The Real (Idiotic) Origin of The Flash

The only good thing to come out of DC's wretched Final Crisis event was, of course, the official (though sadly underplayed) return of the Barry Allen Flash! 

Thankfully, his homecoming will take center stage in April's Flash: Rebirth, a high profile mini-series by Geoff Johns and Ethan Van Sciver. As a long-time fan of Barry, I'm thrilled to see him getting a shot at A-list treatment for two reasons.  First, because of the long absence following his "death" in 1985's Crisis on Infinite Earths. Second, and most important, because of the often harebrained way they handled Barry when he was around.

Although the final two years of Barry's solo title remain the worst examples of this creative cluelessness, another story came close in The Flash #167 (1967).

  

Perhaps spurred on by other superheroes with their own mischievous, magical imps (above), DC introduced Mopee, a "tenth-class Heavenly helpmate". Making matters much, much worse, it was revealed that this diminutive dimwit was responsible for Barry Allen gaining his super-speed powers! 

Imagine how this excerpt from "The Real Origin of the Flash" was received by fans of The Flash, a pseudo-scientific series that had (up until then) managed to avoid this sort of campy crud...

 

But wait...you don't have to imagine what Flash fans thought of the story. Taken from the Flash-Grams letter column several issues later, here's a sampling of their opinions regarding the green-robed schlub:

Now, to be fair, some fans wrote saying they liked the addition of Mopee....but thankfully the "Heavenly Helpmate" was never to be seen (or even mentioned) again...and Barry once more returned to being a "Ten Quadrillion-Billion to One" scientific freak of nature.

Just as it should be.

Comments

[Ivan Wolfe]

You're just afraid to admit Mopee is the greatest character ever created.

In fact, I believe he's responsible for most heroes' origins. I hear Mopee once threw a bat through a window and placed a spider in a radiation demonstration.

(No, I'm not serious, and yes, I just referenced Ambush Bug).

[Chris Mullen]

I think this is the best illustrator of a retcon that did not need to be. It would be tantamount to saying that Thomas Wayne faked his death, killed Martha Wayne for cheating on him with Alfred and Bruce has been living a lie his whole life.

Oh, wait. That one's fake too, right? Just like Mopee?

[Nyarlathotep]

I know a few people who are excited over this new Flash series, with the duo DC has put on the book, it seems it will prosper.

[Pat Curley]

My buddy Mike Voiles at the DC indexes says that the Mopee story is still in continuity, although as you say DC mostly ignored it afterwards. It does explain one thing better than the original, and that's the goofy second lightning bolt hitting the lab rack and turning Wally into Kid Flash. I always felt that was almost as much an insult to us as this ridiculous story.

[Dan Lietha]

Funny that this is an "intelligent design" vs "chance random processes" (aka evolution) debate. Also strange that I want to cheer on the random chance side of this one. The designer here is a goof! Weird! :-)

[Comic Coverage]

LOL! I hadn't thought if it that way before, Dan!

[Kelson]

Odd. A few years ago, Mopee was a forgotten footnote. Now he seems to be getting a lot of attention from fan blogs.

[phineasbg]

That one's easy to fix. Just reveal in some issue that Mopee was lying for some reason. Of course, that would just call more attention to the issue, so maybe ignoring would be better.