More than once now, the Arrowverse has had one major character turn out to be someone else in the DC world, which in many cases have been huge for the shows. When it comes to comic book adaptations, it is not uncommon these days for a TV show or movie to cast an actor as one character but then reveal that they are a different player. Whenever a creative team is adapting characters from the DC Universe, it can get challenging with how to exceed viewers’ expectations.
Since these characters have existed for decades, passionate fans can sometimes see clearly where a comic book show is going in terms of story or character. The Arrowverse, which began all the way back in 2012 with Arrow, has become a massive interconnected franchise for The CW. With more than six shows produced, The CW’s DC TV universe has incorporated multiple heroes and villains for almost a decade.
But over the years, the creators of the respective shows have been able to pull a Twist with some of the characters they adapt to screen. There have been characters who seemed like they were original creations for the Arrowverse, only to be unveiled as an established DC character. In most cases, it has been that one DC character is actually another one, which can sometimes turn a whole season around. The longer the Arrowverse goes on, the more these identity twists will come about with both heroes and villains.
The Reverse-Flash
The first major one for the Arrowverse came in The Flash season 1, which seemingly kicked off this idea across other shows. While it was known that the oft-returning Reverse-Flash would be a huge factor in The Flash season 1, the creators kept Eobard Thawne’s identity a secret for the first nine episodes. In the beginning, it was believed that Eddie Thawne, played by Rick Cosnett, was going to turn out to be the speedster villain. Even his original casting description, stating, “whose past is a mystery and who harbors a dark secret,” alluded to Eddie somehow being a version of Eobard.
But instead, Cosnett’s character played a different role in the Thawne mythology. The Flash episode 9, titled “The Man In the Yellow Suit,” ended with Tom Cavanagh’s Harrison Wells being revealed to have been the Reverse-Flash this entire time. The real Eobard, as played by Matt Letscher, had killed Earth-1’s original Harrison Wells and taken his likeness. While Eddie was never the iconic foe, he was still relevant to the Thawne family tree by being Eobard’s ancestor.
Zoom
It didn’t take long for the Arrowverse to use this plot device again as The Flash season 2 pulled this twist again with their next big bad. In the beginning, Teddy Sears portrayed Jay Garrick, who was The Flash on Earth-2, which is where Harry Wells and Jesse Quick came from too. Their take on the Golden Age Flash was significantly different as he was a lot younger compared to his comic counterpart. Despite being a few years older than Barry, The Flash’s Jay was still relatively young as Earth-2’s protector. Similar to Reverse-Flash, Zoom was announced ahead of the second season as the new big bad, while keeping his identity a secret.
Tony Todd was revealed to be voicing Zoom, but not be the man under the cowl. In The Flash season 2, episode 14, “Escape from Earth-2,” Jay was murdered by Zoom, but there was a big twist to this in episode 15, “King Shark.” During the final scene, Zoom unmasked himself, revealing to be Sears, with the following episodes establishing that he was in fact playing Hunter Zolomon. The reason Hunter had taken on Jay’s identity was that the real Jay Garrick, played by John Wesley Shipp, had been kidnapped and locked away on Earth-2, while Zoom’s time remnant would pose as the Arrowverse’s Crimson Comet.
Martian Manhunter
Supergirl became the next Arrowverse series to stage a major character turning out to be someone else, but this was due to creative changes behind the scenes. When the show was in the works, David Harewood had been cast as Hank Henshaw, who is best known to fans as the Cyborg Superman, traditionally a Superman villain. The Supergirl version depicted him as the director of the D.E.O., and that was the original plan for the series. While they were filming the pilot, the executive producers had been toying around with the idea of having Harewood play Martian Manhunter. But that little discussion ended up becoming crucial for Harewood’s run on the show.
In past interviews, Harewood spoke about his struggle to connect with Henshaw as a character during the Supergirl pilot, which is why he liked the idea of the Martian Manhunter twist. Before the seventh episode, Supergirl began to tease that something was up with Henshaw by having his eyes glow red every now and then to signify that he had a secret. In the seventh episode, “Human For a Day,” Henshaw revealed to Alex Danvers that he was J’onn J’onzz, a.k.a. the Martian Manhunter. After almost being killed by the real Henshaw, J’onn took on the director’s form and began living the former’s life. Although, Harewood did get to play the Arrowverse villain in Supergirl season 2.
Prometheus
In Arrow season 5, Oliver Queen took on one of his toughest opponents, a villain that he was partially responsible for creating. While Prometheus is one of Green Arrow’s enemies in the comics, the Arrowverse reimagined the character while adding a twist to him. When Josh Segarra joined the cast, he was cast as Adrian Chase, better known to DC readers as Vigilante, who would be a big player in the fifth season. Adrian was introduced as Star City’s new district attorney, who was working closely with Oliver when he was the mayor. But as Vigilante starting roaming around in the city, it seemed like Arrow was doing a slow burn to reveal that Vigilante and Adrian were the same person. But instead, the fifteenth episode, titled “Fighting Fire With Fire,” revealed the Arrow creators’ actual plans for Adrian. After having a showdown with Vigilante, Prometheus unmasked himself with Adrian being the man under the hood.
