Gustin was very enthusiastic about playing Barry, noting, “I immediately thought he was really funny and endearing and I hadn't done anything like that and I had a lot of fun with that, just throughout the audition process. They kind of started steering me in that direction immediately, as soon as I met them and I just had fun with it and kind of took it from there.” Gustin, who’s played some less than reputable characters in the past, most notably on Glee, added, “He's likable. I would be his friend. I haven't had the opportunity to play a character I would actually enjoy spending time with so that's nice!”There are some pretty notable sparks on Arrow between Barry and Felicity Smoak (Emily Bett Rickards) and Kreisberg explained, “It was just something we were talking about when we were figuring out how we were going to bring him in. We spent a lot of time talking about Barry, even before the pilot aspect, just how we were going to introduce him in these episodes. Especially with the way the season had been going, talking about Oliver and Felicity and their growing relationship or feelings for each other, the fact that Barry and Felicity are so similar and they're both a little bit uncomfortable in their own skins and both very likable and personable, it just seemed like they would instantly hit it off, which would complicate things for Oliver even more. It felt like the right way to go. One of the things we did when we were testing some of the finalists was Emily Bett Rickards came down from Canada to read [with them] and the minute we saw her read with Grant, it was a done deal.”
Arrow: Emily Bett Rickards on Barry Allen's Introduction and Felicity's Future
Executive producer Greg Berlanti couldn’t resist joking, “Yeah, we wanted to make sure he didn't seem like jailbait next to her!” Gustin exclaimed, in reply, “I am older than her!”Yes, Gustin is 23 years old, and he’s also a pretty notably young looking guy. There are some funny lines in Arrow regarding this -- check out the clip above -- with Oliver making a few cracks about Barry's appearance. Kreisberg revealed, “Greg actually had us add a lot of those lines because it is an elephant in the room and so we addressed it. But we always had sort of seen him as being a little bit younger [than Oliver] and the thing that was really important to us more than anything was he really should be a contrast to Oliver and to Stephen. Stephen is the more traditional, square-jawed, muscle-bound hero and that works really well because he needs all that. And one of the things about The Flash is he's a random guy who gets struck by lightning. He needs the bolt of lightning to be a hero in a way that Stephen doesn't need the bolt of lightning.”Collaborating on The Flash pilot with Kreisberg and Berlanti on The Flash pilot is DC Comics’ Geoff Johns, who also co-wrote this week’s episode, “The Scientist”, which introduces Barry. Said Johns, “The cool thing is the contrast. [Oliver] needs the heart, Barry has the heart. [Oliver] has the body, Barry needs the body.”
While the Arrow producers know fans have some skepticism about Gustin’s youthful appearance, Berlanti stressed they went with him because they felt he was the right actor for the role. “The tricky thing about casting this role is we were trying to hit a moving target in that if we were just creating a character out of nothing, that nobody had any kind of preconceived awareness of, it would be a lot easier,” said Berlanti. “But this, we knew the character that we were trying to honor and the spirit of the kind of character we were trying to bring to the show. Then we went into casting and we didn’t even have a pilot script. When we cast Arrow, we had a pilot script and you go out to all the actors and everybody reads the whole script. We had sides [script pages]. So really, basically off these sides, we were just looking for someone who was the essence of the character. And in addition, you're looking for someone who fits into the Arrow universe we have but really can potentially have the promise of their own universe and their own show. And had we not found Grant, I'm not sure we would have done the character. We looked at everybody -- certainly the largest search I've ever been a part of for a TV show -- and he just was the part. It suddenly didn’t become about age, it didn't become about any of those other things, other than that, ‘Wow, if I were a kid and I got to watch the living embodiment of The Flash, this is who I'd want to see do it.’ So that's our real hope with these episodes is that when people watch them, even before he's become The Flash, that they connect with him in the way that we did.” Continue to Page 2 for more on The Flash and the plans for the pilot episode.
Originally, the plan was for the 20th episode of Arrow this season to be a backdoor pilot for The Flash, focusing on Barry and how he becomes the scarlet speedster. Now however, CW have decided to make The Flash as a standalone pilot, which the producers say they’re grateful for, as it means it’s less of a dramatic shift away from Arrow’s storylines at that late point in the season.
This change also means they are planning on introducing The Flash costume earlier. As Berlanti explained, “We were holding back the costume element because we knew if we had episode 20 [of Arrow] as its own standalone episode, we'd have to find a real reason for people, in addition to the quality of the show, to come back in episode one [of The Flash]. When you make a backdoor pilot like that, you kind of have to remake the pilot [for the show’s first episode]. For notes on how difficult this is, ask [The Vampire Diaries / The Originals executive producer] Julie Plec. And so you have to remake the pilot, so we thought the suit would be the perfect way to introduce that in the time span between episode 20 and [episode] one. Now that it’s become a pilot, one of the great things about it is we get to add a suit. So that will appear in the pilot episode now."It’s established on Arrow that Barry is quite knowledgeable and enthusiastic about the stories in Starling City about The Arrow and Kreisberg noted, “We're obviously still working out the pilot details now, but I think that Barry's love of the hero is going to play a part in the creation of his persona.”
Johns promised that as they write The Flash pilot, “We're using a lot of mythology, a lot of characters from the comics, in the development of The Flash show. I don't want to get too specific yet, but you'll see a lot of characters and a lot of elements form that. It's very much The Flash.”
The Flash previously was the subject of a short-lived CBS series in 1990, but Gustin explained he'd never seen it, noting, “The last time a [Flash] series was around I was an infant!” Still, he has some amusing connections to John Wesley Shipp, who starred in that series, explaining, “We're both from Norfolk, Virginia, which is strange because not that many people are from Norfolk, Virginia... Our birthday is a week apart. It's a little strange, I guess.” Added Johns, “He's The Flash of Earth 2!”
Gustin noted, “I've actually never seen anyone else portray The Flash, which actually was something I thought was really fun about this once they got excited about me, because I'm a superhero fan. I was a big Superman fan growing up. I've always been a big superhero fan and to even have the opportunity to audition for this blew my mind and to have them get excited about it was really cool. But I wasn't trying to be any Flash that I knew about or had seen, because I really didn't have that much knowledge in that category, so it was just kind of fun to have them get excited about my random take on Barry Allen. “
Among the many comic books Johns is known for, The Flash is among the highlights. Remarked Berlanti, “When Geoff brought back The Flash, it made a lot of us fall in love with The Flash character again in the comic book. That's why it's been so awesome and incredible to have him be both part of Arrow but now part of this. For me, as someone who loves reading what he writes in comic books, to actually be crafting the show that way has been awesome. And to use how he sort of reimagined the character’s origin and have it be so emotional and to actually now be able to render that in a pilot form has been terrific. So I think just the fact that we've been able to use how he reimagined the birth of the character and the tortured backstory that Barry carries with him and why he is who he is has been very exciting, so I hope we do it justice.”
Asked if they ever considered any of the other characters from the comics who have been The Flash, Johns replied, “Never. Barry just fits into this world. His backstory makes sense with this world. He is The Flash.” Grant Gustin makes his debut on Arrow as Barry Allen on Wednesday, December 4th.
Eric Goldman is Executive Editor of IGN TV. You can follow him on Twitter at @EricIGN, IGN at ericgoldman-ign and Facebook at Facebook.com/TheEricGoldman.