Everyone who accesses the speedforce is able to read and comprehend at light speed. The downside is that once they "return" to normal time, they forget rather quickly what they learned in speed mode. The only exception is the recently deceased Bart Allen. He was able to retain everything he learned at hyper speeds. In the beginning of the Teen Titans arc, Bart, then known as Impulse, read every book in San Francisco's library and retained the information. He then changed his name to Kid Flash. Here's the problem, although he had all of this knowledge, he did not have the experience or wisdom on how to use it. One word would suffice in describing Bart's attempt at implementing what he'd learned.... Inexperience.

Barry Allen, Bart's grandfather, on the other hand is a brilliant scientist. Back in the day, they called him a Police Scientist. In today's world, we would call him a Forensics Agent. DC had artists intentionally draw Barry with a thin face and long forehead as a visual metaphor of his intellegence.

Barry (and Wally for that matter), were shown to be very smart in the use of their powers and in battles.

Batman, as it's shown, is a genius. He's not an expert in all areas (just ask The Atom who frequently showed he's got the edge in certain areas), but he knows enough to be effective.

What makes Batman seem to be the best of the best is his ability to strategize. He takes what he knows about everything and comes up with solutions. That's what makes him stand shoulder to shoulder with the uber powerful Superman and Wonder Woman.

And because that's his specialty, I think many times both Kal and Diana defer to him. With Wonder Woman's gift of wisdown, she would have the same results, but certainly in a different manner.


Good write-up. I enjoyed what you had to say on this.