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In General
- Wally West. Season 2 doesn't give him any powers and Season 3 seeks to develop him more until The Speed Force discourages Barry from assigning Wally to help against Savitar, which made his development stagnant. In Season 4 Wally is not allowed to take Barry's tenure as the Flash; he only tries to impersonate him for a brief time and after Barry's releasing Wally gets demoted again as a sidekick. In the following episodes, Wally is barely used and leaves the team after his amicable break-up with Jesse. He returns sometime later, but he gets sidelined again on Crisis on Earth-X and leaves. Finally, his transference to Legends of Tomorrow was confirmed
, which only created a wide divide in fan opinion and premature accusations of wasting characters for that show. Then after being returned to his parent show, Wally would only show up occasionally in Once a Season stints and never in a major role ever again, which many have not taken to positively, especially with the In-Universe explanation that he's always off finding enlightenment as a Buddhist. - Sometimes the villains are killed off or forgotten, to the dismay of fans/viewers who wanted more of them. Season One started with that, then Team Flash started locking them up, which came back at them with a vengeance. Then Season Two started with that again.
- The focus on S.T.A.R. Labs and Team Flash and the forced balance between having Barry as the protagonist and having a team has caused everyone's development to mostly be lacklustre: Cisco and Caitlin are almost always nerfed or taken out of the equation before the fight starts and their personal lives have been largely ignored, while Wally had to be transferred to the Legends so he could have his development. This even extends to characters like Barry and Iris, whose individual jobs and lives have been sorely neglected in favor of having their lives revolve around Team Flash as well. The only characters who seem to be involved in the plot with jobs and personal lives are Joe and Cecile - and their stories largely take place offscreen. Regardless of the cause, many fans agree that the show's current formula is wasting the potential of their characters.
Season 1
- Many weren't expecting Plastique to be written out so quickly because of the character's history with the Suicide Squad a.k.a. Task Force X, which already exists in Arrow. It becomes even worse since the character was built up as a very interesting metahuman and potential ally of Barry before dying.
- Roy Bivolo's so under-utilized that his nickname, "Prism", ends up making no sense—he never demonstrates any color-based powers besides flashing red eyes. He's just there as an excuse to put Barry and Oliver into a Let's You and Him Fight situation.
- Linda Park is reduced to a Romantic False Lead and is then sent to a Long Bus Trip in season 2, despite being a very popular supporting character in the comics, one of Iris's closest friend at her station, and a potential love interest for the soon-to-be introduced Wally.
Season 2
- Atom Smasher, who undergoes Adaptational Villainy and appears to die in his debut episode. Counts for double since he's from another Earth and he's implied to have murdered his counterpart on this Earth, who apparently never got powers.
- Patty Spivot, due to Joe and Barry arbitrarily keeping her Locked Out of the Loop she never contributes much to plot, even though she's a very keen-eyed detective. It's very telling when she's Put on a Bus, Joe doesn't get a new partner.
- Tar Pit has a power set that fits especially well to be a foil to the Flash, and the episode even includes a scene based around Barry being slowed down enough to keep him from saving Iris from being hurt. But by the time he shows up, the needs of the ongoing arc mean that he and Barry hardly even fight at all, and he is defeated easily.
- Cisco's Evil Twin Reverb has tons of potential because him being essentially what Cisco could be if he learns to perfectly master and develop his abilities would make him a perfect rival for Cisco in future seasons. He's killed off in his debut episode. The same goes for Rupture, Reverb's brother and another potential rival who was killed off in his debut episode.
- Deathstorm, Ronnie's Evil Twin, doesn't get fleshed out very much, is Out of Focus compared to Killer Frost, and, like Reverb, is offed by Zoom in his debut episode.
- Trajectory had a ton of potential with being the shows first ever female speedster, as well as having conflict with a voice in her head encouraging her to continue using Velocity 9. It's implied that the only reason she has resorted to crime is a result of low wages and her lowering mental state from continued use of the substance. When given the offer by Barry to stop what she is doing and try to fix her wrongs which could lead an interesting plot of the two sides of Trajectory at ends while battling the illness effects of Velocity, she instead takes more Velocity 9 and runs until she evaporates into thin air.
- Killer Frost, who showed signs that she was possibly redeeming herself, ends up locked in a cage by Zoom and executed after the very first time she interacts with her Earth-1 counterpart. It doesn't help that her possible chance at redemption was dropped entirely from her character as well.
- Not once was Eddie's Earth-2 doppelgänger seen or even mentioned, especially jarring as much of the fandom is hoping to see the return of Rick Cosnett portraying a version of the super villain Cobalt Blue.
Season 3
- Shade. Many were unhappy with how he was reduced to a sub-average Villain of the Week with no motivation or even characterization other than being as a distraction by Dr. Alchemy.
- Grodd has a two-parter story arc about him leading an army of gorillas to attack Central City, but the villain gets absolutely zero character development and is defeated anti-climatically. Solovar counts too, since he was only featured three times in the arc, with the episode only implying that he'll perform a Heel–Face Turn before he departs.
- Many fans have expressed disappointment that Alchemy ends up only being The Dragon to the true Big Bad Savitar and not even that, given Savitar is literally just possessing him. Thanks to Arc Fatigue over speedster villains, many were hoping for a full season about a non-speedster Big Bad.
- The show's version of Music Meister is essentially a completely different character. The original Music Meister was a flamboyant supervillain with the ability to make people burst into song, but the show instead opts to make him into a Trickster Mentor with a set of vague omnipotent powers which, bafflingly, have nothing to do with music. He doesn't even get a solo! It doesn't help that, by establishing that this was the Music Meister (given how he doesn't act anything like the actual Music Meister), and not another Trickster type character that could have fit the role in the episode much better.
