Arrowverse: Hunter Zolomon / Characters

Hunter Zolomon

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"Never forget. I am the fastest man alive!"

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"Family, such a weakness."

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"Where I came from, I was a speedster like you. They called me The Flash."

Species: Metahuman^note

Known Aliases: Zoom, "Jay Garrick", "The Flash", The Speed Demon, The Fastest Man Alive, "The Crimson Comet"

Played By: Teddy Sears (unmasked), Ryan Handley (masked), Octavian Kaul (young)

Voiced By: Tony Todd (as Zoom)

Dubbed By: Sylvain Agaësse (European French)

First Appearance: "The Man Who Saved Central City" (The Flash 2x1)

Appearances: The Flash | Heroes Join Forces^note(The Flash)

"You can't lock up the darkness. [...] You can't... lock up... the darkness."

A murderous, sociopathic speedster debuting in Season Two. He dresses in a black version of the Flash's suit, which covers his entire body like a cancerous growth. He is obsessed with being the only speedster in the entire multiverse, and sends Earth-2 metahumans to Earth-1 to kill Barry. At the same time, he poses as "Jay Garrick", who is supposedly "The Flash" from Earth-2, and acts as a Big Brother Mentor to Barry and his team. In reality, the real Jay Garrick is The Flash from Earth-3 whom Hunter imprisoned after defeating him in combat. We later find out that, much like Barry, he saw his mother die; the difference was that his father actually committed the crime. Unlike Barry, he had no support system, and was sent to an orphanage where systematic abuse, coupled with no one taking the time to care, led to him taking a horrific path...

After Zoom and Barry's Final Battle, with the entire multiverse on the line, Zolomon is defeated and dragged into the Speed Force by the Time Wraiths, whereupon he is transformed into the Black Flash, the Grim Reaper of Speedsters and an agent of the Speed Force.

See Arrowverse: Speed Force & Forces of Nature page for tropes relating to the Black Flash, his mutated form from the Speed Force.

See Arrowverse: Central City - Citizens page for his Earth-1 counterpart.

