The Unforgiving Moment
One of my favorite stories is the one where Wally West visits a therapist. I think it's either a Flash or a Secret Origins Annual. Wally's origin is revisited, and we kinda get an insight as to how his new Yellow and Red costume came about. Wally is plagued with self-doubt, trying to live and measure up to his late Uncle Barry's expectations.
Wally West has got to be one of the most unique characters in the DC Universe - probably one of the rarest. When you look at the rest of the Justice League and even the Titans and then at Wally, he is the most three-dimensional, almost like a Marvel Universe character. I could never be Aquaman, Batman, Green Lantern, J'onn J'onzz or Superman. I could be The Flash. Just like I could be Spider-Man. The costumed heroes around Wally don't really have as much depth as he does. Not as much range.
What characters other than Wally West and Peter Parker have grown up and matured in comics to the point where they got married and had children?
Reading The Brave and the Bold 8, I kept thinking of the line by one of the multi-cultural Lost Boys in the Robin Williams - Dustin Hoffman movie, Hook. "Peter Pan's gots kids?"
Wally West's gots kids? Yeah, he does. Let's see where this goes...
The Brave and the Bold is my window into the DC Universe. Whatever is happening to somebody like Wally and Linda and the kids or The Doom Patrol, I'll probably see it in The Brave and the Bold. Or, not at all.
The Byrne-Claremont revival of The Doom Patrol in Justice League of America not too long ago left a bitter aftertaste.
By the time I started reading comics, teams like The Doom Patrol had scarificed themselves for a small town and was gone. There was a revival, but it was just sort of flat.
Here The Doom Patrol comes alive. Almost like they did in the pages of The New Teen Titans. The tragic freak aspect to the team - a dark, horrific mirror universe on the Fantastic Four - is pretty much summed up in the explanation of why Elasti-Girl smiles even when she isn't happy.
Awwww, yeah. This is one good team-up.