Manic Flash Day #4--The Difference One Little Letter Can Make

We comic fans all know Johnny Quick's magic formula by heart, right?

Never mind the snarky questions over how to pronounce it, or how inscriptions found in a Pharaoh's tomb give you super speed (or for that matter, how inscriptions in that tomb contained numbers and letters that culture didn't have...shhh!)

Nope, just suspend your stinkin' disbelief a bit, because we all know, when Johnny says the magic formula, he gets speed.

Ah, but what happens when he says the formula wrong?!?

A mysterious explosion has sent a "water meteor" plummeting towards Keystone, so Johnny Quick decides to go help out Jay Garrick. Except...

Hey, where's that X come from?

Monkeys with invisible beams? Sinister.

And the results of that little tiny alteration to the formula?

Wha...?

Yup, the X turned him evil!!

Johny's comedy sidekick pal Tubby Watts let's him know that he said the formula incorrectly...

Well, Johnny goes to Jay (who has just gone public with his secret identity) to apologize. But...

Again?

Just so we're clear, that guy's working for Grodd. And Grodd has developed an invisible beam that makes you add an X to your magic formula. An oddly specific weapon, but cool.

Anyway...

Don't worry...Jay saves her, Grodd accomplishes his goal of siphoning off some of Jay's super-speed (don't ask) and so Johnny doesn't have to worry about the evil ray anymore, and they all live happily ever after.

You have to wonder, though...Could that ray be used on anyone? Could Billy Batson be made to say SHAZAMX and be evil? What if instead of an X, you added a Q to Johnny Quick's formula? Or an Ñ or a Я or a Ω?

Questions like these are why I'm not allowed to write comics...

From Flash Spectacular (a.k.a. DC Special Series #11) (1978)