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Abhorrent Admirer: When he's posing as Jay Garrick, he and Caitlin develop a mutual attraction and eventually start a relationship. But when Caitlin learns who he is and what he's actually like, she has nothing but fear and disgust for him while he becomes violently possessive of her.
Abled in the Adaptation: Downplayed. He's paraplegic in the comic books, and while it's not the case here, he is instead Secretly Dying from a speed drug overdose.
- Also, while Hunter is clearly deranged, he's more of a psychopath while in the comics Zoom is delusional and almost copmletely detached from reality.
Abusive Parents: "Versus Zoom" shows us that his father was emotionally abusive and murdered his mother.
Actually a Doombot: He uses time remnants to fake his death. The first was killing "Jay Garrick", a time remnant he made to infiltrate Team Flash, and the second was when he fought Barry after killing his father, in which Barry defeats him and has him dead to rights, only to find out that he was fighting his time remnant after the real Zoom shows up and Tele-Frags this duplicate.
Adaptational Intelligence: Zig-zagged. He doesn't possess his comics counterpart's brilliance in the field of psychology, but he is much better at making long-term plans, and is merely The Sociopath instead of being completely detached from reality. He's also far more scientifically inclined than his comics counterpart, able to create his own speed drug, design a device to suppress another speedster's powers, and even figuring out a way to destroy the multiverse.
Adaptational Superpower Change: In the comics he had the power to speed up his personal timeline, making it appear he has Super-Speed when actually he is moving normally while everyone and everything around him is slowed down. Here, he has a connection to the Speed Force and thus has the same powers as other speedster connected to the Speed Force.
Adaptational Angst Upgrade: This version of Hunter was raised in an Orphanage of Fear after his father killed his mother, as opposed to his comic version, who was college age when the aforementioned event occurred. Though he also lacks the Trauma Conga Line that comic Hunter went through afterward.
Adaptational Villainy: A major case. In the comics, Hunter Zolomon was simply a man with bad luck turned supervillain. His father killed his mother before being killed by the police, and as a result, Hunter resolved to become a police officer to understand why this happened, and why villains do what they do. He later loses his wife and has his knee blown out due to a bad call, but only resolves to keep doing his job. He later is further crippled by Grodd and loses his ability to walk, and begs Wally West to use time travel to save his life. When Wally refuses, Hunter uses the Cosmic Treadmill to try to fix it himself; it literally blows up in his face and he gains time powers, but the experience negatively affects his mind. Hunter resolves to become the second Reverse-Flash and make Wally a better superhero by making him experience tragedy. Even after he's defeated by Wally, he apologizes to him. In the show, Zoom is a monstrous psychopath who simply terrorizes people For the Evulz before and after becoming a speedster, long after his mother is killed and his father evidently dies in prison. He targets the Flash not to make him a better hero, but to steal his speed. He puts Barry through tragedy solely to hurt him and prove he can be as corrupt as he is. He decides in the finale to become an Omnicidal Maniac, attempting to destroy all Earths, save for Earth-1, to satisfy his ego and bloodlust. Still, this is the Earth-2 version of Hunter Zolomon; the Earth-1 counterpart (who far as we know is just a normal civilian) averts this.
Adaptational Ugliness: Given that Zoom and Black Flash are completely separate entities in the comics, the DCU version of Hunter never ends up a walking, rotting corpse.
Adaptation Dye-Job: His eyes are black instead of red under black lenses, and his lightning is blue instead of red (though he could have a red lightning when impersonating Jay Garrick and his lightning did become red after being transformed into The Black Flash). He's also got bright red hair in the comics.
Adaptational Relationship Overhaul: In the comics, Hunter Zolomon doesn't really interact with Barry Allen, and instead started off as a close friend of Wally West, before becoming his most personal enemy, much like Eobard Thawne is to Barry. Here, not only are the two very far apart in age, but they never interact, and aren't even aware of each other.
- He does interact with Linda Park, Wally's wife in the comics. In the show, he works with Earth 2 Linda's evil metahuman doppelgänger, while in the comics, he mostly interacts with her through his conflict with Wally, at one point causing Linda to miscarry her and Wally's unborn children.
Age Lift: In the comics, he is closer in age to Wally West. Here, he is obviously older than Wally's predecessor, Barry. Specifically, Hunter was 29 when he became Zoom in the comics, but Teddy Sears is 38 when he started playing him. The age-gap between Barry and Hunter is reminiscent of the gap between Barry and Jay Garrick in DC canon.
Almost Kiss: He and Caitlin nearly kiss in Episode 2x05, but Dr. Light attacks them before they can go through with it.
Ambiguous Situation: In The Flash (2023), Teddy Sears makes a cameo appearance as Jay Garrick in one of the many Earths within the Multiverse as Barry Allen/The Flash witnesses. However, given how Zoom faked being Jay Garrick and that the Arrowverse and the DC Extended Universe co-exist in the same Multiverse as evidenced by Crisis on Infinite Earths (2019), it's unknown if this is merely a Jay Garrick variant that looks like Zoom or Zoom (whether this one or another one) posing as Jay Garrick.
Ambiguously Evil: As Jay Garrick, he's seemingly a good guy and Zoom's enemy, but Zoom considers his death a "complication", which is a strange viewpoint to hold about one's enemy. Also, Jay deceived the main cast on multiple occasions, including the fact that he was Secretly Dying. It stops being ambiguous once it's revealed that he is Zoom and his real name is Hunter Zolomon. The "Jay Garrick" who got killed by Zoom was a time remnant — basically an alternate timeline version of Zoom — who was convinced by his main self to die as part of their plan.
Ambiguously Human: The members of Team Flash insist Zoom cannot be human. Wells adds he was. As it turns out, he was being metaphoric. That said, the demonic voice he makes as Zoom and his ability to turn his eyes completely black make it easy to believe he is this. After his encounter with the Time Wraiths, all ambiguity is thrown out, and he's not only no longer human, but becomes a mindless, ageless Grim Reaper type figure, inhabiting the rotting shell of Hunter's body.
And I Must Scream: His ultimate fate; he ends up being turned into the Black Flash, a feral Humanoid Abomination whose only purpose is to act as the Speed Force's attack dog. Fittingly, during the transformation Hunter screams in terror until he physically can't anymore. Even more horrifying, he never stops screaming, his body just decays to the point where he doesn't have vocal cords.
Appropriated Appellation:
- Two years ago on Earth-2, he faked a hostage situation to lure 15 officers to a place where he could kill all but one. The survivor described him as "zooming". Zoom murdered the man in his home later.
- As he reveals to Joe in the Season Two finale, he stole the Jay Garrick persona from the Flash of Earth-3 after deciding to play the roles of both hero and villain.
Arch-Enemy:
- To Barry Allen, especially considering the fact that he played the role of a false ally like Eobard Thawne did a season prior. He beats the utter hell out of Barry — twice — with the first time ending with him breaking Barry's back and humiliating him in front of all of Central City, kidnapped Jesse and held her hostage to force Harry to do his bidding, seduced Caitlin and — after she learned the truth and rejected him — kidnapped her to invoke stockholm syndrome, and kidnapped Wally to coerce Barry into giving up his speed. For the final finishing touch, he murders Henry Allen in the very same spot where Eobard Thawne murdered Nora Allen, right in front of Barry's eyes. Barry gets set into a Roaring Rampage of Revenge where he develops a burning hatred towards Zoom that he had yet to experience from Thawne. While the Reverse-Flash might be Barry's most personal and hated enemy, Zoom is undoubtedly a very close second, and rightfully so.
- The real Jay Garrick hates Zoom for: 1. stealing his identity to trick the populace of Earth-2 and Team Flash (the leader of whom, as he later learned, was his Earth-1 counterpart's son) and 2. locking him up in a carbine cell and forcing an iron mask on him that dampened his speed and left him unable to speak. After Jay is finally released from his prison, he decides to take something from his captor in return: his father's helmet, which he uses as a symbol of hope to others rather than a false effigy Zolomon used it as to cause despair.
Arrogant Kung-Fu Guy: He's a literal Lightning Bruiser and knows it. As a result, he looks down on everyone. Him being Ax-Crazy just makes things worse.
Artifact Alias: After The Reveal, the team continues referring to Zoom as "Jay", although Barry does call him "Zolomon" in the finale, and Joe backtracks when talking about Zoom to the real Jay Garrick. By Season Three, none of the main cast refer to Zoom as "Jay", only calling him "Zoom" or "Zolomon".
Asshole Victim: He's condemned to spend eternity in a rotting body working on the command of the Speed Force, reduced from an unstoppable fearsome monster to a glorified attack dog with no will of his own. You would almost have sympathy for him were it not for what a rotten bastard he is.
Asskicking Leads to Leadership: It turns out that Zoom is not only a genuinely competent fighter, but also has an entire army of evil metahumans following his command as he prepares to invade Earth-1.
Awesome Anachronistic Apparel: His "Jay Garrick" costume is roughly similar to a late 19th/early 20th century soldier's uniform. In the opening flashback of "Versus Zoom", we see that he deliberately based it on his father's uniform from the War of the Americas.
Ax-Crazy: Zoom is a violent, sadistic maniac who has spent over two years wreaking terror on Earth-2's Central City. "Versus Zoom" reveals that, prior to getting his powers, Hunter Zolomon was a serial killer with 23 bodies to his name. Getting his powers and abusing the Velocity drug just made him even worse. He's so Ax-Crazy that he thinks nothing of creating and killing time versions of himself just to Troll Barry. And his copies agree to being murdered just for that.
Back for the Finale: In the series finale, Zoom is one of several evil speedsters pulled from the point in time before his death, to assist Eddie Thawne in fighting Team Flash.
Badass Boast:
- Delivers a pretty intimidating one to Wells after beating Barry to a pulp:
  Never forget. I am the fastest man alive!
- Delivers one to a captive Barry:
  It's not wise to make promises you can't keep, Flash. Look around. This is the last place you will ever see.
- His voice over at the start of "Escape from Earth-2" qualifies:
  I know you're here, Harrison Wells. And you did not come alone. You can try to hide, but I'm the fastest man alive. I will scour this city until I hunt you down, and when I do, all of you will feel my wrath.
- "YOU CAN'T. LOCK UP. THE DARKNESS."
Badass Bookworm: As "Jay", he claimed he was a scientist in his civilian life on Earth-2. While this ultimately proved to be bullshit, Zoom is incredibly smart, as he created not only the original Velocity drug to enhance his powers, but also a mask that will dampen a speedster's powers and a Doomsday Device capable of destroying The Multiverse. Essentially, he's the Evil Counterpart to all of Team Flash, including Barry.
Badass in Distress: The Time Wraiths turn him into their minion and take him into the Speed Force at the end of Season Two.
Bad Boss:
- Zoom is brutal to the metahumans he sends to kill Barry, and to the evil metahumans that work for him, killing Reverb and Deathstorm for trying to kill Barry, although he does leave Killer Frost alive for trying to get them to stop, even if he chokes her for a short time before leaving. Even that doesn't last — he eventually kills Killer Frost (for trying to kill Earth-1 Caitlin) and Reverb's brother (for getting captured) as well.
- With the reveal that his goal was to steal the Flash's speed, it becomes clear that Zoom never expected any of them to succeed at killing him, and had no problem with leaving them on Earth-1 for the rest of their lives. As "Jay", he even helped Barry kill Sand Demon.
- In "Invincible", Zoom doesn't do a thing to help his minions when Barry returns and starts taking them down; he just stands by and watches. Later in the episode, Zoom just saves himself when Team Flash works out a way to subdue every metahuman from Earth-2, leaving all of his minions to be captured.
The Bad Guy Wins: Gets a lot of this throughout Season Two. The vast majority of his encounters with Team Flash (or anyone else, for that matter) end with him getting what he wants. Plus he's pretty much already taken over Earth-2.
Bait the Dog: It turns out that he was only pretending to be Team Flash's friend Jay Garrick the whole time so he could manipulate them to his own ends. He even laughs his ass off about this in front of them.
Beard of Evil: His flashbacks show that he had a beard during his Serial Killer days. However, he no longer has it.
Beauty Is Bad: A Hunk who also happens to be both a Serial Killer and a Psychopathic Manchild; being the most depraved villain of The Flash.
Be Careful What You Wish For: He had three goals: To save himself, to become the most powerful speedster and to continue spreading fear and hurting people. He ultimately gets exactly what he wants when the Time Wraiths get a hold of him and turn him into a deformed and mindless beast, making him powerful enough to easily defeat other speedsters and turning him into Their enforcer to sic on anyone who breaks the rules of time, making him someone even Eobard Thawne is frightened of.
Becoming the Mask: While posing as Jay Garrick, Hunter develops genuine affection (or as close to genuine as someone like him is capable of) for Caitlin, even claiming to love her. He still tries to kill her after she's run away from him.
- Averted with everyone else. He claims he found pretending to be a hero exhausting and it's clear he hated all the time he had to pretend to be Barry's friend.
Being Good Sucks: He confessed pretending to be a hero is "exhausting".
Berserk Button:
- "Jay" does not react well to being asked to take the Velocity drug; he later blames it for the loss of his speed.
- Never disobey Zoom — especially his prime order of never harming a speedster. He kills Reverb and Deathstorm for planning to team up and betray him, and while he spares Killer Frost for not going along with it, he still strangles her a bit because he's just that pissed at her mere proximity to them. And when the CCPD refused to stand down as he instructed, he murders all of the members at Jitters save Barry, Joe and Singh.
