Title Character
The Flashes (Barry Allen | Wally West)
Supporting Characters
The Flash Family | Other Speedsters
Rogues Gallery
Evil Speedsters | The Reverse-Flashes (Eobard Thawne | Hunter Zolomon) | The Rogues
open/close all folders
The Reverse-Flashes
Reverse-Flashes In General
All Reverse-Flashes provide examples of the following tropes:
- Arch-Enemy: All of them are de-facto the most threatening members of their respective Flash's rogues gallery, and are designed in a way that they are all Evil Counterparts of their Flashes. Played With in Daniel West's case, as he was meant to be Barry's during the New 52 comics but that was dropped when Professor Zoom was reintroduced. It's debatable if he's one for his son Wally II, as the two never met while in their superpowered identities, missing the direct comparisons between the other Flashes/Reverse-Flashes. The matches are as follows:
- Blonde, Brunette, Redhead: Thaddeus Thawne (Blonde), Hunter Zolomon (Brunette), Eobard Thawne (Redhead).
- Chest Insignia: They usually sport a version of Flash's lightning bolt symbol. Eobard's was originally just switched colours. Hunter's has always been both opposite colours and the inverse direction.
- The Dreaded: They leave huge mental scars on Flashes and their loved ones and many Rogues would prefer to not cross paths with one of them. If one's received the "Reverse-Flash" name, chances are they are not someone to mess with.
- Evil Counterpart: All of them are a villainous equivalent to their respective Flash, hence the name "Reverse-Flash".
- Knight of Cerebus: Expect the story to get really dark once one of them appears.
- Names to Run Away from Really Fast: Except for Daniel West, all Reverse-Flashes are seen as someone to be avoided not only by the superhero community but also by super villains as well.
- One-Steve Limit: While being Back from the Dead is alarmingly common for any Reverse-Flash, there's rarely more than one active (or even alive) at any one time:
- For decades, the only Reverse-Flash was Eobard Thawne, who would occasionally pop into stories set after his death due to Time Travel. This lasted until the late 1990s when Geoff Johns aimed to give Wally West a Thawne-like villain without resurrecting him and created Hunter Zolomon as Zoom. After a few years of Zolomon as Zoom (coupled with a few appearances from The Rival), Thawne would return in The Flash: Rebirth (also written by Johns) - which was immediately preceded by Zoom being depowered in Final Crisis: Rogues' Revenge (as well as Zolomon's self-appointed successor Kid Zoom being blasted to death by the Rogues in the same story).
- The New 52 began with Daniel West as Reverse-Flash, but then Professor Zoom's early return (due to the popularity of the 2014 TV show's take on the character) led to Daniel being moved to the New Suicide Squad comic — eventually pulling a Heroic Sacrifice that has (seemingly) killed him for good. After some reality-warping shenanigans from Dr. Manhattan, this eventually left the original pre-Flashpoint version of Thawne free to reclaim the Reverse-Flash mantle.
- Inverted then played straight in the Rebirth comics. The "Running Scared" storyline concluded with Iris vaporising Eobard with a future gun, which was then followed by the return of a repowered Hunter Zolomon in the events leading up to "Flash War". Then, after Hunter's Heel–Face Turn and Heroic Sacrifice and a spell without any Reverse-Flash, "The Flash Age" storyline brought Eobard back once more as part of a very uneasy Enemy Mine with Barry and Godspeed against Paradox. Currently, Eobard has been reset to the harmless curator of the future Flash museum - but Zolomon has returned as Zoom.
- Red Baron: Admittedly part and parcel of being known as a Reverse-Flash - but even then Eobard, Hunter and Thad are well-known known and feared as Professor Zoom, Zoom and Inertia/Kid Zoom outside of the Reverse-Flash moniker.
- Super-Speed: Each Reverse-Flash has this power, except for Hunter Zolomon. Their methods of obtaining it vary; Clariss used a Fantastic Drug, Thawne copied the incident that gave Barry his speed, Thaddeus was a clone of Bart Allen, and Daniel West was hit by a Speed Force-powered monorail car.
- Uniqueness Decay: Unfortunately the concept got hit by this big time in the modern age due to the introduction of other evil speedsters - enough that they now have their own page.
