The Flash: Has everyone forgotten how Wally West got his powers?
By Nick Tylwalk
It’s like everyone on The Flash has forgotten that Wally West received his speed from this season’s big bad.
Wally West’s transformation from young man longing to have super powers to help people at the beginning of season 3 of The Flash to Kid Flash, hero of Central City, has gone awfully well. Maybe too well.
It feels like a setup.
There’s no denying that Wally has become an important part of Team Flash, with H.R. Wells supplying him with confidence and guidance to get him up to speed, no pun intended. Barry Allen has tutored him in the use of his super-speed, originally in the hopes that Wally could be the one to defeat Savitar and save the life of his sister, Iris West.
The problem is, even the usually astute minds of the S.T.A.R. Labs crew seem to have forgotten that Wally didn’t receive his connection to the Speed Force naturally. He got his speed after being encased in one of Savitar and Alchemy’s weird cocoons, a method that the villains have used to grant powers to other people based on their counterparts from the Flashpoint timeline.
That’s ended badly almost across the board, and it’s fair to wonder if Wally’s journey to becoming a hero, which has hit relatively few speed bumps so far, is headed for similar sorrow. It could begin as soon as the next episode of The Flash, as evidenced by this bit of the synopsis from TV Guide:
"Wally has visions of Savitar while training with Barry, but he hides them from the team."
It’s also worth remembering that Savitar predicted someone from the team would turn on the others. The safe guess would be Caitlin Snow, unable to overcome her Killer Frost demon. But what if it’s Wally?
He certainly wouldn’t sell out a group that includes his dad, his sister, his mentor and now his girlfriend. It’s just that he might not have any choice.
We don’t know what Savitar is capable of once he gets his hooks in someone, though we have seen that his control of Julian Albert was near total earlier in the season. It would be especially tragic for Kid Flash to turn against everyone close to him after he’s achieved his dream — and he might be difficult for even Barry to deal with since it’s been established that he’s further along with his speed than Barry was at a similar point.
Next: The Flash season 3, episode 14 recap: Attack on Central City
Wally going bad wouldn’t be in keeping with any storyline from the comics, but since the Arrow writers recently through a curveball to longtime fans, the people behind The Flash could be preparing a similar surprise. If it happens, Barry and company have only themselves to blame for forgetting how Kid Flash got his start.