Mythology Gag / The Flash (2014)

• The creators have previously stated their love for 1990’s Flash series and they've added occasional references to the old show.
  • John Wesley Shipp, who played Barry Allen in the 1990 series, plays Barry's father Henry Allen. He also plays the real Jay Garrick, the Flash from Earth 3, and that's after Shipp expressed his wish in an interview to never wear the Flash suit again. And in "Elseworlds" he plays the actual ‘90s Flash, from "Earth-90", in a version of the same costume, and returns in “Crisis on Infinite Earths”, where it’s revealed he and love interest Tina McGee had been married since after the show ended.
  • Barry in both shows cheat when they need a centrifuge and manually speed-shake a test tube instead.
  • On both shows, the main Star Labs character (Tina in 1990, Harrison in 2014) both turned evil, unnerving Barry because Mission Control Is Off Its Meds. Fortunately, Tina got better and was only a villain of a week (her turn to evil was because of a Freak Lab Accident), but Harrison became the Big Bad.
  • Amanda Pays, who portrayed Dr. Tina McGee in the 1990 series, plays a rebooted version of the same character. In the comics, the character was associated with Wally West.
  • In "Tricksters", Mark Hamill reprises his role as James Jesse/Trickster from the ‘90s series. Still of the Trickster from that series appear as file photos of the Trickster during his heyday. Likewise, his Leitmotif from that episode returns as his main theme in the episode, and at one point they even recreate the set for Trickster's lair from the old show. Even Joe's description of him as "James Jesse...like Jesse James, only twisted" is almost identical to Megan Lockhart's description of him in the original series - "James Jesse...like Jesse James, only its backwards. Twisted."
    • The existence of Earth-90 means the same events happened at the same time on two different Earths with and without The Flash.
    • And in "The Elongated Knight Rises" Prank returns. Yes, still portrayed by the 90s actress.
  • Mayor Anthony Bellows, played by Vito D'Ambrosio in the same episode, is a reprise of Tony Bellows, a cop from the 1990 series. "Elongated Journey Into Night" in Season 4 establishes that Mayor Bellows is an ex-cop.
  • In "Flashpoint" the replacement Captain is Julio Mendez, played by Alex Desert. In the 1990 series Julio Mendez was Barry's partner in the crime lab, played by the same actor.
• Edward "Eddie" Thawne is a reference to Barry's Arch-Enemy Eobard Thawne, known as Professor Zoom/The Reverse-Flash. Later episodes confirm the Reverse-Flash is Eobard Thawne, a relative and probable descendant from the future.
• Also in the pilot, the villain Clyde Mardon stands in for the Weather Wizard, who is his brother Mark Mardon in the comics. Clyde was originally the one who created the technology that allowed Mark to become the Weather Wizard. Later episodes show Mark as the (properly-dubbed) Weather Wizard.
• While at the hospital, Barry's heart beats so fast that it sometimes looks like he's flatlining. In Justice League, Flash deliberately speeds up his heart to look like he's flatlining.
• Oliver says the lightning bolt that struck Barry wasn't random, it may have chosen him. Before the New 52 reboot, one story showed that at the moment of his death in Crisis on Infinite Earths, Barry became one with the Speed Force, went back in time, and became the lightning bolt himself. Post-New 52, it's also hinted that the Speed Force is a semi-mythical power that has chosen multiple champions throughout history.
• Joe takes a jab at Clyde Mardon using his "god-like" powers to rob banks. The Rogues of the comics have long been ridiculed for being content to commit petty crimes in spite of their powers and/or high-tech weaponry.
• Barry running fast on a treadmill and static electricity forming around him, is a visual reference to the Cosmic Treadmill from the comics and a nod to the older Flash show.
• The future newspaper seen at the end of the pilot mentions a "Crisis involving red skies". Another article on the same page mentions a merger between Queen Inc. and Wayne Tech.
• The future Flash seen in the photograph wears an altered costume that looks very close to the classic Flash suit from the comics, right down to the color scheme and chest emblem.
• There is a TV news reporter named Linda Park, the Love Interest of Wally West, Barry's sidekick-turned-successor in the comics. A different actress was later cast as Linda, who has a larger role as she befriends Iris and Barry.
• Before Barry gets the name "the Flash", Iris and other Central City citizens dub him "the Streak". The Streak was the name given to an Expy of the Golden Age Flash in an episode of Justice League. He's also referred to as the "Blur" by Captain Cold. Cat Grant in the Supergirl (2015) crossover also prefers the "Blur" to the "Flash", much to Barry's chagrin. In Smallville, Clark Kent went by "The Blur" before he was Superman when all he did was super speed much like the Flash.
• "Fastest Man Alive" briefly introduces Simon Stagg, a Metamorpho villain in the comics. Cisco calls Danton Black "Captain Clone" before eventually settling on his actual alias from the comics, Multiplex.
