Is The Flash Teasing A Major Season Six Threat in “Gone Rogue?”

In the same way that The Flash has introduced characters like Abra Kadabra and The Thinker in throwaway lines, tonight’s episode — titled “Gone Rogue” — name-dropped one of the last major Rogues yet to appear on the show. McCulloch Industries, a military contractor that was the target of a heist by the Young Rogues (Queen Bee, Ragdoll, and Weather Witch, led by XS), is a clear nod to Mirror Master — the second one, whose real name is Evan McCulloch — and given the magnitude of power he has at his disposal, one has to wonder whether, as with The Thinker, this episode might be a clever way of setting up a major threat for next season.

While fans have met a previous Mirror Master — Sam Scudder — his appearance was brief and he was not a particular threat to Team Flash. In that episode, the Earth-2 version fo Harrison Wells noted that on his Earth, Evan McCulloch used a mirror gun — and such a gun made an appearance in the final moments of tonight’s episode. Nora (Jessica Parker Kennedy) and company stole it, ostensibly so they can use it to reduce Cicada’s dagger to atoms…but along the way, the Young Rogues revealed that McCulloch’s company had not been disposing of dark matter-infused items as they were expected to as part of their government contract, but using them to create meta-tech and meta-weapons. Whether or not the mirror gun is specifically meta tech or just technology built to withstand and destroy it, it seems likely that McCulloch will have a stockpile of dangerous weapons waiting around — and that he will not be thrilled to discover that one of his most powerful pieces was stolen by Team Flash.

In DC Comics (per the Arrowverse Wiki, who tend to have a succinct way of putting these things), Evan McCulloch was the second Mirror Master in the New Earth continuity. Originally a mob hitman, and a professional assassin from Scotland, he was recruited by the Federal Bureau of Investigation, who wanted to hire him as a mercenary. The FBI outfitted him with the technology of the first Mirror Master, Sam Scudder, so he could take out government targets while posing as a super-villain. McCulloch then went rogue, and did a series of crimes under the effects of heroin, the most heinous of which being the murder of Hartley Rathaway’s parents, which he set Hartley himself up for. McCulloch eventually joined the Rogues and, after a degree of positive influence from Leonard Snart, somewhat reformed, proving himself to be a worthy successor to Sam Scudder, although Hartley never forgave him for the murders he committed.

The Flash airs on Tuesday nights at 8 p.m. ET/PT on The CW.

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