Barry dating Patty

[Savitar]

The expected news was released today wherein DC confirms that Barry and Iris' marriage is over, that they are not even dating, and that Barry is dating his co-worker Patty Spivot. Iris is still present in the new timeline, working on a news blog for Central City.

This relationship was certainly being hinted at by Johns near the end of the last title. And while I understand the editorial choice of a new relationship being a new avenue of character development, I feel sad over this development.

What I don't understand is the claim of relevance. DC is targeting a younger audience, fine, to be expected, they are a business after all. But for the older readers, for ones like myself who are married, I find our heroes who are married, who have been in stable relationships (a hallmark, really, of DC over the decades) to be relevant. Then again, I don't appear to be the target audience for this re-launch.

Iris is still present, there's nothing to suggest that her and Barry will never get back together, but I still find it an odd choice that DC cancels the majority of their characters' marriages right from the start.

[golddragon71]

at least the Lois and Clark "annulment" was understandable as they wanted to go back to the original status quo but why break up Barry and Iris?!? Barry and Iris were already a solidly established relationship by the time we "met" them in Showcase. Now, I knew they were hinting at a Jim Gordon/Sarah Essen type thing going on between Barry and Patty during this past year but do we really need it?!? It's like tptb at DC are doing everything they can think of to flush all the good things our characters had down the toilet. The real villain of the DCU isn't reverse Flash Mirror Master or Anti-Monitor. It's Dan Didio!

[xBarryxAllenx]

If they truly keep Barry and Iris apart in the long run, I might agree...but somehow I don't think that will be the case. I know I'm trying to read the tea leaves here, but it seems the intent here is to not only "start over" or "start fresh" but to start from a younger point in everyone's lives. This gives everyone a new jumping on point so that you don't have to have known anything from before to catch up quickly. It may be a somewhat cheap way to do it, but starting all the relationships from "before they went out" is one way to accomplish this. You can tell why there is some tension between Barry and Patty later on by establishing an earlier relationship, and you can also show how Barry and Iris were first attracted to each other.

If that's the intent, I'm okay, as it gives us a chance to bring in a new generation of readers...along with bringing back some older readers who haven't bought in a while and who wouldn't know what has happened in the interim. I'm crossing my fingers and will keep buying for now to see what happens next...which is sort of what I think the DC management is hoping we'll all do.