- Don't say you can defeat him or even think it. That charade with Linda impersonating Dr. Light caused him to temporarily abandon his plans to fatten Barry up in favor of trying to kill him in a fit of rage. When he briefly holds Barry prisoner, he gives him a brutal beating for saying that he'll eventually be defeated.
- Don't call him a monster. It triggers him to have flashbacks to his mother's murder. He gives Caitlin a nasty Death Glare when she calls him one.
Beware the Superman: To an even greater extreme than the Reverse-Flash. He's a speedster like Barry, but is a murderous sociopath who shows every bit how dangerous their powers could be in the wrong hands.
Big Bad: For The Flash Season Two.
The Big Damn Kiss: He and Caitlin make out in "Escape from Earth-2" after a lot of Ship Tease previously in the season.
Bitch in Sheep's Clothing: He pretended to be a hero to give people hope, just so he could take it away from them.
Black Eyes of Evil: When they aren't glowing, Zoom's eyes look pitch-black, just like the rest of him. "Versus Zoom" reveals that he can cause this to happen at will, much like Eobard Thawne's glowing red eyes.
Blue Is Heroic: Inverted. He is the most unrepentantly evil speedster Team Flash has ever encountered, and his Velocity drugs give him unique blue lightning.
Brought Down to Badass: Seemingly losing his powers didn't stop him from getting around the beefed-up security in STAR Labs, or from facing Sand Demon to give Barry some time to free Patty. In reality, his powers were working fine, but he still proved himself to be quite capable without using them.
Brought Down to Normal: "Jay" claims to have lost his speed right before the singularity sucked him into Earth-1. He never actually did, but was able to fool everyone, including Caitlin, into believing he had.
Bullet Catch: And Arrow Catch, as he catches Wells' speed-dampening dart and several bullets with contemptuous ease. For reference, Barry has to scramble to catch three or four bullets fired from one gun. Zoom catches a hail of bullets, one-handed, fired by at least ten cops, with no trouble whatsoever.
Zoom: Nice try.
The Bus Came Back: He gets dragged off into the Speed Force by the Time Wraiths at the end of Season Two, but he later reappears as the Black Flash and starts hunting Eobard Thawne.
…But He Sounds Handsome: There's a lot of this whenever "Jay" talks about Zoom, with frequent references to how terrifying and unstoppable Zoom is. Even in disguise, it seems that Zolomon can't help stroking his own swollen ego.
Can't Kill You, Still Need You: The only reason Zoom didn't kill Barry because is because he didn't want to. All of those meta-humans he's been sending are for the sole purpose of making Barry faster. That way, there will be more of the Speed Force to consume when the time comes, so he can stop himself from dying from the Velocity drug.
Card-Carrying Villain: Even discounting his Obviously Evil appearance, Zoom makes no attempt whatsoever at hiding what a monster he is unless he needs to keep up a deception. Even undercover as Jay, he describes Zoom as "an unstoppable demon with the face of death", showing a fondness for his own evil nature. Once he's done with the facade, Zoom positively revels in what an evil bastard he is.
Cast as a Mask: While masked, Zoom is voiced by Tony Todd who gives him a chilling demonic voice. This hides the fact that "Jay" was really Zoom all along.
Catch and Return: Does this with a lightning bolt Barry throws at him.
Celebrity Paradox:
- The Star Trek franchise has been mentioned a lot in the Arrowverse Earth-1 shows. His actor played two characters in the franchise, namely; the brother of one of the main characters^note of Star Trek: The Next Generation, and the older Time-Shifted Actor of the son of The Hero of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine.
- Cisco mentions the Transformers Film Series during the Season Two finale. His voice actor also provided the voice of the second film installment's Big Bad.
Chest Insignia: Like the Reverse-Flash, he wears a backwards version of Barry's lightning emblem, but rather than be black and dark red, it's pure black.
Civvie Spandex: As "Jay", he wore a dark red jacket with a yellow outline of a lightning bolt on it and a winged helmet.
Clark Kenting: Zolomon is a notorious Serial Killer on his world whose trial was all over the media. Somehow, nobody on Earth-2 recognized him in his superhero alias (despite not even wearing a mask) simply because he did not regrow his beard and cut his hair, though perhaps it would be considered a stretch to link one specific serial killer to a well-known superhero that seems fairly public with his identity as "Jay Garrick".
- That being said, given that the explosion that gave Zoom his powers either seriously injured or likely killed the surrounding medical staff, it's very likely that Hunter Zolomon was assumed to have died in the explosion.
- To add another layer to this, Jay Garrick/The Flash is the other half to Zoom.
Colour-Coded for Your Convenience: When he runs, he leaves a trail of blue lightning. It's a side effect of the Velocity drug. If he was going slower, it would be yellow.
Commander Contrarian: As "Jay", his main role in the plot after Earth-2 Wells shows up is pretty much to disagree with him about everything. Justified because he knew Wells could screw up his plans.
Composite Character:
- Zoom is basically an amalgamation of virtually every evil speedster.
  - He carries Hunter Zolomon's supervillain moniker and is ultimately revealed to indeed be Hunter.
  - Visually, his costume is implied to be inspired by the Daniel West Reverse-Flash of the New 52, Pollux from the previous ''Flash'' series, and the Black Flash. This is further exemplified with the latter, since he literally ends up becoming the Black Flash after the Season Two finale.
  - His status as Jay Garrick's impostor belongs to Edward Clariss aka The Rival (who shows up as a Starter Villain in Season Three), and his glowing look when in motion resembles The Rival post-possession of Max Mercury.
  - His blue streaks of lightning takes after the New 52 Future Flash, a version of Barry Allen who went off the deep end.
  - Like Johnny Quick, he's an evil speedster from an alternate Earth.
  - In terms of motivations, his obsession with speed resembles that of Savitar (though Savitar does show up as the Big Bad in Season Three as a Composite Character with Barry Allen).
  - His Red Baron, the Speed Demon, is the name of a Wally West villain.
  - Even there, he bears a few similarities to the New-52 version of Eobard Thawne, such as having his father murder his mother when he was a child and having his principle motivation be stealing Barry's speed. Speaking of which, many of Hunter's comics traits were given to Eobard, such as his wheelchair gimmick and trying to make the Flash a better hero.
- His Serial Killer background originally belonged to his father in the comics. Said father existed here as his mother's murderer, making them a Decomposite Character too.
Consummate Liar: He was never 100% honest with Team Flash about his true identity. They didn't even know that he'd stolen the Jay Garrick name rather than simply made it up until he spilled the beans to a captive Joe West.
Contrasting Sequel Antagonist: Zoom is dressed in black and produces blue lightning when he runs, unlike the Reverse Flash's yellow suit and red lightning. While Eobard Thawne personally hated Barry, though his main goal was to get home and he wanted to make Barry faster so he could do so, Hunter Zolomon has no personal enmity with the Flash other than he's another speedster and he wants Barry to be faster and stronger so he has more Speed Force for Zoom to eat. They both took on secret identities for different reasons: Thawne had to take on the identity of Harrison Wells for his plan to work, while Zoom took on the identity of Jay Garrick just to mess with people. Thawne discovered he actually liked helping Barry be a hero and grew to care for Team Flash as the kids he never had (although he'd have no problem killing any of them if they got in his way), while Zoom found pretending to be Jay "exhausting" and really doesn't give a damn about Team Flash at all. In short, while Eobard Thawne became a slightly nicer person, Hunter Zolomon became a far more villainous character.
Cop Killer: He solidified his supervillain career by killing 15 cops on his earth. When he finally conquers Earth-1 Central City, he kills an entire SWAT team, only leaving Cap. Singh, Joe and Barry alive. When he returns in the series finale, Singh and the CCPD arrive to arrest him, where Zoom is overjoyed at having more cops to kill and thanks Singh like he's been given a present.
The Corrupter: Earth-2 Wells mentions that anyone who got influenced by Zoom completely loses themselves to the dark side. Later he makes it his mission to this to the Flash since despite their similar backgrounds Barry turned out to be a hero.
Curb-Stomp Battle: Inflicts this on Barry, breaking his spine.
Dark Is Evil: He wears a completely black version of the Flash suit. His demonic voice and psychotic tendencies just emphasize this.
Zoom: YOU CAN'T. LOCK UP. THE DARKNESS.
Dark Secret: It's eventually revealed that Jay was not being honest about why he lost his powers. He initially claims that Zoom stole them in their last battle, but later claims that he actually lost them as a side effect of a drug he'd been taking to enhance them. But even that is a lie. In reality, he still has his powers, but he is close to death because of the Velocity drug abuse, and he needs the Flash's speed to cure himself. Also, "Jay Garrick" is just a heroic identity stolen from the Flash of Earth-3 and perpetrated by Zoom for the sole purpose of instilling hope within people only to later rip it away.
Deadpan Snarker:
- He has a very glib, falsely affable response to Wells' attempt at biding for time while Zoom is coercing him.
  Harry: I need more time.
  Zoom: Don't we all?
- Zoom demonstrates a fairly blunt sense of humor when he kills Deathstorm.
  Killer Frost: You know what Zoom will do if you don't obey him!
  Zoom: [suddenly arrives on the scene and kills Deathstorm] That.
- He snarks at Reverb as well:
  Zoom: What did I say you should do if you encountered a speedster?
  Reverb: Leave him unharmed.
  Zoom: [gestures at the battered Flash] Does this look unharmed to you?
Deadly Upgrade: He reveals that he took the Velocity-6 drug before he ever came to Earth-1 because he wanted to be faster. It worked quite well, but it eventually took a toll on his health.
Deal with the Devil: He promised Wells that his daughter would be returned safely to him if the good doctor helped him steal the Flash's speed. Of course, he had no intention of following through on the deal.
Decomposite Character: Zig-zagged. As it turns out, he is Hunter Zolomon, just the one from Earth-2. However, this is still played straight regarding his background; Hunter's role in the comics as a Friend on the Force was given to Eddie in the first season.
Didn't Think This Through: It’s eventually revealed that a lot of Season Two’s plot comes from the fact that Zoom honestly didn’t consider the danger in injecting an untested drug into himself until it was too late.
Dimensional Traveler: He can quite easily take advantage of the breaches between Earth-1 and Earth-2 to hop back and forth with little difficulty, something virtually no other character appears to be able to do willingly. However, even he seemingly can no longer do this once the breaches are finally closed.
Dirty Coward:
- Earth-2 Wells accuses "Jay" of being one, saying that rather than fighting Zoom and stopping him, he ran from him. "Jay" admits that he is afraid of Zoom, but insists that he tried to fight him and simply never stood a chance alone. "Enter Zoom" shows that, lies aside, he wasn't exaggerating how dangerous Zoom was. Even with the new tricks "Jay" taught him, and his superior speed to "Jay" as emphasized by Wells, Barry gets crippled by Zoom without any effort on the latter's part.
- He could also be considered a straight example. He spends all his time going after ordinary people and other speedsters whom he knows he can take on with minimal effort but, when faced with a genuine threat like the Time Wraiths, he's absolutely terrified.
- Earth-2 Laurel outright believes that the reason why he sics metahumans on Barry more times than he takes on Barry himself is because he's afraid of him.
Do Not Call Me "Paul": Downplayed, but he seems distinctly uncomfortable when Caitlin calls him "Hunter".
Dragged Off to Hell: His ultimate fate: after Barry defeats him, he throws him to the arriving Time Wraiths, who subject him to Rapid Aging and drag him away to his fate.
The Dreaded:
- When impersonating Jay, Zoom describes himself as "an unstoppable demon with a face of death", and later "admits" that he was always afraid of him. If Doctor Light is any indication, even the Metahumans he strong arms into attacking the Flash are absolutely terrified of Zoom. As of "Enter Zoom", we can add the entire main cast, several cops, and probably most of Central City to the list of people who are terrified of Zoom. In "Welcome to Earth-2", we see that not only is all of Earth-2's Central City living in fear of Zoom, his own metahuman henchmen are terrified of him. It only takes Zoom showing up to turn Reverb from a Smug Snake into a cowed submissive.
- His helmet first appears in the Season One finale, which the then-Big Bad takes as his cue to leave. As revealed in a later episode, Eobard Thawne was the Flash's biggest fan prior to becoming his Arch-Enemy — it'd only make sense he'd be aware of his next enemy, and considering that Eobard's connection to the Speed Force was shoddy at best at the time, he wouldn't want to stick around for Zoom's appearance, especially since Zoom has made it clear that he wants to be the only speedster left in the multiverse.
- Hunter Zolomon was apparently already this before his transformation into Zoom. On Earth-2, serial killers are an anomaly, so essentially everyone knows who is or isn't one as his name became publicly known. Caitlin saying his name out loud was what alerted Harry. The reason why Harry didn't realize who "Jay" really was is due to the drastic difference in appearances between his last public photo (a long, unkempt beard, paired with overgrown, matted hair and wild, psychotic eyes) and his current, handsome and clean shaven look as "The Flash".
Driven by Envy: The reason he wants to kill Barry is because he wants to be the only speedster in any universe. He also envies Barry having loving parents. Right before he kills him, Henry makes a So Proud of You speech to his son and Zoom is visibly annoyed by this. Word of God teases that he's also jealous of his Earth-1 counterpart's normal, stable life.
Drugs Are Bad: Hunter took Velocity-6 to increase his speed, but it eventually took a heavy toll on his health, driving him to try to steal Barry's speed for a cure.
Drunk on the Dark Side: He was already a homicidal maniac, but Zoom positively revels in the power he gets from his speed.