- Villainous Legacy: Just like the Flashes they form a legacy of their own, with a clear inspirational chain from Thawne to Zolomon and later to Inertia. This looked to be undone in the New 52, which established Daniel West as the original Reverse-Flash of the new continuity, with Professor Zoom a now-unrelated villain. Rebirth in turn undid that, bringing back the original Thawne to reclaim the Reverse-Flash name and establishing the New 52 universe was the heavily altered post-Crisis DCU, leaving room for other elements of the Reverse-Flash mythos to return - as Hunter Zolomon/Zoom would eventually end up doing in "Flash War".
The Rival
Alter Ego: Doctor Edward Clariss
First Appearance: Flash Comics #104 (February, 1949)
"For fifty years I've been trapped in the Speed Force — then Sorrow freed me, asking only one thing in return. Your head."
Dr. Clariss was a chemistry teacher at Midwestern University who overheard a conversation between Joan Williams and another student discussing how the Flash got his speed. Clariss was able to determine that something in the lab caused it, so he took all the hard water samples he could find and experimented with them, eventually producing a substance that temporarily gave him and his eventual criminal gang super speed to match the Flash. He wore a darker version of the Flash's costume and a mask in his first appearance.
- And I Must Scream: Was trapped in the Speed Force after running fast enough to reach lightspeed in a battle with Jay Garrick — except unlike Jay his powers were temporary. In his own words, once his speed wore off "the Force ate me alive."
- The Bus Came Back: After the New 52 reboot erased Jay from existence, Clariss went with him. He was restored to continuity in 2020, with Flash #750.
- Demonic Possession: After his conversion to pure energy, he learned how to possess other speedsters and ended up possessing Max Mercury.
- Driven to Madness: After being trapped in the Speed Force for half a century — though all indications are he wasn't too stable to begin with.
- Energy Beings: His time trapped in the Speed Force reduced him to one of these, eating away his body and seemingly leaving him comprised solely of Speed Force energy.
- Evil Counterpart: To Jay Garrick — where Jay is eternally selfless and does what he does to help others, Clariss was driven by envy of Jay's powers and injured pride at being unable to fully replicate them.
- Evil Is Petty: He was initially motivated by envy over being unable to create a Superspeed formula that would allow him to receive adulation like Jay — yet when he did gain Superspeed all he did with it was become a criminal and try to humiliate Jay for no reason other than wanting Jay's title of fastest man alive for himself.
- Evil Old Folks: He's the oldest of the Reverse-Flashes.
- Glowing Eyes of Doom: Glow a bright purple after he's released from the Speed Force.
- Mad Scientist: Brilliant enough to create a formula allowing him to temporarily replicate Flash's speed, he nonetheless went mad over his obsession with taking Jay's mantle of fastest man alive.
- Never My Fault: He tried to kill Jay and Jay's wife Joan as revenge for being trapped in the Speed Force for 50 years, conveniently ignoring he'd never have been in such a situation if it weren't for his continued attempts to defeat and humiliate Jay in the first place.
- Predecessor Villain: Clariss was the first villain to be presented as an evil version of the Flash — and one with a personal rivalry with Flash himself to boot. While Eobard Thawne and Hunter Zolomon are far better known and fleshed out, Clariss set the stage for them and many other evil speedsters. When he returns from the Speed Force, Jay even refers to him as "a kind of Reverse-Flash."
- Put on a Bus: Disappeared into the future whilst possessing Max Mercury at the conclusion of the Impulse series and never appeared again, even when Max was brought back in The Flash: Rebirth.
- Revenge: Clariss was bitter because no one believed him when he tried to publicize his speed formula. Even success in other scientific fields wasn't good enough for him. He adopted the Rival identity in order to take the Flash's speed away and become the fastest man alive himself.
- Exaggerated when the Injustice Society freed him from the Speed Force — blaming Jay for what happened to him, he tried to kill Jay's wife Joan. Latterly, he attempted to prolong Joan's dying from cancer as much as possible to make Jay suffer.
- Serial Killer: In his first Post-Crisis appearance killed 80 people solely to send a message to Jay Garrick (literally — the locations of his victims across America spelled out his name). His favoured tactic is to ram into people at full speed, literally tearing them apart.
