SPOILER WARNING: The following article contains major spoilers for The Flash #52 by Joshua Williamson, Christian Duce, Luis Guerrero and Steve Wands, on sale now.


The Flash and the very concept of the DC Multiverse have been intrinsically linked for decades, ever since Barry Allen first crossed the dimensional barrier and discovered Earth-2 in The Flash #123. Since then, whenever there’s been multiversal trouble, The Flash has been at the heart of it; Barry Allen sacrificed himself to save everything in Crisis on Infinite Earths, Wally West found himself lost in time during Zero Hour and Bart Allen became the new Flash in Infinite Crisis.

The events of Dark Nights: Metal and "Flash War" have changed everything The Flash knows about the Speed Force and introduced three new concepts to the DC Universe; the Strength Force, the Sage Force and the Still Force. In order to learn more about these strange new forces, Barry Allen heads to the House of Heroes at the heart of the multiverse, to call together a meeting of every speedster from every world and try and find out more information on these new concepts.

RELATED EXCLUSIVE: Bart Allen Is The Linchpin of DC’s Next Flash War

House of Heroes

The meeting place for The Flash’s pow-wow is The House of Heroes, the former base of The Over-Monitor which rests at the very center of the Multiverse, anchored on one side by The Rock of Eternity and on the other by The Orrery of Worlds. First introduced in The Multiversity, The House of Heroes now serves as the base of Operation Justice Incarnate, the multiverse’s own Justice League who protect reality itself from existential threats which would destroy everything in creation.

The Flashes of the multiverse played a major role during The Multiversity, as Red Racer of Earth-36 attempted to sacrifice himself to cure The Superjudge of The Gentry’s infection. Instead, he opened the door for the multiverse’s speedsters to cross into the House of Heroes and help him in his goal. As a result, once again a cross-world crisis saw The Flash at the very heart of the action, helping to cure Nix Uotan and restoring him to normal.

RELATED: Flash #51 Reveals the Post-Flash War Fate of Wally West

As you scan over the crowd-scenes in The Flash #52, the one speedster you won’t see is Red Racer, who sacrificed himself during the “Multiplicity” arc of DC Rebirth’s Superman ongoing. As a villain hunted Supermen across the Multiverse and Operation Justice Incarnate was without their shiftship The Ultima Thule, Red Racer asked President Superman to tell his husband that he loved him and raced off to spend a relative thousand years building a new one at super-speed at the cost of his own life.

Page 2: [valnet-url-page page=2 paginated=0 text='The%20Flashes%20of%20Infinite%20Earths']



The Flash of Infinite Earths

The first thing you notice when you see the assembled Flashes gathered at the House of Heroes is that there’s a lot more than fifty-two of them. Previously, there were only fifty-two worlds in the multiverse and they were catalogued on the multiversal map. However, the events of Dark Nights: Metal revealed that the reason there weren’t more worlds was that Barbatos had corrupted Carter Hall and imprisoned him in the World Forge, where he destroyed these new worlds before they had a change to mature and take their place in the multiversal structure.

Since the defeat of Barbatos, the World Forge has been active again, and new universes are being dreamed of every second. This has allowed the multiverse to grow at an incredibly rapid rate, and accounts for the large number of speedsters in attendance at Barry Allen’s meeting.

RELATED: The Flash’s First Villain Is Now Officially His Most Dangerous

Going through the crowd-shot, there’s plenty of Easter Eggs and fan-favorite alternate universe Flashes for fans to pick out of the crowd. Just in terms of speaking roles, we can see Wally West of Earth-22 (Kingdom Come), Danica Williams of Earth-12 (Batman Beyond), Bizarro Flash of Earth-29 (Htrae), Lia Nelson of Earth-9 (Tangent Comics), Mercury Flash of Earth-44 (Metal League), The Flash of Earth-42 (Little League), Wally West of Earth-18 (Justice Riders), The Accelerated Man of Earth-19 (Wonder Woman: Amazonia) and Fastback of Earth-26 (Captain Carrot and his Amazing Zoo Crew).

However, a deeper look into the crowd shots gives us even more cameos to pick out, including Jay Garrick of Earth-2 — not to be confused with the Jay Garrick of the Justice Society of America who made a brief return during “The Button” the gender-swapped Flash of Earth-11, Mary Maxwell from Earth-6 (Just Imagine), Mercury Man of Earth-35 (Super-Americans), Vampire Flash of Earth-43 (Batman: Red Rain) and Speed Freak of Earth-47 (Love Syndicate). There are probably even more than we can find in there; that’s how detailed this gathering of The Flashes of throughout the multiverse is.

Force Quest

Barry Allen has brought these speedsters from throughout the Multiverse to find out if there is anything like the three new forces on their worlds, but not a single one of them has heard of the Strength, Sage or Still Force. Determined to go home and find a scientific explanation for these new occurrences, Barry is somewhat chastised by his peers who tell him that he should know that the Speed Force is about more than science. Barry is advised to go on a Force Quest to better understand that mysterious energy which gives him his fantastic power and his visit to the House of Heroes succinctly serves as a reminder that Barry Allen isn’t quite the expert in super-speed that he makes himself out to be.

RELATED: DC May Have Just Brought Back Superboy Prime

As he’s the Flash we follow in the bi-monthly comic book titled The Flash, we’re conditioned to think of Barry Allen as the protagonist and the one with all the answers, but that’s never quite been the case. Heck, Barry died before he even learned about the Speed Force and it was Wally West — along with help from Max Mercury — who really spent time as a student of the Speed Force, learning its secrets and unlocking its potential.

Barry could be a much more effective hero if he similarly dedicated his time to studying the force which gives him his powers, but somewhat ironically, he never has the time. With a new threat on the horizon as the Strength Forge makes itself known in Central City, The Flash is going to have to put a Force Quest on hold and get to the bottom of these new forces by confronting them head on.