Warning: SPOILERS for Flash Forward #1
The story of Wally West may have become a tragedy, but his destiny as more than just The Flash has come to claim him. Forget being the fast man alive, Wally is now officially the fastest man in DC's entire Multiverse--and he'll need to get moving if he's going to save it from a darkness the rest of DC's heroes can't even sense.
Fans have known for some time that Wally's story was far from over, following the accidental deaths of several metahumans during Heroes in Crisis. The continuation of his story has officially begun in the pages of Flash Forward #1, finding him voluntarily incarcerated at Iron Heights (the same prison he's personally responsible for filling). But when a cosmic being arrives to pluck him from his cell to save the entire Multiverse, Wally doesn't get a say. Apparently blessed with abilities even he isn't aware of, Wally is on a new mission to drive the Dark Multiverse's corruption from living worlds. And his first stop... is a doozy.
The story of Flash Forward is only beginning, and it would be an understatement to say it throws readers, like Wally, into the action without much explanation. Here's what we do know: Tempus Fuginaut has come for Wally, just one of a race of ancient, cosmic beings who protect the spaces between DC's many universes. As further fallout from the Dark Nights: Metal event, the dark realities intended to be destroyed and remade are being allowed to remain, and spread their corruption faster than the Fuginauts can fight it.
He may have wished to remain in prison, serving time for the lives he destroyed, but Tempus tells Wally that destiny has chosen him whether he likes it or not. And that not only is he the fastest being in the Multiverse, but Wally has still not come to understand his place in this new reality, since returning from the Speed Force. The first chapter of this story concludes with Tempus informing Wally, in a cryptic tease meant to drive fans crazy with speculation, that "you have only glimpsed the power you wield since you've become... unmoored."
And with that, Wally is propelled--apparently on his own--to one such world in peril. The home planet of the fan-favorite, Obama-inspired, President Superman is the first destination in need of saving... with Superman already bleeding and broken by the time Wally arrives. Is he too late? And more importantly: too late to do... what? It's a heck of a launch for Wally's new series, so fans can check out the plot synopses for the first two issues of Flash Forward below:
His name is Wally West-and he was the Fastest Man Alive. That is, until the Multiverse was rewritten without him or his family in it. Wally returned and tried to make it work, but the damage was done. Spinning out of the events of HEROES IN CRISIS, follow the man who called himself Flash on an adventure to find redemption in a cosmos that has fought so hard to destroy him.
When the border between the Multiverse and the Dark Multiverse starts to buckle, who do you turn to? The answer: Wally West. Once the Fastest Man Alive, he's now a man with nothing left to live for. Will Tempus Fuginaut's chosen champion rise to the occasion and fight back the demons of the darkness, or will Wally's own demons win the day?
Flash Forward #1 is available now from your local comic book shop, or direct from DC Comics.