Sunday, July 12, 2015

THE FLASH Casts Jay Garrick, Zoom is Season 2 Big Bad


As if there weren't a ton of announcements coming out of San Diego Comic-Con 2015 already, Warner Bros. and DC Comics' three-hour "A Night of DC Entertainment" panel in Hall H provided some exciting news for fans of the CW series The Flash.

Opening the segment with a five and a half-minute highlight reel of Season 1, the video ends with teases of the Flash glowing blue instead of yellow as he runs, with a voiceover of Barry Allen and Jay Garrick meeting one another for the first time.

"Who the hell are you?" asks Barry.

"My name is Jay Garrick," replies Jay, "and your world is in danger."

This is immediately followed with text showing the words "Zoom is coming".  At this point, The Flash cast of Grant Gustin, Candice Patton, John Wesley Shipp, Carlos Valdes and Danielle Panabaker, arrived on stage with Andrew Kreisberg, Greg Berlanti and Geoff Johns hanging around from the Arrow segment.

Kreisberg confirmed that Zoom will be the Big Bad of Season 2, remarking "He's going to be faster than the Reverse-Flash, faster than the Flash, and it's going to be very hard to catch him."

Teddy Sears was announced as Jay Garrick, who will be the first actor to truly portray Jay Garrick in live-action, although Billy Mitchell depicted him in a brief cameo in the Smallville episode "Absolute Justice,"

Sears, 38, is known as Dr. Austin Langham on Masters of Sex and as Richard Patrick Woolsley on Raising the Bar.  His other television appearances include 666 Park Avenue, American Horror Story: Murder House, Torchwood: Miracle Day, Dollhouse, Mad Men, and Law & Order: Special Victims Unit.

Jay Garrick is integral to the Flash mythology," said Kreisberg," and he's never really been portrayed in live action.  Now that we've established our Flash, we thought it would be interesting to bring in the original Flash and create a brand-new episode for Barry to have."

Berlanti added that other Earth-2 characters will be introduced as well.  "This year we're going to be introducing characters from Earth-2," said Berlanti.  "That's obviously the origin of Jay."


In addition, Shantel VanSanten was announced as Patty Spivot, Barry Allen's new love interest and CCPD Detective Joe West's new partner.  As previous reported, Patty is a police officer and science enthusiast along the lines of Arrow's Felicity Smoak.  She is obsessed with metahumans, but has no idea that her new crush is The Fastest Man Alive.

VanSanten, 29, is probably best known as Quinn James on One Tree Hill and as Vera Buckley on The Messengers.  Her other TV appearances include The Night Shift, Beauty & the Beast, The Glades, and CSI: New York.

"We were huge fans of The Messengers and are excited to have Shantel join us to help complicate Barry Allen’s love life in season two," remarked Kreisberg.

Other interesting Season 2 tidbits from the panel:

"We find Barry dealing with some extra tension," said star Grant Gustin.  "He knows that Eddie (Thawne) was ultimately the hero that stopped (Harrison) Wells in the finale and saved everybody.  We find him struggling with his role as a hero.  He’s a lone wolf, working alone."

Iris West has a "new sense of urgency," said Candice Patton, adding that she’s found herself filming in S.T.A.R. Labs more in Season 2.  "Iris is part of the Flash team" and provides "the heart and earth" while Cisco Ramon and Caitlin Snow are the technology and science.

After Cisco was killed in an alternate timeline by Eobard Thawne and his Vibe powers revelation, Carlos Valdes said "As fans saw in the latter half of Season One, Cisco starts having these dreams and starts underoging these biological changes that take place in his mind.  Those kind of augment themselves over time, and yeah, the beginning of Season Two deals with how Cisco deals with that change."

Danielle Panabaker added that she's "beyond excited" about her character doing more as Killer Frost "one day."

Also, fans of Grodd will be glad to know that the super-gorilla will return, as will Captain Cold and Golden Glider.

If you'd like to see the Flash highlight reel shown during the panel, you can view it below thanks to Warner Bros. TV's official YouTube account...



The Flash returns to The CW for Season 2 on October 6, 2015.

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