Grant Gustin, 'The Flash' cast mark superhero's disappearance day, as teased in show's pilot

Almost a decade ago, “The Flash” premiered on the CW with a pilot episode that teased a storyline far in the future. In a future front page of the fictional Central City Citizen paper, the headline read that the Flash had disappeared in a “crisis” event. The date: April 25, 2024.

The ominous scene set up multiple important storylines in the nine-season series, from villain Reverse-Flash looming large in the first season to a massive DC Comics crossover storyline that didn't come into play until Season 6.

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Actor Grant Gustin, who portrayed the speedster, commemorated the occasion with a throwback photo of himself in a Flash bathrobe from April 25, 2016. He looked for a photo from the set on every April 25 during the nine years they were in production, he wrote, but the cheeky shot was “the only Flash related April 25th photo” he had.

“We made it — April 25, 2024. I can confirm that Flash has in fact not vanished,” the actor captioned the post.

Fellow “Flash” alum Tom Cavanagh, who played scientist Harrison Wells and the Reverse-Flash who takes over his body, also acknowledged the occasion, sharing photos of him and Gustin backstage at “Water for Elephants,” a musical the latter is starring in on Broadway. “He didn’t vanish after all,” Cavanagh wrote.

Actor Candice Patton, who played the Flash’s love interest Iris West, shared a photo of the newspaper front page marked with Thursday’s date on her Instagram Story.

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The “crisis” that the pilot stinger alluded to played out in the “Crisis on Infinite Earths,” a five-episode crossover in the CW's “Arrowverse” of DC Comics-based shows: on the CW, including “Arrow,” “Supergirl,” “Batwoman” and “Legends of Tomorrow” and “The Flash.” It was a collaboration of epic proportions as the crew of superheroes united to ward off supervillain Anti-Monitor and his forces.

The crossover aired in December 2019 and January 2020 in a culmination of storylines from each of the series.

“The Flash” series concluded in 2023 and is unrelated to the movie of the same name that hit theaters the same year. The only connecting tissue between the two is a brief cameo by Ezra Miller, the star of the film, in one of the “Crisis” crossover episodes.

The brief encounter showed the two actors in full superhero gear, both in awe of the existence of their doppelganger. Gustin’s character says that he is the Flash, and Miller’s character seems to like the novel idea of the catchy nickname. Gustin did not make a cameo in “The Flash” film.

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This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.