The Flash: Is Jay Garrick The Man in the Iron Mask?

Spoilers ahead for tonight's episode of The Flash, titled "Escape From Earth-2."

Because of lighting in the room, many fans last week suspected that Wally West might be the "man in the iron mask" on The Flash.

This week, they've changed their tune.

It seems the new odds-on favorite is Jay Garrick to be wearing that iron mask in Zoom's dungeon -- and that's a bit confusing, for sure.

As we discussed in a previous story, the possibilty that Jay Garrick could somehow be the man in the iron mask is one that a lot of viewers are finding compelling.

What if the man in the mask wasn't asking about Jay, but warning Barry about Jay?

Particularly because the man in the mask is Jay Garrick, and he knows the impostor isn't going to help Barry against Zoom in any meaningful way?

"J...A...Y" is the only message we got from the man in the mask -- and it's pretty clear that he was working on Barry's behalf, and he was happy when Barry managed to escape. He stood tall and brave when Barry told him that he wasn't going to save him now, but would be back later.

If the Jay we know isn't actually Jay Garrick, but somebody else impersonating him in order to infiltrate Team Flash on Zoom's behalf, the odds are good that Zoom would want to keep the real Jay -- a potential bargaining chip or a tie to the Speed Force -- captive and hidden away from the public who might recognize him, or Earth-1, where he could make a difference to Team Flash.

For example: in the Golden Age, Jay had his own Reverse-Flash, later known as The Rival -- and that character, whom we once thought was the odds-on favorite to be Zoom, hasn't come up at all in the series yet.

What if he's actually the one who's been here the whole time, and Jay Garrick has been...somewhere else?

Then there's this observation from a reader:

CB127607 said ... (original post)

What if Jay Garrick is a twin....hense the man in the iron mask reference? I think that makes more sense

That's a really good point -- not just for the reference to The Man in the Iron Mask, but also because while Jay himself isn't a twin in the comics, twins are something that have run through the mythology of The Flash for years. Barry Allen was a twin (although we didn't find it out until years later), and then he and Iris had twins when they eventually had kids.

So did Wally West, Iris's nephew, when he started up a family with Linda Park.

Also, bear this in mind: if the man in the mask is truly Jay, then the Jay we've known all along might still be in play.

If it's somebody impersonating Jay on behalf of Zoom, it could explain why he seemed to stand so close to the breach, and why Zoom knew just where and how to strike: maybe Zoom didn't really kill him, and this is just the next step in their master plan together now that Barry and Jesse are both beyond Zoom's reach.

There's at least one more really credible theory as to who might be the guy in the mask -- but we'll leave that for another story...!