Teen Titans #26 Spoilers: Are Kid Flash’s New Origin & Relationship To The Flash What You Expected? (DC Comics New 52 In Review)

News, Spoilers

SPOILERS follow.

Teen Titans #26 continues with its telling of the origin of Kid Flash as he stands trial in the future (sent there with the rest of the Teen Titans due to Johnny Quick of the Earth 3 Crime Syndicate in Forever Evil #2 – spoilers here). We’re now in the midst of the Trial of Kid Flash that sees his memories unlocked and the recounting of his “crimes”.

This includes a start at the very beginning to understand who “Bart Allen” is, how we got his super speed powers, and what crimes he committed with them.

As I have been saying for the last several weeks with my other pieces, DC Comics seems to be revealing a lot in their free previews of the issues in question. Teen Titans #26 was no exception. Check out what they gave away for free this week in advance of the book hitting stands.

So Bart Allen is a fiction; his real name is Bar Torr and “Bart Allen” is the alias given to him as part of a witness protection deal. He is therefore not related by blood to Barry Allen – the DC Comics New 52’s Flash – and does not have a hereditary tie to the Speed Force any longer.

Before we learn how he got into witness protection, we learn how – even before he had super speed powers – how far he was willing to go to protect his sister after witnessing his parents’ double murder at the hands of the Functionary’s Purifiers (basically the enforcers of an oppressive regime). This Bar Torr is a dark character; dissimilar from the happy-go-lucky Bart Allen in the pre-Flashpoint era where he started off as Impulse and graduated to Kid Flash. Bar Torr / Bart Allen appears to be a cold-blooded killer in the New 52; extreme actions taken to protect his sister.

After he leaves his sister with nuns, he goes to get his revenge – or build up to it – against the Purifiers and the Functionary. He infiltrates them by running contraband.

And due to his smuggling efforts, an accident occurs granting Bar Torr super speed powers. As noted earlier he has no hereditary super powers stemming from Barry Allen.

With these new powers Bar Torr starts a rebellion against the Functionary and that leads to an unexpected confrontation and consequences for his rebellious actions (against a repressive regime mind you).

He almost kills his sister – who Bar / Bart hasn’t seen in years – and has a change of heart. He turns himself in and betrays those that followed him in the rebellion to end the bloodshed.

Can the Teen Titans forgive and trust him again? Looks like the trial continues next month. Although since Bar / Bart was sentenced by the court already even before Teen Titans #1, I’m not sure what this new trial is for. Maybe I missed something in a previous issue of Teen Titans. I will re-read to figure that out.

And, so now we also have Bar Torr’s origin finally revealed. Or has it been?

I got to thinking that if these memories are surfacing because of the machine that is hooked up to him, could these be false memories? And, was that really Inertia – the evil reverse Kid Flash – we saw in last month’s issue (it sure looked like him – spoilers here)? Further, there is still a gap yet to be explained from when Bar Torr was sentenced and when he turned up as Bart Allen in present timeline of the DC Comics New 52. More to come? More than meets the eye?

What do you think? Is this dark Bart Allen a swerve or is he really this grim and not really an Allen?

Lastly, what role will the time displaced Bar Torr / Bart Allen have in the DC New 52 2014 weekly series called The New 52: Futures End since he is one of at least 10 time anomalies in the DC Universe presently.

Thanks for reading. All feedback welcome. :)


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John is a long-time pop culture fan, comics historian, and blogger. He is currently the Editor-in-Chief at Comics Nexus. Prior to being EIC he has produced several column series including DEMYTHIFY, NEAR MINT MEMORIES and the ONE FAN'S TRIALS at the Nexus plus a stint at Bleeding Cool producing the COMICS REALISM column. As BabosScribe, John is active on his twitter account, his facebook page, his instagram feed and welcomes any and all feedback. Bring it on!