- The Sociopath: Utterly ruthless and uncaring, with a monumental ego to boot. Jay describes him to Impulse as such.
- Superpowers for a Day: Clariss developed a speed formula that was only temporary. He couldn't quite match the one that gave Jay Garrick permanent speed, despite many experiments with it.
- Would Hit a Girl: Tried to kill Jay's wife Joan several times after returning from the Speed Force.
Professor Zoom/Reverse-Flash I (Eobard Thawne)
A psychotic speedster from the future, Eobard Thawne holds a deep-seated resentment of the Flash and, by extension, the Flash Family. After he is foiled in the future by a time-traveling Barry Allen, Eobard would devote his life to menacing the Flash Family, but he reserves the most of his hatred for Barry Allen specifically.
For a complete list of tropes regarding him, please see his own page.
Zoom/Reverse-Flash II (Hunter Zolomon)
Formerly a friend and ally to Wally West, Hunter Zolomon would be twisted and driven to desperation by a series of personal tragedies, eventually trying to use the Cosmic Treadmill to travel back in time to fix his life. The fallout from this gave him incredible powers but warped his sanity and worldview, leading him to take up the Reverse-Flash costume and become Wally's Arch-Enemy Zoom.
For a complete list of tropes regarding him, please see his own page.
Inertia/Kid Zoom
Alter Ego: Thaddeus Thawne II
First Appearance: Impulse #50 (July, 1999)
He will never have what Impulse has; will never know their approval, their pride...their love.
When Bart refused his heritage as part of the Thawne family, the Earthgov president Thaddeus Thawne created a clone of Bart named after himself. He was effectively created to be the complete opposite of Bart: slow-thinking, calculating, and utterly sociopathic.
- Alliterative Name: With the word "thunder", no less.
- And I Must Scream: Wally exacted revenge on Inertia by essentially turning him into a living statue, putting him on display in the Flash Museum facing a statue of the Flash he killed. Inertia is still perfectly conscious and aware, and is unable to even close his eyes. Eventually, he recovered, although it's made him rather Ax-Crazy.
- Arch-Enemy: To Bart Allen.
- Ax-Crazy: By the end of Rogues' Revenge, he's more psychologically warped than Zoom himself, and that's saying something.
- Becoming the Mask: He realizes this and genuinely considers abandoning the plan to kill Max right then and there. Old grudges die hard, though...
- The Bus Came Back: After being dead for over ten years, he returns in Flash #760 to momentarily try and attack Barry, having apparently been resurrected—or perhaps fished out of the timestream—and then stuck in the Speed Force by Reverse-Flash.
- The Chessmaster: In contrast to the impulsive Bart, Thad always plans things out beforehand.
- Clone Angst: His status as a clone adds to his hate of Bart.
- Curtains Match the Window: Blonde hair, yellow eyes.
- Deceptive Disciple: To Zoom.
- Defiant to the End: Once Wally West finally catches up to Inertia, he taunts him about the fact he killed Bart.Thaddeus: He screamed like a little bitch...
- Doppelgänger Gets Same Sentiment: While Inertia's status as Bart's clone doesn't completely get him the same sentiment as the original, when Wally captures Thad after Bart's death, Wally acknowledges that, even though Inertia is "an irredeemable sociopath", the fact that he was a piece of Bart was the only thing that stopped Wally crossing the line and killing him outright.
- Evil Knockoff: He was created specifically to be the evil Thawne that Bart couldn't be.
- Evil Twin: Of Bart.
- Expy: Of the original Reverse-Flash, Eobard Thawne, right down to being motivated by jealousy.
- Foil: To Bart. Bart is a flighty, impulsive, cheerful young superhero who is beloved by his family. Thad is an icy, calculating supervillain with no friends other than Craydl, his sentient computer.
- Green-Eyed Monster: Towards Bart, who has a loving family and friends, while Thad was created solely to settle the Thawnes' grudge against the Allens.
- Hated by All:
- Suffers from this after he tricks the Rogues into killing Bart Allen. Wally West comes to consider Thad as an irredeemable monster, and the Rogues hate him for sticking them with a murder charge. Even Zoom hates him, having respected Bart for doing his best to become a better hero.
