The Flash: Carlos Valdes Says Cisco Is “Haunted” by Giving up His Powers

During the Season 5 finale of The Flash, Cisco Ramon made a major decision that altered not only his life changed the dynamics of Team Flash forever when he chose to take the metahuman cure, thus giving up his powers as Vibe. While Cisco would briefly regain his powers during “Crisis on Infinite Earths”, those powers were revered in the creation of Earth-Prime leaving Cisco to aid Team Flash in other ways — including helping Barry attempt to create a new Speed Force for himself. But while Cisco chose to give up his powers for his greater happiness and doesn’t have regrets, actor Carlos Valdes says that his character is haunted by it.

During The Flash‘s panel during Saturday’s second part of the DC FandDome event, Valdes said that he personally identifies with Cisco’s feelings and teased that there will continue to be repercussions of the decision to walk away from his powers even into Season 7.

“I don’t think he regrets the decision, but I think it definitely haunts him,” Valdes said. “Like, I’m actually feeling a lot like Cisco these days, because, like, we’ll have a fan we’ll see on the street or whatever be like ‘yo, Vibe!’ I have to imagine Cisco’s probably ‘I know, okay.’ But you know, it was such a big decision for him. I feel like the ripple effect, you know, repercussions for that in terms of Cisco’s sense of identity, we’re still seeing those waves. We’re continuing to see those waves in Season 7 so I’m just riding the wave.”

Some of those repercussions may come into play when Barry’s (Grant Gustin) speed powers run out. It was established in Season 6 that, as a result of “Crisis”, the Speed Force was dying and while Barry had some speed remaining, it would eventually run out leaving him powerless. When it does — and if the team can’t create an artificial Speed Force in time — Team Flash will need all the metahumans it can get. The seriousness of a powerless Barry is something fans got to see in the teaser for Season 7 that showed a plane about to crash in Central City and a Flash not fast enough to stop it.

And speaking of that teaser, showrunner Eric Wallace told fans during Saturday’s panel that it’s actually full of spoilers, at least for the very first part of Season 7.

“When we had the shutdown happen as unfortunate as it was, we were on the last day of filming for what would have been the 20th episode of last season which will now become partially the first episode of season seven,” Wallace said. “So, we do have 85 percent of the footage that we were able to use plus, also, we knew where we were going already in season seven. So, even though it’s only footage really from one episode, pay attention to the way it’s presented. It’s actually huge spoilers, all over the place.”

The Flash is expected to return with new episodes in 2021.