when he became Flash he had more of a reason to be after Barry died and with Iris gone) and he was more sardonic and a bit of a smartass but more willing to joke around than Barry.

Wally also befriended the Rogues, something Barry was not able to do (although I am sure they will give that befriending you bad guys shtick to Barry now in the show and in the New 52).

Shit go read a Flash comic with Wally, because you obviously haven't picked one up.

And Iris was such a non entity and boring generic girlfriend, honestly I liked her better when she came back in Wally's run and when Wally flashbacked about her because the comic then gave us a reason to like her.

>Saying Zolomon is another Thawne

Holy shit KYS

She had a very weird shtick as "the aunt from future" and that was really cool. Hell, her The Queen Mother status was much better than where she is now.

The more I think about it, the more I realize what a great sidecast Wally had. That's something Barry severely lacks in comics.

Like said. Barry was always pretty whitebread.

I always preferred Wally because I liked how flawed he was. He was portrayed as a slacker, a womanizer and he we wasn't completely virtuous. He was also usually funnier and had a more interesting supporting cast.

>how Hal Jordan didn't become a total sub-Guy Gardner knucklehead until Geoff Johns brought him back.
Lies. He already screwed up sometimes in the Silver Age, and his foolhardiness heavily intensified throughout O'Neil and Wolfman's runs. It was less present in Jones run, but that was a more mature, experienced, character growth which, for better or worse, was reverted in GL: Rebirth.

I've read 1 to 247 of Wally's run, and the 90s Morrison, Waid, and Kelly JLA. All the seminal Wally reading.

Different backstories, same roles as characters. Both torture their respective Flash by trying to take their loved ones away, albeit for different reasons. There's a reason Zolomon puts on Thawne's outfit.

Of all things, isn't supporting cast interchangeable? Barry got saddled with the New 52 where DC was explicitly against the supporting cast, but we're getting them back soon.

This is honestly a kind of inane statement. "I like Wally more than Barry because I like Max Mercury and Jesse Quick," is drivel. Those are their own characters.

I believe the saying goes coming out of the wood work. Not word

The problem you are having here to understand is that Barry hasn't and never had any of the qualities that made Wally awesome. No amount of "b-but you could tell those stories with Barry too!" will change the fact that they haven't done anything noteworthy for the last 7 years.

Barry's main sidecast is West family. That's how it is in mainstream media, that's how it is in comics. And Wests besides Wally mostly suck so there is little you can do about it.

Barry needs to focus more on detective work. That's his gimmick and you can do wonders with it.

Saying you like Wally more because DC banned Barry from having a Flash Family supporting cast is ridiculous. It's not like The Flash Family follows Wally wherever he goes, either.

And yeah, Wally had a couple of great runs over TWENTY YEARS. Barry had a good run with the only competent writer who wrote him (Johns) and then he got saddled with mediocre ones. Wally isn't a worse character because Baron's run was shit.

he is white

>And Wests besides Wally mostly suck so there is little you can do about it.


this isn't true.

Barry also had a 20 year long run before dude. Baron's run wasn't shit, it was boring. Wally's entire run until Infinite Crisis was pretty good.
>Saying you like Wally more because DC banned Barry from having a Flash Family supporting cast is ridiculous.
That's called opinion. They banned them to "improve" Barry but yet here we are.

You have absolutely zero argument here at this point. We've given you things why Wally is better and your only counter argument is "BARRY COULD HAVE TOO". He didn't, pronto.
Besides Wally's only sidecast isn't speedsters. There is Piper, McGees, Chunk etc. They have given Piper to Barry's sidecast and did nothing with it either.

OCs like Joe works maybe but Ira was ruined in New 52.

Barry's Silver/Bronze Age comics were some of the best, so that's not the horrible indictment you think it is.

Chunk stopped being a Wally character in Waid's run. He showed up like once afterwards in that single Johns issue. Same with the McGees. Piper is fine in Barry's comic, basically the same character except the being gay thing isn't as big a deal because it's 20 years later.

> This reaching

I entertained your bait enough, dude. You take or you leave.

> Piper is fine in Barry's comic, basically the same character except the being gay thing isn't as big a deal because it's 20 years later.

i'm genuinely questioning whether you read comics or not here.

Wally offered much more variety in the types of story offered.

Since his career started so early in his life we have seen coming of age stories from him, different love stories, stories about the Flash legacy and honouring your elders that paved the way, stories about defining yourself and gaining confidence in ones abilities, stories about distinguishing yourself beyond your role models, stories about petting go of the past, about the transition from young lone hero to mentor for a new generation, stories about forming a family what having children means when you also have huge responsibilities and how those are balanced, stories about coping with your children coming of age and even defying you, possibly being right even.

Barry could maybe do half of these types of stories.

Through Wally's stories we are shown how he earned the mantle, made it his.

Aside from the fact that most of the lore came about during his time. It makes him much more influential.

Barry lost myth status once he came back. His story had an end and his likes would never be seen again, until they were and made everything else lame.

Most of the lore did not come during Wally's run. That's preposterous.

Barry (the character) is only three years older and wasn't around for 20 yrs at one point.

In our time Barry was Flash for about ten year longer but has been in publication about 17 yrs less that Wally and during Barry's tenure as Flash the origin of his powers was not explored as much, or explained and laid out as it was during Wally's run.