Remember howThe Flashintroduced Wally West / Kid Flash (Keiynan Lonsdale) as a speedster in Season 3, and how he was faster than Barry almost immediately? And then they gave him a cute speedster girlfriend, which seemed like it could be the makings of a great crime-fighting super-speed duo? And thenThe Flashrealized that Barry should probably be the fastest speedster, so ret-conned that whole plot and broke Wally and Jesse up and then banished Wally to a meditation retreat because it had no idea what to do with him? So that when helandedonLegends of Tomorrowit was like, Oh! Finally!This makes more sense.
Well,The Flashgiveth andThe Flashtaketh away. According toTVLine, It looks like Wally will be back on the speedster series for Season 5, at least for its premiere. That’s a disappointing development, because Wally barely had time to establish himself as part of the Waverider crew. And now thatLegendsSeason 4 is going tomoving more into magic(withMatt Ryan’s John Constantine joining as a series regular), it’s actually a great place for a speedster to be. In a regular Earth-1 environment, Barry’s powers (like Supergirl’s) are pretty much God-like, which has consistently been a problem when it comes to the show finding season-long villains for him to face. Super speed fixes a lot of problems, pretty much immediately, so finding compelling stakes is hard.
One of the best things about putting a speedster amongst magical creatures, though, is that speed doesn’t automatically solve everything. We already saw a little bit of this at the end ofLegends' (excellent) third season – Wally’s powers were convenient, even occasionally used for comedy, but they weren’t what saved the day. The love ofBeebosaved the day, which honestly worked a lot better than the suddenly shoe-horned “for the love of Ralph Dibney” thatFlashgave us.
The Arrowverse has several characters that bounce around among its shows though, includingKatie Cassidy’s Laurel Lance / Black Siren, as well asWentworth Miller’s Captain Cold / Leo Snart. So it’s certainly possible, and likely, that this won’t be the last the Legends see of Wally. He might be dropping in from time to time. In the meantime, we’ll see ifThe Flashhas found a better way to incorporate him into the narrative of their show, which could also use some otherupgrades for Season 5.
… And just before I hit publish on this initial news, Lonsdale has responded on Twitter, explaining: “I’ve changed a lot in the past year (as you’ve probably noticed lol), and for infinite reasons my perspective on life and what I want from it now is just completely different. Because of that, my heart told me it was the right time to continue my journey on an unknown path.” He also wrote, “It’s definitely not a total goodbye or ‘see ya never’ situation. Wally West will still be around when you need him most.”