- Averted in Flash #760, where Barry Allen sympathetically describes him as a "kid in pain".
- Hate Sink: While he was portrayed fairly sympathetically in Mercury Falling, Thad is afterwards written as a smug, arrogant, condescending sociopath who has no problem killing babies. Even Zoom and the Rogues are disgusted by him. To drive it home, the Rogues usually have strict rules against killing someone as young as Thad. For him, they made an exception.
- I Just Want to Be Loved: Mercury Falling revealed his hatred for Bart stemmed over his jealousy of Bart having a better life than him. Bart is surrounded by friends and loved ones, while Thad was created to be a killer and his only friend is a sentient computer called Craydl.
- Instant Costume Change: Like Hunter Zolomon when he became Zoom, Thad is able to manifest the Kid Zoom costume out of seemingly nowhere while connected to Hunter's Time Master powers.
- Jumping Off the Slippery Slope: Manipulating the Rogues into killing Bart.
- Karmic Death: Killed by the Rogues in the same way they killed Bart, as revenge for Thad's manipulating them into the prior killing.
- Killed Off for Real: In Final Crisis: Rogues' Revenge, by the Rogues in revenge for killing Bart.
- Meaningful Name:
- Roughly translates to "praise" or "desired" in Old Aramaic; sadly enough, that was all he ever wanted.
- More literally, it would translate to something along the lines of "friend", and specifically a close friend (Aramaic תדא tadda, lit. "breast"; in context, an appellation one would give to a close friend or perhaps a younger brother); the "praise" definition may be a very loose take-off of said appellation).
- Meaningless Villain Victory:
- Uniquely among the villains on this page, actually manages to arrange the death of his Flash Arch-Enemy, Bart Allen, via carefully manipulating the Rogues into killing him. Unluckily for him, Wally returns from the Speed Force as a direct result of Bart dying and turns Thad into a living statue as punishment mere moments after he thought he'd escaped.
- Making this trope even more pertinent, the Rogues were livid they'd been taken advantage of in such a manner (and were now wanted for murder to boot) — so when he finally escaped the aforementioned statue situation, they blasted him to death not long after.
- Oh, Crap!: When he's confronted by a man in a Flash uniform just after Bart's death — and realises it isn't a resurrected Bart but a returned and ALMIGHTILY pissed-off Wally...
- Parental Substitute: He saw Deathstroke as his dad. Deathstroke being who he is, saw Inertia as a tool.
- Red Oni, Blue Oni: The Blue Oni to Bart's Red Oni.
- Screw This, I'm Out of Here!: After ineffectually harassing Barry for a few minutes, he takes off back into the Speed Force.
- Slasher Smile: In a way the complete opposite of Bart in this area. While Bart grins are full of warmth and good natured mischief, his are wild, deranged and horrifying.
- The Sociopath: As you could probably tell from some of these other tropes, he isn't a nice guy.Wally West: He's just an irredeemable sociopath with Bart's face.
- Supernatural Gold Eyes: Thad can pull off some stunning impressions of Bart's emotional body language (and that includes the famed Puppy-Dog Eyes as well) when the situation calls for it, but his eyes usually default to a sinister glow.
- Theme Naming: With Bart. The codenames are obvious; impulse/go/Bart's flighty personality, inertia/stop/Thad's methodical way of thinking (they're not the literal definitions, but the implication is clear). Less obvious are their given names; their namesakes are the patron saints of Armenia.
- This Is Your Brain on Evil: Designed to be the opposite of Bart.
- Took a Level in Jerkass:
- Goes from a tragic villain to an amoral monster.
- The "tragic" aspects of the character seem to have returned in Flash #760, when Barry Allen takes pity on Thad and describes him as a "kid in pain".
- Tyke Bomb: Was created as the Thawne counter to Bart.
- With Great Power Comes Great Insanity: Before he was killed by the Rogues, he had absolute mastery over the individual timestream of a human being, able to revert Zoom to the powerless Hunter Zolomon and kill with a simple snap of his fingers. At this time he was even more Ax-Crazy than Hunter himself.
