After seven years and seven seasons, Tom Cavanagh is leaving The Flash. Departing alongside fellow series regular Carlos Valdes, Cavanagh stated in a post on his Instagram over a year ago that it had been "a joy creating and playing the myriad Wells," a sentiment clearly expressed in the actor's performances on screen. Unlike most actors' relationships with a show (which might see them portray one or even two different roles), Cavanagh was constantly oscillating between different characters, with the question of who the Wells for each season would be as much of a mystery as the show's villains.
Cavanagh started off portraying Eobard Thawne, who was secretly impersonating the Harrison Wells of Earth-1. But after Thawne's death at the end of the season, the show decided to recast Cavanagh instead of parting ways. This led to the introduction of "Harry" Wells, the Harrison Wells of Earth-2. And even though Harry survived the events of the season, the show decided to continue the pattern, recasting Cavanagh each season and letting him fill the shoes of a new Wells doppelganger, each from their own Earth in the Arrowverse's expansive multiverse. So, as he departs the show, let's say a fond farewell to Cavanagh by looking back on the best moments in his long tenure.
Cavanagh's performance as Eobard Thawne is always a treat. It's the role he's had the longest to grow into, but the combination of acting as Barry's first mentor while also being his greatest enemy was gold from the start. There's no moment that highlights that dualism more than when he teaches Barry how to phase through solid matter in Season 1 Episode 17, "Tricksters." Strapped with a bomb that will explode if he drops below 600 miles an hour, Barry is forced to literally run for his life. Thawne coaches Barry through the process of phasing, delivering an impassioned monologue on how to tap into the Speed Force. It's clear to the viewer at this point in the show that Wells is the Reverse-Flash, so hearing him speak so fervently about the powers he's slowly losing access to gives a dual meaning to the scene.
It's also clear that The Flash's writers were fond of the scene, as it's repeated again in Season 5 Episode 18, "Godspeed." But this time around, Thawne coaches Barry's daughter Nora through defeating Godspeed from his prison cell. The moment follows a similar setup, with Thawne giving Nora an almost word-for-word recreation of his speech from Season 1 while walking her through the exact steps she needs to take to avoid certain death. Thawne is a terrifying villain, but his best moments are when he's not the sole antagonist, working more off of an undercurrent of menace than an in-your-face threat.
While Thawne-as-Wells set the stage for the character during the show's first season, it's Cavanagh's performance as Harry that sold the idea of multiple Wells. Harry exhibited a massive shift in personality from the original Wells, showing the audience this wasn't just a ploy to bring back the same character. Where Thawne was silent, subtle and manipulative, Harry was angry and unabashed, making no secret of how he felt towards the rest of Team Flash. He was only there to find his daughter, and his animosity was borne of a frantic worry that she wouldn't be okay.
Harry would eventually warm up to the rest of the main cast over time but would remain starkly different in personality to any other Wells. His entire arc is hard to sum up in a single moment, but it all started with his original appearance. The audience catches a brief glimpse of him before this, but the show really shows him off when he blasts King Shark with his energy rifle, saving Barry at the end of Season 2, Episode 4, "The Fury of Firestorm." Barry chases him down, and the episode ends on a cliffhanger as he pulls down his hood to reveal the familiar-yet-new face of Harrison Wells. There's more exposition and backstory given in the next episode, but it's that single moment that works so well to sell the mystery of Harry as a new character.
Cavanagh isn't the only actor to take on the role of Eobard Thawne, and Season 2 Episode 11, "The Reverse-Flash Returns" has Matt Letscher make his first appearance as the yellow-garbed speedster. While this episode can be primarily seen as laying the groundwork for Letscher's eventual appearance as the main villain in Legends of Tomorrow Season 2, it also features one of The Flash's quirks of time travel: closed loops. Time travel does alter the past, but it can also introduce closed loops, where the future is what causes events in the past, eventually leading to the same original event in the future. There is no cause and effect, only a continuous cycle of events acting upon one another.
The loop here is the Reverse-Flash's scheme of impersonating Harrison Wells and causing the events of the first season. Thawne travels to the past and has a conversation with Harry, convincing him as to the cleverness of Harrison Wells. This causes him to later kill and impersonate Harry's Earth-1 counterpart and cause the particle explosion that creates the Flash. Barry later imprisons him when he returns to the past, causing him to have his conversation with Harry. Their exchange isn't a large part of the episode, but it's important all the same.
Cavanagh spent most of his time each season as whichever character was the "primary" Wells, but the writers also took the concept of interdimensional doppelgangers to its comedic zenith by introducing the Council of Wells, an assembly of Wells from various different timelines. These characters tend to be Wells combined with another character from pop culture or history, and the first of them show up in Season 4 when Harry and Cisco need help decoding the identity of "DeVoe," the name left from their encounter with Abra Kadabra.
The Council includes members like "Harrison Wolfgang Wells," a German Wells who dresses like Steve Jobs, "H. Lothario Wells," a sexually promiscuous playboy and "Wells 2.0," a cyborg Wells from a post-apocalyptic Earth. This group is clearly an excuse for Cavanagh to dress up in silly costumes, but it's also a fun testament to his acting chops. Each Wells feels different and distinct, and they often result in Cavanagh holding entire multi-person conversations with no one but himself.
As evidenced earlier in the show by their many interactions, Thawne is at his best when Barry isn't directly opposing him. If they get into a fight, it tends to be a lot of zipping back and forth through the streets of Central City, with what usually feels like an arbitrary decision as to whoever wins. But what does work is when they are forced to work together. Cavanagh is great at making the character feel menacing and dangerous, even when he's just talking to Barry. And no scene underscores that idea better than in Season 5 Episode 8, "What's Past is Prologue," directed by Cavanagh himself. It features Barry and Nora traveling back in time to get Thawne's help -- something Barry had already done years earlier in Season 2.
Their previous interaction involved Thawne having the upper hand, handcuffing Barry to his wheelchair and threatening to kill him. But Barry has been hardened by years of fighting the Reverse-Flash, and he simply stands calmly while demanding his former mentor fix Harry's dark matter extractor. The real element of danger comes from how calm Thawne is, barely raising his voice above a whisper as he cheerily guesses who Nora is. He tosses out a few names before figuring it out, and it's chilling when does, mentioning almost with glee that Barry has brought him his daughter. Nora is as afraid as Barry is confident, which is what really sells the scene -- there's an implicit threat that Thawne could snap at any time and try to kill her, just to hurt Barry.
The Flash stars Grant Gustin, Candice Patton, Jesse L. Martin, Danielle Panabaker, Carlos Valdes and Tom Cavanagh. New episodes air Tuesdays at 8 p.m. ET/PT on The CW.
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