The final lap of The Flash’s race is about to begin. After premiering in September 2014 following the introduction of Grant Gustin’s Barry Allen in Arrow Season 2, the Scarlet Speedster’s CW series is returning for a ninth and final season comprised of just 13 episodes. While fans remain in the dark about what Season 9 holds in store plot-wise, there’s been a few casting announcements over the last several months, and today brings word that three rumored Arrowverse characters will indeed be appearing too, including the big bad from the first chunk of Season 6.
Those of you who read DC Comics’ Earth-Prime six-issue series last year will recall that it ended with a tease that Ramsey Rosso, a.k.a. Bloodwork, would appear in The Flash Season 9. Sure enough, it’s been announced (via Deadline) that Sendhil Ramamurthy will guest star in Season 9’s ninth episode. That same episode will also feature the return of David Ramsey as John Diggle and Keiynan Lonsdale’s Wally West, a.k.a. Kid Flash. With Diggle having made 10 guest appearances on The Flash so far, and Wally having been an important character in the show’s earlier seasons, fans speculated that they’d be looped into Season 9, and now we know for sure this is happening alongside the return of Bloodwork.
Ramsey Rosso was the villain in The Flash Season 6’s opening arc (i.e. the episodes prior to the “Crisis on Infinite Earths”), with his efforts to ward off death resulting in him obtaining haemokinesis, the ability to control and manipulate blood. After being defeated in “The Last Temptation of Barry Allen, Pt. 2,” Bloodwork was imprisoned by A.R.G.U.S. and last seen in “Liberation” giving a sample of his special blood to Eva McCulloch’s mirror minions, but forgoing their offer to free him from custody, as he was playing “the long game.” Bloodwork was then seen in the Earth-Prime comic book series being transported to 2049 to cause trouble, and after the main story was concluded, it was shown in the present day that he hadn’t been returned to his A.R.G.U.S. cell, meaning he’s still on the loose.
David Ramsey was last seen as Earth-Prime’s John Diggle in The Flash Season 8’s “The Man in the Yellow Tie,” when he visited Eobard Thawne at Lian Yu to ask for the sinister speedster’s help with opening the mysterious box that he found in the Arrow series finale. After a couple years of this mystery lingering in the Arrowverse, the cosmic contents of the box were finally revealed, but Diggle ultimately ignored its offer of greater power in favor of returning to his family. While the Dingle-centric spinoff Justice U is still in development, if that project doesn’t get off the ground, The Flash Season 9’s ninth episode may end up being the last time we see Ramsey playing Earth-Prime’s Diggle, though let’s not forget that he’s also been playing a different version of the character on Superman & Lois, which is set on another Earth.
As for Keiynan Lonsdale’s Wally West, he started out as a series regular in Seasons 2 and 3 of The Flash, recurred in Season 4 and guest-starred in the following two seasons, as well as starred in the latter half of Legends of Tomorrow Season 3. We last saw Wally in The Flash Season 6’s “Death of the Speed Force,” when he came back to Central City to help Barry investigate what was wrong at the Speed Force at the time and deal with Turtle II. Considering how important Wally has been to both this show and DC Comics’ Flash lore in general over the decades, it’s good to know we’ll see him at least one more time before this CW series wraps up.
Along with these three characters, The Flash Season 9 is also bringing in Supergirl’s Nicole Maines to reprise Nia Nal, a.k.a. Dreamer; Andy Mientus to reprise Hartley Rathaway, a.k.a. Pied Piper; and Batwoman’s Javicia Leslie to reprise Ryan Wilder (although in her case, it hasn’t been clarified if we’ll be seeing the main Ryan or a doppelgänger). The Flash’s final season will also introduce Richard Harmon as Owen Mercer, the new Captain Boomerang. While Jesse L. Martin will only be recurring as Joe West in Season 9, Jon Cor’s Mark Blaine, a.k.a. Chilblaine, has been upgraded to the main cast for these last episodes.
The Flash Season 9 premieres on Wednesday, February 8 at 8 pm ET. Check out our 2023 TV schedule to learn what other shows are slated to premiere in this year’s opening weeks.