- Would Hurt a Child: When he's unfrozen (see And I Must Scream above) in Final Crisis: Rogues' Revenge he immediately goes to kill Wally's children in revenge, though he's stopped by Zoom. Later in the same story he murders Weather Wizard's infant son out of pure sadism.
Reverse-Flash III
Alter Ego: Daniel West
First Appearance: The Flash Vol 4 #0 (November, 2012)
The last time I was happy, I was eight years old.
Daniel West is the brother of Iris West. When Daniel was born, complications resulted in the death of his mother. Daniel's father never stopped blaming Daniel and would regularly abuse the boy, who grew up resentful, but still loved his sister Iris. After his father killed his pet insects, Daniel pushed his father down the stairs, rendering him paraplegic. Daniel ran away from home, leaving his sister behind to grow to resent him for what he had done and his abandonment of her, though he still loved her. Daniel would fall in with a bad crowd and end up in prison for five years after being caught committing an armed robbery two days after his eighteenth birthday.
When Daniel crashed into a monorail carrying a Speed Force battery, he gained Speed Force powers. He began murdering others gifted with the Speed Force in order to strengthen his own power, so that he could go back in time and supposedly fix his life by murdering his father instead of just crippling him. However, he was stopped by Barry Allen and imprisoned, though made no secret of his desire to try again.
He is also the Cool Uncle of Wallace West, later retconned into being his father. While acting as Wallace's uncle, Daniel tried to steer Wallace away from a life of crime, while never revealing the boy's true parentage.
- Absurdly Youthful Father/Age Lift: Originally, he's at oldest 24 when he becomes Reverse-Flash, as he's explicitly said to have been caught by the Flash two days after his eighteenth birthday and was sentenced to 5 years in prison (and the Flash would've debuted 5 years ago at the start of the New 52 as per DC's "Five Year Timeline" rule), and the current stories took at best a year to play out. However, Wallace West debuted as a teenager back when Daniel was just his uncle, but in the Rebirth era, at the start of which their real relationship was "revealed", Wallace is established to be 16, meaning Daniel would have had to have fathered Wallace when he was an 8-year-old. Eventually, a flashback was shown that depicted him as a teenager or young adult during the birth of Wally West (who's about a decade older than Wallace at minimum), meaning Daniel got an Age Lift to make his relationship with Wallace more believable.
- Abusive Parents: His father was physically and emotionally abusive in his youth, due to blaming Daniel for the death of his mother when birthing him. Eventually, the old man killed his pet crickets out of sheer sadism, leading Daniel to snap and push him down the stairs...
- Accidental Murder: While the Flash issue in which we see the aftereffects doesn't go into detail, Futures End strongly implies his killing Wallace (and crippling Iris) in the future was not intentional on his part.
- Archnemesis Dad: Of the new Kid Flash. An interesting variant, as while Kid Flash is aware of their relationship, the two have never met while in their superpowered identities.
- The Atoner: Towards the end of his time in the Suicide Squad, resulting in his Heroic Sacrifice.
- Big Bad Wannabe: His limited time as Reverse-Flash and subsequent Villain Decay give this impression — all the more since he proceeded towards a Heel Realization fairly rapidly in New Suicide Squad, rendering both the Bad and Wannabe parts moot. He was replaced by Professor Zoom as Barry's Arch-Enemy after just one arc, and the post-Crisis Thawne treated Daniel's memory with nothing but irritation once he returned, to the point of completely disowning him from the Reverse-Flash name.note Since his death he's been reduced to little better than a cautionary tale for Kid Flash not to misuse his powers.
- Body Horror: See the red part of his suit? That's his skin. He got his look when he crashed a car into a monorail carrying a Speed Force battery. He became bound to the Speed Force and the remains of the monorail fused to him and created the black part of his suit.
- Bus Crash: He was sent to New Suicide Squad as part of a reconstituted team, and then died there in an explosion to cement Thawne as Barry's main speedster nemesis once more.
- Chekhov's Gunman: His true identity, Daniel West, is introduced even before Reverse-Flash and seems to be just a minor supporting character before The Reveal.