E-J

Early-Installment Weirdness: In the brief glimpses of Zoom in Season Two's early trailers, he looked rather different. His eyes were glowing blue and his blurred mask looked like a robot's head. When he appears in the show itself, and especially when he fully appears at the end of "The Darkness and the Light", his eyes are pure black and his costume proves more organic.
Empowered Badass Normal: He's a notorious Serial Killer, and his impressive build all but confirms that he's no slouch in getting physical. Then he gains Super-Speed.
Establishing Character Moment: When he parades Barry's broken body around both the CCPD and Central City Picture News buildings within seconds, gloating about his victory, it shows the depths of his hubris and cruelty, along with the extent of his abilities. Also applies to his Jay Garrick persona, as right after Cisco brags about how much he's beefed up security, "Jay" walks into the STAR Labs Cortex to tell Barry his world is in danger.
Even the Guys Want Him: Cisco has a Stupid Sexy Flanders moment when he compliments Hunter's physique. He gets embarrassed by this, obviously.
Even Bad Men Love Their Mamas: It turns out that the only person Zoom ever cared about was his mother. He describes this emotion as a weakness after it gets him lured into a trap.
Even Evil Has Loved Ones: Young Hunter was absolutely crushed upon witnessing his abusive father murder his mother. He also abducts Caitlin, who he flirted with while posing as her friend; however, this proves to be a subversion, as the experience leaves her with PTSD and he later tries to kill her for running away.
Evil All Along: "Jay Garrick" proves to have been nothing but an act, much like Harrison Wells in Season One turning out to be Eobard Thawne.
Evil Cannot Comprehend Good:
- When Barry says that his deception was unnecessary and they would have helped save his life if he'd just asked, Hunter just shrugs it off, believing that they would never have helped him willingly (although, given his nature as a homicidal maniac, he might not be totally wrong on this one).
- He seemed to genuinely believe that Caitlin, whom he'd been getting to know for months, was fundamentally no different from himself or Killer Frost.
- Despite the fact that he pretended to be Jay Garrick for so long, Hunter fundamentally does not understand what it means to be a hero, and complains about his act as being "exhausting", believing that kind of attitude is obviously what Barry Allen is feeling.
  Zolomon: You think your anger is dirty somehow. You want to be seen as pure, the hero. Doesn't that get exhausting? Doesn't it get exhausting, Barry? It was exhausting playing Jay, believe me!
- He thought that killing Henry would be enough for Barry to end up exactly like him. Hunter's mental issues aside, he's known Barry long enough that he should have realized what kind of person he truly is.
Evil Counterpart: To Barry Allen (Earth-1, at least) in more ways than even Reverse-Flash, being completely inhuman and monstrous.
- Emphasised by his Badass Boast after defeating Barry for the first time.
  Zoom: Never forget: I am the fastest man alive!
- Both Hunter Zolomon's and Barry Allen's mothers were murdered by demented sociopaths. In Hunter's case, however, it was his father, who also forced him to watch, which served as his Start of Darkness. Conversely, Barry's father was merely accused of killing his mother but didn't actually do it. Even Zoom himself says Barry could've easily have been him if things were different, though Barry disagrees.
- While Barry was sent to live with Joe and Iris West, people who genuinely cared for him in the wake of his mother's murder, Hunter had no such relatives and/or family members, and so was sent off to an orphanage.
Evil Doppelgänger: Zoom is the bloodthirsty, narcissistic doppelganger of Earth-1's Hunter Zolomon, who appears to be a well-adjusted individual.
Evil Feels Good: Zolomon revels in the carnage he causes, and thinks that his façade of playing hero was only worth it so he could get more enjoyment out of crushing peoples' hopes.
Evil Genius: For a homicidal psychopath, Zoom is surprisingly intelligent and scientifically inclined; he managed to create the Velocity drug, built a device to suppress Jay Garrick's speed, and built a doomsday machine capable of wiping out the entire multiverse.
Evil Gloating:
- When Zoom has Barry defeated and wounded, what does he do? Show off his victory to the newspaper, the CCPD and Harrison Wells. After being outed as the fake Jay Garrick, Zoom shamelessly gloats about how he fooled everyone and how he uses the facade to destroy people's hope.
- In retrospect, a lot of the comments "Jay" made about Zoom, such as him being an "unstoppable demon with the face of death" and his constant (if accurate) warnings that Barry didn't stand a chance against Zoom, come off as subtle Evil Gloating.
- An example that backfires on him is bragging to Barry about his use of Time Remnants on multiple occasions. This directly leads to his own demise.
Evil Is Hammy: It's obvious his actor is having a blast playing an evil speedster. Basically everything Zoom says sounds like an awkward sociopath always on the verge of flipping out.
After Barry gives him his speed: THANK YOU, FLASH!
Evil Is Petty: He outdoes even Eobard Thawne in this regard; Thawne's excuse for villainy was a case of Go Mad from the Revelation, while Zoom was a Serial Killer even before he got his powers. Every evil act he does amounts to "because I can" and to give himself an immense ego boost with the knowledge he can't be stopped. His ultimate act of pettiness is in the penultimate episode of Season Two, when he kills Henry in the old Allen house right before Barry's eyes just to prove the two aren't so different. Justified, as he's confirmed by Word of God to be a sociopath, who by nature tend to have poor impulse control.
Evil Makes You Ugly: Once the Time Wraiths get their hands on him, his face disintegrates.
Evil Overlord: He's grown bored with control over his home world, so he now desires to rule Earth-1 with Caitlin by his side.
Evil Sounds Deep: Like Eobard Thawne, he's able to disguise his voice, making it sound demonic in the bargain. ^note When his face is finally revealed at the end of "King Shark", he has a more natural baritone; in "Versus Zoom", he demonstrates that he can deepen it and blacken his eyes even without the mask on, similar to Eobard Thawne's Red Eyes, Take Warning and Voice of the Legion. Using his demonic voice while wearing his mask is apparently a habit for Zoom; he doesn't drop it even around people who already know his true identity.
Evil Wears Black: Unlike his comic book counterpart, this Zoom dresses head-to-toe in black.
Eviler than Thou: To the Reverse-Flash. In the Season One finale, Eobard Thawne took the appearance of his helmet as his cue to leave and head home, back to the future. In hindsight, it becomes clear he knew full well that was Zoom's helmet and that there was a decent chance of the man himself coming through soon if he stayed any longer. Since Zoom is a brutal Serial Killer obsessed with being the only speedster in the multiverse, there was no way that hypothetical confrontation would've ended well for Thawne, regardless of the experience difference.
Expendable Clone: He's flagrant when it comes to abusing time travel and creating remnants, and is even willing to create them just so he can Troll his opponents by killing them. Being as Ax-Crazy as him, they actually agree to this. Eventually, this behavior caused Time Wraiths to start coming after him, although he's able to avoid them until the Season Two finale, when Barry deliberately draws them out.
Expository Hairstyle Change: Had his hair trimmed starting in "Family of Rogues". It's also revealed that he has longer hair and a Beard of Evil during his Serial Killer days.
Expy: He's got a lot in common with Lord Voldemort. He lost his mother at a young age and grew up in a gloomy orphanage. He is extremely powerful, intelligent and almost unstoppable. He gave himself a new scary name and appearance and dislikes being called by his old name. He's an unhinged sociopath who hides his true nature under a charming and friendly facade, he uses his good looks to cover for his true nature and he's a selfish monster who will stop at nothing to keep himself from dying in addition to being unable to understand the heroic leads.
Face of an Angel, Mind of a Demon: Beneath his mask, Zoom has a handsome face. He's still probably the most brutal, terrifying villain to be seen in the series so far, and is high in the running for the most despicable individual in the entire Arrowverse. As "Jay", Zoom even describes himself as a demon.
Facial Horror: His face disintegrates once the Time Wraiths get their hands on him.
Fake Guest Star: Teddy Sears only missed four episodes (out of twenty three) in The Flash Season Two, yet is not credited as a series regular.
Fake Ultimate Hero: He posed as Jay Garrick, who was held in high regard as the Flash of Earth-2. The entire façade was only a twisted joke on Zoom's part, meant to make the suffering he inflicted in his real identity more enjoyable.
False Friend: He was posing as Jay Garrick the whole time.
Fame Through Infamy: To satisfy his ego and need for others to fear him, Zoom became an incomparable monster that spread terror wherever he went. Even attaining positive attention as "The Flash" seemed to pale in comparison to the mortal dread associated with Zoom.
Fatal Flaw: His arrogance. Zoom is absolutely convinced of his power above everyone he meets and it's clear he never imagined what would happen if he ran into a Speedster or entity that could take him down. He pays dearly for this when the Time Wraiths come after him.
Fate Worse than Death: John Wesley Shipp confirmed in an interview that Zoom is now trapped in the Speed Force, and will likely become a slave to it for eternity as the Black Flash. Ironically, his fate worse than death was to become Death.
Faux Affably Evil: In addition to his Nice Guy act as "Jay", he has a habit of playfully mocking his enemies, as shown after beating down Wells and hoisting him with one hand:
Wells: Say something!
Zoom: Merry Christmas.
Fluffy the Terrible: Downplayed, but Cisco seemed to think Zoom was a rather unimpressive name for someone so terrifying. Then Harry tells the story of how one of his victims referred to him as "blue lightning zooming" and the name wasn't so lackluster anymore.
Foil: To Reverse-Flash. While both are evil speedsters who are more experienced than Barry, both posed as an ally and joined Team Flash where they end up being Barry's Evil Mentor.
- Both stole the identity of someone else, but while Thawne did it copying the genetic template of Wells, Zolomon did it by merely dressing up as Jay Garrick.
- Both pretended to be a hero, Thawne learns that Good Feels Good and grows genuinely attached to Barry and Team Flash, while Zolomon only did it for the fun of it while at the same time told Barry it was "exhausting".
- Both had speedster tricks that allowed them to be in two places at once. Thawne did so via speed mirage where he moves so fast he leaves behind afterimages. Zolomon did so by making a Temporal Duplication of himself that he planted as The Mole.
- Their Evil Plans are very different. Thawne merely wanted to return to his time after being Trapped in the Past while Zolomon wanted to stave off his terminal illness but once he got that he decided to destroy the whole multiverse simply because he could.
- Both used artificial means to augment their speed, only Thawne used a tachyon prototype while Zolomon pumped himself full of Velocity.
- Their ultimate fates have Thawne being Ret Goned while Zolomon is Dragged Off to Hell by Time Wraiths. Conversely, both end up returning, but while Thawne cheated death with Joker Immunity, Zolomon suffered a Fate Worse than Death and experienced a Loss of Identity upon being transformed into the zombie-like speedster known as the Black Flash.
Foreshadowing:
- Looking back before seeing Zoom take his mask off at the end of "King Shark", there were more subtle hints to his identity than first-time viewers realize.
  - "Jay" mentions that he and Zoom were in their final battle before coming to Earth-1, but Harry states the two were rarely if ever seen together.
  - "Jay" teaches Barry how to use his own lightning as an attack; Zoom easily counters the attack in their first battle.
  - Zoom never acknowledges "Jay Garrick". Whenever he talks about the Flash, he only refers to Barry Allen, not "The Flash of this Earth".
  - "Jay" claims Zoom stole his speed, yet Zoom never displays any such ability to Barry despite wanting his speed. Not only is "Jay" lying about ever losing his speed, but Zoom recruits Wells into helping him steal Barry's.
  - "Jay" has been telling everyone not to trust Wells since before they even left Earth-2; soon, Zoom forcibly recruits Wells to work behind Team Flash's back to steal Barry's speed.
  - Zoom somehow knew Barry's ex-girlfriend is a meta on Earth-2. "Jay" spent months silently stalking Team Flash, so stuff like who they recently dated would likely be something he'd pick up.
  - There's also "Jay" getting increasingly upset that Barry thinks he can beat Zoom. While he says that he knows Barry doesn't stand a chance (which is true) and he won't participate in a plan that he knows will get Barry injured/killed, his actual reason for being upset is that he considers himself the fastest speedster in the multiverse and finds it insulting that Barry thinks he can win against him.
  - The Man in the Iron Mask that Zoom is keeping prisoner uses tapping on the glass to communicate with Barry and Jesse, and spells out the word "Jay". When Barry thinks he's referring to the "Jay Garrick" they encountered on Earth-1, the Masked Man shakes his head and tries again, before Zoom interrupts them.
  - After Zoom's first defeat of Barry he runs his defeated body around the city and to all his friends to show Central City that he beat the Flash, but notably takes care to not blow his identity in front of Iris's coworkers or the rest of the police other than Joe (or just on camera in general) by not unmasking him until he's back in Star Labs. His implied reasoning for not exposing him is that he wants to cement that he beat "The Flash" without distracting the city from his image by revealing him to be a regular CSI, but it's odd that Zoom only just showed up but already knows exactly who does and doesn't know the Flash's identity. "Jay" worked closely with Team Flash and picked up on all that.
- "Jay"'s story that he was Trapped in Another World after battling a rival speedster is basically what happens to him for real after being beaten by Barry in the Season Two finale.
- While it has nothing to do with him (sort of), his cover story to Caitlin that some doppelgangers have different names comes into play when the real Jay Garrick turns out to be the Earth-3 counterpart of Henry Allen.
- Zoom replies to one of Harry's pleas for more time by saying "don't we all [need more time]?", foreshadowing the real reason that Zoom wants Barry's speed.
- "Jay" describing Zoom as "an unstoppable demon with the face of death" ends up as a very accurate description of his fate at the end of Season Two, when he is turned into the unstoppable, inhuman Black Flash.
Forced to Watch: His father deliberately murdered his mother in front of him, and he forced Barry to watch him kill his dad just to prove they're the same.
For the Evulz: Beyond his own survival, this is demonstrated to be his sole motivation for all the atrocities he commits. This was true even before he became Zoom, as a newspaper about his arrest states he lacked any motive for his murder spree beyond pure bloodlust. He even says that he masquerades as Jay Garrick because it's "fun pretending to be the hero", giving hope to his victims before he tears it away. It's also the reason why he decides to conquer Earth-1 and beyond in order to widen his scope of victims since, to paraphrase his words, he's already brought Earth-2 to its knees.
