The second season of The CW's The Flash is now in the books, and the season finale came to a close with Barry Allen going back in time to stop the death of his mother. For many longtime comic book fans, that moment set alarm bells ringing as to what possible ramifications that act will have for the Scarlet Speedster and those closest to him when the show returns.
With Grant Gustin having now confirmed that the Season 3 premiere will be titled Flashpoint, even further alarm bells were going off as that's effectively confirmation that the upcoming season of the Sultan of Speed-centric show will indeed be pulling from one of DC's most famous modern day arcs, also named Flashpoint.
In Flashpoint, Barry awakens in the present day and with an entirely different world around him. Firstly, his deceased mother Nora is alive and well, and then a whole host of events unravel as we find out that there has been a major shift in the timeline, sending shockwaves throughout the DC Universe.
Now that Season 3 of The CW's The Flash looks set to pull elements from the comic book Flashpoint, here's 15 things you need to know about this fan-favourite arc.
15. All Change For The Allens
When Flashpoint begins, Barry Allen wakes up to what he believes is just another regular day. Little does the Scarlet Speedster know that all around him has changed.
The biggest immediate shocker to Barry is that his mother Nora is actually still alive. Considering how much of a huge impact on his life Nora’s death had, this is a total game-changer for the Fastest Man Alive. Well, apart from he’s no longer the Faster Man Alive, for another revelation is that Barry has absolutely no superpowers.
Another change-up is that Barry’s father Henry didn’t actually die in prison as was previously depicted, and he’d instead actually died of a heart attack supposedly three years before this strangely switched-up present day.
Sure, Barry may not have his powers and his father is still dead (albeit not having died in prison), but at least he’s got his long-dead mother back in his life. Everything’s great from here on out, surely? Well everything’s certainly “different”, is probably a better way to describe things.
14. Captain Cold Is The Saviour Of Central City
The Flash is the proud hero of Central City, right? Well, not in Flashpoint he’s not. Nope, Barry Allen has a replacement and it’s not who’d you necessarily expect.
Instead of the Scarlet Speedster being the face of Central City, it’s actually the nefarious Leonard Snart, aka Captain Cold, who is the protector of the city in Flashpoint. Yep, Cap’n Cold, a longtime villain and rival of The Flash’s is the one who is the loud and proud face of Central City. In fact, he's even got a shiny superhero name: Citizen Cold.
Seeing Cold taking his place as Central City’s hero is a bit of a bitter pill for Barry to swallow at first, but, from what we’re led to believe, Snart has been nothing but the consummate professional and consummate hero when it comes to all things Flashpoint.
Whatever’s next? The Joker overseeing Gotham? Ares trying to bring happiness and positivity to Themyscira? Darkseid wanting to love the Earth? Lex Luthor as US President? Oh, wait…
13. Kal-El Is Far From Super
The Last Son of Krypton is always the quintessential hero, the ever-strong, do-the-right-thing sort of figure who leads by example and is a clear symbol of hope for a world so often shrouded in darkness. Not in Flashpoint, he’s not.
For poor Kal-El, rather than land in rural Kansas and get found by the Kents, he instead crashes directly into Metropolis. With many civilians killed during the crash, the military are quickly on the scene and take the would-be-Superman into custody, launching what was known as Project: Superman.
Kal is experimented on for years, living a solitary existence and looking like a scarily thin shell of the hero longtime comic book fans have come to love and know. The only person who ever has any time for him is General Sam Lane, who essentially views him as a son.
Within Kal, many of the powers of our Superman exist, it just takes a while for them to come to fruition and to be controlled. Unfortunately for the Flashpoint take on Superman, he grows up as a military experiment who lives a life of misery for the most part.
One of the key changes that this caused is that the Flashpoint world has no form of Justice League whatsoever. That’s not to say that there aren’t some familiar “heroes” still around, but they are a little different to what we’re used to.
