Mike Wieringo on The Death of Bart

Mike Wieringo - cocreator of Impulse - sounds off on his blog about Bart's death in Flash: The Fastest Man Alive #13: "Let me be clear– I haven’t read FLASH #13. I don’t really read that many superhero books anymore because the dark and depressing nature they’ve adopted just doesn’t interest me. I got my fill of that in the mid 80’s with DARK KNIGHT and WATCHMEN. I’ve read many reviews of the ‘event’, though… and I think the reaction overall has been that the story was 1) very badly done… and 2) in the end, a real yawner and not something that’s had the ’stunning event impact’ that DC was hoping for."

"I think this is symptomatic of the idea that fans are simply getting a bit weary of all this kind of thing. I think that the event-comic-that-heralds-the-death-of-lots-of-characters has become the new gold-foil/Lenticular/Acetate/holographic cover of the 2000’s. They’re stunts… gimmicks meant to sell comics. The writing seems to have taken a back seat to earth-shattering events that are having less and less impact as they are overdone."

I can't say I disagree. I think DC completely wasted a great opportunity to see Bart grow as Kid Flash for awhile. "If it ain't broke...." . Read Mike's whole post here. There's also a larger image of Mike's wonderful "tribute sketch" of Bart.