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Smallville History: A Forgotten Flash

As Smallville celebrates its 15th anniversary, we recall the show’s Flash-y guest star

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runseeya15 years ago today, the show that started it all, Smallville, premiered on The WB Network, which later merged with UPN to become The CW. The series lasted 218 episodes and paved the way for such shows as Arrow and The Flash on The CW network.

In 2004, the Smallville episode “Run” was the first to really bring in a “guest hero” – and while the character Bart Allen later took the code name “Impulse,” WB promos called him The Flash.

Unlike John Wesley Shipp and other alums from The Flash TV series of 1990, Kyle Gallner, who currently stars in WGN’s Outsiders, hasn’t been on The Flash… yet. But his place in Flash history should not be ignored. Maybe sometime?

You can see the Smallville “Run” promo trailer below; some photos from the episode can be found here.

2 Comments

2 Comments

  1. Justin Black

    October 16, 2016 at 11:24 am

    Craig you gotta admit that smallville sucked the entire 10 years of its airtime. it made people want decent tv shows about superheroes. it just happened to be the only show about a superhero at the time, thats the only reason it survived for so long. the only thing good about it was when it ended, that gave cw the chance to replace it with something decent. so we got Arrow, followed by The Flash, then Legends and Supergirl. and Supergirl’s Superman is far better than tom welling in every way. tom welling cant act his way out of a wet paper bag

    • Craig Byrne

      October 16, 2016 at 12:15 pm

      Actually having written 4 companion books for the series I can definitely say “no” to that “it sucked the entire 10 years of its airtime.” Sure, there were bad moments – like the disappointing series finale – but it still goes without saying that without Smallville, shows like The Flash wouldn’t exist.

      And I’m not arguing with you that Hoechlin is better, because he is better than Welling. But I can still appreciate what Smallville was. The Flash episode “Run” as well as Bart’s second episode “Justice” were incredible.

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New CW Head Throws Shade At The Flash

New CW President Brad Schwartz has thrown shade at The Flash while propping up another series.

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New CW Entertainment President Brad Schwartz today threw some shade at The Flash when propping up one of The CW’s better new performers, Wild Cards, when doing an interview with Deadline.

“You’ll probably be hearing more announcements from us very soon,” he said. “That show did great. It grew 10% versus what The Flash did in the same spot the year before. So, here we are beating shows that everyone’s very romantic about. We’d very much like to renew that one.”

Obviously, this is to show that Canadian imports perform better than more expensive fare… but might it be considered that The Flash was a show in its ninth season – a time when new audiences might not be interested in jumping on to series? Or, perhaps that portions of The Flash fandom had moved on, with no interest in The Cecile Show? Finally, The Flash Season 9 mostly aired at a time where producers and/or cast were unable to promote it, during the 2023 strikes, which makes the comparison very unfair.

Wild Cards is a fun series, but there’s no reason to denigrate The Flash or the superhero shows that made The CW great. Hopefully this was just a wild misunderstanding of his quote. The fact of the matter is: Sometimes more expensive fare is worth investing in. Especially considering how Schwartz hypes up the new season of Superman & Lois, that should be known to the new people in charge of The CW.

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Flash Cast Member Returns for the Superman & Lois Finale

A major actor from The Flash will be playing a role in the series finale of Superman & Lois.

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A major cast member from The Flash will be appearing in the series finale of Superman & Lois.

No, it’s not Grant Gustin, sadly… the actor in question is Tom Cavanagh, the actor who brought us infinite Wells variants. Cavanagh revealed this recently at a convention, where he talked about how he usually enjoyed directing season finales for the show, but was unable to in this case because Gregory Smith had already signed on to direct the Superman & Lois finale.

Superman & Lois showrunner Todd Helbing, who had also worked with Cavanagh before on The Flash and recruited him to direct the series’ 100th episode among others, instead suggested he has a role in the finale.

No word yet on what that role might be. As Superman & Lois is at a different spot in the multiverse, it doesn’t necessarily even have to be a version of Harrison Wells or Eobard Thawne. It could serve as a good closer, though, to the Arrowverse in general, as Superman & Lois is the last gasp for that world on The CW. In any event, you can see video of Cavanagh speaking about this (and more) at our Superman & Lois portal, KryptonSite.

The final season of Superman & Lois premieres this Fall on The CW.

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Flash Missing: Vanishes In Crisis, April 25, 2024

The “Flash Missing: Vanishes in Crisis” headline in the Flash TV series pilot was dated April 25, 2024.

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While events of the series would ultimately speed up the timeline, Flash fans surely remember the final moments of the pilot episode of the Grant Gustin-led series where we see a Central City Citizen newspaper graphic announcing “Flash Missing, Vanishes In Crisis.” The date of that article? April 25, 2024.

Which happens to be… today.

When The Flash premiered in 2014, one might have expected that April 25, 2024 might be the right time for the final episode of a 10-year run… of course, as we saw, the Crisis happened a few years earlier, The Flash ended in 2023 instead, and it all might have been a good thing, considering how strikes and pandemics got in the show’s way. Still, it’s fun to think about, and it’s fun to remember that fantastic rush we had after the end of watching such an excellent premiere. And hey – not only did we get nine seasons of the show, but we also had a bad Flash movie that the series was far superior to, even in its worst moments. Win-win!

Ride the lightning, everyone.

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