It doesn’t seem impossible.
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Probably the two most notable characters from DC Comics’ 25th Century are Eobard Thawne — the Reverse-Flash — and Justice Leaguer Booster Gold.
Coincidentally, both of those men are members of centuries-long family legacies. Eobard is the product of a bloodline of notable superbeings, politicians and more that started with his Twenty-First Century ancestor Malcolm Thawne, better known as the supervillain Cobalt Blue. Booster Gold — Michael Jon Carter to his friends — is the patriarch of a centuries-long line of Time Masters, generally understood to be led by Booster’s son, Rip Hunter.
Eobard Thawne, currently serving as the season-long big bad on The Flash, has a heart-to-heart with his great-great-great-great…you get the point…Eddie Thawne on this week’s episode — and ComicBook.com just debuted an exclusive clip of their confrontation:
When Wells tells Thawne that he’s “the only Thawne to be all but forgotten by history,” it reminded me of the following quote about time-traveling superhero Booster Gold:
“No one is sure of the exact moment the Carter Family began the amazing Time Masters, but it’s thought to have dated back to at least the early 21st Century. From that moment on, the members of the Carter Family took on the responsibility of policing and protecting all of history against those that would exploit it. There was only one ‘black sheep’ of the Carter Family in the last two thousand years. A young man from the 25th Century who went by the name ‘Booster Gold.’ He is the only documented Carter to have ever been a fraud, a failure and a fool. That’s why historians like myself find it remarkable that in all recorded images, Booster Gold had a smile on his face. Perhaps he was stupid as well.”
In other words, it’s worth noting that in the DC canon, there’s another time-traveler who is similarly remembered as a failure and a fool…turns out he’s pretending.
Taken from Booster Gold #1,000,000 by writers Geoff Johns and Jeff Katz, that was the final issue of their year-long run, in which they established Booster Gold as someone who has played the “glory hound” card for years in order to hide his true nature as a Time Master. He is, in fact, monumentally important to the Carter family legacy and if villains were to know that, Booster could be killed in his crib. That’s the risk when your enemies can time-travel.
Since the line is so similar, and Johns is an executive producer on The Flash, I have to wonder: could Eddie have something truly remarkable coming up on the horizon, which he and The Flash work to keep hidden from history?
Don’t get me wrong: I’m not saying that Rick Cosnett’s character is secretly Booster Gold (although that would be awesome). What I am saying is that such a similar sentiment, expressed in a project with which Johns is involved and relating to a character who is thus far competent, likable ad good at his job, seems like it could be a hint. If he’s “the only one,” why? What makes him different than literally every person in his family line after him?
My guess is that Eobard is either lying or, more likely, mistaken and he simply doesn’t know it because either The Flash or Rip Hunter (who is slated to appear in the forthcoming Arrow/The Flash spinoff series) wants it that way.
Who knows? Eddie could be one of the greatest heroes you’ve never heard of.