12. Cyborg Is THE Hero
One of the first things that hits home during Flashpoint is that the big, bright shining light of superheroes isn’t who it usually is.
Instead of Superman being the beacon of hope, the whiter-than-white hero, the main hero of the day is Victor Stone, aka Cyborg. Working alongside the US government, Cyborg is the man who is seen as the greatest hero of the day, although that’s not to say he is averse to working with other heroes.
In fact, Cyborg actually has a frosty relationship with an edgier-than-normal Batman during Flashpoint, and he does his best to bring heroes together to stop the threat of the day. Unfortunately, Cyborg ultimately doesn’t get the job done in time for the powers-that-be, eventually leading to the US President publicly labelling Cyborg a failure.
Ouch! And people thought the President was using Superman as a pawn in Frank Miller’s The Dark Knight Returns. For poor Vic Stone, he was always fighting an uphill battle during Flashpoint.
11. Bruce Wayne Isn't Batman
So, Superman isn’t Superman, but at least there’s Batman to save the day, yeah? Well, kind of…
There is a Batman in the Flashpoint realm, but that isn’t Bruce Wayne. You see, during that infamous night in Crime Alley it was actually Bruce who was killed by Joe Chill rather than parents Thomas and Martha. To put it bluntly, the Bruce of Flashpoint didn’t even reach puberty before his life was tragically cut short.
In his place, the mantle of the Batman was taken on by none other than Thomas Wayne. If you thought that Bruce made for a menacing and dark Caped Crusader, Thomas’ Batman, driven by the loss of his son, makes the Bruce version of Batman look like an extra from Barney the Dinosaur.
This damaged, aggressive and alcoholic Dark Knight patrols the streets of Gotham City but will happily dish out brutality to any heroes or villains who get in his way.
But whilst that’s the route Thomas took after his son’s death, that’s nothing compared to Martha…
10. Martha Wayne Is The Joker
The death of young Bruce Wayne may have drove his father to become the darkest of Dark Knights, but the tragedy caused even more trauma for mother Martha.
In the aftermath of Bruce’s untimely death, Martha went off the deep end and cut a smile into her face, giving her an appearance that had more than a passing resemblance to Heath Ledger’s Clown Prince of Crime. Similarly, her actions matched those that we’d usually associate with Mr. J, including kidnapping the children of Harvey Dent.
Ultimately, Martha would end up falling to her death in the depths of Wayne Manor after losing the plot after it was explained to her that the world could be changed so that her and Thomas died instead of Bruce.
Given how aggressive and damaged Thomas’ Batman is, he’s only just about got the moral high ground over his wife. Regardless of who is the more damaged of the duo, Flashpoint led to a vastly traumatic life for the Waynes.
9. Oliver Queen = Tony Stark
Think back to Jon Favreau’s 2008 first Iron man movie, the one which launched the Marvel Cinematic Universe. I think we can all agree that Robert Downey Jr.’s Tony Stark was a bit of an a**hat when the film began, right?
Take that character and just replace the name Tony Stark with that of Oliver Queen, for that is where we find Ollie in the Flashpoint realm.
With his Green Arrow Industries company, we meet an Oliver Queen who steals from supervillains to help create his own weapons, but that’s not to say he’s particularly a hero. In fact, even Roy Harper talks to Ollie about how he can do so much more for the world with what’s available at his fingertips.
Oh, and Oliver Queen cannot fire a bow and arrow in Flashpoint. Yes, as in the Green Arrow, a hero who is synonymous with his trusty bow and arrow, is unable to successfully use said weapon. Even worse, that fact is slapped across your face at every turn during the Flashpoint: Green Arrow Industries one-shot.
In hindsight, you kind of wish that Ollie got the Bruce Wayne treatment here…
8. War!
It’s already been mentioned about the Flashpoint timeline having no Justice League. With Batman a loner whose only friend is an empty bottle, Superman not Superman at all, and Barry Allen powerless, two other main players are at all-out war with each other.
