‘DC’s Stargirl’: John Wesley Shipp Breaks Down The Flash’s Flashback Episode

One of the big advantages of DC’s Stargirl airing on The CW, instead of the much-missed DC Universe streaming service? Crossovers, baby! And this week’s episode, “Summer School: Chapter Nine”, included a big one with the introduction of Jay Garrick, aka The Flash (John Wesley Shipp) via a flashback to the classic Justice Society of America lineup.

“Geoff [Johns] called me and I said I will be there in a heartbeat,” Shipp told Decider. “He outlined it: what he wanted me to do, and the capacity he wanted me to fill within this conflict in the JSA, and I was totally on board for it.”

Spoilers for the episode past this point, but as part of the latest attack from this season’s villain Eclipso (Nick Tarabay), Pat (Luke Wilson) ends up recalling a secret from years earlier that led Eclipso to Blue Valley, and broke up the original JSA. That secret? Under attack by the villain, the JSA decided to take him down the only way they knew how: by killing his host. Pat, of course, disagreed with the course of action, and so did Jay; but ultimately, they went through with it anyway. And in the present, Courtney (Brec Bassinger) finds out, leading to a massive fight with Pat.

To find out more about how Shipp keeps the various versions of The Flash he’s been playing since the ’90s straight, what went on behind the scenes to make this cameo happen, and whether there’ll be more Jay Garrick in Stargirl‘s future, read on.

Decider: okay, first off because it’s hurting my brain: Is this Jay Garrick a different Jay Garrick than the one on The Flash, or is it the same guy?

John Wesley Shipp: What I can tell you is this episode establishes the Golden Age Flash as a member of Earth 2’s JSA. It officially brings DC’s Stargirl into the post-Crisis CW Verse.

I appreciate the simplicity of that because ultimately it’s fun just to see you on the show, but there’s a part of my brain that goes to nerd-ville a little bit. How do you keep it straight, given that you’ve played so many different versions of Jay Garrick, Barry Allen, etc., etc.?

You know, I’ve been so fortunate from Danny Bilson and Paul De Meo in the 1990s to Greg Berlanti, Geoff Johns, David Nutter, Andrew Kreisberg, the Helbings, Eric Wallace — I could go on and on. These people are so steeped in the franchise and in the comic book universe that they write the characters differently. It’s very interesting. Someone said to me, having seen the episode, that they felt that I was more Jay Garrick in the Stargirl episode even than I had been in the Flash episodes, and it’s very interesting because it’s written very classically. And it did feel different. Of course, I’m walking into my own Society, you know what I mean? My own territory. And they’ve been written so well. It’s funny, also, Marc Guggenheim said that when I put on the Flash ’90s suit for Flash, for “Elseworlds” in “Crisis”, and I heard him say this to an interviewer, not to me: He said, “John began to move and talk differently, more like he did in the 1990s.” So I don’t know, maybe it’s so far into my psychology right now that they differentiate themselves. Of course, Henry was so different. The big switch was Henry Allen to Jay Garrick because it totally changed the temperature of mine and Grant’s relationship.

How did they first approach you about playing this version of Jay Garrick on Stargirl?

I got a call initially from Eric Wallace. Apparently Geoff had called Eric and said, “Do you think he’d be interested?” and Eric called me and I said, “Of course I’d be interested.” I said, “Tell Geoff to call me, he should never, ever hesitate to call me.” Geoff was there from that first scene in Flash, CW Flash, the iconic scene where we put our hands on the glass. He was there basically through the whole thing… I consider Geoff a friend. And I certainly admire his work and I admire the way he writes, specifically Jay Garrick, so I knew he was going to do something that I was going to want to play. So Geoff called me and I said I will be there in a heartbeat. He outlined it: what he wanted me to do, and the capacity he wanted me to fill within this conflict in the JSA, and I was totally on board for it.

