The Illiad and Odyssee make great use of flashbacks. It's what makes them stand out from the other epics from that time (who have all been lost in time for the most part). But that's literature and not video games. Xenoblade Chronicles on the other hand made great use of flash forwards. :)

Flashbacks in Arrow are great, because they're expontentially better than the show's main content.

I loved the way Lost used them.
Couldn't imagine the series without them.

Bleach anime had the worst flashbacks! During the Espada sage they'd show like a 5min long flashback at the beginning of almost every single epsiode and the entire show length was approx. 22min long, so after the flash back and intro/outro you have about just 15min of the show really. =S

I usually love flashbacks, I think it's more effective than having a character tell what happened.

It all depends on the show though, Game of Thrones doesn't have any flashbacks and I think it would ruin the mystery to have them. On the other hand, Once Upon A Time is built around flashbacks and it works really well too.

Edit: I loved seeing the Nibelheim flashbacks in FFVII (both the fake and the real one).

It all depends, but it's true that the line between a good and bad flashback is very fine. The problem as it relates to video games is that often times when a game has a flashback it breaks the established rules of the game in order to make the narrative work in that situation and that tends to be jarring. Really, one of the first things a writer learns is not to break the rules they establish early in their story for that very reason unless they have a damn good, compelling reason, and more importantly, a well thought out plan to execute it.

Flaskbacks in movies are okay, as long as they don't fill it will flashbacks and not having a flashback on something that happened like 10 minutes ago

Dawn of the New World is a perfect bad example of flashbacks, where you get unskippable flashbacks on something that was just said like 5 minutes ago.. and the same flashback over and over :/

Hi five

Thats exactly what I thought this thread was about. 

The best use of flashbacks I've ever seen is definitely in Lost. The way flashbacks intertwine with current events to build each character's personalities and motives elevates the way the story is told. But for that you need interesting and relevant characters to begin with, which is something Lost did really well but other shows like The Walking Dead failed to do.

As a fan of one piece (best manga of all time...wait what) I love flashbacks. Every straw hat has a really emotional flashback or heck even the antagonists get really great ones (look at the flashback with senior pink and his wife the reason he ......)