That’d be Aquaman and Wonder Woman.
The King of Atlantis and his Atlanteans are at savage, brutal and bloody war with the Amazing Amazon and her Amazon warriors. No punches are pulled and both sides are most definitely playing for keeps. So intense is the war that it’s literally destroying the globe, with London a hotspot of death, destruction, carnage and chaos when we’re introduced to the Flashpoint world.
There’s a good argument to be made that the war between the Atlanteans and Amazons here is one of the most violent battles that has ever been seen in any DC arc or timeline. Flashpoint as a whole is a fantastic read, and this element of the story is certainly a major highlight.
7. Hal Jordan Never Becomes Green Lantern
Due to the whole changing of the landscape, Flashpoint is a world in which Hal Jordan never became a Green Lantern. But that’s only half of the problem for Hal.
In the Flashpoint world, the ramifications of the situation reached as far as the skies and into space. As such, Abin Sur, the alien being who crash-landed on Earth and gave Hal Jordan his Green Lantern ring with his dying breath, never actually crashed into Earth at all. That meant that Hal was never in a position to receive the shiny little ring that would change his life, resulting in him just being a pilot.
If not becoming a Green Lantern was bad enough, even worse for Hal was that he was one of the pilots shot down and killed by the Amazon army of invisible jets.
So, you can add Hal Jordan to the list of DC heroes whose life was changed for the worse as a result of the whole Flashpoint event.
6. Barry Recreates His Powers
Having awoken in a world that is at its knees, Barry Allen is desperate to become The Flash once more. So desperate that he actually recreates the accident that caused him to get his powers in the first place.
The only problem is that this recreation doesn’t work. At all. Not even slightly. In fact, the only thing that happens is that Barry suffers extreme burns and nearly dies.
Luckily, one thing that Barry Allen isn’t is a quitter. Determined to get his superspeed back, Barry attempts to recreate the accident for a second time. This time it’s a very different result, with him regaining his powers and once more becoming the Scarlet Speedster, the Sultan of Speed, the Fastest Man Alive… The Flash.
Where The CW’s The Flash is concerned, we’ve already actually seen Barry have to go through this process, with him ending up actually inside a living, sentient version of the Speed Force before successfully getting his powers back after Zoom had drained him of his superspeed.
5. It Was All Barry's Fault
One of the big swerves of Flashpoint is the reveal that this world gone to hell was all caused by the actions of one man: Barry Allen.
From what we were to believe – and what Barry believed – this new timeline was all down to the actions of Eobard Thawne, aka Reverse-Flash. It turns out, though, that Flashpoint was caused because Barry chose to go back in time and save his mother.
As Thawne proudly explains to Barry, “You were like a bullet through a windshield. You shattered history. The lives of the people closest to you were put on a broken path. You changed time like an amateur! This is your fault, Barry. This hell is your creation. You traded the life of your mother for the rest of the world!”
In terms of kicks to the nuts, they don’t get much bigger than your biggest nemesis proudly explaining to you how it was actually your actions that ruined the world for every single person you know and love.
Nice one, Barry. Nice one.
So, we can expect to see some pretty heavy changes in The CW’s Scarlet Speedster show if Flashpoint is to be followed in even a loose way.
4. Batman Kills Reverse-Flash
One of Bruce Wayne’s main rules is that he doesn’t kill people. Unfortunately for Reverse-Flash, it wasn’t the Bruce Wayne version of the Dark Knight that was roaming the streets in Flashpoint.
With Barry Allen a beaten and broken man, both emotionally and physically, it appears that Eobard Thawne has finally toppled his great rival in a way that perfectly rubs Barry’s nose in the dirt. But while Thawne is giving it large and playing Barry Big Time as he taunts his foe, he suddenly gets stabbed and killed by an Amazon sword courtesy of Thomas Wayne’s Batman.