• "Things You Can't Outrun" opens with Barry and Iris leaving a theater that mentions a Blue Devil movie on the marquee. The marquee also mentions The Rita Farr Story; Rita Farr was Elasti-Girl in the original Doom Patrol.
  • Caitlin comments that Ronnie Raymond used to say their relationship was like fire and ice, referencing their comic alter egos Firestorm and Killer Frost.
  • Barry tells Joe how he doesn't want Central City to build a museum for him...
• "Going Rogue":
  • Leonard Snart briefly wears a blue parka as a disguise.
  • During the trivia contest, one of the scientists mentioned is named Erdel. Saul Erdel is the scientist responsible for teleporting J'onn J'onzz the Martian Manhunter to Earth.
  • The attempted theft of the Kahndaq Dynasty Diamond.
  • Said museum's curator is named Dexter Myles, better known as the curator of the Flash Museum.
  • In the same episode, Felicity asks if Barry would age into dust and disappear if he ran too fast. That's how Barry famously died in Crisis on Infinite Earths.
  • She also asks if he ages faster when he speeds up. The same question is brought up in the 1990s show by Barry and, again, never answered.
• The Central City Police Department has a giant mural◊ depicting Greco-Roman gods from Classical Mythology, along with the words "Truth - Liberty - Justice." They can be likened to DC superheroes, as writers like Grant Morrison have done in the past, and just might foreshadow plans of a full-blown Justice League for this universe. They are: Hephaestus/Vulcan, Hermes/Mercury, Hera/Juno, Zeus/Jupiter, Hades/Pluto, Apollo, and Poseidon/Neptune. Obviously, Hermes = the Flash and Apollo (the archer) = the Arrow...
• In "Plastique", Plastique originated as a Firestorm (DC Comics) villain but eventually wound up marrying Captain Atom. Her emergency contact is "Cameron Scott" which was an alias used in the comics by Nathaniel Adam (aka Captain Atom). Wade Eiling was also originally a Captain Atom supporting character/antagonist and was responsible for the project which empowered Captain Atom and his nemesis Major Force.
• In "The Flash Is Born", Barry tells Thawne about a "big bad man" who can turn his skin into metal. Thawne muses: "A man of steel..."
• "Revenge of the Rogues":
  • In a similar vein, Barry says that he's "faster than a speeding bullet."
  • When Iris was young, she had a stuffed animal called McSnurtle the Turtle. This was the secret identity of The Terrific Whatzit, a Golden Age DC Funny Animal character based on the original Flash.
• In "Flash vs. Arrow", one of the thugs who tries to mug Ronnie is wearing a British flag t-shirt and a trench coat.
• One to it's sister show, Arrow: in "The Sound and The Fury," when Thawne is commenting on how his ignorance lead to the reactor explosion, he states that "he had failed this city" - the same Catchphrase used by the Arrow to those who terrorize Starling.
• "The Nuclear Man":
  • Martin Stein won a prestigious scientific accolade called The Conway Award, named for Gerry Conway, the writer who created Firestorm.
  • The same episode has a reference to a jazz musician named Mal Duncan.
  • And Cisco briefly refers to the corner of Waid Street, after 90s Flash writer Mark Waid.
• General Eiling's eventual fate in "Fallout" where he's snatched away by an angry Gorilla Grodd after having experimented on him is certainly going to bring back memories to those who know what happened to Grodd in Justice League at the hands of a character played by Clancy Brown. And in the same episode, Eiling exclaims "Dear God!" when he hears Grodd's voice in his head, and gets the reply "Not God...Grodd." - which hearkens back to one of the best-known scenes from Superman II, specifically the exchange "Oh God!" "Zod."
• In "Rogue Time", Cisco's brother Dante makes a disparaging comment comparing Cisco to a dog, primarily for his loyalty. In the comics, Dante dons a suit of armor for the military and becomes known as "The Dog Soldier."
• In "Who is Harrison Wells?", Eobard uses a machine that gives him Harrison Wells' face which is reference to how Eobard face changes in the Return of Barry Allen storyline to Barry's own face.
• In "The Trap", Gideon tells Barry that he was "a founding member of..." before getting cut-off. Don't think too hard about what she was talking about.
• "Grodd Lives":
  • Eobard actually manages to turn a Kick the Dog moment into one of these. Not only does he reveal to Eddie that Iris eventually marries Barry in the future, but that Eddie is the only member of the Thawne lineage whose accomplishments were considered so unimportant that in Thawne's timeline everyone barely remembers he even existed at all. In the comics, there is no character named Eddie Thawne.
  • Cisco offers Grodd a banana, but "Grodd hate banana". Minus the Hulk Speak, this was the same reaction Grodd had to being offered a banana by Wally West in the Justice League episode "The Brave and the Bold."