Even though Vincent Sobel turned out to be Vigilante, it was a fair assumption that Adrian was the crime fighter. Before the big identity twist, Mick Wingert was voicing Vigilante, who did sound a lot like Adrian, which may have been on purpose to throw viewers off. Arrow and Arrowverse co-creator Marc Guggenheim admitted in an interview they intentionally set out to make viewers believe Adrian was Vigilante when he was, in fact, Prometheus. Segarra’s real character name was actually Simon Morrison, which was a nod to Prometheus creator Grant Morrison. But after Oliver had murdered Simon’s father in the first season, he changed it to Adrian Chase to begin his quest in destroying the Emerald Archer.
XS
Towards the end of the first half of The Flash season 4, the creative had already begun to seed the idea of a new major Arrowverse character, who would be imperative for the following season. In the Crisis on Earth-X crossover, Jessica Parker Kennedy appeared as an unnamed waitress at Iris and Barry’s wedding. While she only had one scene, Kennedy’s character seemed very excited to be at their wedding, almost as if she knew Iris and Barry. What followed was a few cameos in the back half of The Flash season 4 when the mystery girl began interacting with the other characters. But by the 20th episode, Kennedy’s mystery player unveiled that she was a speedster.
The season finale revealed that she was Nora West-Allen, the future daughter of Iris and Barry, as she had helped The Flash destroy the satellite by rewinding time. As Nora became a main player in The Flash season 5, it seemed like the Arrowverse had created an original character as Iris and Barry’s daughter. But as the season went on, it became evident that Nora was actually an amalgamation of Dawn Allen and Jenni Ognats, who is the original XS in the comics. Eobard hinted at the idea that Nora was initially named Dawn in his original timeline, meaning Kennedy’s Arrowverse character was based on The Flash’s original daughter.
Mia Queen-Smoak
In Arrow season 7, Kat McNamara joined the Arrowverse as a new player named Blackstar, who is actually a Supergirl villain in the comics, but spelled as Blackstarr. Initially, McNamara’s character was reported to go by Maya, but Arrow season 7 only referred to her as Blackstar when they first introduced her. Blackstar debuted as part of Arrow’s flashforward scenes to Star City 2040, where she was a street fighter. But in the thirteenth episode, “Star City Slayer,” Blackstar revealed herself to be Mia Smoak, the daughter of Felicity and Oliver.
Despite McNamara’s character being mostly a creation for the Arrowverse, there are a few DC players the Arrow writers seemingly got inspired from for Mia. While the Green Arrow in DC’s current continuity doesn’t have a daughter, Mia Dearden, a.k.a. Speedy (who Thea Queen was based on), was originally his adopted kid pre-Flashpoint. There is also Olivia Queen from Earth-22, who was Black Canary and Green Arrow’s daughter. After Oliver’s sacrifice in Crisis on Infinite Earths, Mia became the new Green Arrow in her timeline.
John Henry Irons
The latest Arrowverse series to pull the secret identity twist was Superman & Lois season 1 with Wolé Parks’ Captain Luthor. In the pilot, he got introduced as The Stranger, a mystery villain who was determined to defeat Earth-Prime’s Superman before he could turn on humanity as he did on The Stranger’s world. The pilot ended with the big reveal that Parks was playing Captain Luthor, a Lex from a parallel universe. Throughout the first couple of episodes, Luthor’s background slowly got unveiled, establishing that he was married to Lois Lane on his Earth where Superman had, for unknown reasons, turned on the planet and become a tyrant.
But in the seventh episode, “Man of Steel,” Superman & Lois dropped a major Superman and Arrowverse surprise to the viewers. The episode centered heavily on Captain Luthor’s life in his reality before he came to Earth-Prime. Not only was he married to Lois, but they had a daughter together called Natalie, who was named after Sam Lane’s mother. But as Earth-Prime’s Lois was trying to uncover who “Marcus Bridgewater” really was, they discovered that Captain Luthor was none other than John Henry Irons, a.k.a. DC’s Steel. Natalie is also based on Nat Irons, John’s nephew in the comics, who has been changed to his daughter on Superman & Lois.
It was also explained in the same episode that John’s Earth-Prime doppelganger had died in 2015 during a military mission. Superman & Lois showrunner Todd Helbing and Jai Jamison, who wrote “Man of Steel,” shared in an Entertainment Weekly interview that the John twist was pitched during summer 2020. According to them, they had always intended to do something more with Parks’ character. This is probably not the final time a DC TV character will be introduced as one character, only to come out and be someone else entirely from the DC Universe. It will be interesting when and where they will do their next big identity twist in the Arrowverse.
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