Even though Thomas was a depressed alcoholic with a penchant for extreme violence, Flashpoint saw Barry be able to reach some sort of connection with Bruce’s father. Explaining to him about the altered timeline and how Bruce is alive and is Batman in the usual timeline, Thomas decides to make a stand and do what he can to help Barry put things right.
Unluckily for Thawne, that meant he was merely collateral damage as far as this darker Caped Crusader was concerned.
3. Barry Saves The Day... Kind Of
After all has become crystal clear, Barry Allen makes a plan of attack that will ultimately see him restore the Earth’s original timeline; the timeline in which there is a Justice League, where Wonder Woman and Aquaman aren’t battling each other for global domination, and where Cyborg is still seen as one of the sh*tter JL members out there (sorry Cyborg fans).
Travelling back in time, Barry actually merges with his earlier self in order to not save his mother. What happens next is that he’s confronted by three different timelines: DC (New Earth), Vertigo (Earth-13), and WildStorm (Earth-50).
It turns out that the world as we know it has been split into three timelines to weaken it ahead of impending doom. All three worlds would then merge together to become a new DC realm known as the New 52.
So yeah, if you thought that the New 52 absolutely sucked (let’s face it, who didn’t?) then you have The Flash to blame!
2. Batman Cries!
No, the Caped Crusader didn’t shed a tear because of the New 52 (although some of us were driven to the verge of tears by some of the bumbled attempts at reimagining some of our favourite heroes and villains), but we actually got to see the Dark Knight display an emotional level of which we’d never previously seen.
By now, of course, this was a Batman that was indeed Bruce Wayne. Barry had reset the timeline (ish) and had a gift for Bruce – a letter from his dear old dad, Thomas Wayne.
This was an emotionally striking and poignant moment to witness as a reader, and it got even more dusty in the room when we got to see the notoriously unemotional Bruce Wayne shed a tear. And with that, there was not a dry eye in the house.
Throughout history, Bruce is someone who simply never truly lets anyone see his emotions, even the very few people who he actually lets get anywhere near close to him. To see this moment play out on the page, though, was one of the most memorable moments of the entire Flashpoint arc.
Could a TV Flashpoint arc in The Flash maybe have something similar happen to, say, Oliver Queen? Given how both of his parents are dead and that The CW's DC realm has no Batman, crazier things have happened.
1. How This May Fit Into The TV Show
As with any adaptation of anything from one medium to another, any take on Flashpoint that we see in The CW's The Flash will obviously be a little different to what we've seen in the comic books.
For instance, the TV show doesn't have the scope or character depth to go as deep in its actions as the comic arc. In TV land, Barry's world is one that involves the likes of Green Arrow, The Atom, Hawkman, Hawkgirl, Firestorm, and now Melissa Benoist's Supergirl. There's no Thomas Wayne to take on the Batman mantle instead of Bruce, there's no Hal Jordan (even though he was teased in an Arrow flashback) to not become Green Lantern, there's no Cyborg to be the world's primary hero, etc.
Given how Barry will shortly be existing in the same world as Supergirl following the Maid of Might's move to The CW, and how that show has recently cast a Superman, the Man of Steel is a vague option for the TV Flashpoint, but that would be too much, too soon and would lack any gravitas.
With the TV Flashpoint, Barry's immediate vicinity is all that we can really expect to change. Wentworth Miller's Captain Cold could well be the hero of Central City, for one. Then there's Stephen Amell's Emerald Archer, who could be pivotal to proceedings should The CW wish to expand their reach to Arrow. In fact, we've already seen a world (Earth-2) where Oliver Queen died and his father Robert became the Green Arrow instead. Maybe that now plays out in Earth-1.
What's most likely is that Barry will be powerless, that Nora will still be alive, and that we could very well see Eobard Thawne's Reverse-Flash lurking in the background ready to taunt Barry for having created a gone-to-the-dogs world.
What do you expect to see from Flashpoint on the TV series? Share your thoughts and theories down in the comments.
The Flash Season 3 Premier on October 4, 2016.
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