"The Trickster Strikes Back!": James Jesse, in prison since his defeat at the hands of the Flash, devises a way to escape from jail. When the prisoners are instructed to make toys for orphaned children, James has rigged a toy airplane
The Flash #121 is an issue of the series The Flash (Volume 1) with a cover date of June, 1961.
Synopsis for "The Trickster Strikes Back!"
James Jesse, in prison since his defeat at the hands of the Flash, devises a way to escape from jail. When the prisoners are instructed to make toys for orphaned children, James has rigged a toy airplane to actually fly and uses it to escape from the prison yard.
The news spreads quickly and Iris West is put on assignment to report the escape of the Trickster. Iris refreshes herself on the history of the Trickster and how he was previously defeated by the Flash. Now busy with the assignment she calls Barry to cancel a lunch date, which works out for Barry -- having heard the news -- as he was going to break off the date as well so that he could try to find the Trickster before he can pull off any additional crimes.
The scarlet speedster comes across a jewel robbery in progress and easily captures the crooks and when he is turning them over to the police, he is shocked when the Trickster appears and steals the jewels right out of his hand. Flash follows after the Trickster at super-speed as his foe flees on his special trick shoes. Try as he might, the Flash fails to capture the Trickster and his foe makes a clean getaway.
This sets the tone for their next few encounters, as the Flash would round up other crooks in the middle of a robbery, only to have the Trickster appear with some toy-related gimmick to steal the look and successfully escape. Putting his deductive reasoning to work, the Flash realizes that he Trickster must be using a toy factory to come up with his new theft devices, and deducing that he is not stealing these items, but working in toy factories at night, the Flash goes out and searches all the city's toy factories. He finds the Trickster hard at work on his next invention.
The Trickster is prepared for the Flash, and rigs up an explosive trap for the Scarlet Speedster, however the plan backfires when Flash uses his super-speed to race away from the explosion and race around and capture the Trickster. Giving up on outsmarting the Flash, the Trickster surrenders and allows himself to be turned over to the police. Later, when in his civilian guise, Barry is taken to a dance by Iris West and he has to stop dancing due to his sore feet. When Iris chides him for being lazy, Barry has to bite his lip and accept her criticisms as he cannot reveal the fact that he ran five thousand miles that day as the Flash in order to preserve his secret identity.
Appearing in "The Trickster Strikes Back!"
Featured Characters:
Supporting Characters:
Antagonists:
- Trickster (Flashback and main story)
Other Characters:
- Marty
Locations:
- Central City
- Acme Inc.
- Arco Toys
- Central City police department
- Picture News
- Missouri State Prison
Items:
Synopsis for "Secret of the Stolen Blueprint!"
When Flash and Iris West attend Barry's 10 year college reunion, Barry runs into his old roommate Pete Forester. Catching up on old times, Barry learns that Pete still has not mustered the guts to propose to Doris Hunt, and that he is still a rival for her affections with Bill Lawson. Lawson, Pete explains, is doing everything in his power to show up Forester and cut him out of Mary's life.
When meek-and-meager Pete attempts to be the better man by approaching Doris and Bill, Bill makes an attempt to emasculate by showing off his superior athletic prowess. Barry decides to give Pete a helping hand by secretly making Pete show a display of athletic superiority over Bill by intervening as the Flash and moving at super-speed so as nobody can see him. The display ends with Bill being knocked out and Pete winning over Doris.
Later the next day while Doris is out shopping, Barry get's a call from Pete who tells him that he suspects foreign spies have stolen his plans for a new hydrogen power generator and asks Berry to help him out. Barry agrees to help and bring along his "friend" the Flash to help solve the case. Meeting with Pete, Barry uses his super-speed to make it appear as though both the Flash and Barry Allen are two different people. moving so fast he appears to be in two places at once.
As they puzzle out the mystery, they are interrupted by Bill who has come to check on Pete after hearing of the robbery. When Bill mentions he was helping out some skin-divers on the beech when he heard the news, the Flash makes a quick deduction. Realizing that spies might be operating from a submarine off shore, they could be posing as skin divers. Speeding off to investigate, the Flash finds that his hunch is indeed correct and catches the spies making their get away.
Using his super-speed, the Flash washes all the spies to shore, knocking them out in the process. The Flash recovers the blueprints just as Pete, Bill and the police arrive to take them in. After the incident, Pete confides in the Flash, telling him that he is so charged up he could ask Doris to marry him. Deciding to lend Pete another helping hand, the Flash races Pete to Doris' side where he proposes her and much to his surprise, she accepts.
Later when the story has made the news, Barry is with Iris as she reads the paper. When Iris learns from Barry how the proposal happened, she leaves Barry wondering when she begins thinking about getting the Flash's aid to get Barry to propose to her.
Appearing in "Secret of the Stolen Blueprint!"
Featured Characters:
Supporting Characters:
Antagonists:
- Foreign spies
Other Characters:
- Pete Forester (Single appearance)
- Doris Hunt (Single appearance)
- Bill Lawson (Single appearance)
Locations:
- Sun City
- Sun City University
Notes
- Both stories in this issue are reprinted in:
- "The Trickster Strikes Back!" is also reprinted in:
See Also
Recommended Reading
Links and References