CW’s ‘Arrow’-‘Flash’ Spinoff Will Feature ‘Big’ DC Comics Villain ‘Who Hasn’t Been Used Yet’
DC Comics’ Justice League may be a few years away from fruition on the bigscreen, but the comicbook publisher is steadily building a powerful roster of superhero shows on TV. The CW’s hit “Arrow” has already spawned an equally successful spinoff in “The Flash,” and now executive producers Greg Berlanti, Andrew Kreisberg and Marc Guggenheim are looking to further cement their empire with another super-powered offshoot, this time taking characters from “Arrow” and “The Flash” and combining them in an epic team-up series. The spinoff will be produced by the trio, along with Sarah Schechter.
Berlanti — who is also exec producing CBS’ “Supergirl” series with Kreisberg, Schechter and Ali Adler — told Variety that the new show is designed to be “most similar to our crossover episodes, where you feel that ‘event-iness,’ but all the time.”
“For us, first and foremost, with all of [our shows], it’s about ‘how is it its own thing?’ Because we don’t just want to do it to do it,” Berlanti explained before the casts of “Arrow” and “The Flash” hit the stage at PaleyFest on March 14. “Some people do that and then they’re three episodes in, thinking, ‘Why did we do this?’ So for me, I compare the shows to old Westerns; we have a lot of lone gunmen and sheriffs in town, and this one is very much an ode to things like ‘The Magnificent Seven’ or those great heist pics like ‘Ocean’s Eleven’ where you get all of those colors at the same time, and a true ensemble, and that was the fun of it.”
If the new spinoff is picked up to series at the CW — which seems like a safe bet, given the success of its predecessors — it will feature previously established heroes and villains from “Arrow” and “Flash,” including “Arrow’s” Brandon Routh, as Ray Palmer/the Atom; Caity Lotz, who portrayed the (seemingly dead) Sara Lance/Black Canary; “The Flash’s” Victor Garber as Dr. Martin Stein/one half of Firestorm (Ronnie Raymond, the other half of Firestorm played by Robbie Amell, was not announced as part of the spinoff’s lineup), and Wentworth Miller as villain Leonard Snart/Captain Cold. The show will also introduce at least three major DC Comics characters who have never been in a television series before.
“In picking them, it was very much about picking, ‘who are some of the most popular characters we’ve created?’ and also, tonally, who went with who? How disparate could we make it?” Berlanti explained. “And we’re also introducing these three new characters that we’re casting right now… I think it’s really important that we have another female hero on the show, and this one is really exciting. I can’t wait for people to find out — we just have to cast it right, as always. And then you want that Rat Pack-y kind of vibe of all this crew hanging out, as disparate and as different as they are.”
Both “Arrow” and “Flash” have already featured some of DC’s most iconic villains, including Ra’s al Ghul, Deathstroke and Reverse Flash, and it was important for Berlanti to find someone equally worthy for the new spinoff, which means he’s focusing on “making sure that the villain that we have on that show is distinct too… another big character who hasn’t been used yet.”
“The Flash” airs Tuesdays at 8 p.m. and “Arrow” airs Wednesdays at 8 p.m. on the CW.
Which DC Comics villain do you think would make a good antagonist for the spinoff? Hit the comments with your theories.
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