- For other uses of "Super Friend", see Super Friend (disambiguation).
- "We're Team Flash. We always watch each other's backs. We always keep each other safe."
- —Barry Allen[src]
Team Flash, also known as Team S.T.A.R. Labs[1] and nicknamed Super Friends,[2] was a vigilante team dedicated to fighting meta-human criminals, who were affected by the S.T.A.R. Labs particle accelerator explosion, which was triggered by Eobard Thawne disguised as Harrison Wells. Team Flash also fought other criminals that endangered the people of Central City and beyond whenever possible.
Due to the Crisis, this team was disbanded and a new team was formed on Earth-Prime.
Overview
Team Flash's goal was to capture meta-humans who used their new-found superpowers for evil intentions. They also fought against crime in the name of justice. Team Flash helped the Flash on missions and gave him info on where he needed to go next and what was going on there. Team Flash's main goal was to protect Central City and it's citizens, however, they sometimes helped surrounding cities; like Star City, and beyond with their criminals and threats.
History
Year One: The Flash is Born
- "Yeah, I may be the one in the suit doing all the running... but when I'm out there helping people, making a difference... you're all out there with me. I finally realized something: we were all struck by that lightning."
- —Barry Allen to Team Flash[src]
The team was formed by Barry Allen after gaining the power of super-speed to fight the meta-human criminals around Central City. Later on, it also worked to discover the identity of his mother's killer, "the Man in Yellow." Their main base of operations is S.T.A.R. Labs. The team was initially comprised of Barry Allen, Cisco Ramon, Dr. Caitlin Snow, Detective Joe West, and Dr. Harrison Wells, with the latter acting as the team's leader.[3] In addition to The Flash, the team also supports the conjoined meta-human vigilante Firestorm, the conjoined form of Ronnie Raymond and Professor Martin Stein.[4] Eventually, the team reveals their secret to Eddie Thawne in order for him to help keep Iris in the dark about their activities, only for her to discover the truth later on her own.[5]
The team fought a number of meta-humans. However, their most prominent enemy wasn't a meta at all. Leonard Snart, a.k.a. Captain Cold,[6] was a most ferocious foe, doing things such as backstabbing Barry when he reached out for help, kidnapping Cisco and his brother, and using S.T.A.R. Labs' own technology against them. He stole a gun Cisco built to stop Barry, although that was before he knew Barry. When the rest of the Team found out about Cisco's creation, they reacted with shock, and in Barry's case, hurt and distrust. They patched up their feelings in the end, though.[7]
During the Christmas season, a person who was the same as Barry, just faster and with an opposite color scheme started targeting the team. Cisco coined him the Reverse-Flash, and he was the main antagonist for the rest of the year.[8]
Eventually, it was revealed that Wells himself was the Reverse-Flash and that his real identity is that of Eobard Thawne, a speedster from the late 22nd century who murdered the real Harrison Wells and stole his identity. He also turned out to be the one who killed Nora Allen but lost his ability to travel through time by harnessing the Speed Force after the deed.[9] Now stranded in the early 21st century, Eobard decided to train Barry in order for him to gain enough speed to achieve time travel, and allow Eobard to return to his time in exchange for Barry going back in time and undoing his mother's murder. However, Barry chooses to let his mom die, making the timeline created by the Reverse-Flash stay intact. After doing so, Barry returns to his own time and begins to battle Eobard, when Eddie commits suicide, erasing Eobard from existence. Because of this time paradox, a singularity formed that nearly obliterated Central City. With Firestorm's help, Barry managed to close it, at the cost of Ronnie's life. Not wanting to watch any more people he cares about to die, he dissolved the team and resolved to defend the city on his own.[10]
Year Two: Enter Zoom
After six months, the team was once again reassembled to defeat Atom-Smasher, and while celebrating their success, a man who introduced himself as "Jay Garrick" appeared and revealed to the team that the singularity that nearly consumed Central City has inadvertently opened a portal to Earth-2 and threatened their world with Jay's archenemy: an evil, mysterious, and powerful "speed demon" named Zoom, obsessed with being the only speedster in the multiverse. Jay then informs the team how Zoom has been sending meta-humans like Atom-Smasher from Earth-2 to kill Barry and that he, like Barry, was the Flash, but on Earth-2.[11] He somehow lost his powers at the demonic claws of Zoom. While reluctant to trust him at first due to their previous encounter with Eobard, the Team accepted him when he helped them defeat Sand Demon, even taking on a role as Barry's new mentor as a speedster, doing things like teaching Barry how to throw lightning. While working on finding and closing the Earth-2 breaches Zoom and his Earth-2 meta-human minions use to invade Earth-1,[12] Martin Stein was randomly bursting into blue flame and passing out. The team pinpointed the problem soon enough: Stein was unstable because he needed another Firestorm partner. After a mishap, Jefferson "Jax" Jackson became Firestorm and left with Stein to go to Pittsburgh for training.[13]
