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Flashpoint Reading Order, a DC Comics event by Geoff Johns and Andy Kubert

Since the conclusion of Crisis on Infinite Earths, the DC Universe has existed in an era now referred to as the Modern Age. This period began in 1986 and ended in 2011 with Flashpoint. This comic book crossover story arc, written by Geoff Johns and illustrated by Andy Kubert, radically altered the status quo by ending the New Earth continuity and leading to the relaunch of the New 52.

Following his recent resurrection at the end of the Final Crisis, Barry Allen is back, fighting the Rogues in the streets of Central City. The world has moved on in his absence, but one thing has not changed: Eobard Thawne’s hatred towards him. The Reverse Flash is back with a plan to get his revenge, but something even bigger is lurking on the horizon. As he was ready to take his enemy down, Barry woke up in an altered DC Universe in which he seems to be the only one aware of significant differences between the regular timeline and the altered one.

In the Flashpoint version of the universe, Cyborg occupies the place of the world’s quintessential hero, much like Superman is in the main timeline, with Superman himself being held captive as a lab rat by the United States government within an underground facility in Metropolis. In addition, Thomas Wayne is Batman, and a war between Wonder Woman and Aquaman has decimated Western Europe.

Flashpoint consists of 61 issues, with sixteen separate three-issue miniseries, and a number of one-shots.

Flashpoint Reading Order: The Collected Editions

What to Read before Flashpoint?

Flashpoint is the conclusion of Geoff Johns’s run on The Flash. More precisely, the end of his work on returning Barry Allen to his life. As such, you’d better start with reading the 6-issue miniseries The Flash: Rebirth that set the stage for Flashpoint by pushing his conflict with Eobard Thawne (aka Reverse Flash/Professor Zoom) to a breaking point. 

Collected in Flashpoint: The World of Flashpoint Featuring The Flash, the one-shot Reverse Flash #1 is a companion piece to The Flash: Rebirth, a short story from the point of view of Reverse Flash explaining how he came up with his plan to get his vengeance. 

Once Barry gets his life back with his wife Iris, he returns to work, but something is not right with The Rogues, his regular group of enemies. This first story arc suggests that something big is coming. You can skip it if you want, but I’d still recommend it to get a better grasp on where Barry is in his life. The second part of the short 12-issue run is the story that leads to Flashpoint. It’s the official prelude.

Flashpoint: The Main Event

Despite the entire event comprising little over 60 issues, the main Flashpoint story stands on its own. It’s a 5-issue miniseries that tells the complete adventure of Barry Allen waking up in a new version of his Earth. He found Batman, only to realize he wasn’t who he thought he was, and slowly put together the pieces of the puzzle. There was a Flashpoint event, a change that rewrote the whole reality. Now, he has to get his speed back and find Reverse Flash before his memories of the old universe are erased forever. 

Those five issues are all you really need to read. Everything else is complementary information, explorations of the events that led to the catastrophic war between the Amazons and the people of Atlantis, a menace that threatens to destroy the rest of the World. Those tie-in miniseries are optional. They don’t contain important information needed to understand the plot of Flashpoint. In fact, most are prequels. Still, they do make this version of the universe richer, and it’s a DC Comics tradition to explore alternate timelines. 

Flashpoint: What editions are available?

From the standard trade paperback to the oversized Absolute Edition, there’s an edition of Flashpoint for every kind of reader! Below is a listing of the various reprints of this now classic event. All collect Flashpoint #1-5, some have bonuses, some don’t.

  • Flashpoint: The 10th Anniversary Omnibus – This is the complete event in one huge 1500-page hardback book. It not only includes the main event, but also the prelude story from The Flash #8-12 and all 56 tie-in issues.
  • Absolute Flashpoint – This is part of the Absolute collection, it’s an oversized hardback book which includes the main story and bonuses like scripts, design sketches, and more.
  • Flashpoint – The classic trade paperback edition, originally published in 2011, but DC Comics reprinted it in 2024.
  • Flashpoint Unwrapped – The Unwrapped collection is for the fans who want to look closely at the pencils. Every scratch made by Andy Kubert before being inked is on display.

Flashpoint: The Companion Series

As I was writing earlier, the companion series is optional to the story of Flashpoint. But if you are intrigued by this short-lived version of the DC Universe, this Earth on the brink of total war, without a Superman, a Justice League, and a Flash, 56 issues were produced to explore that. 

