The CW
In the movie world, superhero stories aim high. There are no Marvel execs trampling each other to put a Speedball movie into production. There probably never will be. And for good reason, too, because Speedball kinda sucks.
For superheroes on TV, it’s just the opposite. 20+ episode per year requires a writers room to scrape up the forgotten, crusty bits at the bottom of the comic book world so Barry Allen has someone new to speed-punch (and lock away forever in an bizarrely inhumane super-Guantanamo Bay) every week.
The largest offender by far is the CW’s conglomerate of superhero shows: Arrow, The Flash and Legends of Tomorrow. Between the three of them, we’ve got more than 20 DC comics super-players swarming onto TV in just about a month and a half. It’s a lot to handle. Let this giant list of all of them guide you through the madness.
Courtesy of DC Comics
Damien Darhk
Arrow’s bucking a trend this year: instead of picking a major DC Comics adversary for their Big Bad (Merlyn, Deathstroke, Ra’s al Ghul- all heavyweights)- the show’s snapped up Damien Darhk (Neal McDonough), a shlub who terrorized a handful of 1999 “Teen Titans” comics and then nothing else, ever. There’s also the issue of that “h.” Just pretend it’s not there.
On the printed page, Darhk was tech wiz with a dark side and ties to the super villain organization HIVE (Hierarchy of International Vengeance and Extermination- god I hope Arrow keeps the same acronym). That’s more or less the case for Arrow, as Darhk’s running his own version of HIVE, a shadowy villain organization that’s already been name-dropped on Arrow a few times.
According to co-showrunner Marc Guggenheim, Darhk will buck the Arrow Big Bad formula in two ways. One, instead of that classic “villain who thinks he’s the hero” motivation that the show’s other Big Bads all had, Darhk’s just a jerk who genuinely likes doing the cruelest shit imaginable (McDonough’s smart casting, then- he did an extraordinary turn on Justified as a very similar psycho villain). And two, rather than waiting halfway through the season for that Big Bad reveal, he’ll be there right from the start.
Courtesy of DC Comics
Zoom
This could get weird. The Flash’s next Big Bad is Zoom, and The Flash already borrowed from this character heavily to create Harrison Wells last year (“But Harrison Wells is the Reverse-Flash!” you protest. Well, Zoom is also the Reverse-Flash. It’s confusing).
Zoom was originally Hunter Solomon, a police profiler working alongside the Flash, until a freak Gorilla Grodd accident left him wheelchair-bound. Desperate to get the use of his legs back, he tampered with the Speed Force and voila! Super-speed (well, not really- he can actually travel through time in a way that looks like he’s moving all quick-like). Also, the whole “a super-gorilla snapped my spine” thing kinda left him insane, so Zoom thinks he’s “training” the Flash to be a better hero by causing horrible tragedies in his life. Basically Harrison Wells.
But as The Flash exec producer Gabrielle Stanton cautions, “no one will confuse him for one second with what we did last year,” so clearly the CW has considered the startling similarities. Also, Zoom will be “scary as hell,” faster than any other speedster, and as TVLine puts it, “may resemble Eobard Thawne upon first impression.” Considering The Flash has been filming for months and Zoom as yet to be cast, one might assume that one of the show’s two Eobard Thawnes (Tom Cavanagh, Matt Letscher) is stepping in to fill the role.
Courtesy of DC Comics
Vandal Savage
Our third Big Bad for our third CW superhero show- Casper Crump will play Legends of Tomorrow baddie Vandal Savage. He’s a little like Ra’s al Ghul, in that he’s an immortal ruler who’s influenced the world in secret for centuries. Both men also favor distinguished-looking facial hair. Savage, however, is a little more outwardly evil, as his end goal is usually ruling the world rather than sponsoring a secret clan or two.
This much we know from the Legends trailer: time traveler Rip Hunter (more on him later) has seen the future; the future is a total mess because of Vandal Savage; Legends’ assortment of B and C-list super-characters are the only ones capable of traveling through time to stop him. Cue an army of laser-toting soldiers and a robot foot the size of the Epcot dome.
Courtesy of DC Comics
Jay Garrick
We saw Jay Garrick’s lightning bolt-adorned helmet on The Flash last year, so this should come as no surprise: DC Comics’ original Golden Age version of the character, Jay Garrick (Teddy Sears), is also joining the series.
This much we know: He’ll be a mentor to Barry- and a non-evil one, which should be a pleasant change of pace. He’ll be arriving in Central City with news of something all huge and scary that one Flash alone can’t handle (conveniently, season two has already cast two more Flashes besides Garrick). Given that hat-cameo, he’ll probably wear the hat and look completely goofy. And that early image teasing the iconic “Flash of Two Words” cover isn’t just a tease- the show’s going to include the actual “two flashes save dude from falling girder” moment, early on in the season.
Courtesy of DC Comics
Wally West
The second of three speedster heroes joining The Flash is Wally West (Keiynan Lonsdale), who served as Kid Flash from the ‘60s through Barry Allen’s death in 1986, then as the official Flash until DC swapped Barry back in with 2009’s “The Flash: Rebirth.”
Comic book Wally is, as the last name implies, the nephew of longtime Flash love interest Iris West. Wally’s a big Flash fan, and as the Flash explains to Wally how he got his powers- that very shelf of precariously-placed chemicals splashed on me, just as I was struck by lightning– that very shelf of precariously-placed chemicals splashed on Wally, just as he was struck by lightning. Jinx!
Although none of that will probably happen to the TV Wally West. On three occasions (occasion one, occasion two, occasion three), sources close to The Flash have been asked “hey, what’s the deal with Wally?” and the only response anyone’s gotten is total hush-hush secrecy. Suffice to say, TV’s Wally West will probably be some kind of half-human, half-zebra cannibalistic serial killer. Or maybe he’ll just be the Flash of some other multiverse realm.
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