Kid Flash

Bart Allen, also known as Impulse is a teenage speedster and the second and current Kid Flash. Born in the 31th century, he is the grandson of Barry Allen, the second Flash. Brave and always looking for adventure, he has continued to honor the legacy of his grandfather and the Flash Family as a member of Teen Titans and the Legion of Super-Heroes.

Source imported · 2026-10-23Edit this pageSource history ↗
Edit section

Overview

  • Bart Allen, also known as Impulse is a teenage speedster and the second and current Kid Flash. Born in the 31th century, he is the grandson of Barry Allen, the second Flash. Brave and always looking for adventure, he has continued to honor the legacy of his grandfather and the Flash Family as a member of Teen Titans and the Legion of Super-Heroes.
Related article links (4)Barry Allen · Flash Family · Teen Titans · Legion of Super-Heroes
Edit section

Background

  • Suffering from a hyper-accelerated metabolism, Bart Allen was aging at a faster rate than that of any human being, thus causing him to appear the age of twelve when he was chronologically only two years old. To prevent him from developing mental health problems, he was raised in a virtual reality machine which created a simulated world that kept pace with his own scale of time. When it became clear that this method was not helping, his grandmother, Iris Allen, took him back in time to the present where Wally West tricked Bart into a race around the world. By forcing Bart into an extreme burst of speed, Wally managed to shock his hypermetabolism back to normal. Because he had spent the majority of his childhood in a simulated world, Bart had no concept of danger and was prone to leaping before he looked. The youth proved to be more trouble than Wally could handle, and he was palmed off onto retired superhero speedster Max Mercury, who moved Bart to Manchester, Alabama.
  • Taking on the identity of Impulse, Bart became one of the founding members of the superhero team Young Justice along with his two best friends, Robin and Superboy. Impulse stayed with Young Justice for an extensive period of time during which he developed the ability to make speed-force energy duplicates. This allowed him to be in multiple places at once. The newly acquired power proved useful until one of the duplicates was killed during the "Our Worlds at War" story line when half the team was lost on Apokolips. Bart quit Young Justice temporarily as the death of his duplicate led him to come to terms with his own mortality.
  • Following Max Mercury's disappearance, Bart was taken in by Jay Garrick, and his wife Joan. After the breakup of Young Justice, Bart joined Robin, Superboy, Wonder Girl in a reformed Teen Titans group with Cyborg, Starfire. Beast Boy and Raven. Shortly after joining, Bart was shot in the knee by Deathstroke and received a prosthetic one. While recovering, Bart read every single book in the San Francisco Public Library and reinvented himself as the new Kid Flash.
Related article links (10)Wally West · Robin · Superboy · Jay Garrick · Wonder Girl · Cyborg · Starfire · Beast Boy · Raven · Deathstroke
Edit section

Combat Statistics

Related article links (3)BOUNTY: Kid Flash · Controlled Kid Flash · Brainwashed Kid Flash
Edit section

Known Abilities

Related article links (5)Cyclone Push · Flash Fist Barrage · Tornado Kick · Vortex Trap · Whirling Arms
Edit section

Involvement

Related article links (12)Granny Goodness · Fatal Exams · Alert · Halls of Power Part II · Heroes · Villains · Starro · Starro the Conqueror · Giant Robot · Titans Tower · FP: Flashtastic Voyage · FP: Flash to the Future
Edit section

Villains

Related article links (4)Kid Flash · bounty · Little Bohemia · Club L'Excellence
Edit section

Associated Equipment

Related article links (2)Junior Speedster · Kid Flash Banner
Edit section

Trivia

  • Bart first appeared in Flash #92 (June 1994)
  • Bart originally created the "Impulse" codename for himself, though a retcon has Batman codenaming him such as a warning.
  • Born in the 31th century to Meloni Thawne and Don Allen, Bart is related to a number of superheroes and super-villains. His father, Don, is one of the Tornado Twins and his paternal grandfather is Barry Allen, the second Flash. His paternal grandmother, Iris West Allen, is also the adoptive aunt of the first Kid Flash, Wally West (Bart's first cousin once removed). Additionally, Bart is the first cousin of XS, a Legionnaire and daughter of Dawn Allen. On his mother's side, he is a descendant of supervillains Professor Zoom and Cobalt Blue as well as the half brother of Owen Mercer, the second Captain Boomerang. In addition to these relatives, he had a supervillain clone known as Inertia.
  • Kid Flash is best friends with Red Robin and Superboy.
Related article links (7)Batman · Barry Allen · Wally West · Professor Zoom · Owen Mercer · Red Robin · Superboy
Edit section

Gallery

Edit section

See also

Related article links (2)Flash Family · Teen Titans
Edit section

External links

  • Bart Allen Wikipedia
COMMUNITY EDITOR

Editing: Kid Flash

Loading full article editor...

Insert content