‘The Flash’: What That Name-Drop Could Mean for ‘Legends of Tomorrow’

Tonight’s season premiere of The Flash provided quite a lot of clues about the Arrowverse’s future — including one that might be relevant to one of the sister shows.

Spoilers for tonight’s episode of The Flash, “Nora”, below!

The episode saw Nora Allen/XS (Jessica Parker Kennedy) getting used to being with Team Flash, after she traveled from the 2040s to spend time with the younger versions of her parents. Through an array of events, Barry Allen/The Flash (Grant Gustin) was left without a working suit, a problem that Nora was able to solve. She gave Barry the Flash Ring that he wears at some point in the future, which she reveals was designed by Ryan Choi.

As DC Comics fans know, Ryan Choi is the fourth character to take on the mantle of The Atom, after studying under the tutelage of Ray Palmer. Considering the fact that Brandon Routh’s portrayal of Ray has factored into the Arrowverse for quite some time, and is one of the mainstays on Legends of Tomorrow, this certainly adds an interesting wrinkle to things.

As the episode also reveals, Barry vanishes into a crisis in 2024 and still hasn’t returned in the 2040s, which would place Ryan designing the suit in a relatively narrow window of time. Not only does the name-drop confirm that Ryan exists, but the notion that he has access to shrinking technology sometime in the 2020s could hint at him factoring into Ray’s life sooner rather than later, either as the next Atom or as just a student.

In several iterations of the comics, Ryan becomes the Atom after Ray gets trapped in some sort of subatomic level, something that Routh has entertained having happen on Legends.

“Certainly for me it would have been cool, but I don’t know if that’s going to happen or not; I don’t think there’s enough worked into the current storyline of Ray in that time for it to work right now,” Routh told ComicBook.com back when Legends launched. “The changes have come mostly from him coming back into the world versus the experiences that he had. And we might come back and play in that world a little bit, or something like that might happen again, certainly. There will be adventures of Ray being small and fighting bugs and other things that seem bigger than life to him at some point down the road.”

But even then, what exactly this name drop of Ryan could mean for Ray – and for Legends of Tomorrow – is a mystery at this point. While Ray has been a fixture of Legends since its inception, bringing in Ryan could be a easy, comic-accurate way to (eventually) wrap up his time as The Atom, while also allowing the legacy of the character to carry on.

What did you think of The Flash‘s Ryan Choi name-drop? Do you want to see him factor into the Arrowverse at some point? Share your thoughts in the comments below!

The Flash airs Tuesdays at 8/7c on The CW. The season four premiere of Legends of Tomorrow, which is titled “The Virgin Gary”, will debut on Monday, October 22nd, at 9/8c on The CW.