Harrison Wells (Earth-1)


 * For the man who stole Harrison Wells' appearance and identity, see Eobard Thawne. For Wells' Earth Two equivalent, see Harrison Wells (Earth Two).

Dr. Harrison Wells was a brilliant scientist and the husband of Tess Morgan. In the original timeline, he was the mastermind of S.T.A.R. Labs and the co-creator of the particle accelerator, which successfully launched in the year 2020. In the current timeline, Harrison and Tess were murdered in the year 2000 by Eobard Thawne, who took on Wells' appearance in order to use his resources for his own ends and masqueraded as him for nearly two decades.

Original Timeline
Harrison originally lived in Starling City and became a well respected, yet eccentric scientist. He was good friends with equally devoted scientists Tina McGee and Tess Morgan, the latter of whom he fell in love with and eventually married. In at least one timeline, Wells and Morgan successfully built S.T.A.R. Labs and the particle accelerator which resulted in Barry Allen becoming the Flash in 2020.

Current Timeline
In 2000, in the current timeline, Harrison was planning on opening a laboratory in Central City, discussing it with Tess, while Eobard Thawne, stranded in time, watched over from a distance. As Wells drove with Tess, Eobard left spike strips across the road, causing them to crash their car. Wells' life was then ended when Eobard uses a futuristic device that transferred Wells' likeness to Eobard, completely dissolving the real Wells into a decayed corpse in a matter of seconds. Eobard then took on Wells' identity in order to re-create the particle accelerator explosion as soon as he can, then get back to the future.

Original Timeline
Because Harrison and Tess created S.T.A.R. Labs without Eobard's knowledge of future technology, and so their particle accelerator was created in 2020, but failed and exploded. This event led to the creation of many meta-humans, including the Flash.

Current Timeline
Although Harrison and Tess never got their chance to create S.T.A.R. Labs, nor see it in its prime, their company and the particle accelerator still exist in the new timeline because of Eobard Thawne who, under the guise of Harrison Wells, used his knowledge of the future to create and activate the particle accelerator ahead of schedule to ensure that he could return to his own time as soon as possible.

It wasn't until the year 2015 when Joe West and Cisco Ramon discovered the real Harrison Wells' corpse near the crash site in Starling City and Barry learned from Dr. McGee that Dr. Wells was a completely different person after Morgan's death. After some tests, they ascertained that the decayed figure was the true Harrison Wells, meaning their mentor was an impostor.

Because of Eobard's masquerade, including the release of the video of his confession to Nora Allen's murder, the real Harrison Wells's name and reputation had been disgraced, making it hard even for the Harrison Wells of Earth Two to go out in public undisguised while on Earth One. Harrison Wells will (incorrectly) go down in history as a sociopath and a murderer; despite the fact that the world is aware of the existence of meta-humans, it would probably still be a stretch for both the population and the legal system to accept the fact that it was a person from the future that stole Well's identity and killed Nora. Although Harrison Wells's reputation was destroyed, its sacrifice allowed the wrongly imprisoned Henry Allen to walk free.

Personality
According to Tina McGee, Harrison was a very kind man. He showed himself a romantic during his date with Tess Morgan, to the point of idolizing his wife, even wanting to name S.T.A.R. Labs after her.

Abilities

 * Genius-level intellect: According to Eobard, Harrison was a genius scientist, yet surpassed by his wife.

Behind the scenes

 * Even though Harrison Wells does not originate from the DC comics, as he is an original character specifically created for the show, another brief character, only known as "Dr. Wells", appeared in the tie-in DC comic book of the 1990s The Flash TV series titled, Flash TV Special #1 (January, 1991). Interestingly enough, the character was a wheelchair-bound villain who dressed in black and yellow and had the ability to be in two places at once, similarly to how Eobard Thawne, under the alias of Harrison Wells, was introduced on the show.