8 Clues To The Flash’s Villain Twist

Warning! This article contains spoilers for The Flash.
A major plot twist regarding a new villain in The Flash is hinted at several times throughout the film. The Flash is one of the final installments in the old DC Extended Universe, with Barry Allen’s timeline and multiverse-altering escapades allowing the franchise to undergo a soft reboot, becoming James Gunn’s new DC Universe. While The Flash serves as a love letter to DC’s many film and TV adaptations, it is, ultimately, Barry Allen’s story with a surprising new villain whose origin is closely tied to The Flash’s reckless actions. The Flash hints at this antagonist’s tragic nature many times, using established DCEU lore in some cases.
While General Zod and his followers are a major threat in The Flash, the movie’s true antagonist is an original character known as the Dark Flash, who appears to take loose inspiration from an iteration of Black Flash from DC’s comics. The mysterious Dark Flash turns out to be a third variant of Barry Allen, having spent years futilely traveling through time trying to defeat General Zod and save the lives of Batman, Supergirl, and his mother. This reveal comes at the end of The Flash, yet there are numerous clues that the mysterious entity is Barry himself throughout the film’s runtime.
8 Dark Flash Appears In The Speed Force The first hint that Dark Flash is a variant of Barry Allen comes early on in The Flash. Barry Allen recklessly travels through time to undo a major life event: The death of his Nora Allen. Once Barry alters one event to allow his mother to survive, he attempts to travel back to his present, only for the Dark Flash to appear within the Speed Force and push him into an altered September 2013. Only a speedster with a connection to the Speed Force can traverse the realm, and Barry Allen is the only known DCEU character with this connection, hinting that Dark Flash is a variant of Barry.
7 Dark Flash Has Purple Lightning When Dark Flash first shows up, he is notably emitting purple lightning. The DCEU already established that Barry Allen’s powers cause lightning bolts to form around him. Normally, these bolts are blue, but Barry’s second Flash outfit augments his powers and changes the color of his lightning bolts to a more comic-accurate yellow. When Barry fights alongside his younger counterpart, the latter’s lightning color is the familiar shade of blue. Dark Flash’s lightning being purple is closet to the unrefined blue lightning Barry’s powers used to emit.
6 Young Barry Wears Yellow Like Reverse-Flash Eobard Thawne, better known as the Reverse-Flash, is Barry Allen’s greatest enemy in DC’s comics, so the villain was, naturally, hypothesized to appear in The Flash. Reverse-Flash is, ultimately, absent, yet the mysterious circumstances of Nora Allen’s murder leave room for him to appear in future movies. Notably, however, the younger iteration of Barry Allen is introduced wearing yellow, the color of Reverse-Flash’s suit. While Reverse-Flash does not appear in The Flash, the younger Barry’s use of his signature color is a subtle hint that he will turn to villainy.
5 Young Barry Overhears Bruce & Barry The young Barry Allen variant is the main source of The Flash’s comic relief, but his first truly serious moment occurs when he overhears a conversation between the displaced main DCEU Barry Allen and the Michael Keaton iteration of Batman. Not knowing that his younger counterpart is eavesdropping, Barry reveals to Bruce that he comes from another timeline where his mother was murdered when he was only a child and that his reality merged with Bruce’s due to his tampering. The younger Barry is quietly distraught to learn that his mother was supposed to die years ago, setting him on the path towards abusing his time-traveling abilities.
4 Dark Flash Appears In Barry's Nightmare The main DCEU’s Barry Allen also has a nightmare of Dark Flash before he departs the Batcave to battle General Zod. This may be a minor reference to Barry’s own DCEU debut, in which he appears to Bruce Wayne to warn him about an undefined (at the time) future threat. There is no dialogue in Barry Allen’s nightmare of Dark Flash, but it is yet another parallel to Barry himself, foreshadowing that the mysterious entity is a version of Barry Allen from another timeline.
3 Young Barry Overuses Time Travel Things take a sudden turn for the worse in The Flash’s third act when both Batman and Supergirl die battling General Zod and his Kryptonian forces. The younger Barry Allen variant immediately uses his time travel powers to undo this, only for Batman and Supergirl to die again, albeit differently. It soon becomes clear to both the main Barry Allen and the viewers that Batman and Supergirl’s deaths, as well as Zod’s victory, are inevitable events in this timeline. The younger Barry Allen refuses to accept this, and his repeated attempts to redo the battle and defeat General Zod show his descent into violent desperation.
2 Young Barry Gets Kryptonian Shrapnel Embedded In His Arm In Dark Flash’s few early appearances, he is shown to be wearing a bulky and dark outfit covered in what looks like jagged metal shards. In a repeated attempt to redo the battle against General Zod, the younger Barry Allen gets a massive piece of Kryptonian shrapnel embedded in his arm, though his healing factor leaves him almost unphased by this injury. This is one of the film’s most obvious hints that the younger Barry will become Dark Flash, but what he uses the Kryptonian metal for is an even darker clue to his eventual villainous turn.
1 Young Barry Killing Faora Foreshadows His Turn To Villainy Using the shard of Kryptonian metal lodged in his arm, the younger Barry Allen variant kills General Zod’s sub-commander Faora before attempting once again to redo the battle. The DCEU is notable for its heroes killing their enemies, but this has never been done frivolously. In Man of Steel, Superman’s guilt over taking Zod’s life haunts him and leads him to develop a no-kill rule. Ben Affleck’s Batman breaks his rule in Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice but reinstates it afterward (as shown in The Flash). Wonder Woman kills enemy soldiers and terrorists but spares ordinary criminals.


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