• In "Rogue Air" Barry mentions Ferris Air got shut down after one of their test pilots disappeared, seemingly all but confirming Hal Jordan's origin story occurring in this universe.
• "Fast Enough" is loaded with these.
  • The helmet of Jay Garrick, the Golden Age Flash, falls out of a wormhole. Also doubles as Foreshadowing.
  • One of the visions Barry sees of his possible future is one where he is in handcuffs and in prison, a reference to The Trial of the Flash, a famous Flash storyline from the comics (which, like this episode, also included the death of the Reverse-Flash) and was in fact the last solo Barry Allen story before his death in Crisis on Infinite Earths.
  • A lot of story elements used in this episode are borrowed from Flashpoint, such as the notion that Barry changing the past by saving his mother could have disastrous consequences, and an older iteration of Barry preventing his younger self from saving his mother.
  • The final scene, Barry running towards a singularity that is about to destroy the earth, intent on stopping it by running around it, is reminiscent of the iconic sequence in Crisis on Infinite Earths, where Barry uses a similar method to prevent the Anti-Monitor's anti-matter cannon from destroying the earth...an act which in the comic story resulted in his death.
• "Enter Zoom" reveals that in Earth-2's timeline, Oliver Queen died when their boat sank, whilst his father Robert went on to eventually become The Arrow instead. This is similar to Flashpoint, where Thomas Wayne became Batman instead of Bruce, when their deaths switched places in that timeline.
  • Judging by Zoom's thrashing of Barry, including breaking his back and paralyzing his spine it seems he's fond of some of Bane's methods.
• Kendra performing a leap of faith in order to get her wings is a reference to her Justice Society of America debut. Her first appearance consists of her jumping off a cliff before using her wings.
• The Earth-2 version of Cisco is a villain named Reverb. In the comics, one of Cisco's brothers becomes a superhero named Reverb after Cisco's death during Legends.
• The Earth-2 version of Ronnie Raymond is a villain called Deathstorm. This is the identity taken by Ronnie uses during Blackest Night and Earth-3 Martin Stein in Forever Evil (2013).
• On Earth-2, the motto of the CCPD is "A Fair and Just Society", with "Society" in bigger letters. This is a reference to the original Earth-Two Justice Society of America, and the New 52's Earth 2: Society book.
• In "Flash Back", the equation we see Barry write on the board is 3 x 2 (9YZ)4A. That's the Speed Force Mantra that Johnny and Jesse Quick use to access the Speed Force in the comics.
• In "Invincible" Henry Allen and Christina McGee finally meet and there seems to be some attraction between them. In The Flash (1990), Dr. McGee was the potential love interest of John Wesley Shipp's Barry Allen. Sadly, this ship sank when Zoom killed Henry.
• The plot of the season two finale is the villain wants Flash to power his multiverse-destroying machine, and in the end, (a temporal duplicate of) Flash deactivates it by pushing himself so far he crumbles into dust. Apart from the identity of the villain and the fact it was the real Barry Allen who died, this is #8 of Crisis on Infinite Earths.
• The original pilot script had a reference to Blue Valley, the hometown of Wally West.
• In "Monsters", H.R. Wells accidentally calls Wally "Walter", the name of Wally's Alternate Self met during "The Dark Flash Saga."
• When Wally first gets his speed, he's said to be faster than Barry was when he first got his speed. This is a reference to Wally being faster than Barry in the comics.
• In "Invasion!" the S.T.A.R. Labs hangar is an exact replica of the Hall of Justice from the comics.
• In "Cause and Effect", an amnesiac Barry tries to get people to call him Bart, which is the name of the other Bartholomew Allen in the comics, Barry's grandson Impulse.
• Season three's Savitar arc has a few:
  • When Jay is describing Savitar's supposed origin, the viewers see a clip of a shirtless Savitar grabbing the Philospher's Stone. The comic version of Savitar was a Walking Shirtless Scene.
  • Savitar once says, "I am the future Flash." At the time we think he's saying "I am the future, Flash." but once we realize he's a time remnant from a future battle, it's clear that he's got more in common with Future Flash than with the very different original Savitar. (Future Flash being a Barry Allen from the future whose lightning effects are white.)
  • After several events that seemed references to his fate in Crisis, the season finale cliffhanger is that the Speed Force prison becomes an unstable danger to the world if it goes unoccupied too long and so Barry makes the sacrifice. In other words, he is now trapped in the Speed Force with Wally as Central City's hero, as was the state of things in the comics for a great many years.
    • Indeed, in the Season 4 premiere, Wally briefly dons the Flash costume in a bid to impersonate the Flash, which is a nod to Wally's Flash tenure in the comics after Barry's supposed death.