Freak Lab Accident: He supposedly got his powers after an explosion caused by running experiments on heavy water. He was sent into a coma, but woke up with super-speed. As far as he knows, no lightning seems to have been involved. However, this is revealed to have been a lie invented for the Jay Garrick persona. He actually got his powers by being exposed to the same energies as Barry in the middle of being subjected to electroconvulsive therapy, so electricity was involved.
Freudian Excuse: When he was a child, his father murdered his mother in front of him. He insists he would have turned out differently if that hadn't happened but it's clear he's just avoiding responsibility for all of the awful things he's done.
From Bad to Worse: A notorious Serial Killer empowered with Super-Speed? What Could Possibly Go Wrong?
From Nobody to Nightmare: He was once a poor abused kid left alone in an orphanage and now he's a monstrous supervillain that everyone is terrified of.
Generic Doomsday Villain: Subverted. Zoom is first characterized as little more than an "unstoppable demon" who wants to eliminate Barry and become faster, in contrast to the more manipulative and complex Eobard Thawne. Later, however, it is revealed that he has been pretending to be Jay Garrick the whole time in order to manipulate everyone, has been deliberately invoking this trope as Zoom, and is shown to have suffered a similar childhood tragedy as Barry did.
Genius Bruiser:
- Prefers operating through catspaws, sees right through an ambush, and calmly observes Barry's tactics to unleash a devastating counter. It helps that he actually taught Barry how to use the lightning-throw tactic in his alternate persona as Jay Garrick.
- He also apparently has enough knowledge of chemistry and biology to create a speed-enhancing drug and enough knowledge of theoretical physics to figure out a way to destroy the multiverse. That's in addition to being a terrifyingly skilled strategist, manipulator and actor who was able to keep up the facade that he really was Jay for months.
Genre Throwback: Earth-2 appears to be based on The Golden Age of Comic Books, with "Jay" as a stereotypical stalwart, square-jawed hero who doesn't even hide his face (and thus his identity) at all. He also seems to have no problem killing his more dangerous villains, as he taught Barry how to use speed lightning on Sand Demon. It turns out to be a smokescreen for his true identity, and Earth-2 proves more like the comics' Earth-3, a world overrun with supervillains.
The Ghost: His father's helmet, which came through the wormhole, is the only sign of his existence in Season One. He appears in-person in Season Two.
Giggling Villain: When he confronts Team Flash after being unmasked, he can't seem to resist laughing in their faces about how good he fooled them.
Glowing Eyes of Doom: His eyes briefly glow red and blue from the lightning generated by absorbing all of Barry's speed in "Versus Zoom". He also sports glowing blue eyes in the early trailers for Season Two, though they're actually pitch-black in the show.
Godhood Seeker: Zoom wishes to be the only metahuman with super speed so that everyone will fear him. He goes even further in the Season Two finale, preparing to wipe out the entire multiverse just to keep a single world as his own personal domain.
Gone Horribly Right: As "Jay", he makes up a story of him being "The Flash" from another Earth stranded on Barry's after fighting a rival speedster. In the Season Two finale, he gets Trapped in Another World for real when the Time Wraiths drag him into the Speed Force after being defeated by Barry.
HA HA HA—No: His reaction to Cisco asking if he pulled a speed mirage between Earth-1 and Earth-2.
Zoom: Even I'm not that fast.
Handicapped Badass: He spends most of the season dying from cellular degeneration (a side-effect of abusing the Velocity drug). It doesn't stop him from easily killing people or beating the Flash to a bloody pulp.
Hell-Bent for Leather: Zoom's costume is made of black leather, and his jacket as The Flash is made of dark red leather.
He Cleans Up Nicely: Pre-Zoom Hunter Zolomon was pale, dirty-looking and with long hair and a thick, unkempt beard, none of which rings true afterward.
Hero Killer: In "Welcome To Earth-2", it's implied that he's killed numerous speedsters and others who've wandered through the breaches. He also kills Henry in the penultimate episode of Season Two.
Hero of Another Story: Supposedly, of a parallel Earth. Then it turns out he's the Villain of Another Story before becoming the villain of this one.
Hidden in Plain Sight: Team Flash's new archnemesis from Earth-2 turns out to be the very same guy who came to warn them about him in the first place.
Hoist by Their Own Petard: Zoom was left dying because of his abuse of Velocity, a drug that he developed to increase his own speed. His final fate is likewise brought on himself; Barry's use of a time remnant (inspired by Zoom's liberal use of the same trick) attracts the Time Wraiths, who subject Zoom to a Fate Worse than Death.
Hope Bringer: The presence of "Jay Garrick" on Earth-2 brings hope to people, even as they're being terrorized by Zoom. That is exactly why Zoom adopted the identity; "Jay" brings hope so Zoom can take it away.
Hope Crusher:
- When Zoom realized that Barry was going to Earth-2, he left a time remnant version of himself on Earth-1, who agreed to die so he could both provide Zoom with an alibi for being on two Earths at once, and help him crush the hope of Team Flash by having their beloved mentor die before their very eyes.
- As mentioned above, Zoom's only real motive for posing as Jay Garrick was to create hope for the express purpose of destroying it.
- After humiliating the Flash in battle, he shows off the hero's broken body to the entire city so they'll lose faith in their protector. He even takes the time to go the newspaper and the police station, just to nail his point home.
  "Look at your hero. This man is no god. He is nothing!"
  "The days of the Flash protecting this city are over. Now what will you do without your precious hero?"
- Just when Barry has finally gotten his confidence back in Episode 2x22, Zoom murders his dad right in front of him.
Humanoid Abomination: Cisco certainly considers him to be this when he first appears to Team Flash as Zoom in Enter Zoom, asking how Barry is supposed to fight "that". Considering he stands 6'4", clad entirely in black, with clawed hands and a demonic mask, and has blue lightning flashing erratically all around him, Cisco has a point.
Hunk: He is handsome, muscular, rectangular-faced and lantern-jawed. He gets a Shirtless Scene to show his muscular side off, and the other characters note that Barry's spare clothes are tighter on him.
Hypocrite: One of Zoom's Berserk Buttons is being called a monster, and he insists that he isn't one. He was a serial killer before getting his powers, and after getting his speed, he runs around in a demonic costume killing people at will while looking and sounding like something that crawled out of the depths of hell, all while being a Hope Crusher for the sake of making everyone afraid of him. His claims of not being a monster really don't have a leg to stand on.
- He also tries to frame himself as a victim, someone whose childhood trauma meant he never had a chance. This coming from a guy who has spent a season absolutely reveling in the destruction and pain he caused.
Iconic Sequel Character: Does not appear in the Arrowverse until its fourth year aka The Flash Season Two, though his hat (better known for belonging to the real Jay Garrick) is seen during The Flash Season One finale.
I Control My Minions Through...: Fear. Out of the various metahumans that Zoom has sicced on the Flash or that he allows to run wild on Earth-2, only Atom-Smasher and King Shark seem to be even remotely loyal to him (and even then, Atom-Smasher was only trying to kill the Flash because Zoom promised to return him home if he did). All the others are kept in line by fear of Zoom, or forced into working for him.
Icy Blue Eyes: When he's not sporting Black Eyes of Evil, he has these, though the icy part doesn't become obvious until The Reveal.
Idiot Ball: Played with. "Jay" stands next to the portal to Earth-2 for a while and turns his back to it, despite the fact that his team told him they were running from Zoom. This allows Zoom to impale him and drag him back through. However, as it turns out, this was a deliberate Thanatos Gambit on the part of "Jay" (a time remnant Zoom had recently created) to ensure his death would further propel Barry to become faster, so that he would have more speed to feed on as Zoom.
If I Can't Have You…: He outright tells Caitlin that if she chooses her friends and rejects being with him, he will show her no mercy by killing her along with all of them. Even when Caitlin tricks Hunter into thinking she wants to be with him in the Season Two finale (luckily, she was using a hologram to trick him), his response is to try and kill her for rejecting him while telling her it's too late.
If You Kill Him, You Will Be Just Like Him!: He seems to believe this about Barry and is keen to have Barry kill him to prove that they're fundamentally no different. This is despite the fact that Barry would only be killing him to save lives while Zoom's actions were done out of pure sadism.
I Have You Now, My Pretty: Kidnaps Caitlin and tries to force her to have Stockholm Syndrome. It doesn't work, but she is left with PTSD after escaping him.
I Have Your Wife:
- He was keeping Wells' daughter Jesse hostage in order to force her father to do his bidding. Barry and co. rescued her.
- At later points in the season he also kidnaps, in order: Barry, Wally, Killer Frost, Caitlin and Joe, and at some point prior he'd kidnapped the real Jay Garrick. In general, this seems to be his second favorite method of getting what he wants (the first being murder).
I Lied: Zoom once spared a single police officer after massacring his whole unit, allowing him to live if he'd tell the world of Zoom's greatness. After the officer kept his end of the bargain, Zoom went to his home and killed him anyway.
Impaled with Extreme Prejudice: In "Escape from Earth-2", Zoom shoves his arm through his time remnant's torso and drags him back through the portal to his world, killing him in the process. He does the same thing to another time remnant in "The Race of His Life".
I Need You Stronger: He forces other villains to fight Barry in order to force him to become faster, as he plans to take his speed and become faster himself.
Informed Flaw: He's said to be Secretly Dying, but there's little indication that he's sick other than characters mentioning it a few times. His illness has absolutely no noticeable effect on his ability to use his powers (his claim of being Brought Down to Normal was an act) and curbstomp Barry at will.
In Name Only: In the comics, the speedster calling himself Zoom is a (reverse) Legacy Character for Eobard Thawne, even wearing a similar yellow costume. Here, he appears to be a completely separate character. He is not a Time Master as he was in the comics, but a traditional speedster. This ultimately proves to be a Zigzagging Trope as he turns out to be the Earth-2 version of Hunter Zolomon and shares some elements of classic Zoom's backstory, though he is a much more evil bastard in this version.
Insane Equals Violent: He's never explicitly confirmed as mentally ill, but Zolomon spent time in an asylum, and, in addition to having already been a prolific Serial Killer, as Zoom, he has probably the highest body count of any villain in the series so far.
Insane Troll Logic: He has a lot of this going on due to being unable to understand people who are heroic. He insists that he and Barry are fundamentally no different and believes that Barry will end up as evil as him if given a push, in this case losing his father. This is despite the fact Barry already lost his mother at a young age and still became a hero and has repeatedly shown that he has nothing in common with Zoom. Zoom seems genuinely unable to grasp that concept likely as a way of avoiding responsibility for his actions. He also wants Barry to kill him, believing that it will prove They're the same even though Barry would be killing him for purely pragmatic reasons while Zoom's actions were completely sadistic.
In Spite of a Nail: His costume is an all-black version of Barry's Flash suit, even though "Jay" is the Flash on Earth-2 instead.
Ideal Hero: Deliberately plays himself off as this as "The Flash", being a handsome, pure-hearted, maskless superhero similar to those of the Golden Age, just to further add contrast to Zoom.
Interspecies Friendship: Jay mentions one of his best and closest friends originates from Earth-2's Atlantis. Considering later about the character, however, it's pretty likely that this was either a lie or yet another false friendship.
Invincible Villain: Nothing can stop him. Even a speedster's natural weakness like a cold blast will only delay him. Subverted by the end of Season Two, where Barry has become fast enough to defeat Zoom.
Irony: Zolomon spent most of his time on The Flash trying to escape his impending (self-inflicted) death. Because of the methods he used, he ends up a victim of the Speed Force, and becomes its version of The Grim Reaper. In trying to avoid death, he becomes it.
It Amused Me: He was bored just playing the villain, so he decided to take the hero's name and shtick too. That's why we knew him as Jay Garrick instead of the bright-suited old man who looks like Henry.
It's All About Me: He wants to kill every speedster in existence because he thinks he deserves to be the sole person with the power. He also wants Barry's speed so that he can become even faster and save his own life, throwing away the lives of his minions and killing a number of innocent people to achieve his goals. In "Versus Zoom", he flat-out admits that he doesn't care how many people he's killed as long as he can get what he wants.
It's Personal:
- He really seems to hate Harrison Wells, to the point of wanting to kill his daughter in front of him just out of spite. It's not really clear why. It's likely that it's because Wells was the only real threat to his reign of terror before he came to blows with Barry.
- Subverted with Barry. While Zolomon purposely made it personal on Barry's end to give him the motivation to become faster, it was never personal on Zolomon's end. Other than some vague resentment against Barry for having a stable home life after his mother's death opposed to Zolomon being dumped in an Orphanage of Fear when his own mother died, Zolomon largely screwed with Barry For the Evulz rather than for any real personal hatred he felt.
Jerk with a Heart of Jerk: Harry reveals in a story that Zoom massacred a whole unit of police officers, but purposely allowed one to live to warn the world about his presence. The cop did as he was told and was thankful for his chance to live. Unfortunately, Zoom later killed the officer anyway at his house.
The Juggernaut: He's the fastest being in any universe, and he has unbelievable combat prowess to back it up, with the ultimate result being that if he wants anyone dead—including powerful metahumans—he can pretty much instantaneously will it to be so. He forces other metahumans to "work" for him under this threat. Ultimately there appear to be a few things that can slow him down briefly, arguably making him more of an Implacable Man, although even these are extremely hard to attack him with given his incredible speed and reflexes.