It’s only two brief scenes with you in the episode, but even in those, it’s a very different dynamic, Jay working with the JSA versus over on Team Flash. What was it like working over here with everyone on this show?

We had a great time. You know, even though it’s a second season officially, it really feels like a first season show. It’s its first run exclusively on the CW and it crackles with that new show excitement and energy. Everyone shows up with their A-game. It was so funny because Andi Armaganian, who I got so much from — she’s such a wonderful director, and collaborative director — she had a question about the big Justice Society scene. And so we said, “so why don’t we run it?” And everybody was so A-game and Geoff was standing right there, that we ran the scene cold, and they were like, “Oh, I guess it does work!”

One thing that bugged me a little bit — and this is not about Jay — but everybody seemed so mean to Pat in these scenes. They seemed so dismissive to him, except for Jay. Why do you think everybody else is dismissive of him? What did you see as the relationship between Jay and Pat?

Sylvester [Pemberton] used to be the Pat, right? In comic book lore? Sylvester was the assistant before he became Starman in comic book lore. So he was the one that was told, go do this, go get that, you’re not really a member of the team. It’s odd that now he treats Pat that way, or maybe it isn’t odd. Maybe that’s what happens. Maybe it’s sort of like, this is your initiation. I tried in the limited time I had to make the way I talk to each character differently and everybody, like I said, was so into it. Clearly I had a great affection for Pat. Clearly they called Pat down for saying “Flash” in public so I turn to Pat and call him Stripesy. That lets you know right off the bat who Jay is. Pat asks the question — he gets called down again, I turn to Pat to give the answer. I love coming in and putting my hand on his shoulder. I think that the Jay that we see here is incredibly compassionate; he’s very much for anyone others might perceive as an underdog. And how could you not love the Pat Luke Wilson is playing? Here he is: a superhero, a mentor, and yet has an exquisite vulnerability verging on insecurity about himself. He’s very endearing; I told him, I can’t think of another character exactly like it, the one he’s creating on that show.

This episode, they have the big debate about killing Bruce Gordon. Killing supervillains is one of the perennial superhero show debates, and Jay is pretty definitive about where he falls on it, but I’m curious where you, John Wesley Shipp, fall on the debate?

It’s curious you should ask that because, I got to tell you, talk about a rock in a hard place. Because I believe one of the characters says, “They’ll kill all our children.” So do you stand for a principle — it’s going to be one or the other. It’s going to be short term gain for long term pain or it’s going to be short term pain for long term gain. It’s going to be one or the other. There’s no, “I abstain, courteously,” you know? You have to make — there’s no right choice. And so then Jay falls back on his ethics. Even though that would mean some pretty serious short term pain. But I also tried to play it that when I was surprised by Joel’s, Sylvester’s “yes.” That moment on from the rest of the scene, I was playing as Jay in my head what was going to happen to the Justice Society because a society that is built around justice and doing things that are not about killing people without a trial, not about execution. That if we go down this road, it’s going to be the end of this. It’s going to be big trouble for the Society. And I played that tape in my head for the rest of the scene. Disappointed that he had made that choice.

This is just a little blip of Jay Garrick on the show… Are there any plans for him to return to Stargirl, either in a flashback again or potentially in the present?

I can’t speak to that, except to say I loved working in Atlanta. My family is in Atlanta. We’re not from there, we’re from Virginia, but everybody sort of ended up in Atlanta. Certainly I would go there when I was doing Dawson’s Creek in Wilmington. That would be my playground during weekends. I love Atlanta, I loved working with the crew and the cast, and I would be completely open to returning.

If this by chance led to an original Justice Society of America spinoff, would you be up to that?

Again, it would depend on who’s writing it and who is involved, but what an intriguing and exciting idea, and it’s something I’ve been seeing on social media being asked for. So thank you for that question. Let’s keep that question cooking.

This interview has been edited for clarity and length.

DC’s Stargirl airs Tuesdays at 8/7c on The CW.

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