• The first episode of season 4 is called "Reborn" and has Barry returning from the Speed Force. The comic book where this happened was The Flash: Rebirth.
• "Luck Be a Lady",
  • Wally says he's moving to Blue Valley. In the comics, Blue Valley was the home of the West family.
  • Hazard's croupier uniform is her costume from the comics. When she returns to the casino, she uses her Winds of Destiny, Change! powers to repeatedly throw snake-eyes at the craps table; her comics counterpart activated her powers through a pair of dice that always came up snake-eyes.
• "Elongated Journey into Night":
  • Ralph's client is Mrs. Broome, named after John Broome, the Flash writer who created Elongated Man.
  • Iris finds a bottle of Gingold soda in Ralph's desk. In the comics, a concentrated form of the drink's main ingredient gave him his powers.
  • When Ralph is trying to think of a superhero name, Barry suggests "Plastic Man". Ralph hates it.
  • Barry's suspicion of Ralph is a reference to his comics introduction, where Barry thinks the new hero Elongated Man is actually a Villain with Good Publicity, when he was actually framed.
• In "When Harry Met Harry", Black Bison is trying to recover a bison necklace that is sacred to her tribe. In the comics, Black Bison gets his powers from the magic talisman of the Black Bison Cult.
• "Therefore I Am":
  • In the flashbacks, Devoe's original thinking cap looks like the one worn by his comics counterpart.
  • At the end, when Kid Flash returns, he mentions fighting alien starfish, a reference to JLA villain Starro the Conqueror.
• In "We Are the Flash", Defoe briefly returns after losing Ralph's body as a Virtual Ghost projected from his chair. A version of the Thinker was introduced in JSA as an AI generated from a computer system based on the thinking cap, which possessed Devoe's personality and memories and projected itself as a hologram via Mr. Terrific's T-spheres.
• In "Nora":
  • Barry's parents used to take him for ice cream at Happy Harbor. Happy Harbor is the location of the Justice League of America's original headquarters in the comics.
  • Nora uses the Future Slang word "schway", originally from Batman Beyond.
  • Barry gets a costume that collapses into a ring, like the comics version. In the series it was invented in the future by a Ryan Choi. Comic book Choi is the second Atom (presumably implying the costume uses Atom tech to shrink rather than being super-compressible like the comics version).
  • Caitlin's father's death certificate was signed by a Dr. Cameron Makhent (who doesn't exist). In the comics this was the identity of the second Icicle.
• In "All Doll'd Up", Cecile tells Nora that Barry once travelled through time and fought a race of golden giants called Grodans. This is a reference to the Silver Age Flash story "Land of the Golden Giants!"
• In "The Icicle Cometh":
  • The metahuman Cicada attacks at the beginning is Razorsharp of the Psyba Rats.
  • Caitlin's dad was in contact with scientists including Louise Lincoln (the original comics Killer Frost) and Victor Fries (Mr. Freeze).
• In "What's Past is Prologue", when Thawne is trying to guess who Nora is, he suggests Jesse Chambers ( Jesse Quick, later the second Liberty Belle), Libby Lawrence (the first Liberty Belle, Jesse Chambers' mother) or Danica Williams (the JLU's Flash in Batman Beyond comics). When he realises she's Barry's daughter, he thinks her name is Dawn; in the comics Barry and Iris had twins called Dawn and Don.
• In "Elseworlds Part 1", the Establishing Shot of Earth-38's Kent Farm is scored with a burst of "Save Me".
• In "Failure is an Orphan" Thawne says he's scanned the timeline "from Anthro, the first boy, to Kamandi, the last".
• In "Godspeed" Nora's friend in her time is named Lia Nelson. This was the name of an explicitly In Name Only version of the Flash from DC imprint Tangent comics, who had light-based powers.
• In "Gone Rogue", Nora has a fake ID in the name of "Jenni Ognats", which is the name of the comic book XS, daughter of her counterpart.
• In "The Exorcism of Nash Wells", Nash refers to fighting telepathic starfish on Earth-26. In addition to being another reference to Starro the Conqueror, Earth-26 in the comics is home to Captain Carrot and His Amazing Zoo Crew!. Starro was the villain of their first issue and the miniseries Captain Carrot and the Final Ark.
• When Bart shows up at the end of "P.O.W.", one of the first things out of his mouth is "This place is crash!" This is a reference to his Young Justice (2010) counterpart frequently using the word "crash" as a slang term (and which other characters start using later).
• During "Into the Still Force," Barry mentions "Max," probably a reference to Max Mercury.
• The resurrected Eddie Thawne initially uses the name "Malcolm" before taking on the powers and name of Cobalt Blue. Making him the show's version of Malcolm Thawne. Barry's twin brother from the comics and the original Cobalt Blue.