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mpollack
Preeminent Apostolic Prelate of the Discipleship of Jabootu
USA
119 Posts |
 Posted - 03/10/2006 : 3:18:05 PM
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Of all the superheroes in the DC Comics Universe, none of them are as lazy as the Flash.
As shown, the Flash is one of the most powerful characters in the DC comics universe. He possesses super speed (and, presumably, super strength given that Force = Mass x Acceleration). He can do pretty much anything by vibrating his atoms, from walking through walls to travelling to time to making animators forget he cannot fly. He can even accelerate the molecules of other objects to create heat or counteract spells.
Yet, for all intents and purposes, he has the weakest enemy list of any DC character. Batman and Aquaman consistently fight above their weight class often, stretching their limited talents to fight against tremendous odds. Superman and Green Lantern consistently fight against villians of tremendous power that can conceivably beat them. The Flash puts in a couple of hours with a bank robber, and then takes the rest of the day off. He's the civil servant of superheroes.
Aside from the Reverse Flashes (Bizzaro-style Flash clones), there are no superspeedsters that he faces off against. Nor are there any Time Masters, fortune tellers, or glue people. Instead, Flash usually faces off against Mirror Master, a Mysterio knock-off that likes to display illusions, or against the Weather Wizard, a guy who can control the weather, or the occasional steel man.
And then there are the guys that would be laughed out of Gotham City. Captain Boomerang, a man whith the power to... throw a boomerang. (Apparently, the Flash has a problem with ducking TWICE.) Turtle Man, the slowest criminal in the universe.
(My slow speed will trigger the Flash's ADD). The Trickster, with his power of exploding teddy bears (my head hurts). Seriously, it's like if Spider Man's sinister six included Big Wheel as a senior member.
Actually, it's worse, because we're on the FIFTH iteration of the Flash. He's died at least four times, despite having the weakest villians roster of any DC Superhero. Hell, even I have a stronger villian's roster, and my superpower is the ability to withstand the awesome pain of complex legal and technical documents.
Kind of puts the snowball guy in a better light, doesn't it.
Unlike other villians, the Captain didn't want money, power, or even revenge. He wanted fame. He was a total media whore, and he decided that the best way to get famous was to become a super-criminal and destroy the Flash, this being an age before reality TV.
This, in fact, is the real reason why I so appreciate The Bachelor and its ilk. Because without it, we would have a present-day Legion of Doom led by Richard Hatch, and staffed by sinister beings from remote galaxies such as Omorosa (sinister being, not remote galaxy), Danny Bonoduche, Darva Conger, Ozzy Osbourne, Donald Trump (remote galaxy), and Simon Cowell. And that scares me more than Osama bin Laden, who wouldn't be a problem today if only Fear Factor had not rejected his application.
Let's give the Captain credit: at least he had the right idea. Rather than buying, say, a frikkin boomerang, he decided to build a weapon that actually slows down molecules i.e. the molecules of Flashy. As you know from your cartoon physics, the speed of molecules determines the heat of an object, which is why you always see the Flash vibrating whenever he's drinking coffee. Either that, or super-speed plus Starbucks Venti Cappuccino equals major seizure. One or the other.
The problem is that he lacks follow-thru. He discovered the accidental freeze ray properties of his cyclotron, looked at his
gift certificate for Parka World, and said "Meh, close enough." Seriously, if you're going to take over a planet, you have to have more focus than that.
And that was it. No freeze grenades, or spreadable beam or any object that can freeze a significant area. No "freeze shield" in case the Flash decides to rush or fight him. Just a pinpoint gun against a small, fast object. Good luck.
The Flash's preferred counter to the ray is to dodge the ray. In dodge ball, I would stand perfectly still until I saw that the ball was thrown, and then move out of its path. Every time I had recess, I was kicking as much butt as the Flash.
Oh, except that even the biggest elementary schoolers don't throw the ball at the speed of light, the way a cyclotron throws emissions. That's important, because we see from light reflecting off objects into our eyes. Which means that the time between seeing Captain Cold fire and the beam reaching you is zero. Nada. If you see Captain Cold fire, you are a fish stick.
I can forgive Seanbaby and KenH for not knowing this. But SCIENTIST Barry Allen should have known better. There is no way for Captain Cold to miss, given Flashmoron's method of dodging. But there he is, waiting for the trigger to be pulled, and then (sometimes) seeing faster than the speed of light.
What the Flash should be doing is rushing Captain Cold at every opportunity, using his speed to reverse the above advantage. Even Bizarro wouldn't be able to react fast enough. On the other hand, that Newton's Third Law is a mother. Wear a helmet.
One other thing about the Captain that doesn't get shown in the cartoon: He was the kind of guy who believed he should act as a roll model for young supervillians everywhere. More specifically, he joined the "Don't Do Drugs" campaign, and was even part of the Mr. T "Be Somebody" video (cut for time constraints and for more Mr T rapping). He supported various charities, such as the orphanage made famous for raising Tom Riddle. I think he did a few green movements, and yes, he appreciates the irony.
Where Are They Now:
After the death of the second Flash, Captain Cold kind of wandered in his mid-life crisis for a bit. He became a bounty hunter, after noticing what five minutes of bounty hunting did for Boba Fett's fame quotient. He fought supervillian Heat Wave, and JLA heroes Fire & Ice. He appeared in the GreenPeace episode of Seinfeld. He did a couple of Old Navy commercials.
Finally, he decided to do what millions of seven year olds have been yelling at him to do: he formed the second supervillian-owned Ice Cream emporium, after Haggen-Dahz. No more fancy bank robberies or holding the world for ransom or the evil tricks of the average corporate member. Just his trade secret low cost production system, a few loans, and a flair for marketing, and he finally beat his true nemessis Ben and Jerry. Made a lot more money than dealing with the
Fearians, and he even made the cover of Fortune a couple of times.
In the end, though, he returned to crime. Because supervillianry isn't about money or power or revenge. It's about the supervillianry, and about the thrill of mettle vs mettle while the world watches. Yeah, simply shooting a hero is more efficient - and more likely to succeed - than placing him in a death trap, but at what cost? At what point does it stop being about why you really got into it? At what point do you join all the other sell-outs and lose all respect for the craft? Captain Cold understood what being a bad guy is really about, and we're better off for it.
Me? I gave up the dream when I entered law school a long time ago. Some nights, I remember when it was about more than taking over the world.
Oh well...
MPollack
Oh, and at sunset we invade France. Just because.
The Democrats are politicizing the end of the world. |
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Superfriends Files: Captain Cold
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