The Flash postmortem: Scoop on that shocking West family reveal

Warning: This story contains major spoilers from Tuesday’s episode of The Flash. Read at your own risk!

While Team Flash was busy finding a new Firestorm match for Stein (Victor Garber) — welcome to the Berlanti-verse, Franz Drameh — Iris West (Candince Patton) put on her investigative hat during Tuesday’s episode of The Flash and discovered the truth behind her mother Francine’s (Vanessa Williams) sudden reappearance in town.

It was revealed that the West matriarch is dying, but she was also trying to hide a second, even bigger secret: She has a son! And yes, that son is none other than Wally West. Destined to become the speedster known as Kid Flash, West will be portrayed by Keiynan Lonsdale — scoop on his character here.

First and foremost, executive producer Andrew Kreisberg confirms that Wally West is Joe’s (Jesse L. Martin) son that Francine had after she left Central City, which makes things even more complicated for Iris. “Iris is now in the position that Barry [Grant Gustin] was in last year, she’s keeping a secret to protect somebody,” Kreisberg says. “She’s going to find that for all of her anger at Barry and Joe from last year, keeping this secret is not going to be so easy. It’s going to be weighing on her before she finally decides to take some action in an upcoming episode.”

But the Wally reveal wasn’t the only shocking moment from Tuesday’s episode, as Barry came face-to-face with Earth-Two’s Harrison Wells (Tom Cavanagh), who saved the scarlet speedster from King Shark in the closing moments of the episode. “The next episode opens in a slightly surprising way,” Kreisberg teases, potentially hinting toward seeing things from this Wells’ perspective.”The beginning of [episode] 5 is really exciting and you’re going to get a lot of answers to questions you probably have.”

In fact, the next few episodes will be exploring more of the other side. “It’s about to go doppelgänger a-go-go,” Kreisberg teases. “Now we’re really going to pick up with… the Earth-Two storyline, so there will be doppelgängers and doubles.”

Elsewhere in the episode, before Stein departed to train with his new Legends of Tomorrow partner, he encouraged Cisco (Carlos Valdes) to open up to Team Flash about his newfound powers. Though Cisco is on the path to embracing those powers, he is still very hesitant. “He’s seen what happens to the other metahumans, good or bad intentions, they all go nuts and they all get locked up,” Kreisberg says. “Cisco is really scared. Also, he doesn’t see what the benefit is yet, he doesn’t see that it really is a gift, and he doesn’t see that it’s a blessing and a power that could be used to help people. Right now all he sees is the nightmare. That’s what’s really scary for him.”

“It’s not like he woke up and he can fly,” Kreisberg continues. “Not only is he scared about what it means to be a metahuman, he also feels he drew the short straw. ‘Barry got super speed, Ronnie [Robbie Amell] gets to fly, me, I get these blinding headache nightmare visions of people being killed.’ It’s not, at first blush, the most heroic way to step into the world.”

Meanwhile, Cisco’s S.T.A.R. Labs partner-in-crime Caitlin (Danielle Panabaker) is also destined to follow down the metahuman rabbit hole. While Panabaker is beyond excited to eventually take on the mantle of Killer Frost, Caitlin is not itching to fulfill that destiny just yet. “Cisco’s powers come slowly and there’s some complication with that,” Panabaker says. “I don’t think Caitlin is particularly jealous of all these superpowers. She’s a doctor, she’s an nurturer. She wants to make sure everyone is OK and follow those methodical scientific steps first.”

In the meantime, Caitlin will find herself drawn more toward Jay Garrick (Teddy Sears) in the coming episodes. “Obviously we’re building a relationship between Jay and Caitlin,” Kreisberg says. “There’s going to be some fun and surprises there… They’re actually going to have multiple projects to work on. There are problems that come up that they’ll be working on together.” Panabaker adds: “He’s a fellow science nerd. What could be better for Caitlin?”

The Flash airs Tuesdays at 8 p.m. ET on The CW.