The team got a shocking new member when Barry was saved from an ambush by King Shark, Dr. Harrison Wells from Earth-2,[13] came to aid Barry and the team in the fight against Zoom. Tensions were high, especially with Jay, and while his assist did help Barry stop Dr. Light, Jay left for a time when the team went with Wells' plan to use Light to trap Zoom and end his threat.[14] However, the plan went horribly wrong went not only Light escape but even when they found a replacement with Linda Park, Barry's ex, not only did Zoom see through the trap but after drawing Barry into a fight, despite the Flash's best efforts, Zoom easily managed to completely and utterly destroy Barry in the fight, even paralyzing him for a time, while showing off his defeat for all of Central City to see. Luckily, when he was about to kill Barry in front of his team, Cisco manages to use Wells' speed damping serum to chase him away.[15]
It took Barry about a week to recover, but his defeat at Zoom's claws still haunts him. However, with the assistance of his father and stopping Grodd, he begins to overcome the sting of defeat, and he, Harry and the rest of the team are now more determined than ever to stop Zoom.[16]
While working on a way to get Barry to become fast and strong enough to face Zoom, they got drawn into a conflict with Vandal Savage, a threat that would require the assistance of Team Arrow to defeat, and after many twists and turns, they succeeded. Meanwhile, Jay decided to settle his differences with "Harry" Wells and eventually came back to resume work on a way to close the breaches across the city.[17]
After Jay uses Velocity 6 to rescue Harry's life, Harry is forced to secretly ally with Zoom and help steal Barry's speed so Harry can retrieve her daughter back from Zoom.[18] Eventually, he came clean after he and Barry managed to figure out how to close the breaches, but Barry then proposes they head to Earth-2 to rescue Jesse.[19]
Despite a few setbacks, it was successful, but it appeared that Zoom killed Jay when the last breach was closing.[20] While dealing with the return of King Shark, Barry decides to continue to hone his speed and find a way to return to Earth-2 to stop Zoom.[21] While dealing with a chaotic speedster named Trajectory, her lighting turned blue, like Zoom. To the team's horror, they pieced together that Jay was in fact Zoom.[22] This made Barry more determined than ever to become faster and stronger to beat Zoom that he traveled back in time to get the answers from Eobard. With it, Barry and the team were able to create their own Tachyon prototype. It is with this and newly revealed knowledge of Hunter Zolomon, he matched him, but his sense of gloating of victory allowed Zoom to escape and capture Wally West as leverage for The Flash's speed. With no other choice, Barry consents to give up his powers, with Caitlin being captured in the process.[23] Soon Zoom gained the desire for inter-dimensional conquest, starting with Earth-1 Central City. Despite the efforts of Barry and the team to stop his invasion, it wasn't enough without Barry's powers, leaving him no choice but to go through with Harry's risky, yet more contained recreation of the particle accelerator explosion. Although this effort seemingly vaporized Barry, he was actually sent into the Speed Force itself, where his encounters with aspects of the Speed Force masquerading as Joe, Iris, his father, his mother and himself helped him accept his mother's death and his identity as the Flash before he returned home, his powers restored and even increased.[24]
With his powers, back stronger than ever, Barry faces off against platoons of Earth-2 meta-humans that Zoom unleashed upon Central City, with one of them being the doppelganger of a recently deceased friend, Laurel Lance. Barry takes it upon himself to fight her after she attacks Mercury Labs. Team Flash had managed to build a machine that will render all Earth-2 beings unconscious. The device works and Earth-Two Laurel is locked up. However, Hunter kidnaps Henry and tells Barry that his inability to be selfish made him weak,[25] and kills Henry in front of him. Henry's funeral is held shortly after that, with Barry wanting to take revenge on Zoom. However doing so made him emotionally uncontrollable, so he is locked up for some time. Wally later releases him, and Barry finds out that the team tried to take down Zoom on their own, with Joe taken. They realize they have no choice, so Barry (with the help of Cisco's vibes) arranges the race with Zoom. Zoom reveals he plans on destroying the