The cover to this issue is a wonderful moment of déjà vu as a classic Infantino illustrated Flash confronts one of his classic foes. It’s too bad that Dick Giordano couldn’t have inked the story inside as well since his inking seems to suit the art better than the artist Bob Smith who did do the interior inking. Small quibble though since the story is a great example of Cary Bates ever improving back-to-the-Flash basics which Infantino’s art carries along beautifully.
The tale opens with Barry’s parents Nora and Henry (I may be wrong, I don’t believe we knew their names before) coming to visit Central City to visit Barry. Their car crashes trying to avoid a head-on collision sending them to the hospital. Meanwhile, Barry as the Flash attempts to break up a robbery only to be scooped by Captain Cold who captures them first. It seems that the good (at least for now) Captain has mended his ways thanks to his love for a beautiful model. The model, Myrna Troy, on the other hand only wants to borrow CC’s costume and freeze weapons to pull off a big crime of her own. Captain Cold discovers her duplicity and places himself and Myrna in a terminal freeze trap. Luckily for them both, the Flash breaks up the murder/suicide just in time to avoid having the pages turned down by the Comics Code Authority.
As Barry moves his dad into his apartment while his mother remains in the hospital, we learn that his dad is there for more than just a visit. His thoughts tell us he’s planning to bring about the end of the Flash in the most “horrible demise imaginable”. Sounds like Henry has some issues, but we’ll have to wait until the next issue to find out what they are.
