While we wait for season two of the new Flash TV series, WB has released all of the 1990 TV show to view for free on CW Seed!
The series ran for one year and starred John Wesley Shipp as Barry Allen, Amanda Pays as S.T.A.R. Labs scientist Dr. Tina McGee, and Alex Désert as fellow CSI Julio Mendez. The network wasn’t too keen on the Rogues, though the show runners managed to get versions of Mirror Master, Captain Cold and the Trickster (Mark Hamill) onto the show. And yes, some of those names should sound familiar!
The whole series is up for streaming right now, so you can binge-watch the whole thing or pick and choose.
Be aware that the tone is vastly different. Aside from just being an early 1990s TV show, it’s an interesting blend of camp and “this is serious” not unlike the Tim Burton Batman movies, and Central City has a very 1930s Art Deco look despite being set in what was then the present day.
It’s been a while since I watched it, but I’d recommend “Watching the Detectives,” the two “Trickster” episodes, “Ghost in the Machine” and “Deadly Nightshade.” Crimson Lightning reviewed the whole series when it came out on DVD, and you can check out their choices for best — and worst — episodes as well.
I bought that a few years ago when it was first released on DVD. It was great at the time because I go to watch all of the season finally, and not just one or two like I had when it was being aired in 1990. I still keep several episodes on my phone when I need some Flash entertainment.
But I wholeheartedly agree, the CW Flash is by far the better of the two. Story, characters, sets and effects are so much better!
The original show hasn’t aged all that well, but my favorites are still the Captain Cold episode and the “Flash Forward” (or whatever it was called) episode where Barry time travels to ten years in to the future…the dreaded year 2001!