Multiverse, leaving only Earth-1 behind, with a pulsar he built. Barry races against him, summoning Time Remnants to help him. Zoom is finally defeated and is taken away by Time Wraiths. Sometime after that, Team Flash returned to Earth-2 and rescued the man in the iron mask, and his identity as it turns out was the actual Jay Garrick and Henry's Earth-3 doppelgänger. They open up the Speed Cannon and send Harrison, Jesse, and Jay back to their worlds. That night, Barry and Iris declare their love for each other and kissed. Barry, too distraught after his father's death sped back to the past to the night his mother was killed to save her, shortly after his older self-sped off with his 11-year-old self he ran into the house and grabbed Eobard seconds before he stabbed Nora after which he knocked him out, thus drastically changing the timeline and causing his younger self to fade from existence to which he assured Nora that she was safe.[26]
Year Three: Flashpoint Paradox
When Barry went back in time to save his mother from the Reverse-Flash, it created a new timeline with Barry not being the Flash, Wally being the Flash, Wally and Iris being the only members of Team Flash, Joe an alcoholic cop, Cisco being a millionaire, and Caitlin being an eye doctor. After seeing the lives in Flashpoint being ruined, Barry decides to release the Reverse-Flash to kill his mom and resets the timeline back to its original state.[27]
But there were some changes to it. Team Flash was falling apart with Joe and Iris not speaking to each other due to Iris not forgiving Joe for not telling that her mother was still alive, Cisco's brother Dante died in a car crash and Cisco being angry with Barry for refusing to go back in time to save him, and Caitlin getting ice powers. When Barry reveals he changed the timeline, the team forgives him with Barry and Cisco reconciling along with Joe and Iris. After defeating Edward Clariss, the team realizes he got his powers back from Alchemy, who is also getting people from Flashpoint their powers back.[28]
Several days later, Harry and Jesse return revealing that Jesse has super speed and wants to run a few tests. When the team comes face to face with Magenta, Barry and Jesse work together to defeat her. Harry at first did not want Jesse to become a hero, but finally accepts her heroism and has Cisco make her a costume. Later Barry and Joe see a security video of Clariss being killed by an invisible metahuman in Iron Heights.[29]
A few days later when Jesse's training was complete and after she helped Barry defeat Sam Scudder and Rosa Dillon. Harry finds a new Wells to work with the team while he is on Earth-2 Harrison Wells aka H.R From Earth-19. But after Harry and Jesse depart to Earth-2, it is revealed that H.R. is not a scientist but an author who is trying to make a book. The team decided to give him a chance.[30]
Sometime later, Alchemy was offering Wally West the chance to reclaim his powers and title of "Kid Flash" from the Flashpoint timeline. As the team soon comes to realize that Alchemy will not stop tormenting Wally, Wally decides to use himself as bait, guiding the team to Alchemy's lair so that Alchemy can be taken down. Barry beats Alchemy and tells him it's over, until Alchemy replies, "You have no idea what's about to begin". Suddenly tremors can be felt, and white flashes of lightning zoom around the lair, taking out CCPD officers systematically by lifting them up and snapping their necks. Barry finds that he is the only one who can see it, and tells Joe and Wally to leave. In the last attempt, Alchemy reaches out to Wally, prompting him to touch the Philosopher's Stone and turn into a cocoon. The speedster with white lightning reveals himself to Barry as "Savitar, the God of Speed".[31]
Savitar then pummels Barry around the city by dragging him and running, so fast breaches are created. Cisco and Caitlin arrive through a breach Cisco created just in time to save Barry, with Caitlin freezing Savitar. Unfortunately, this causes her Killer Frost personality to take over her, She goes on a rampage, kidnaps Julian Albert, and battles both Barry and Cisco. They manage to capture her, but the team is fractured when Caitlin reveals Flashpoint was the cause of Dante's death. The team becomes whole again when Caitlin is cured of her Killer Frost persona and the team gets Wally out of the cocoon and it is revealed that he has gained speed and is faster than Barry. While the team has reconciled, Cisco is still angry with Barry for causing his brother's death.[32]
When the Dominators attack the Earth. Team Flash enlists the help of Team Arrow, the Legends, and Supergirl to help fight them. But when a message from future Barry is revealed, and Barry reveals he changed the timeline. Everyone except Oliver, Kara, Felicity, Caitlin, Supergirl, Stein, and Jefferson starts to lose trust in him. But after Wally saved Barry and Oliver, they save them from the mind control of the Dominators. The teams forgave and trusted Barry again. At the heat of battle, when Cisco changes history, he realizes Barry made the exact same mistake and forgives and reconciles with him. The team with the help of the other heroes defeat the Dominators.[33][34][35]
