The CWHow about that reveal, y'all?
The Flash's season two finale gave us an answer we've been craving for at least half of the season—among many, many other things—who, exactly, the Man in the Iron Mask was. In true Flash fashion, it turned out to be mind-blowing in the most wonderful of ways.
Although we had to say goodbye to Henry Allen after a truly tragic death (dammit, Zoom!), that's not the end of John Wesley Shipp on the show. It turns out that the man Zoom was holding prisoner in his lair on Earth-2 had a very familiar face. Like many suspected, it was the real Jay Garrick—but with two extra special twists: he's from Earth-3, and he's played by Shipp (who played The Flash in the '90s TV show)!
E! News caught up with Shipp to talk all about the big reveal, and where Henry Allen's death stacks up against the other gone-too-soon TV dad he played, Dawson's Creek's Mitch Leery.
E! News: Did you know all along that you'd be playing the Man in the Iron Mask?
Shipp: I went up there to film the last four episodes knowing that it would be Henry Allen's death. I had no idea that it was going to morph into my ending up playing the role that The Flash audience wanted me to play from the very beginning. I had a long conversation with Greg [Berlanti, executive producer] and then I had a conversation with Andrew [Kreisberg, EP] and I expressed my reservations 25 years later putting on a super hero costume—he sort of allayed my fears about that.
Were you nervous?
I was finding out about it as it was unfolding, which I'm sort of glad [about] in a way because I didn't have time to obsess about it. "Should I do it? Shouldn't I do it? Is this a good idea? People have good memories of me playing the Flash from all those years ago, do I want to tamper with that?" I didn't have time for any of that. I was too busy doing it.
Did you have any theories as to who the Man in the Iron Mask could be?
I didn't. I didn't know! I mean, I was riding along reading Twitter. I thought there was a good chance that it was Eddie, given his history through the whole thing. I thought there was a good chance it might be Grant, because we had seen when we were going through the whatever that is where they went from Earth to Earth. We saw Grant [Gustin] with a beard in a prison suit. We saw my version of the Flash coming through the portal along with Supergirl and all the others. I really didn't know. Never once did it occur to me that it would be me. Not once.
I actually really wanted it to be you. It's perfect! The original TV Flash is the original Flash!
Isn't it good storytelling? That's what I said to Greg. I said, "You know, take me out of the equation. It's really brilliant TV. It's really good TV."
So you'll be a major part of season three going forward, yes?
That's what they've told me. There are endless possibilities—they're just now mapping out that they can do with the character Jay Garrick. I mean, come on, he's the head of the Justice Society of America. They just mentioned that they were going to be doing that on Legends. They just announced multiple crossovers. Now we have Supergirl who has come from my old network, CBS. The possibilities are literally endless.
How do you approach playing Jay Garrick?
Although he looks just like Barry's father, he has got to be—for the purposes of the story and for this story to work, and for Barry's psychological drama to work—a very different character. It's got to be clear as soon as that iron mask comes off that who we are seeing is not Henry Allen. That's my challenge.
Now that we know the big reveal, that line a few weeks ago about "Garrick" being Henry's mother's maiden name makes a little more sense.
I know! It was right there! If you noticed, I tried to deliver that into my coffee cup. I thought, "I don't want to give this away. How can I throw this line away?" So I did it as I was drinking.
You also played another TV dad who met an untimely end. Which death do you think was more tragic, Mitch Leery's or Henry Allen's?
Mitch Leery, you know, death by ice cream. Then I got to sort of tie up my relationships with everyone, but the sad all happened with everyone else and then I was off the show. This one is harder. This one was harder on me mostly because of the special chemistry that everyone has talked about in season one and season two. It was really hard on me and yet I knew I was going forward in the new role, but still!
The scene that actually made me the saddest was before Henry's death, Grant, Barry is thinking he's invincible, Henry runs out into the hallway to say you know, you still have to be careful. … You think we are headed to another father-son warm embrace moment, but instead of that, Barry puts his hand on my shoulder. … Suddenly in that moment Henry realizes that the old Barry-Henry relationship isn't there anymore. It'd be what I'd imagine a father would feel when your son reaches that stage of maturity where he doesn't need you that way anymore. I said to the director, "You know, I went home after we filmed that scene and I felt so cold because I knew we were at the end of something." It set up Henry's death beautifully.