The Flash: An Arrowverse Favorite Just BETRAYED His New Team - CBR - Comic Book Resources

WARNING: The following contains spoilers for The Flash #760, by Joshua Williamson, Christian Duce, Scott Kolins, Luis Guerrero, Hi-Fi and Steve Wands, on sale now.

As the Reverse-Flash and Barry Allen set the stage for their final confrontation, the time-traveling supervillain stacked the odds against his longtime nemesis by recruiting his greatest foes from across time and space to make up an evil ensemble dubbed the Legion of Zoom. Outnumbering the Scarlet Speedster in their initial skirmish, the Legion overpowered Barry, leaving him weakened and vulnerable, with Eobard Thawne able to take control of his body while shunting Barry's consciousness off to the Speed Force.

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As Barry struggled to escape the pocket dimension and reclaim control of his body, Eobard enacted his final plan to solidify his hold on the body for good as he and the Legion searched for an object with enough temporal residue to ground the villain in the DC Universe's relative present and eliminate Barry's consciousness once and for all. However, just as Eobard was about to complete his master scheme and finally triumph over the Flash Family, he was thwarted by a shocking betrayal from within his new team. In The Flash #760, the teenage Trickster, Axel Walker, became the Flash Family's unlikely man on the inside.

After defeating the Flash and plunging Central City into chaos, the Legion reconvened in the city's cemetery at the grave of Barry's murdered mother Nora Allen. While traveling back in time to alter history and murder her, Eobard had left temporal residue on her corpse that would allow him to remain in the present without causing another paradox following his multiple deaths during the DC Rebirth era. While the Legion's moral code had them balk at the prospect of disturbing a random woman's grave -- with Eobard having refrained from revealing the Flash's true identity to them -- Trickster pulled the ultimate prank on his teammates by tipping off the Flash Family on the Legion's whereabouts. Led by Jay Garrick, the heroic speedsters interrupt the Reverse-Flash's plot long enough for Barry to regain control of his body and prepare for an epic rematch.

Trickster, and his predecessor James Jesse, have a history of being the more sympathetic and nuanced figures among the Flash's colorful rogues gallery. Jesse would later become an FBI agent, putting him direct conflict with his old associates led by Captain Cold. Axel was initially much more chaotically antagonistic than his predecessor but gradually became more sympathetic and less impulsively destructive over time, especially after losing his arm and enduring harsh, torturous treatment from Warden Wolfe while imprisoned in Iron Heights. And while the Reverse-Flash recruited the Trickster from an earlier point in his history in effort to better manipulate him, the teenage supervillain still was unwilling to desecrate a woman's grave, leading to the surprise betrayal.

Obviously, the Reverse-Flash is less than thrilled by Trickster's actions, using his powers to return the teenage recruit to his native point in time. However, while Barry was able to return from the Speed Force, with Max Mercury and Jesse Quick in tow, the speedster supervillain still has one last trick up his sleeve, and he recruited even more reinforcements to maintain his numerical superiority over the Flash Family.

The Trickster's betrayal cost Eobard Thawne the opportunity to seize control of Barry Allen's body for good, but the Reverse-Flash and Legion of Zoom are far from surrendering to the assembled might of the Flash Family as the battle lines are set for one last showdown.

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Sam Stone is a 10th level pop culture guru living just outside of Washington, DC who knows an unreasonable amount about The Beatles. You can read his work in the pages of Image+, follow him on Twitter @samstoneshow, and listen to his podcast Geek Out Show on iTunes and Google Play.