K-R

Karma Houdini Warranty: He spends the entirety of Season Two and very long before it escaping justice of any kind until the Time Wraiths come after him and take him away.
Karmic Death: After Zoom used his time remnant as a plan to hurt Team Flash, Barry defeats him with the same tactic. The Time Wraiths then show up and drag him away because of said temporal meddling on Zoom's part. Although he continues to exist afterward as the Black Flash, Hunter Zolomon appears to be dead in every way that counts.
Karmic Transformation: The Time Wraiths cause his appearance to decay, causing him to look like a rotting corpse and making Zoom as monstrous on the outside as he was on the inside.
Kick the Dog:
- As if beating Barry within an inch of his life wasn't enough, he drags his broken body all across town to publicly humiliate the hero in front of the entire city in order to crush their faith in him, then stabs Barry in the gut just to hurt him a little more before trying to kill him.
- He brings Jesse through the portal to Harry, only to take her away the moment Wells comforts her.
- Years ago, he killed 14 out of 15 officers, sparing only one to let people know he existed. He then murdered the man in his home when he thought he was safe.
- While killing Deathstorm and Reverb is at least somewhat justifiable (they were both defying his orders and Reverb expressed some treacherous notions), he throttles the already cowed and loyal Killer Frost for no apparent reason.
- In "Escape from Earth-2", he brutally beats a captive Barry for vowing to defeat Zoom.
- He also reveals that he loves to Yank the Dog's Chain
Joe: Why the charade? Why pretend to be the Flash?
Zolomon: To give people hope, Detective.
Joe: Hope?
Zolomon: So I could rip it away from them!
- After lying to Rupture about who killed his brother, Zoom kills him as well, revealing the truth just to twist the knife.
- After the team's attempt at restoring Barry's speed fails and seemingly kills him, Zoom shows up just to rub it in.
- He kept the real Jay Garrick in a cage and a mask that suppressed his powers and kept him from speaking after stealing his identity and using it to play hero so that the carnage he caused as Zoom would be less boring.
- Kills Henry in front of Barry in the same house (and spot) his mother was murdered by Eobard Thawne.
Knight of Cerebus: By far the darkest character to ever appear on The Flash, and a contender for scariest character in the entire Arrowverse. Until he directly confronts Barry, Season Two has been a serious but still lighthearted season that explores The Multiverse and his threat is only referenced by "Jay" or Harry. When he finally shows up, he immediately shows why he's a threat by brutally curb-stomping Barry, showing off his broken body around Central City, and nearly killing him, leaving the entire cast in shock.
Lack of Empathy: His response to Barry yelling that he doesn't care about the people he's killed? Emphatically state that indeed he doesn't.
Lantern Jaw of Justice: He definitely has a solid square jaw. Cisco even points it out on at least one occasion.
Large and in Charge: At 6'4'', Zoom towers over most of his minions, with only Atom-Smasher and King Shark dwarfing him (and even they bend to Zoom's will without any trouble).
Laser-Guided Karma:
- It turns out that Zoom took the Velocity drugs to enhance his speed, but his addiction to increasing his powers is now slowly killing him. He wants to avoid his possible Karmic Death by harnessing Barry's speed to cure himself.
- As the Black Flash, his main focus is to find Eobard Thawne, a man who should've died long ago, for more reasons than one.
Late-Arrival Spoiler: The fact that he's not the real Jay Garrick, and that his real name is Hunter Zolomon, both of which were important twists, are casually mentioned during Season Three of The Flash.
Leitmotif: Has an overtly creepy, demonic piece of theme music. Some small portions resemble the Flash's theme, albeit much darker and menacingly.
Let No Crisis Go to Waste: He takes advantage of Thawne's manipulation of Team Flash as a selling point against Harry Wells. Initially, it works like a charm, with even Caitlin telling him that she doesn't trust Wells and trusts him. And by the time the jig is up, he's already gotten what he wanted.
Lightning Bruiser: Puns aside, he's literally described as the fastest of all speedsters, and he's stronger than Barry and Eobard until the end of Season Two. When he and Barry fight for the first time, he effortlessly pulls a Catch and Return on Barry's lightning bolt, then proceeds to brutally thrash Barry, breaking his back, and pulls a Bullet Catch on Earth-2 Wells' dart and a full barrage from the CCPD — one-handed, no less, while he's dragging a thrashed Barry around to show him off to Central City.
Like Father, Like Son: Despite hating being called a "monster" like his father James, Hunter grew up to become a violent man, just like his father (albeit much, much worse), even going on to hide his monstrous personality beneath the façade of a respected hero, and even basing said "respected hero"'s appearance off of his father.
Love Hungry: Hunter developed an obsession with Caitlin and invoked Stockholm Syndrome by kidnapping her and trying to force her to love him and reciprocate his affections. It doesn't work.
Love-Interest Traitor: He poses as Caitlin's love interest for his "Jay Garrick" facade. Zoom's real intention is to exploit Team Flash to cure his condition and to do more misdeeds.
Love Is a Weakness: He proudly tells off Barry for caring about his friends and family, declaring them as a liability. Zoom even considers positive feelings he himself has to be a weakness; he falls into a trap set by Barry because he was distracted by memories of his childhood, and he later tries to murder a defenseless Caitlin despite her claiming that she wanted to be with him (thankfully, she was using a hologram to trick him).
Love Makes You Crazy: Hunter is already Ax-Crazy as it is, but he acts even more psychotic where his Villainous Crush on Caitlin is concerned. He's so much of a Stalker with a Crush and a Yandere for Caitlin that he ends invoking Stockholm Syndrome by kidnapping her and keeping her hostage in his lair so that she will love him. His obsession with Caitlin is downright disturbing and creepy especially when you take into account his serious Mommy Issues and how strong Caitlin physically resembles his mother Ashley.
Love Makes You Evil: Inverted. Hunter was already evil and a villain. He just happened to develop an unhealthy obsession with Caitlin. But Caitlin does indirectly inspire Hunter to become an Evil Overlord and conquer Earths with his desire to have Caitlin rule alongside him.
Loving a Shadow: After his backstory is revealed, it becomes very clear that his Villainous Crush on Caitlin was just a shallow attempt of trying to project his deceased mother Ashley on to her. That's why it was so easy for him to give it up when she rejected him to return to her friends.
Mad Love: Hunter was obsessed with Caitlin and he was trying to force her to love him. But Caitlin was completely repulsed by him after finding out his true identity as Zoom and wanted nothing to do with him, so much that he became an Abhorrent Admirer for her. He tried to invoked Stockholm Syndrome by kidnapping her and holding her hostage in his lair on Earth-2. His obsession for her became more psychotic in nature to the extent that he gave Caitlin an ultimatum: choose to be with him and rule Earth-1 alongside him or choose her friends and die along with them.
Malevolent Masked Man: He sports a sinister-looking mask, which somewhat resembles his electroshock therapy mask. He's also a Serial Killer and his evilness has been shown and described as elaborately as possible.
Manipulative Bastard: He played Team Flash like an orchestra for the whole second season and succeeds at gaining the Flash's speed.
Master Actor: He could give Daniel Day-Lewis a run for his money. He spent months pretending to be a hero and getting close to Team Flash all the while he absolutely hated every minute of it.
Meaningful Name: "Zoom" means either to travel very quickly or to change smoothly from a long shot to a close-up or vice versa. Aside from the obvious fact that he is a speedster, he loves suddenly appearing up-close to his victims. His real name is Hunter, befitting his Serial Killer background.
Military Brat: Implied, as his father did served in the War of the Americas. It is unclear, however, if his father is just conscripted or actually has a military career.
Misblamed: In-Universe. Barry initially distrusts Jay since his previous mentor, turned out to be an enemy. However, Jay notes that he had nothing to do with that. It takes time for Barry to realize that Jay was innocent. Subverted when it turns out the person they knew as "Jay" was Zoom all along, meaning that Barry was actually Properly Paranoid.
Morality Pet: Caitlin is able to talk Hunter out of killing Barry. Doesn't stop him from taking her as a prisoner or later trying to murder her for running away, though.
Movie Superheroes Wear Black:
- In the comics, Zoom's costume is essentially the same as Eobard Thawne's, just with black eye lenses. Here, it's all-black to help differentiate them and to show that he's evil.
- This is also in effect with the suit he wears for his Jay Garrick persona. In the comics, Jay wears a bright red long-sleeved shirt with a big golden lightning bolt on it, as well as bright blue pants and red boots, the latter sometimes sporting golden Mercury wings. Here, "Jay" wears a dark maroon soldier's jacket with merely a golden outline of the lightning bolt, dark blue pants, dark brown boots with no wings, and even dark brown gloves. This is yet another aspect of him twisting the legacy of the real Jay from Earth-3, who dons an outfit much more akin to comics Jay once freed from the iron mask.
Mr. Fanservice: Upon first meeting him, Caitlin and Iris waste no time in complimenting his physique.
Multiversal Conqueror: Decides to become one once he solves his You See, I'm Dying issue, for no real reason other than For the Evulz.
Murder Is the Best Solution: To an even greater extent than the Reverse Flash. While Thawne at least makes a token effort at justifying his murders with Because Destiny Says So and the fact that the people in question are dead in his time anyway, Zoom doesn't even bother trying to make an excuse. His first (and usually only) solution to any problem (including boredom) is to kill and/or threaten to kill someone.
