Twenty-five years ago today, at 8 pm Central and Eastern, 7 pm Pacific and Mountain time, "The Flash" television series debuted in the U.S. television airwaves. Since I was living in Asia at the time, I wasn't able to catch the show until it was released on PAL VHS -- and even then, it was only five episodes (on three tapes: the pilot movie, the two Trickster episodes, and the two Nightshade episodes). When I was in Malaysia, the local television station "Metrovision 8" aired the pilot movie (in two parts), and the "Mask of Rasputin" episode, and then the show was inexplicably banned by the Information Ministry. So I had only seen six episodes, but it was enough to make me a fan of the show. It wasn't until the DVD set came out in the mid-naughties did I watch, and rewatch, the rest of the season.
This piece is to commemorate this wonderful programme, which still stands as one of the best comic-book inspired television shows, in my opinion. Another show on this list is the current "The Flash" programme on the CW, which honors the original show (including casting the original Flash himself, John Wesley Shipp [below], in a recurring role) and surprisingly manages to include aspects of the Silver Age Flash comic books that the previous show could not.
