The Flash Season 8 kicked off a few months back on with the five-episode “Armageddon” event, which saw Grant Gustin’s Barry Allen teaming with Arrowverse heroes like The Atom and Black Lightning during his conflict with Despero and Eobard Thawne, a.k.a. the Reverse-Flash. Season 8 will resume in March, and now it looks like The CW might be laying the groundwork for a ninth season. However, the downside is that this could mark the beginning of the end of Gustin’s run (pun intended) on the CW series.
According to Deadline, Grant Gustin is finalizing a new contract to return to The Flash for Season 9, but it would only be for one year rather than a multi-season deal. This new contract could see the actor netting upwards of $200,000 per episode, and he’s also reportedly “capped his involvement” at 15 episodes. This could mean one of two things: either The Flash Season 9, assuming it’s greenlit, will be much shorter than its predecessors, or Barry Allen would be absent for a sizable chunk of the season.
Hearing news like this might also lead one to assume that The Flash might just be ending altogether, and that’s certainly possible. The series is already on track in Season 8 to surpass Arrow’s total number of episodes, and so scoring one more season than the Stephen Amell-led show would be the icing on the proverbial cake. Plus, few shows ever get to run for nearly a decade, so it’s not like The Flash is leaving too soon. For right now though, the available information is just pointing towards Grant Gustin seemingly preparing to retire as the Scarlet Speedster.
On the chance that The CW wants to keep The Flash going into Season 10 without Grant Gustin, it’s fortunate that this is a superhero mantle that’s been shared by multiple people in the comics. John Wesley Shipp’s Jay Garrick also fights crime as The Flash, but if the network wants a younger lead to take over, Keiynan Lonsdale’s Wally West/Kid Flash or Jordan Fisher’s Bart Allen/Impulse could easily fill that role, just like their comic book counterparts did. I’d also throw in Jessica Parker Kennedy’s Nora Allen/XS as a worthy candidate.
In addition to The CW’s The Flash series still chugging along, there’s also The Flash movie coming out in November, which wrapped filming last October and sees Ezra Miller reprising his version of Barry Allen following his appearances in Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, Suicide Squad and Justice League. Miller and Grant Gustin’s respective Flashes met each other during Part 4 of the “Crisis on Infinite Earths” in early 2020, and part of me wonders if Gustin might cameo in the Scarlet Speedster’s first solo movie given the presence of other superheroes, like both Ben Affleck and Michael Keaton’s versions of Batman. But as far as the TV show goes, once an official announcement is made about its future one way or another, we’ll pass it along.
The Flash Season 8 will resume Wednesday, March 9 at 8 p.m. ET on The CW. Keep track of when your other favorite shows are airing by scanning though our 2022 TV schedule.
