Why only now, at least according to the current Flash writers, are they taking a brighter approach?
IO9 interviewed Francis Manapul and Brian Bucellato about their take on the Scarlet Speedster, where they tell us that now, after all this time, they're suddenly taking a more optimistic approach:
A bright and optimistic feel cannot work properly if one-sided editorial mandates are pulling the strings from behind the scenes.
When you guys had the opportunity to write the Flash, what sort of narrative instincts did you want to bring to your run?Unfortunately, they're doing this much too late, and it all reeks of the same bait-and-switch tactics as Marvel used when they destroyed Spider-Man's marriage with Mary Jane Watson, because here, over these past 2 years, DC's wasted no time in shoving Wally West out of the Flash series, and not only that, Iris West Allen's been thrown out as well. Put another way, they've made quite an effort to get rid of Barry's extended family and successors, all for the sake of focusing on a relationship with Barry's lab assistant Patty Spivot instead. And they expect people to go for it now? Especially when many of the same people who sullied the Flash and other DC products this past decade are still running the store?
Brian Buccellato: We definitely decided we wanted an optimistic, hopeful, and noble story because that's who Barry Allen is to us. It was important for us to go in that direction, and not toward the darker or more tortured hero. He's a guy from the Silver Age who does the right thing because it's the right thing.
A bright and optimistic feel cannot work properly if one-sided editorial mandates are pulling the strings from behind the scenes.