Most of the stories are set before the events depicted in Flashpoint, as the arrival of Barry Allen changed everything. All of this is also available in the Flashpoint: The 10th Anniversary Omnibus, but the miniseries have been collected, more or less, by themes/Superheroes.

I would recommend reading them after having read the Flashpoint miniseries. 

This first collection is mostly focused on the war between the Amazons and the Atlanteans. Except for The Outsider series clearly put here to complete the book, these stories complement each other and provide a solid background to the climactic battle that happens toward the end of Flashpoint.

This collection is dedicated to providing background information about the Flashpoint versions of Batman and Robin, to explore the magic side of the universe, and finally to expand on Deathstroke’s side of the story introduced in Flashpoint #2.

Except for the Project Superman miniseries, which ties in with the ending of the Flashpoint series, these are tangential stories. There’s the quest of young witch Traci Thirteen to stop another catastrophe; Booster Gold’s search for a way back to his timeline; and the origin story of British resistance fighter Canterbury Cricket.

In the Flashpoint timeline, Abin Sur survived the crash on Earth and continues his work as a Green Lantern, while Hal Jordan is a fighter pilot, Oliver Queen builds weapons, and the Creature Commando is just waking up to a new world. Those stories are barely connected to the main event; they still take us to the final battle.

The Reverse Flash one-shot is a complementary story to The Flash: Rebirth, while the Citizen Cold miniseries shows the Flashpoint version of Central City, and Kid Flash Lost follows Bart Allen sent in a future under Brainiac’s control. Finally, the Grodd Of War one-shot is another tangential tale to add background to one little panel.

Flash Barry Allen - Flashpoint Reading Order

Flashpoint Reading Order: Issue by Issue

If you are not going to read the event with the help of the collected editions, here is a possible reading order. As most of the tie-ins are not dependent on the events depicted in the Flashpoint miniseries, there is no need for a strict reading order. However, I choose to place the stories in relation to their ending. 

The Road to Flashpoint

  • The Flash: Rebirth #1-6
  • Flashpoint: Reverse-Flash #1 – A recap of Eobard Thawne’s quest to get his revenge on Barry Allen. This can be considered a prequel to The Flash: Rebirth, but it would be a spoiler to read it before.
  • The Flash (2010) #1-8 (optional)
  • The Flash (2010) #9-12 – The prelude to Flashpoint. 

Flashpoint

I would recommend reading the 5-issue Flashpoint miniseries before reading the tie-in stories. But if you prefer mixing things up, here is my proposed reading order. Some readers would go with a more chronological approach. As such, most of the tie-in miniseries would come before Flashpoint #1.

I think that reading the first three issues of Flashpoint before reading anything else is a better way to get a really good grasp of this version of the universe. All the different versions of the characters are introduced, and you can now go back to learn how they came to be like that, like a series of flashbacks to read before the climax of the story.

That said, I regroup some miniseries together in a way that makes sense.

  • Flashpoint #1
  • Flashpoint: Batman Knight Of Vengeance #1-3 – A miniseries introducing who this version of Batman is. Not connected to the main event.
  • Flashpoint: Green Arrow Industries #1 – A one-shot about who Oliver Queen is in this version of the DC Universe. Barely connected to the main event.
  • Flashpoint: Deadman and the Flying Graysons #1-3 – Set after the Antlanteans attacked Europe, Dick Grayson, his parents, Boston Brand, Kent Nelson, and more are part of a circus entertaining the surviving nations of the East until the war caught up with them.. 
  • Flashpoint: Secret Seven #1-3 – Following Cyborg’s meeting of heroes in Flashpoint #1, Shade the Changing Man is tasked to rebuild his Magic team, but he may have lost his mind under pressure. 
  • Flashpoint: The Canterbury Cricket #1 – The story of how The Canterbury Cricket joined the Resistance in the fight to save England from the Amazons. 
  • Flashpoint: Legion of Doom #1-3 – Another prequel story, this one follows bad guy Heatwave, who is put in jail by Cyborg and plans an escape. 
  • Flashpoint #2
  • Flashpoint: Deathstroke and the Curse of the Ravager #1-3 – This story tells what happened to Deathstroke and his crew before and after the 6-page introduction of Flashpoint #2.
  • Flashpoint: Citizen Cold #1-3 – Follows Citizen Cold, hero of Central City, as the Rogues plan their revenge. Clearly set after his appearance in Flashpoint #1, not related to the overall plot, and can be read here or a bit later. 
  • Flashpoint #3

The World is at war. Antlanteans vs Amazons. How did that happen? The following miniseries explores the history of the two civilisations, but also how intrepid journalist Lois Lane finds a place in the middle of the conflict.  While prequels, the next series all lead to the end of the Flashpoint miniseries. 

