Flashpoint: The Outsider #1

   In 1960, a city in India was mysteriously wiped off the face of the earth. There was only one survivor- a chalk-white newborn with armor plating skin. This babe grew up to be known as Michael Desai in the orphanages of Calcutta. Now he's the Outsider, the richest and most powerful man in India and a major power player on the global stage.
    But just who is the Outsider, really?
    From the cover and his appearance in issue #1 of Flashpoint, I thought that maybe he's Metamorpho. For one, the Element Man was a founding member of the Outsiders so I thought maybe that was the connotation.  Secondly, they both have a ghostly white face. But the man who was Rex Mason received his powers from a mystical orb while on an archaeological expedition in Egypt. The Outsider is born with his powers and his parents weren't effected by the orb. So, no, despite some similarities, the Outsider is not the Flashpoint equivalent of Metamorpho.
     Without giving away a major plot twist, to understand the pre-Flashpoint origins of the Outsider, you have to go back to the Batman comics of the mid-1960s. Go ahead, Google search him and after reading this issue, things will make perfect sense. But this guy is in no way your dad's Outsider!
      This issue is a shining example of why I love the multiverse stories of DC. They don't always follow the same archetype. Certain characters might have the same name but they often either have different origin stories or they're different characters altogether. (There are a few exceptions to this, of course!) I wish Marvel could see this way instead of thinking the best way to present their characters as new or different is either by making them a different sex or race. 
    The intentions are all well and good but the stories told are often the same with very little originality. Here, the Outsider is completely different from anything I've read in DC history and that makes this character a total mystery to me. A mystery that I want to come back to again and again. That's why I say 'Make Mine DC!"

    Worth Consuming

    Rating: 9 out of 10 stars.