Tom Cavanagh was very cagey when it came to discussing what’s happening in season two of The CW’s breakout series The Flash during roundtable interviews at the 2015 San Diego Comic-Con. Laughing, Cavanagh said, “I know what’s happening and I’m not going to tell you any of it!” Sticking pretty much to that promise, Cavanagh did say that he and executive producers Greg Berlanti, Andrew Kreisberg, and Geoff Johns would like to see more Flash and Arrow cross-over episodes.
“Last year, I think Johns and Greg and Andrew felt like they did a solid job bridging Arrow and The Flash, and if the viewership numbers are a testament to that, then we did,” explained Cavanagh. “It’s very organic for Martin Stein and Harrison Wells and Reverse Flash and Oliver – all of those guys to join up again. […]We certainly have a desire to. It’s all part of the same world. We all want to explore as much as possible of that world.”
Looking back on season one of the series, Cavanagh said episode 15 in which Eobard Thawne murders Cisco Ramon (played by Carlos Valdes) was a truly pivotal episode of the show. “It was tremendous because this is episode 15 – we talked about this when we had a screening of episode 15 in Hollywood. I’ve never been part of a television show that says we’re going to air not a season finale or not a pilot, we’re going to air a mid-season part of it and we’re going to have a special airing of it.
We did it because most of the journalists in the room could say episode 15 felt like a season finale. He declares his love, I kill Cisco, I get out of my chair, Joe is dying because of the weather wizards… It had so much stuff going on and that’s in 48 minutes of television. The fact that we had a big moment when Eobard Thawne kills Cisco, that feels like a really big moment when one of your main cast members dies. And the nice thing about the way we structured the story was we could then do that scene and Carlos and I could do that scene five different times.
Next episode, we come back and we need a lucid dream to try and get some information. Next episode it’s a flashback. And our next episode…we kept coming back and we got to do it many different ways every time,” explained Cavanagh. “It was fun to put my hand through his chest. I think we did it organically without us trying to cheat and we got to show people again and again and again how horrifying this was and also raised questions about will it happen again and how will he be affected. How will I be affected?”
As for season two, about the only solid hint Cavanagh would drop was that everything that happens will be earned. They won’t be taking any shortcuts in storytelling. “My starting point is always Eobard Thawne and what’s nice about being that person is there’s a lot of different worlds that Eobard Thawne can encompass and because of that there’s always new people we can bring in. It doesn’t feel like a cheat; it’s in an organic fashion. I very much enjoy that.”
“What I really enjoy about that character is you know it’s a comic book so the walls that prevent us from joining people who are big in mythology come down very quickly, and everybody wants to see it. Everybody wants to see that. Even though they want to see it, you want to do it in the best possible way that will give people… You want to do it where you feel like you have earned it,” said Cavanagh.
Season two of The CW’s The Flash will premiere on October 6, 2015.
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