When they learn more about the Philosopher's Stone, Savitar and Julian being an Alchemy without his knowledge, with Jay's assistance, the team managed to throw the stone into the Speed Force. However, in the process, Barry was accidentally thrown five months into the future, where he saw Iris being murdered by Savitar, but Jay told Barry to live in the present rather than become obsessed with the future. However, after a month of nightmares about the dark future, after getting a place with Iris, and training Wally as Kid Flash, he eventually came clean about it and resolve to figure out how to alter the future to save not only Iris from Savitar but also Caitlin from her fate as Killer Frost.[36]
With the addition of the team's newest member Julian, and recurring allies Jesse and a Viber from Earth-19, Gypsy, they continued to face crime while trying to subtlety change the future, including thwarting Grodd's attack on Central City with Gorilla City's gorilla army.[37]
Cracks later developed in Team Flash as Savitar's prophecies started coming true; Caitlin was revealed as the traitor, who kept a piece of the Philosopher's Stone in hopes of curing herself; and Wally suffered a fate worse than death as he was tricked by Savitar into taking his place in the Speed Force. Wally was only freed by Jay, who took his place in the Speed Force prison. With Earth-3 left without a Flash, Jesse left the team to fill in for Jay until they could free him.[38]
A week later Mon-El and J'onn J'onzz appeared through the breach at S.T.A.R. Labs with a comatose Kara Danvers who had been whammied by the Music Meister. Shortly thereafter Barry was also whammied and ends up in the same musical world with Kara. They both sing and dance their way out while Cisco, Wally, and Martian Manhunter capture Music Meister. With help from Iris, Mon-El, and Cisco, Barry and Kara were freed.[39]
Following Team Flash's clash with Abra Kadabra, who critically injured Caitlin during his crime spree, Julian's desperate attempt to save her life by removing her power dampening necklace only accelerated her transformation into Killer Frost.[40] Shortly afterward, Barry ran into the future to acquire information about Savitar from his future self, where he discovered that after Iris had died, Team Flash fell apart, including Killer Frost being imprisoned. With the help of future Vibe, 2017 Barry was able to reassemble future Team Flash to inspire his future self into giving him critical information to use against Savitar, telling him to seek out a physicist named Tracy Brand, who would create a weapon that would imprison Savitar.[41]
While trying to recruit Brand, Team Flash found themselves being outsmarted at every turn by Savitar, who had teamed up with Killer Frost and was able to anticipate their every move with extreme precision. Barry ultimately deduces that Savitar is a future time remnant of Barry created by a causal loop in an endless cycle, driven insane by future Team Flash's shunning of him; Cisco also predicted that the message from 2056 Barry was warning them against trusting Savitar. As Savitar could remember everything Barry does, Cisco tried to disable Barry's brain's ability to create new memories, only to end up erasing all his memories, which in turn caused Savitar to lose his memories and Wally to lose his speed. Team Flash was forced to collaborate with Killer Frost to restore Barry's memories when Central City was threatened by Lucious Coolidge.[42]
With only twenty-four hours left before Savitar would murder Iris, Team Flash needed to acquire a Dominator power source to power Brand's Speed Force bazooka. Because Lyla refused to trust Barry with alien technology due to his creation of Flashpoint, he was forced to recruit a younger version of Leonard Snart to help him steal the device. Though they were ultimately caught, Lyla decided to entrust Barry with the device after seeing how he rescued Snart from King Shark. Meanwhile, Iris, Joe, and Wally hide out on Earth-2, but Savitar finds them after H.R. lets slip their location when the villain was masquerading as Barry.[43]
At the same time Barry goes to confront Savitar and save Iris, Cisco vibes Killer Frost challenging him to a fight. However, things went awry when Savitar shields himself from the Speed Force bazooka with the Philosopher's Stone and murders Iris in front of him. After Savitar had fled, taking the bazooka with him, "Iris" is revealed to be H.R. in disguise, who chosen to amend his mistake by taking her place. This caused a paradox that would erase Savitar from existence, as they had averted the events that would lead to his creation. However, Savitar had a plan to avoid that as he and Killer Frost abduct Cisco to force him to modify the bazooka into an interdimensional quantum splicer that would fragment him throughout time, making him the omnipresent definition of being a god.
