‘The Flash’ Original Cast Members Tom Cavanagh & Carlos Valdes Exit The CW’s Series After 7 Seasons

Nellie Andreeva
·3 min read
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EXCLUSIVE: The Flash, which already has been renewed for Season 8, is bidding farewell to two original cast members, Tom Cavanagh and Carlos Valdes.

Valdes, who plays Cisco Ramon, will end his run as a series regular after the CW drama’s current seventh season with an appearance in the finale.

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Cavanagh, who has played Eobard Thawne/Reverse-Flash as well as the various versions of Harrison Wells, actually was slated to end his tenure as a series regular at the end of Season 6, I hear. He hinted about that in a February 2020 Instagram post, which didn’t draw much attention at the time (you can see it below). But a couple of weeks later, the pandemic hit, shutting down all production and cutting short the seasons of dozens of series, including The Flash.

As a result, Cavanagh quietly ended his series regular run with Episode 3 of Season 7, “Mother,” which wrapped the outstanding Season 6 storylines, but he continued on the show as a recurring guest star. His status transition was not seamless; he has not appeared since that third episode, but the DC drama’s producers have assured fans that he would be back. Online listings indicate that Cavanagh might appear in Episodes 9, 10 and beyond; his final appearance this season is being kept a surprise. There are no current plans for Cavanagh to continue on the show beyond that, but there is a possibility for both him and Valdes to do guest stints.

“Tom and Carlos have been an integral part of our show for seven seasons, and will be greatly missed,” The Flash executive producer/showrunner Eric Wallace said in a statement to Deadline. “Both are incredible talents who created beloved characters that fans and audiences around the world have come to love. Which is why we are happily keeping the door open for return appearances.”

Cavanagh and Valdes were two of six remaining original Flash cast members, along with star Grant Gustin, Candice Patton, Danielle Panabaker. Gustin already is contracted for Season 8 while the three have been negotiating new deals to return.

Valdes’ Cisco Ramon, an engineering genius, has been part of the S.T.A.R. Labs team, along with Dr. Harrison Wells (Cavanagh) and Dr. Caitlin Snow (Panabaker), that help Barry Allen (Gustin) with his superpowers. Ramon is later revealed to have metahuman powers of his own and takes on the name Vibe. Valdes also plays Ramon’s Earth-2 doppelganger, who goes by Reverb, and has also played Ramon’s Earth-19 doppelganger, who goes by Echo.

In the Season 7 premiere, “Nash” Wells and every iteration of the character Cavanagh has played over the course of seven seasons perished after saying goodbye to Barry (Gustin). At the time, Wallace encouraged fans of Cavanagh to continue watching the show, telling TVLine, “Just because somebody’s dead doesn’t mean they don’t have plenty more to do.”

In his IG message to fans posted more than a year ago, Cavanaugh wrote about his journey on the show next to a photo of himself standing below a N. Wells street sign. “It has been a joy creating and playing the myriad Wells that make up ‘Wells st’ on The Flash,” he said. “At times brusque, sunny, capricious, and perpetually shameless, they will always be linked by a single unbreakable thread of gratitude. My thanks to everyone on all sides of the screen that makes up this wee superhero show of ours.”

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A post shared by Tom Cavanagh (@cavanaghtom)

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