Names to Run Away from Really Fast: An Ax-Crazy Serial Killer named Hunter who also happens to be a speedster? Good luck trying to actually run away from him.
Near-Villain Victory: In "Enter Zoom", he is about to kill Barry before Cisco shoots him in the back with one of Wells' darts. And even then, it just drives him off.
Neck Snap: In addition to the Tele-Frag that evil speedsters use for execution, this is also a preferred method of murder.
Never My Fault: He has this in regard to his becoming a Serial Killer after his father killed his mother, claiming that his capacity for empathy was "taken" from him even though he knowingly killed twenty-three people on his own. When he meets with Barry near the end of the season, he insists that anyone could have ended up like him if they went through what he did, and has no real response when Barry proves him wrong. This fits in with the rest of his personality; sociopaths like Zolomon are often pathologically incapable of accepting responsibility for their own wrongdoing.
Nice Guy: His persona as Jay. In reality, he's about as far removed from this trope as you can get.
Not Good with Rejection: The greatest consideration that he shows to Caitlin when she rejects his romantic advances is to not kill her on the spot. The next time they see each other, even when it seems like she's trying to return his affections, Zoom's response is to try to kill her.
No-Holds-Barred Beatdown: He cripples Barry with his own bare hands.
No Challenge Equals No Satisfaction: This seems to be a big reason for his pretending to be Jay. He wanted the challenge and to make the pain he caused even worse.
Not So Above It All: During Christmas, "Jay" playfully pranks Caitlin by pretending he doesn't know what the holiday is.
- Earlier during that episode, when Harry mentioned that every Earth has The Godfather, Jay nods in agreement.
No-Sell: He just brushes off everything that Barry and his team throw at him. Even after being hit with a speed suppressing dart, Zoom is just inconvenienced, and only for about a second before he escapes.
"Not So Different" Remark: He and Barry have similar origins: Both of their mothers were killed in front of them with both their fathers going to prison for it. However, while Barry's father was framed, Hunter's father did actually kill his mother. And while Barry was raised with love, Hunter had no one and grew up in darkness. Hunter insists that Barry could have easily been him.
Not So Similar: Zolomon believes that, at heart, Barry is just like him and just lucked out by getting a better life after losing his mother. As he proves, both directly to Zoom and several times over afterwards, even at his worst, Barry isn't capable of even a tenth of Zolomon's depravity. Even Savitar, arguably the darkest possible version of Barry, is capable of love, affection, and genuine courtesy, all qualities that Zoom distinctly lacks. In the end, Zolomon's assertion that he and Barry are the same is nothing more than a flimsy attempt by Zolomon at dodging responsibility for what a vicious, abhorrent human being he turned out to be.
Nothing Is Scarier: One of the things that makes Zoom so terrifying is that nothing is really known about him; he just showed up on Earth-2 after Wells' accident and started terrifying the populace. His identity, his appearance under the costume, why he's so much faster than Barry, and his motives (outside of stealing Barry's speed eventually) are all shrouded in mystery until later in the season.
Obfuscating Disability: "Jay's" alleged loss of power is just a lie made up by Zoom while he's masquerading as Jay.
Obviously Evil: Zoom wears entirely black outfit, sports a demonic voice and appearance, constantly has blue lightning sparking around his body, and almost every scene he appears in has him threatening or trying to kill someone. Unless he's in his "Jay Garrick" disguise, no one could spend any amount of time around Zoom and mistake him for anything benevolent.
Oh, Crap!:
- When he sees a cardboard picture of his father and realizes that Team Flash has discovered his true identity.
- He has an even bigger Oh, Crap! moment when he sees the Time Wraiths hurtling towards him after Barry has beaten him in combat.
Older and Wiser: Sort of. He's capable of some tricks that Barry isn't aware of, but by his own admission he's only been the Flash in Earth-2 for a couple of years — only around a year longer than Barry. It's then further subverted when he accepts Earth-2 Wells' long-standing admonishment that his refusal to take risks means he wasn't nearly as effective as he could have been, and calls Barry the better Flash.
- Later we understand why he has great knowledge of what being a speedster entails, since he acted as both the Flash and Zoom to give people hope, then take it away from them.
Omnicidal Maniac: He clearly has zero regard for human life and takes pride in killing so many people, but he really hits this trope with his attempt to trick Barry into helping him destroy the entire multiverse save for Earth-1. Notably, he doesn't actually have it as an end goal that he wanted altogether; he's just wants something to do after solving his initial problem.
Orcus on His Throne: Rather than face the Flash himself, he coerces others like the Atom Smasher and the Sand Demon to dispose of the Scarlet Speedster for him. He's dying from the Velocity drug and he needs Barry's speed to cure it. He's been sending all of those metas so Barry will get stronger and faster as he fights them.
- Barry manages to lure him out in "Enter Zoom". Unfortunately for Barry, Zoom sees the ambush coming. Not that it likely would've made much difference considering the power difference between them at the time.
- In "Running to Stand Still", he reveals he doesn't want to kill Barry just yet — he wants him to get faster so he can steal more Speed Force. Once he decides he's ready to steal Barry's speed, he completely averts this and does almost everything himself; in fact, the team has to close the portal just to keep him out.
Orphanage of Fear: Implied to have ended up in one after his mother was murdered by his father.
Outside-Context Problem: He's from another universe. Even on Earth-2, no one, with the possible exception of Wells, has any idea who Zoom is, and he tries to keep it that way, although he makes sure that they're all afraid of him.
Painful Transformation: He is screaming in agony when he is being transformed into the Black Flash by the Time Wraiths.
Parental Abandonment: A very unfortunate example. His father was sent to prison for killing his mother. Unlike in Barry's case, though, he was actually guilty and did it in front of Hunter.
Pay Evil unto Evil: He later kills Killer Frost, who had been quite the Ungrateful Bitch and tried to kill Caitlin after setting her free.
Pet the Dog: After stealing Barry's speed, he leaves him alive at Caitlin's urging. Then he promptly subverts it by kidnapping her.
Phlebotinum Dependence: Turns out that due to his use of the Velocity drug, he's dying and now needs to consume speed from others to survive.
Power Incontinence: A downplayed variant. Even while standing still and not blurring himself, he constantly has flashes of lightning sparking around his body. It's later revealed that his blue lightning is an effect of the Velocity drug's enhanced speed. Notably, Trajectory's lightning turned blue before she literally ran herself to death; oddly, this doesn't seem to be something that worries Zoom, although it's possible that Velocity's effects aren't as severe on someone who was already a speedster.
Pragmatic Villainy: The only reason he hasn't killed the Flash yet is so that he can steal Barry's speed and make himself more powerful. He also issued a standing order to his minions that any speedsters they encounter are to be left unharmed, presumably so Zoom can either steal their speed or kill them personally.
Pride: Clearly a big part of Zoom's personality. He wants to kill every other speedster so that he can be the only one, and after easily overwhelming Barry, he declares himself "the fastest man alive". He also sounds almost insulted that Wells thought that Barry could beat him. Harry later relates an incident where Zoom massacred all but one of a SWAT team just so the survivor could spread the word and rub in to the police that they couldn't stop Zoom.
Psychopathic Manchild: In addition to all his other petty acts of malice, why did he assume the Jay Garrick alias? Because he finds it amusing to pretend to be a hero. His tone and expression while describing this motive to Joe makes him sound like a child explaining the appeal of a particularly fun game.
Psychotic Smirk: In "Versus Zoom", once Zoom no longer has to hide his true self, he seems to relish giving this off to the members of Team Flash since he knows they'll give him the Flash's speed.
Red Baron: "The Speed Demon". "The Crimson Comet" is a subversion since it's revealed that he stole it from the real Jay Garrick.
Red Is Heroic: Played up for his Jay Garrick persona, though it's a much darker version of Jay's outfit in the comics.
Reminiscing About Your Victims: In retrospect, a lot of "Jay"'s warnings about Zoom and all the horrible things he's done, such as the aforementioned SWAT team massacre, are this.
The Resenter: He can't stand the existence of other speedsters and does everything he can to make sure he's the only one. When we find out his backstory, it's also implied that he hates Barry because while they both suffered familial tragedy, Barry was taken in by the West family, while Hunter was sent to a foster care since his remaining relatives refused to take him in.
The Reveal:
- Jay Garrick, Earth-2's Flash is actually him; more specifically, the one who died was a time remnant of him (time travel was involved). Slightly less earth-shattering is the revelation that his true identity is Hunter Zolomon, convicted serial killer.
- In Episode 2x23, "The Race of His Life", we learn that Jay Garrick actually does exist, but he hails from Earth-3; Hunter kidnapped and imprisoned him behind an iron mask, stealing his name and making a costume based on his own in order to create the heroic persona.
- Episode 2x10 of Legends of Tomorrow, "The Legion of Doom," reveals just what happened to him after he was abducted by the Time Wraiths: he's been transformed into the Black Flash.
Rogues' Gallery Transplant: Zoom is traditionally the Arch-Enemy of the Wally West incarnation of the Flash, not an enemy of Barry Allen or personal foe of Jay Garrick.

