A Station Eight Fan Web Site

Gargoyles

The Phoenix Gate

Search Ask Greg

Search:
Search type:

Displaying 1 record.


Bookmark Link

Anonymous writes...

I've read a lot of unanswered questions and posts about what happened to Wally in Endgame, but I think what I want to say here is different enough that I can say it without just re-iterating what everyone else has already said. My numbered comments aren't questions per se, but what I'd like is just your thoughts and comments in response to each one. I doubt I'll get any spoiler-y information out of you, but I just want to know what you think.

1. First, let me say that I like that you left it sort of ambiguous as to whether he's dead or not. Scarab uses the word "cease" rather than "die." We never see a dead body. He meets his demise because of being attacked by energy, and in fiction, energy can do lots of crazy things to people. So, reasonable arguments could be made either way as to whether he's alive or dead. Which is nice.

The following are my thoughts on why I think he's really dead, and my conflicting thoughts on why I think he might really be alive.

Dead:

2. This is a Greg Weisman show. Death isn't something to be taken lightly round these parts, and tends to be permanent, and having Wally cheat death only to come back later could come off feeling cheap without the right execution.

3. The only other deaths to a character that we were close to turned out to not be genuine deaths in Artemis' case (both in Failsafe and Darkest), and the other deaths that have occurred on the team happened off-screen to characters that we weren't close to, Tula and Jason. So maybe this time, it was time for someone that we cared about to actually die for real. Similar to how Nabu relinquished hosts the first two times but finally claimed one, it was something that needed to happen for real for the series to have dramatic weight and the characters not just continually escape their fate by the skin of their teeth. Sooner or later someone we loved had to die. Thoughts?

Why He Might Be Alive:

4. As mentioned earlier, there was never a body. Although this may have been more for S&P reasons than anything else.

5. According to the Conservation of Mass, matter cannot just be created or destroyed. He could have been incinerated or something and turned into Wally dust, but seemingly that's not what happened. He progressively grew more and more transparent and less tangible, and then he was gone. So I'm guessing there wasn't a cloud of Wally vapor floating around in the arctic on that day. All that matter just...vanished...and matter doesn't really do that. That matter had to go somewhere unless he was converted to energy himself.

6. Wally in the comics started out as being able to run about the speed of sound, and then eventually became the fastest Flash. Generally you seem to be pretty true to source material while also taking some liberties as needed, so having Wally die before he ever became the fastest seems like his story isn't being fully told, because that seems to be an essential quality of who the character became. Plus his encounter with the energy of the MFD as a possible reason for his increased speed is (for me at least) an explanation that could be taken a lot more seriously than something silly like a "psychological block" like in the comics.

7. Wally's a speedster. In the comics, some speedsters have really crazy abilities like being able to travel through time. It feels cheap to have them be able to do this Willy Nilly as they please (which is why I'm guessing none of your speedsters so far have this ability) but it wouldn't necessarily feel cheap to have a speedster able to be hurtled forward or backward through time (or hurtled into another dimension) because of a combination of his speedster abilities and the chrysalis energy and survive. I don't feel this counts as an original idea because speedsters time traveling is not something that I came up with, and I know people have asked you questions about speedsters time traveling before. Please know that I am sincerely NOT trying to pull a fast one on you and suggest something; I really just want you to see my thoughts and know what you think in response.

8. You said that if there was a Season 3, there'd be another time skip. Depending on how long the time skip is, maybe Season 3 would NEED Wally like 2198 needs Brooklyn, to be a character we identify with and see the world through.

9. You aren't wasteful. This one might be a stretch...but to me it seems wasteful that a character like Wally would die when (according to comics) he has so much power potential, could potentially have so much utility in Season 3 if it would have happened, and is just such a darn great character all around. But on the other hand, his kinetic contribution saved the world, so maybe from your point of view it wasn't a waste. But...on the other hand, the speedsters could have simply succeeded in saving the world without any of them dying. If Wally's really dead, what do you think the series as a whole has gained as a result?

10. Having Wally survive sort of resonates with Timedancer for me. It might not be a coincidence that the apocalyptic setting we see in the episode Bloodlines is 40 years in the future.

Greg responds...

I can't give you any thoughts on any of this for reasons I've already stated here at ASK GREG. But I will say that I like the way your mind works.

Response recorded on November 26, 2013