- Many fans feel that the Big Bad Savitar had a lot of wasted potential, largely due to the writers dragging out the reveal of his identity until so close to the end of the season that there wasn't really enough time left to actually develop his character. The backstory of how Barry's time remnant became Savitar is never actually shown (the only explanation we get is that he decided to become a god to escape his pain) and we also never learn how he got his suit or scars. He was also defeated in a rather anticlimactic way. Others also thought that it would have been much better if Savitar was the time remnant that sacrificed itself against Zoom instead of one that fought (off-screen) against...himself.
- Tracy Brand had potential to reach Ensemble Dark Horse status that was squandered when her main plot contribution, the Speed Force Bazooka, apparently the only thing able to stop Savitar according to Future Barry, was rendered moot by the philosopher Stone, and thus being degraded to a Satellite Love Interest spending the entirety of the season finale mourning and weeping over the loss of her beloved H.R., a man she had only met a few episodes prior.
- Alchemy's Cult dedicated in the name of Savitar during the first half of the season had a chance at fully realizing a small army for the Big Bad to command in the same vein as the Meta-Apocalypse Zoom had attempted prior, while much more manageable due to a smaller mass. Unfortunately they appear in one episode after being mentioned, and Killer Frost was the only minion seen working with Savitar after his escape from the Speed Force.
Season 4
- They Wasted a Perfectly Good Character:
- Cisco and Caitlin are metahumans whose powers could be used more often, but their powers are overlooked this season and only Barry and Ralph are really given a chance to shine as the heroes. They are kept as Voice with an Internet Connection, despite Iris and Harry already having this role. It even makes you wonder: If you have four powerful superheroes on your team, why send just two of them to face the powerful villain of the week? Though their case isn't as bad as Wally's, many feel they've been unfortunately pushed aside to provide comic relief almost exclusively.
- Pretty much all of the Bus Metas, barring Ralph. Several of them were really interesting and creative, but all of them were underused and promptly killed off by DeVoe when he either drains their powers or steals their bodies. A common complaint is that DeVoe's actions are destroying any potential additions to "The Rogues", an element that has been fairly underdeveloped as a whole. Two attempts of "Rogues" in the previous seasons were dropped. Special mention goes to Matthew Kim, the first Asian member of Team Flash...who ends up being nothing more than a willing prisoner, never interacting with anybody after his debut episode and who gets killed by DeVoe in his second appearance, and offscreen at that. Also Becky Sharpe (see why under The Woobie) and Izzy Bowin, who wanted to use her new sonic powers for a music career rather than any costumed villainy, and briefly bested DeVoe before going down in her debut episode.
- Dave a.k.a. Big Sir was almost a throwaway character.
Season 5
- Weather Wizard hasn't been seen since Season Two, so naturally many fans were overjoyed when he returned...and then disappointed when it turned out it was just for what was essentially a cameo and he wouldn't be an antagonist at all. There was a Deleted Scene of him and Ragdoll discussing plans, but this arrived nowhere.
- Many fans felt Icicle and Weather Witch would've made worthy secondary antagonists in addition to the Cicadas, and many felt they were vastly underused in compared to Cicada who took the bulk of this season's screen time.
- Also Godspeed. He's a character that fans had been anticipating for quite some time, and in addition to that has one of the most well-received costumes of any speedster on the show. Unfortunately he's written as a Flat Character with very little backstory or characterization. It also doesn't help that he was defeated rather easily, and by an untrained Nora at that.
- Cicada himself. Him being a metahuman who hunts other metahumans and having a sympathetic origin was the only thing that made him stand out. He could have been given more to work with, more to his goals and desires than just stab every meta he encountered, or at the very least have Chris Klein tone down the voice he uses when wearing the mask, and became a genuinely sympathetic and nuanced villain. Instead, he quickly became very disliked and would be replaced before the season even ended.
Season 7
- Season 7 begins with the original Harrison Wells resurrecting, which finally gives the series a chance to show him interacting with Team Flash. Unfortunately, he stays for just one episode and then leaves. Following the announcement that Tom Cavanagh left the regular cast, many fans regretted the fact that they will never see the original Wells as a full-time member of the team or a development of the concept that he is an amalgamation of all the previous versions of the character.
Season 8
- Ryan Choi, after having not been seen since Crisis, finally gets to become the Atom, in a very comics-accurate suit... for only a minute, in a Bad Future which winds up being undone by Barry anyway, against the backdrop of the Unresolved Sexual Tension between Chester and Allegra.
- Chillblaine seems to be the writers' attempt to replicate Captain Cold as an ice-themed sort-of villain who eventually allies with Team Flash. However, because he never shows much in the way of personal growth and doesn't have Cold's sophistication or planning skills, or anything else to really make him stand out, a lot of fans find him to be pretty dull.
Season 9
- Bivolo last appeared a couple of times all the way back in Season One, where he wasn't generally liked for his flat characterization. Here, he appears again, serves very little to no purpose that couldn't be taken care of by Red Death or some other generic minion, and gets the same amount of characterization.
- The Legion of Zoom, featuring the returns of Reverse-Flash, Zoom, Savitar, and Godspeed for the Grand Finale. Sadly, they all get defeated very quickly and easily (by side characters) almost as soon as they show up, with Barry sharing practically no interaction with any of them.
- After 9 years of the fandom hoping to see Eddie return as a version of Cobalt Blue, they finally got to see their wish...for roughly four episodes. Technically only one as Eddie doesn't fully become a villain until the series finale. Many people have opened up that the idea of a fallen friend and member of Team Flash returning as a villain was a strong enough concept to support a larger arc, or even an entire season, as had partially been proven with Deathstorm using Ronnie's likeness to throw them off balance, particularly the final season. Not helping the fact was just how well Rick Cosnett took to the role, and how badass he looked in the suit.
