The CW is hoping that lightning can strike twice with their young superhero franchises, announcing that they’ve ordered “The Flash” as a new live-action TV series set to air this fall, Entertainment Weekly reports.
The show, which will be part of a lineup that includes the recently renewed “Arrow” as well as “Beauty and the Beast” and the DC Comics adaptation “iZombie,” is a spin-off of “Arrow.” The fan-favorite Barry Allen character, played by Grant Gustin, first appeared in a few episodes of “Arrow.”
Gustin will reprise his role as the Fastest Man Alive for the new series, a scientist who gains super-speed after getting hit by a lightning in a fateful experiment (check out the origin scene from “Arrow” in the clip above).
It will be the character’s second television incarnation, as he first appeared in the 1990 TV series “The Flash” hot on the heels of the success of 1989′s “Batman.”
Gustin’s Flash will be of course a far younger incarnation of Barry Allen (Gustin is only 24), in keeping with other CW superhero shows like “Arrow” and “Smallville.”
Marvel might have some competition on its hands: with “Flash” and “Arrow” locked down as TV series, DC looks like it’s going to give their rival a run for their money when Marvel’s Netflix series debuts in 2015.
And with Zack Snyder’s “Justice League” movie being fast-tracked, who knows if DC will attempt to create a Marvel-like multi-platform universe of its own, using “Arrow” and “The Flash” as springboards to a larger world teeming with all the DC heroes and villains you could ever want to see on the big and small screens.
In the meantime, it doesn’t hurt that Flash’s TV costume looks pretty awesome, feeling both retro and modern. We can only hope the costume is a sign of great things to come for the series.
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