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Cover to The Flash vol. 2 #109 (January 1996), showing the title character, with fellow speedsters Jesse Quick, Bart Allen, and Jay Garrick in the background. Art by Oscar Jimenez.

A speedster is a character whose powers primarily relate to superhuman speed (also known as superspeed). Primary abilities shared by all speedsters include running at speeds far in excess of human capability (to varying degrees) and resistance to the side effects (air resistance, inability to breathe, dynamic shock resulting from contact with objects at high speed, etc.) that result from such velocity. In almost all cases, speedsters are able to physically attack opponents by striking them while at high speed to impart huge amounts of kinetic energy without suffering harm, although this has on rare occasion been lampshaded by characters discovering that they cannot do this and suffering severe injury from the attempt. A variety of other powers have been attributed to speedsters depending on the story, the origin of the power, and the established continuity and rules of a given universe.

Plausibility and artistic license

The use of speedsters in fiction requires artistic license due to the laws of physics that would prohibit such abilities. Moving at the speed of sound, for example, would create sonic booms that are usually not heard in such stories. An enormous amount of energy would be required to achieve such speeds, and as some speedsters can actually move close to or at the speed of light, this would cause them to gain near-infinite mass, according to the laws of relativity.

For example, the Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe states that the character Nova maintains speeds which can be considered "modest", especially when carrying a passenger. The Handbook also concedes that a solid object moving in the Earth’s atmosphere at several times the speed of sound or faster would wreak havoc on the planet and that moving at such speeds would prohibit Northstar from breathing, while the generated wind/friction would ravage his body. On the other hand, the Handbook states that the character Quicksilver was born with adaptations that make higher speeds possible, such as enhanced cardiovascular, respiratory, musculature, and digestive systems, a more efficient metabolism (which has been a weakness for some incarnations of the Flash, calling themselves "snack holes"), better lubricated joints, tendons with the tensile strength of spring steel, unidentified bone composition that can withstand the dynamic shock of his touching the ground at speeds over 100 miles an hour, and a brain that can process information fast enough for him to react to his surroundings at high speed.^[1]

In comics published by DC Comics, the Flash family of speedsters derive their abilities from an extradimensional energy source known as the Speed Force, which grants them superspeed and various other abilities required to use it, such as durability.^[2] However, the Speed Force is not the source from which other DC characters with superspeed such as Superman or Captain Marvel/Shazam derive their powers.

Writer John Byrne maintained modest abilities for the speedster character Danny Hilltop in his series John Byrne’s Next Men. Although Danny can keep pace with a race car, the friction generated by his speed melts any footwear he wears, burning his feet. Thus he runs barefoot, having toughened the soles of his feet through a regimen of pounding increasingly harder materials (sand, gravel and then broken rock).^[3] The costume he wears has a built-in guidance system.

Other writers choose not to offer any scientific explanations for the questions raised by the actual use of such abilities.

Comic book writer Peter David, whose run on the series Young Justice included the junior speedster Impulse, has opined that speedsters are inherently difficult to write, saying:

Some speedsters may also end up destroying their surroundings or entire astronomical structures around them by their sheer speed alone if they are not careful enough. For example, Saitama from One-Punch Man accidentally destroyed a large portion of the Moon when he jumped back to Earth from it within ten seconds during his battle with Boros.

In other media

A webcomic speedster character.

Speedsters in other media include Daphne Millbrook (played by Brea Grant), a character in the NBC television superhero drama Heroes. Daphne first appeared in that series' third season in 2008, initially as a villain.^[6]

In addition, many characters exist in other media such as film, video games, anime and manga who possess the abilities to perform feats at incredible speeds that exceed the abilities of those around them. Examples include the video game character Sonic the Hedgehog, and the animated cartoon characters Speedy Gonzales and the Road Runner from Looney Tunes, Morton of Horton Hears A Who!, several Ben 10 aliens including XLR8, Jetray, and Fasttrack, Rainbow Dash (and in one case, Pinkie Pie taking on an alter ego called 'Filisecond' in a comic book universe) from My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic, Saitama, Speed o' Sound Sonic, Flashy Flash and several other characters of One-Punch Man, several Stand users and almost all other characters from JoJo's Bizarre Adventure, Goku, Vegeta, Frieza, Beerus, Whis, Jiren and practically every single character in the entire Dragon Ball franchise and Dash Parr of The Incredibles. Bree Davenport, the superhero from Lab Rats is one of the characters depended on to take them to mission sites.

References