S-Y

Sadist: Zoom clearly enjoys the suffering of others because it makes him feel above them. His entire motive for wreaking havoc is for the sheer entertainment value.
Sadistic Choice: He offers Caitlin the choice of either standing by his side when he conquers Earth-1 or die never reaching her friends before he slaughters them all.
Sanity Slippage: Not that he was ever all there to begin with, but he becomes even more unhinged in the last part of Season Two, graduating from acts of wanton cruelty to trying to commit universal genocide.
Second Episode Introduction: While he's mentioned in The Flash Season Two premiere, we only get a brief glimpse of him from behind; he fully appears in the following episode. Subverted after The Reveal that he's actually "Jay Garrick", as he appeared throughout the Season Two premiere using that identity.
Secret Identity: Much like Eobard Thawne, Zoom's true identity remained a secret to even the viewer until near the end of the season, when it's revealed he is actually Hunter Zolomon, or to his "friends" on Earth-1, "Jay Garrick".
Secretly Dying: He's dying from the Velocity drug, and he wants Barry's speed in order to cure it. After "Versus Zoom", he appears to have indeed been cured.
Serial Killer: He loves targeting speedsters. "Versus Zoom" confirms he is one, and was one long before the Velocity drug made him have to try and kill to survive. He was convicted of twenty-three murders and locked away in a mental hospital.
Ship Tease: Caitlin takes quite an interest in "Jay", who wants to bond with her as well. They have an Almost Kiss before Dr. Light attacks them. Throughout the midseason finale, "Jay" playfully flirts with Caitlin, prompting Cisco to tell them to just kiss and get it over with. They indeed become a couple, only for "Jay" to drop the death of his time remnant on Team Flash, further pushing them to the depths of despair. Next time Caitlin meets him, she knows that he's nothing but a monster, even if she tries to make him remember his feelings for her in order to stop him from choking Barry to death; in the season finale, she plays upon those feelings to distract him, but he shows that he's stopped caring at all when he tries to kill her.
- In "Back To Normal", it's revealed that his feelings for Caitlin led him to spare Killer Frost, though he still kills her when she tries to kill Caitlin.
Shout-Out: When he breaks the Flash's back and parades him around Central City, it's very reminiscent of Bane's trademark story.
Skeletons in the Coat Closet: Downplayed, but his mask is reminiscent of a demonic skull. "Versus Zoom" suggests that the mask was inspired by one he wore while undergoing electro-convulsive therapy.
Slasher Smile: Can deliver downright manic grins. One in particular when agreeing to return Caitlin home to Earth-1, while deciding to widen his scope from just conquering Earth-2 to the entire multiverse, is stunningly horrific.
Small Name, Big Ego: Okay, not really small name, since he's an infamous criminal. However, he loves boasting that he has "conquered" the entirety of Earth-2, yet the only place he seems to have taken over is Central City.
Smug Smiler: After he drops the "Jay" act, he is absolutely full of self-satisfied smirks about how much pain he caused the team.
Smug Snake: As noted above and below, Zoom is absolutely convinced of his power and is convinced nothing can stop him and will brag about both facts at every available opportunity. Barry puts an end to his delusions by summoning the Time Wraiths.
Smug Super: He's deeply confident in his own abilities, and for good reason. However, he proves to be capable of making little mistakes that trip him up.
The Sociopath: Has been called as such by his actor in an interview, and his Lack of Empathy and murderous tendencies more than back up that claim. He is also able to lie very well and has a certain jovial charm to him, as well as an overly inflated sense of self-worth to the point that the suggestion of someone being superior to him is a Berserk Button. After his initial scheme to save his own life succeeds, he demonstrates the characteristic poor impulse control of a low-functioning sociopath, moving from one plan to another whenever a new one comes to mind as being amusing (kidnapping Caitlin, taking over Earth-2, then destroying the multiverse). He outright admits that stealing Jay Garrick's identity was more or less solely done to sate his boredom, and even using a time remnant as part of posing as Jay for Team Flash seemed more about the inevitable payoff of killing the remnant in front of them, thus leaving them all devastated, rather than any practical reason.
The Spook: He's a speedster who wants to kill off every other speedster. That pretty well sums up everything we know about him for most of the season. Even Jay, his Arch-Enemy, has no idea who Zoom really is (or so he claims). It's heavily implied that Earth-2 Wells knows more about him, but he's not exactly forthcoming with information; however, it turns out that Wells didn't even realize Zoom had been hiding in plain sight all along.
Stalker with a Crush: He becomes one for Caitlin. Hunter becomes obsessed with her to the extent that he kidnaps her and holds here hostage in his lair on Earth-2. He kidnapped her in the hopes that she would love him. Unfortunately for him, invoking Stockholm Syndrome on her does not work.
Stalker without a Crush: He's been tracking down Barry and the S.T.A.R. Labs crew ever since the Season One finale.
Steven Ulysses Perhero: His real name is Hunter Zolomon. The secret identity name itself was apparently a coincidence.
Stockholm Syndrome: After his true identity is exposed, he tries to invoke this trope on Caitlin, wanting her to love him. Naturally, she doesn't fall for it.
Strike Me Down with All of Your Hatred!: He tries to get Barry to kill him so he can claim they're the same as he has insisted. Barry doesn't take the bait but probably makes Hunter wish he had.
Strong Family Resemblance: He looks a lot like his father, and the resemblance is only enhanced in Zolomon's "Jay Garrick" disguise.
Summon Bigger Fish: This is ultimately how he is defeated. Zoom may be powerful but he's nothing compared to the Time Wraiths who promptly drag him away to his fate.
Super-Speed: He's a powerful speedster and Evil Counterpart to the Flash.
Superpower Lottery: He's one of the most powerful villains in the Arrowverse.
Tall, Dark, and Handsome: He stands a whopping 6'4 and is a Hunk to boot. His hair is more auburn/light brown than actually dark brown, though.
Tall, Dark, and Snarky: Once his masquerade is over, he starts giving insanely sarcastic remarks.
Temporal Duplication: Making time remnants is practically a Signature Move for him, letting him be in two places at once or just to mess with people.
That Man Is Dead:
- Implied. When Caitlin tries to convince him to stop killing people, calling him "Jay" in the process, Hunter just dons his mask and makes a cold remark before going about his plans.
  Zoom: My name... is Zoom.
- Previously, when Caitlin addressed him as "Hunter", Zolomon became agitated, implying a dissociation with his birth name.
There Can Only Be One: His main goal, aside from saving his own life, is to be the only speedster left in The Multiverse.
There's No Place Like Home: Zoom seems to be fond of invoking this for the metahumans he press gangs into his service. "Wanna go back to Earth-2? Kill the Flash for me." Not that he actually expects them to succeed or has any intention of taking them home.
They Look Just Like Everyone Else!: He looks like an attractive man underneath his mask.
To Be a Master: An (extremely) villainous version; this is his ultimate motivation outside of saving his own life and For the Evulz. Zoom wants to be the fastest man alive on any Earth, which means that any other speedster needs to be killed, de-powered, or imprisoned. Since the multiverse is too big for him to deal with every other speedster personally, his ultimate solution is to build a Doomsday Device and destroy the rest of the multiverse outside of Earth-1.
Zolomon: When we first met, I told you that Zoom needed to be the best. You just didn't realize that I was talking about myself.
Touché: When Barry manages to outspeed him and figure out who he really is, he's genuinely impressed.
Token Evil Teammate: For the first fourteen episodes of Season Two, he impersonates Jay Garrick, giving guidance and mentoring Barry Allen, only to turn out to be the Big Bad Zoom all along.
Trapped in Another World: Double Subverted. He makes this excuse as "Jay" when he was introduced, stating that he lost his speed and was sucked from Earth-2. As written here many times, it's a lie. However, the Time Wraiths drag him into the Speed Force in the Season Two finale.
Tragic Keepsake: The helmet, given to him by his dad...before his dad killed his mom right in front of him.
Trauma Button: Images of his parents and being called a monster give him flashbacks.
Two Aliases, One Character: He is also "Jay Garrick" aka "The Flash", having stolen that name from the real Jay.
Uncertain Doom: While it seems that the Metapocalypse still happened post-Crisis and Hunter was still defeated, it's not clear what became of him in the new timeline - killed, turned into the Black Flash once again, or merely imprisoned. Additionally, if he still became the Black Flash, it's unknown what became of him with the death of the Speed Force.
The Unfettered: Being an entirely selfish, psychotic sociopath, Zoom has no limits in what he's willing to do to achieve his goals. He's crossed dimensions, killed his own time remnants, posed as a hero, violated the laws of the Speed Force, and (of course) brutally murdered scores of people, all to get what he wants (saving his own life and causing a whole lot of carnage).
Ungrateful Bastard: Caitlin managed to develop a treatment for the cellular degeneration that was killing "Jay". When Barry mentions this to Zolomon later, he spitefully dismisses it as a temporary fix, showing no appreciation for Caitlin's hard work.
Uriah Gambit: He sends many a Monster of the Week of Season Two to kill Barry. But he doesn't expect it to happen and even goes to help kill them while posing as a hero.
Used to Be a Sweet Kid: He was once a sweet, innocent child who loved his mother and lived in fear of his abusive father. Needless to say, he's long since lost any kindness or innocence he once had.
Victory Is Boring: Decides to become a Multiversal Conqueror since he's already taken over his own Earth and, well, it's something to do.
Vile Villain, Saccharine Show: The Flash is (relatively) lighthearted compared to Arrow, but this guy is absolutely despicable and even makes the Reverse-Flash look reasonable by comparison. See Kick the Dog, and For the Evulz for examples.
Villain Has a Point:
- After he rescues Caitlin from Killer Frost, he correctly points out that he saved her from a woman who was an Obviously Evil Ax-Crazy psychopath despite her reaction of horror.
- He's absolutely correct in calling Wells out for taking no responsibility for the metahuman crisis and instead electing to make money off the public's fear with his tech apps.
Villain of Another Story: What he was before discovering the breaches. He terrorized his own Earth (and apparently other Earths in The Multiverse, including Earth-3) before discovering Earth-1 and Barry. Although he becomes the villain of the main story in short order, and by the end of the season, everyone's story.
Villainous Breakdown: He becomes increasingly unhinged during the final act of Season Two, particularly once his identity has been exposed and Caitlin continuously rejects him. However, he gets his biggest one when the Time Wraiths show up after his defeat. His Smug Super mentality vanishes into screaming in horror before they drag him off to his fate.
- He also doesn't take it well when he's proven wrong about Barry being just like him, via Barry's time remnant pulling a Heroic Sacrifice to save the multiverse.
Villainous Crush: On Caitlin, which developed during his time posing as Jay.
Villainous Glutton:
- Harry figures out why Zoom keeps sending metahuman after metahuman to confront Barry. It's all to strengthen the Speed Force inside Barry. That way, there's more of it to consume when Zoom decides he wants to kill Barry for good. Harry even describes it as "fattening [Barry] up like a Christmas Goose". It later turns out that he's dying from the Velocity drug and he needs Barry's speed to cure it.
- This is perfectly displayed during Zoom's cameo in "What's Past is Prologue", where Barry and his daughter Nora travel back in time to collect certain items lost in history, with one of them being the Speed Force Transmitter Harry made and Zoom used to take Barry's speed in "Versus Zoom". When he confronts Barry and Nora after having just consumed Barry's speed during the latter episode, Barry tries to convince Zoom to just leave, saying that he had already gotten what he wanted. However, the very moment Zoom realized Nora was a speedster, father and daughter booked it because they knew that he would've done just about anything to grab her and consume her speed as well.
Villainous Legacy: Near the end of Season Two, he makes every effort to try and corrupt Barry, including by killing Barry's father right in front of him. While Zoom is defeated shortly after, come Season Three, his plan to corrupt Barry is ultimately proven successful in one timeline; killing Henry sets in motion the chain of events that causes Barry to turn to the dark side and become Savitar. Ultimately, moving on from the damage that both him and Reverse-Flash have done to his life is Barry's main goal during that season.
Villainous Rescue: He saves Barry from Reverb and Deathstorm, killing both of them for ignoring his orders and trying to kill Barry, and later saves Caitlin from Killer Frost, killing her as well.
Voice of the Legion: His disguised voice, already deep and demonic, has a subtle echo to it. When he absorbs some of Barry's speed courtesy of Harry's device, the echo briefly becomes far more obvious.
Walking Spoiler: He already is one to an extent from the start, but becomes moreso once his identity is revealed.
Was Once a Man: According to Harrison Wells of Earth-2, he was human. Once. However, this is inaccurate; he really is a regular (if incredibly powerful) speedster... until the Time Wraiths get their hands on him. Now he's essentially an animal, unable to sense anything but speed and can't react to anything around him.
We ARE Struggling Together: "Jay" and Wells hate each other, to the point of coming to blows when they have to work together to help Barry fight Dr. Light.
We Can Rule Together: He offers Caitlin a chance to be with him when he conquers Earth-1.
Wham Shot:
- His sudden appearances will often change the tone of an entire episode, as he did in "Enter Zoom" and "Welcome to Earth-2".
- In "King Shark", Zoom removes his mask, revealing that he has been "Jay Garrick" the whole time.
Worthy Opponent: He eventually comes to view Barry as this, especially after he learns of their similar backgrounds. His decision to face Barry in a race is his acknowledgement of the fact that Barry is only his true competition as for the title of "Fastest Man Alive".
Would Hit a Girl: Dr. Light is very afraid of Zoom, and, in "Welcome to Earth-2", he throttles Killer Frost and kills her a few episodes later.
Would Hurt a Child: It's no secret that he submitted Jesse to Cold-Blooded Torture.
Xanatos Speed Chess: As he himself notes in "Versus Zoom", the wormhole opening in his world which led to another world with its very own Flash was unexpected, but it provided him with a way to undo his own imminent death; everything he did throughout the season was a long gambit in order to absorb Barry's speed.
- About three-quarters through the season, Barry finally manages to level the playing field, meaning Zoom can no longer successfully face his nemesis directly in combat; however, he makes up for this in other ways, such as by bringing over an army of Earth-2 metahumans and by threatening innocents (including Barry's friends and loved ones) to distract Barry.
- It's revealed in "Versus Zoom" that Zoom can go even faster when tapping into his "darkness", allowing him to effortlessly escape a meta-human dampener and elude Barry in an instant.
Yandere: He becomes obsessed with Caitlin, to the point where he abducts her and keeps her imprisoned in his lair. In fact, the only reason he allowed Killer Frost to live was because she reminded him of her, at least until he finally captured the real version that he desired. He later gives Caitlin a choice: either stay with him, or die along with the rest of Team Flash.
You Are What You Hate: Implied by his reaction to being called a "monster", which his mother said to his father just before he murdered her. Further supported by the fact that he based his appearance as "The Flash" off of James' uniform from the War of the Americas. Zolomon's feelings about his father are implied at best, but he still turned out very much like him.
You Have Failed Me: He kills Deathstorm and Reverb for trying to kill Barry against his orders. Though Reverb also wanted to be The Starscream.
You Have Outlived Your Usefulness:
- In Harry's story about how Zoom got his name, he informs us that Zoom massacred a whole unit of police officers, but purposely left one alive to warn the world about the threat he posed. After the officer did as he was told, Zoom killed him anyway at his house. A none-too-subtle foreshadowing of what innocent lives mean to Zoom when he no longer requires them.
- He offs Killer Frost after he captures Earth-1 Caitlin.
You Killed My Mother: He clearly resents his father for killing his mother right in front of him.
You Monster!: Caitlin calls him out on his atrocious personality. This is also his Berserk Button.
Your Days Are Numbered: After their encounter with Trajectory, Team Flash realizes that Zoom is dying from the same side effects of the Velocity drug that killed Trajectory and was killing "Jay". This leads them to realize that "Jay" and Zoom are one and the same.

Characters / Arrowverse: Hunter Zolomon

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Hunter Zolomon

Species: Metahumannote Until May 2016 where he became a Speed Force related entity

Known Aliases: Zoom, "Jay Garrick", "The Flash", The Speed Demon, The Fastest Man Alive, "The Crimson Comet"

Played By: Teddy Sears (unmasked), Ryan Handley (masked), Octavian Kaul (young)

Voiced By: Tony Todd (as Zoom)

Dubbed By: Sylvain Agaësse (European French)

First Appearance: "The Man Who Saved Central City" (The Flash 2x1)

Appearances: The Flash | Heroes Join Forcesnote (The Flash)

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Species: Metahuman^note

Appearances: The Flash | Heroes Join Forces^note(The Flash)