Barry and Iris try to convince Savitar to give up on his plan in exchange for saving him, but Savitar double-crossed them by planting the Philosopher's Stone in S.T.A.R. Labs as a bomb, forcing Team Flash to vacate. Thankfully, Cisco has returned to them thanks to Gypsy and reveals to the team Savitar's plan. Team Flash goes to confront Savitar and Killer Frost, who learn too late that Cisco had tricked them, having instead modified the bazooka into a Speed Force skeleton key to release Jay, beginning the final battle, as the three speedsters chase the so-called God of Speed while the Vibers took on Killer Frost. Cisco is able to bring Caitlin back in control when he offered her a cure created by Julian and her mother, which caused her to rebel against Savitar when he came close to killing Cisco. The battle ended when Barry forced Savitar out of his armor but refused to kill him but it was Iris who killed Savitar before he could kill Barry.
After burying H.R., Team Flash was horrified to discover that without a speedster to occupy the Speed Force prison, it became unstable with its energies bleeding out, threatening to destroy Central City. Barry chose to go into the Speed Force to amend for his mistake in creating Flashpoint, leaving Team Flash to protect the city.[44]
Year Four: Rebirth
During the six months, Barry was in the Speed Force, both Tracy and Julian left the team. Iris took over the leadership positions left vacant by Barry's sacrifice and S.T.A.R. Labs was rebuilt. Cisco and Wally became the main members of the team that operated in the field along with Joe. Cisco vibed Caitlin's location and asked her for her help in getting Barry back. She agreed to help and they successfully freed Barry from the Speed Force. However, Barry was not his old self so the team locked him in a containment cell until they could figure out what was wrong with him.
Once Iris put herself in danger by letting the Samuroid take her, Barry returned to normal, yet stronger than ever before and rescued her. Once he got back to S.T.A.R. Labs, he once again became the leader of the team, and Caitlin officially rejoined them. Despite his return, Barry later took a back seat and Iris became co-leader of the team.[45]
However, Barry's return from the Speed Force released dark matter into Central City again, transforming twelve people on a bus into meta-humans. One of these people, Ramsey Deacon or Kilg%re as he began calling himself, began targeting former colleagues who had sold a program he had developed but gave him none of the profits. After Deacon was stopped he was placed in Iron Heights where he was unknowingly being surveyed by a man named Clifford DeVoe and his wife, Marlize.[46] DeVoe had actually orchestrated the events that led to Barry's release from the Speed Force and the creation of twelve new meta-humans. The next of these new metas to appear was Becky Sharpe who gained the ability to create good luck for herself but cause bad luck for everyone around her. During her crime spree, DeVoe observed her, commenting that her powers might be the most dangerous of the new metas and began to calculate how to manipulate her. Becky was defeated by the team, but DeVoe revealed that the remains of the Samuroid, which was now in S.T.A.R. Labs had a live feed and allowed him to observe the team. It was during these events that Harrison Wells from Earth-2 arrived back on Earth-1 because he was voted off of Jesse's new team. He revealed that Jesse had decided to break up with Wally which led to him going to Earth-2 to find out why. She told him that she needed to focus on herself and Wally started to think about that and his place on the team. He left the team to figure things out for himself.[47]
One week after Wally left, the team encountered the next meta to be created from the bus incident. Discovering the man who drove the bus that was exposed to dark matter was dead from drowning in his own bathtub. They were able to trace a connection to the next meta that was created on that bus, Ralph Dibny a former cop from Barry's past. Joe and Barry went to confirm Ralph's status as a meta-human at his office were Ralph was working as a private detective as Ralph had been fired from the CCPD due to Barry proving that he falsified evidence on a murder case. After a short conversation, Barry and Joe left Ralph, disgusted by his behavior and personality. Ralph was then attacked by two men and hung from a roof. It was at this moment that Ralph's powers emerged and his legs stretched him all the way down to the ground. The problem was that Ralph couldn't control his powers, leaving him in an elastic state. Joe and Barry brought him back to S.T.A.R. Labs in the hopes of returning his body to its normal shape. Caitlin informed the team that she needed a sample of Ralph's DNA from before his exposure to dark matter in order to find a way to stabilize his cells.[48]
