Batman and Robin are the most famous duo in all of comics. They’re the first-ever hero and sidekick duo, and set the precedent for all other heroic partnerships. There’s no chance that any other combo dethrones them as DC’s best mentor and sidekick anytime soon, but there are a couple of teams that can rival them. The premier sidekick and hero that can give even the Dynamic Duo a run for their money are none other than Barry Allen and Wally West, the Flash and Kid Flash. They are one of the greatest duos in all of DC, and yet zero modern stories center around their time as sidekick and mentor.
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All of Wally and Barry’s early years are detailed in the Silver Age and, to a lesser extent, Bronze Age Flash comics. As great as these comics are, a lot of them have aged and are products of their time. What the pair needs is a brand new comic that gives us a glimpse into the earliest days of their partnership with a modern storytelling style. Batman and Robin: Year One is a fantastic comic that does just that with Bruce and Dick, and there is no other duo that is more worthy of a similar series than Barry and Wally.
The Fastest and Healthiest Duo Alive
From the very beginning, Wally and Barry had a fantastic relationship. Wally was a fan of the Flash before he even met him, and when the freak accident granted him the same powers as his idol, Barry wasted no time in taking the young boy under his wing. While many superhero and sidekick partnerships are twinged with tension and rifts that stem from drama and a lack of trust, that was never a problem for these two. From the very beginning, Wally and Barry completely trusted each other and brought out the best in each other.
Many people say that Barry lacked a personality in his earliest adventures, and he certainly is an old-fashioned, white toast kind of hero. However, that personality made him the perfect teacher to contrast with Wally. Kid Flash was a hotshot who wanted to prove himself, but also wanted nothing more than to impress the Flash and learn from him. Barry’s endless patience and more mature attitude were a great counterbalance to Wally’s inexperience and exuberance. The same was true in reverse, with Wally pulling Barry to lines he wouldn’t go to without the younger hero’s perspective. Wally was the entertainment factor that the straight-laced Barry needed.
In a world where so many heroes are at each other’s throats more often than not, Barry and Wally are a harbor of pure good times. They truly treat each other like family, which has always been a major theme for the Flash. They are a showcase of what a great teacher and student duo look like, the perfect showing of a hero training the next generation, and finding endless hope in that. Seeing these two work together makes the reader feel good, and with DC reembracing the Silver Age definition of classic heroism more recently, now is the perfect time to see these two together once again. These two are one of the most heroic, healthiest pairs in comics, and modern DC fans deserve to see that.
Flash and Kid Flash: The Early Years
Barry and Wally have each evolved a lot as characters since their time together in the Silver Age. A series that focuses on the duo in their earliest career years could easily revolve around how their dynamic positively impacts both of their lives. Barry and Wally, for the most part, were both lonely before they joined forces. Barry was living a solitary life as the Flash, not even revealing his secret identity to Iris. Wally, meanwhile, came from a home where nobody believed in him, and his Aunt Iris was his closest friend. Both heroes needed each other, though they didn’t know it.
A comic focusing on the fastest duo alive when they were both still figuring out how to be heroes and partners has infinite storytelling potential. It can hone in on Wally’s insecurities and Barry helping to lift him up from them, or Barry isolating himself in his work and needing Wally to pull him out to live his life. It can have themes about finding family and believing in yourself, which are the types of things that the best Flash stories are built on. These two deserve to have a modern story for themselves, and I will not stop advocating for Barry and Wally’s early years until they get just that.
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