- Clothing Switch: During his time on New Suicide Squad the bright red skin of his costume is replaced by a sickly yellow, possibly indicative of his reduced power level after the "Reverse" storyline. He also sports this look in Futures End, implying it may be a natural evolution of his "costume", or simply a nod to the traditional yellow color-scheme of Reverse-Flashes.
- Cool Uncle: He was Wallace West's Parental Substitute until he was retconned into his actual father. However, he intentionally took on the role to Wallace as a way of still interacting with him without revealing their relationship.
- Death Equals Redemption: He sacrifices himself to save a town full of kids from a time bomb, right after he goes through the Heel Realization.
- Decomposite Character: In the New 52 he was Reverse-Flash rather than Eobard Thawne, who went solely by Professor Zoom. However, in DC Rebirth Barry gets his pre-Flashpoint memories back and starts referring to Thawne as Reverse-Flash again (specifically calling him the first Reverse-Flash in #18 of the 2016 series), thus making Reverse-Flash a mantle attained by different evil speedsters once again.
- Demoted to Extra: Was initially introduced as the Evil Counterpart of Barry Allen in the New 52 until Eobard Thawne's return hit him pretty hard. Since Rebirth he's only appeared in flashbacks and dream sequences before being confirmed as dead by Captain Boomerang, leaving Eobard as the main Reverse-Flash again.
- Dramatic Irony: A genuinely sad case: when he goes back in time to kill his father, his past self begs him to leave his/their father alone.
- Dropped a Bridge on Him: He is killed in New Suicide Squad to make way for Professor Zoom to be the prime evil speedster again. On top of all that, his death isn't even mentioned in the main Flash book until the post-DC Rebirth Flash comic's ongoing subplot about Wallace trying to find out more about his father, including his time as Reverse-Flash — but that only ended up confirming Daniel was Killed Off for Real.
- Dying to Be Replaced: Died in New Suicide Squad to make way for Eobard Thawne. Fully invoking this trope, the issue where his death is confirmed by Captain Boomerang also features a major return for Eobard Thawne, literally replacing one Reverse-Flash with the other. Lampshaded by Thawne himself later on.Iris West: Daniel was a monster when he was Reverse-Flash...
The Reverse-Flash (Eobard Thawne): Actually, and I hate to quibble, but...there is only one Reverse-Flash. - Even Evil Can Be Loved: If the Futures End comic is anything to go by, Iris never gives up on him, attempting to talk him down from an impending murderous rampage because, even after everything he's done, "Daniel is still family".
- Even Evil Has Loved Ones: He's sincere about his love for his sister, Iris. He attacks everyone who entered the Speed Force, except her, and is devastated when she Takes the Bullet for Flash and gets wounded. More complex with Wallace — all indications are he genuinely tried with his son and wanted him to make more of himself than Daniel ever did, but wasn't above lying to Wallace regarding his remorse over his crimes or the nature of their relationship.
- Evil Counterpart:
- In his initial "Reverse" storyline Daniel is presented as one to Barry Allen — both had a hugely traumatic event in their childhood, but where Barry was able to use his mother's murder to inspire him to help others (both as a CSI and later the Flash), Daniel never got over the effect crippling his father had on his life, obsessing over being able to change his past for the better. In addition, both care deeply for Iris, albeit in very different ways.
- Also, more obviously to his son Wallace (aka Kid Flash) once the latter gains his speedster powers. Both come from broken households and have criminal backgrounds (though Wallace was only getting started with his before Barry intervened) — but in this case Wallace is determined to not go down his father's path in life.
- Evil Makes You Monstrous: He seems to be able to switch between normal and the look in the above image at will. However, his appearance in #24 really qualifies him as this — when he thinks he's killed his father and the Flash can't stop him, his powers shift him into a much larger and more demonic-looking form.
- Evil Uncle: To Wally West, at least technically. The two never actually met in their superhero identities, and Wally says he and Daniel were distant — given Wally's history with his family, it's possible they barely knew each other. Meanwhile, Wallace grows up believing him to be his uncle as well but it turns out that he's actually his father.
- Expy: His principle motivation — to go back in time and undo the moment he feels led to everything going wrong for him — is remarkably similar to Hunter Zolomon/Zoom's reasoning for trying to use the Cosmic Treadmill, as well as his general theme of not moving beyond his past.