They retrieved the DNA from Ralph's office and in the process arrested Mayor Bellows. After that adventure Barry extended membership to Ralph, Ralph accepted and Barry learned the identity of a man he had heard of before, DeVoe.[48] However, Barry and the team decided to take time off and celebrate his upcoming marriage to Iris. During this time Caitlin was attempting to leave Earth-1 as she was now receiving threatening messages from an old acquaintance she made during the 6 months Barry was in the Speedforce, Amunet Black. Amunet sent Matthew Norvock to retrieve Caitlin, crashing Iris's party. The party members; Felicity Smoak, Cecile Horton, Iris and Caitlin managed to fight off Norvock when Killer Frost emerged. Killer Frost attempted to flee but Amunet caught up with her and they fought with Amunet winning but Killer Frost managed to escape. Later, back at S.T.A.R. Labs Iris managed to convince both Caitlin and Killer Frost to stop running and to let her friends help her. They tracked down Amunet and interrupted her deal of handing over The Weeper, another bus meta who's tears act as a drug, to some gangsters. They interrupted the deal but both Amunet and the Weeper escaped, though he was quickly tracked down by DeVoe.[49]
During all this, Harrison Wells formed a Council of Wells, made up of the most brilliant versions of Wells in the multiverse. Then Mina Chaytan, a bus meta with the ability to animate statues, began targeting people who were in possession of a precious Native American necklace. Ralph gained a suit and began operating in the field alongside Barry. But he soon injured a girl while capturing Mina, causing him to feel extreme guilt. Mina escaped custody and proceeded to Central City's museum to steal the last piece of the necklace. Barry managed to defeat her and Ralph sent all the pieces of the necklace back to the Native American reservation where it belonged. The Council identified a Clifford DeVoe living in the suburbs of the city as the enemy Barry will face but much, to everyone's surprise, was a normal man in a wheelchair.[50]
Barry became obsessed with proving that DeVoe is a villain, doing things like breaking into his house which got him a restraining order from Marlize DeVoe and forced leave from Captain Singh. He then confronted DeVoe one last time and this time DeVoe confirmed Barry's suspicions and told Barry that he could not beat the power of limitless thought. Barry left but not before he congratulated him on his wedding to Iris and said that he would be thinking of him. Barry subsequently told the team what he had discovered and this time they believe him. Thus Cisco gave DeVoe the name Thinker.[51]
DeVoe decided to leave Barry alone for his wedding. At the wedding, many people showed up including Oliver Queen, Sara Lance and Kara Danvers just to name a few. The ceremony went off without a hitch until it was interrupted by the military force of Earth-X, Nazis.[52]
Soon after dealing with the New Reich, DeVoe kidnaps Barry at the same time Amunet abducts Caitlin. Torn between focusing their resources on one person, Iris decided to make Caitlin their priority, allowing them to rescue her and a telepathic bus meta named Dominic Lanse, while Barry escaped on his own. But later that night, discovered that DeVoe had transferred his mind into Dominic's while leaving his lifeless body in Barry and Iris' apartment to frame him for murder.[53]
Prior to Barry's trial, the team revealed to him recordings of him having prophesied his own trial upon exiting the Speed Force. As Cecile Horton acted as Barry's attorney, the rest of the team had to deal with Neil Borman, a bus meta with uncontrollable radiation generation. Cecile suggested that Barry reveal himself as the Flash to clear his name but he refused to put his friends and loved ones in danger and even stopped Iris from doing so. Though he neutralizes Borman as the Flash, who is publicly lauded by Captain Singh, he is sentenced to life in Iron Heights.[54]
While awaiting Barry's appeal, it was up to Ralph to protect Central City in his stead. However, Ralph soon met his match when Axel Walker escapes from prison and wounds him with Axid. Having lost the illusion of invulnerability, Ralph declined to face the Trickster and Prank, leading to Cisco and Caitlin being captured by the villains. Regaining his self-confidence, he dons a new costume and captures the villains, gaining the name Elongated Man by the media.[55]
Around the same time, Cecile discovered her pregnancy had given her telepathy, Cisco and Ralph were shrunk to two inches tall by another bus meta named Sylbert Rundine. Concurrently, Barry asked the team to help prove the innocence of David Ratchet, who had taken the fall for Rundine's crime in the past. The team is able to capture Rundine and restore their friends to normal but Rundine refused to clear Ratchet's name. Thus, Barry ran Ratchet all the way to China before returning to Iron Heights, inadvertently exposing his secret identity to Warden Gregory Wolfe, who was running a metahuman trafficking ring with Amunet.[56]
While trying to visit Barry, Cecile read Wolfe's mind and learned that he was planning on selling Barry and the other incarcerated bus metas to Amunet. As Team Flash debated on what to do, given they have no legal options, Ralph inadvertently discovered his own ability to shapeshift. Ralph then attempted to pose as Wolfe to get the trade called off but his disguise fell through before he could succeed. With Ralph having lost his self-confidence again, Cisco and Caitlin go to stop the trade but arrived too late, as when Barry was helping the bus metas escape, the Thinker showed up and absorbed their powers, killing them while taking Becky's body as his own. Barry declined to escape until he could be exonerated and thus returned to his cell.
