The Flash Showrunner Says Wally West Will Return For a "Pivotal" Episode

Later this week, The Flash will finally return from a midseason hiatus, and it seems like the series will establish a whole new corner of the post-"Crisis" world. The multiverse-shattering event is expected to continue to have a prolific effect on the series, and also provide a way to weave in previous characters from the series. Late last year, reports surfaced that Wally West/Kid Flash (Keiynan Lonsdale) would be among those returns -- and it sounds like it will definitely be a meaningful one. In a new interview with TVLine, The Flash showrunner Eric Wallace teased that Wally's return will be in one of the series' most monumental episodes yet.

"How do I say this without spoilers….. Wally returns for one of the pivotal episodes in the mythology of The Flash, and that is not an understatement," Wallace explained. "He comes back a changed person, and what he comes back to deal with, and how it involves Barry, will literally change the two of them — and their abilities, quite frankly — moving forward."

When The Flash fans last saw Wally, he was essentially dipping in and out of the series, appearing in a handful of episodes in Season 5. Prior to that, he briefly left Central City to join the cast of Legends of Tomorrow, and even that was a stint that fans thought was too short-lived.

"I'm not coming back full-time, but I'll still be like in the DC universe, just not like, I won't be filming ten months of the year every year," Lonsdale said in a 2018 interview. "It got announced and then I was like, I've got to make sure that people know it was my decision so that no one got too angry. I hope that everyone's not too sad about missing Wally."

It definitely will be interesting to see how Wally fits into the tapestry of a post-"Crisis" Arrowverse, especially considering the minor tweaks in canon that are expected to come with it.

"One would think the true fallout of 'Crisis' is the death of Oliver Queen and not having your mentor — you know, Obi-Wan is gone, Luke must rise up, become a hero — and that happens, don't get me wrong, but that's not the real fallout of 'Crisis,'" Wallace said in another interview. "The real fallout of 'Crisis' has yet to be seen. That is the heart of our story, and that is the heart of what is going to lead Barry on a very emotional journey that he is not prepared for. That's one of the things having Keiynan back as Kid Flash does for us: [It] directly addresses — because Keiynan will be in one of our episodes in 'Graphic Novel #2' — [and] is to help Barry deal with the real fallout of 'Crisis.'"

Are you excited to see Wally West return on The Flash Season 6? Share your thoughts with us in the comments below!

The Flash airs Tuesdays at 8/7c on The CW.