  • Flashpoint: Wonder Woman and the Furies #1-2
  • Flashpoint: Lois Lane and The Resistance #1-3 (Lois Lane’s story ends in Project: Superman)
  • Flashpoint: Wonder Woman and the Furies #3
  • Flashpoint: Emperor Aquaman #1-3

While the three previous miniseries are connected and give a better understanding of the Flashpoint Universe, the next ones are mostly focused on the characters and add nothing of note to the bigger events at play.

  • Flashpoint: The Outsider #1-3 – The miniseries follows what happened to The Outsider between his introduction in Flashpoint #1 and his one-panel appearance in Flashpoint #4.
  • Flashpoint: Frankenstein and the Creatures of the Unknown #1-3 – The story of the Creature Commando from WWII to this day. Barely connected to the main event, but there’s a reference to an event suggesting the story in the present is set around here..
  • Flashpoint #4

The following miniseries tell stories that start at different points in the past but conclude in the middle of the ultimate battle for Europe. 

  • Flashpoint: Booster Gold #44-47 – Set directly after the Time Masters: Vanishing Point miniseries, which dealt with the consequences of Final Crisis (which includes a short appearance of Eobard Thawne), this story follows Booster, who, like Barry, comes from the regular timeline and must find his way back to his time.
  • Flashpoint: Project: Superman #1-3 – Created to protect the Earth from extraterrestrials, Project Superman was a government project led by General Sam Lane. It starts with the story Subject Zero, thirty years before Flashpoint. 
  • Flashpoint: Abin Sur – The Green Lantern #1-3 – Tell the story of Abin Sur, why he came to Earth, until the climactic battle that led to the last issue of the event.
  • Flashpoint: Hal Jordan #1-3 – Hal Jordan didn’t become Green Lantern, but he was still a pilot and had to play his part in the war.
  • Flashpoint: The World of Flashpoint #1-3 – Following the destruction of Europe, young witch Traci Thirteen tries to find a way to stop his father’s quest for vengeance, which could lead to hundreds of millions more deaths. 
  • Flashpoint: Grodd of War #1 – A prelude to why Grodd joined the fight in the last issue of Flashpoint.
  • Flashpoint: Kid Flash Lost #1-3 – Kid Flash and Hot Pursuit wake up in a future under Brainiac’s control, and they need to reconnect with the Speed Force to go back to their time, but the Force is nowhere to be found.
  • Flashpoint #5

Flash Barry Allen - Flashpoint Reading Order

The Flashpoint universe was born from a change in the past. When Barry Allen fixed it, the world of Flashpoint was no more, but the world of DC Comics didn’t go back to “normal.” It was the launch of The New 52 publishing initiative. A new DC Universe was born.

Known as Flashpoint Batman, Thomas Wayne did make a comeback. First in The Button (Batman #21–22 and The Flash #21–22) by Tom King and Joshua Williamson, which connected the story to the world of Watchmen. King later brought back the character in the regular DC Universe during his run on Batman in the storylines The Fall and the Fallen, and The City of Bane.

 After that, Joshua Williamson made Thomas Wayne a member of Justice Incarnate, a group defending the multiverse in the Infinite Frontier miniseries (2021) and the follow-up series Justice League Incarnate. 

Finally, Geoff Jones brought back the world of Flashpoint in the miniseries Flashpoint Beyond (2022), providing a follow-up to his original event series and tying up the events to Doomsday Clock and the Dark Crisis, which set the stage for Jones’ relaunch of the JSA.

DC Comics also explored an alternate version of the Flashpoint universe in the one-shot Tales from the Dark Multiverse: Flashpoint #1.

Note: An earlier version of this guide appeared on our site in 2021. It has been completely refreshed and updated with a new revised reading order, new information, and new images!

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