Receiving unintentional encouragement from Killer Frost, Ralph impersonated DeVoe and, combined Cecile's smooth-talking, created reasonable doubt to get Barry cleared of all charges. But while celebrating, Barry tells the team that DeVoe could've taken the powers of the other incarcerated metas in Iron Heights and suspects he had a specific plan for the bus metas. Realizing Ralph could be targeted next, the team sets up a buddy system to keep an eye on him.[57]
Upon learning he was still suspended from CCPD due to the interim mayor being skeptical of DeVoe being alive, Barry and the team attempt to protect a bus meta named Izzy Bowin, whose ability to make powerful sounds from DeVoe. But despite their best efforts DeVoe manages to take Izzy's body as a new host due to his powers weakening Becky's body.[58]
Sometime later, Barry manages to get a nuclear bomb out of Central City with the help of Jesse and Jay. Jesse and Harry manage to reconcile. Barry and the team later encounter another bus meta Matthew Kim, who has the ability to swap people's DNA. He causes Barry's speedster powers to be transferred to Iris. He also accidentally creates a new meta-human when he gives Jaco Birch powers drained from a bank robber, although Birch wasted no time using his newfound powers to turn to a life of crime. Iris manages to defeat the criminal and Matthew not only manages to give Barry back his powers but also joins the team as a new trainee.[59]
With Harry having reverse-engineered DeVoe's Thinking Cap, the team manages to find the last two bus-metas; Janet Petty and Edwin Gauss.[59] However, DeVoe is able to get their powers as well as Matthew's and manages to take Ralph's body as a new host due to his powers weakening every other host body and in order to look like himself again. DeVoe and Marlize then attack warehouses in order to get supplies for their satellites and to get the meta Neil Borman for their plan. But with the help of Leo Snart[60] and Gypsy, the team is able to slow them down.[61]
Meanwhile, Harry attempts to take down DeVoe by boosting his own intelligence with dark matter but it backfires when it causes him to lose his own intelligence. However, Cecile is able to read Harry's regressing mind, which had finally figured out DeVoe's plan to reduce the intelligence of everyone on Earth. Iris publishes an article about DeVoe and his plan causing people to help the team find him.[62] However, the team is unable to stop DeVoe and he manages to get the parts for his satellites and uses Borman's energy to power them. Realizing the only way to defeat DeVoe is to travel into his mind, Barry, with the aid of a repentant Marlize, goes into DeVoe's mind to stop him. While in DeVoe's mind, he finds Ralph who is able to take back control of his own body which kills DeVoe. However, DeVoe had a backup plan and causes the S.T.A.R. Labs satellite to fall to Earth. Barry is able to stop it and later reveals to Iris that another speedster helped him. While celebrating the birth of Cecile and Joe's new baby at the West house, a girl named Nora arrives and tells everybody that she is Barry and Iris's daughter from the future and that she made a big mistake.[63]
Year Five: The Rise of Cicada
Nora revealed that she went back in time to meet Barry because she never got to know him in the future but her arrival had caused some problems in the present. Barry and the team eventually decided to let her stay and be a part of the team. She helped them take down both William Lang[64] and Vanessa Jansen. However, after defeating Jansen, they ran into a meta-human killer named Cicada who killed Lang and preceded to kill Jansen.[65]
After the first Cicada was defeated, a second one appeared, which was actually Grace Gibbons of a possible future. Grace was part of the Reverse Flash's plan to be released from prison. Although conflict arose within Team Flash when it came to light that Nora was secretly working with Eobard Thawne[66], the team eventally forgave her and she grew immensely close with her family. However, when Cicada II was defeated, a new timeline was formed, resulting in Nora being erased from the existence, leaving the team devastated.[67]
Year Six: The Coming Crisis
Although still reeling from the loss of Nora, Barry managed to continue to lead the team and they were successful in keeping crime rates low in Central City. He eventually came to terms with Nora's death at the end of thwarting the black hole caused by Chester P. Runk, only to be soon confronted by The Monitor and who told him a terrible truth: the crisis in which he disappeared in will now occur 5 years earlier and he must make the ultimate sacrifice on December 10, 2019.[68] After Barry confirmed that truth himself by seeing how in billions of timelines the only one where everyone didn't die was the one in which Barry sacrificed himself, Barry and Iris resigned themselves to Barry's fate and began to prepare the team to continue without Barry.[69]
A hope eventually came from Harrison Nash Wells, who after a brief conflict with the team, eventually made an alliance with them to save Barry's life. He called upon them to aid him in fighting against the Monitor, who Nash claimed was a false god and his words of a crisis were just false tales to spread fear.[70]
While their goal was to avert the crisis and if possible to save Barry's life, they also had to face Ramsey Rosso, who became the monstrous Bloodwork in his desire to cure his cancer and defeat death. Ramsey even managed to possess Barry, turning him against the team[71], but he was restored to normal when Allegra Garcia used her powers to cure everyone that was affected by Rosso's disease.[72]
The team was disbanded after Earth-1 was destroyed during the crisis.[73] After the crisis, a new team was formed on Earth-Prime.[74]
Known members
Former members
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Alternate future members
- Barry Allen/The Flash (founder, leader, forensic scientist, occasional tech support and field agent)
- Cisco Ramon (computer hacker and tech support)
- Joe West (field support)
- Harrison "H.R." Wells (strategy support)
- Julian Albert (forensic scientist and tactical support)
Known allies
Current allies
- Paragons (operating on Earth-Prime)
- Ryan Choi
- Kara Danvers/Supergirl (operating in National City)
- J'onn J'onzz/Martian Manhunter (operating in National City)
- Kate Kane/Batwoman (operating in Gotham City)
- Sara Lance/White Canary
Former allies
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Known enemies
Former enemies
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Appearances
The Flash
Arrow
DC's Legends of Tomorrow
Season 2
Season 3
- "Crisis on Earth-X, Part 4""
- "The Curse of the Earth Totem" (mentioned)
Supergirl
Season 3
Season 4
Batwoman
Season 1
Comics
The Flash: Season Zero
The Chronicles of Cisco
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Trivia
- Team Flash had a habit of referring to their past enemies like Eobard Thawne and Hunter Zolomon by the fake identities they used or their super-villain alias. They still referred to Eobard as "Fake Wells" or "Evil Wells" and Hunter as "Jay"; this proved annoying to Harry Wells and the real Jay Garrick. Although, they started referring to Hunter Zolomon by his real name by Season 3. However, they do still called Hunter "Jay" on occasion, as seen early in Season 5.[65]
- A recurring theme with Team Flash is that while they did succeed in catching their "villain of the week" and sending them to jail, they failed, quite horribly, at ever doing the same with their "Big Bads" who usually ended up dying somehow or getting a fate worse than death.
- The only original member to have never left Team Flash was Cisco Ramon. In 2015, "Harrison Wells" left the team after his true identity was revealed, and in 2017, Barry left for 6 months to serve his Speed Force punishment, as did Caitlin to gain control over Killer Frost.
- Team Flash had a group chat in which they updated each other on the foes that they've faced.[75]
References
Other versions of Team Flash | ||||
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To see other versions of this group, click the Earth name below for that Earth's counterpart of Team Flash. | ||||
New multiverse | ||||
Earth: Prime | ||||
Original multiverse | ||||
Earth: 1 | ||||
Transmultiversal multiverse | ||||
Earth: |