- Family Relationship Switcheroo: During Wallace West's introduction, he was said to be the Cool Uncle Wallace idolized. With DC Rebirth's retcon, he's revealed to actually be Wallace's father.
- Foil: To Barry, in that both experienced trauma in their childhoods and it has hugely impacted their lives. The difference is that Barry tries to move on from his mother's murder, whereas Daniel is obsessed over one incident that he has let consume him and has not learned from.
- Freudian Excuse: His mother died during his birth and his father was an abusive drunk. When his dad pushed him over the edge, he pushed him down the stairs; crippling him for life and estranging his sister, Iris. Horrified, he ran away and went down the path of crime. With his Speed Force powers, he wants to go back in time and kill his father before that moment; thinking it will fix everything for him.
- Futureshadowing: When he got his powers, the Speed Force showed him glimpses of others connected to the Speed Force. He figures out that he needs to kill these people to gain more power.
- Heel Realization: By the end of his time in the Suicide Squad, noting that while Iris may think of him as a monster, he at least knows he doesn't want to be one anymore.
- Heroic Sacrifice: Sacrifices himself to stop a time-travel bomb from going off when he's on the Suicide Squad.
- How Do I Shot Web?: A variant, in that it's not him who doesn't understand his powers, but his Suicide Squad controllers. During his first mission with the Suicide Squad they insist he run at full speed to plant explosives in order to prevent a situation in China escalating out of control. Knowing he isn't as powerful as he was pre-"Reverse", he protests but ultimately accedes. The resultant run has him shatter his kneecap completely, leaving him useless for the rest of the team's mission.
- Instant Costume Change: His Forever Evil tie-in issue implies that he can switch from human to the monstrous Reverse-Flash look in seconds, with his "costume" actually manifesting from within his body.
- Killed Off for Real: Dies in the first New Suicide Squad annual.
- Make It Look Like an Accident: He pushes Turbocharger off a building to make it seem like he fell.
- Mana Drain: He's able to steal the Speed Force powers from other speedsters and absorb them into his own.
- Murder Is the Best Solution: Believes killing his father in the past will make his relationship with Iris right in the present.
- My God, What Have I Done?: When he attempts to kill his father in front of a young Iris and younger version of himself, a terrified Iris dubs him a "monster", leading to a brief moment of this that allows Flash to temporarily borrow his powers to get them back to the present. Thoroughly subverted when they get back though, as he flatly tells the adult Iris he'll do it all over again when he gets another chance.
- My Suit Is Also Super: Can break off parts of his suit to use as blades; which is how he kills Sprint and Marissa.
- Neck Snap: How Future Flash kills an alternate version of him in the Futures End comic. May double as a Shout-Out to the pre-Crisis Barry's killing of Professor Zoom.
- Never My Fault: His defining character trait. Whether it's pushing his father down the stairs at an early age, pulling a bank job that was stopped by the Flash or actually killing multiple innocent speedsters as Reverse-Flash, he's utterly unable to accept responsibility for his own actions and how they've contributed to his life turning out, at one point flat-out lying to Wallace over having remorse for any of his crimes. He looked to have been finally subverting this as part of the Suicide Squad, but died before he could undergo a true Heel–Face Turn.
- Odd Friendship: With Harley Quinn on the Suicide Squad. Notably, his inability to understand her reluctance to give up her Ax-Crazy ways play a big part in his own Heel Realisation.
- Only Sane Man: Definitely comes across as this on his final mission with the Suicide Squad — though, to be fair, this isn't hard on a team featuring Harley Quinn, Boomerang and Parasite...
- Pet the Dog: Wallace's dream sequence in #18 of the 2016 series strongly indicates Daniel did try and be a positive influence on his (secret) son, encouraging him to study in order to get into a good college and taking him to a live hockey game as an incentive. It's not entirely clear how much of this is wishful thinking on Wallace's part though.
- Put on a Bus: Professor Zoom's return to the comics led to this, as he was shunted to the New Suicide Squad comic before being (supposedly) Killed Off for Real there.
- Red and Black and Evil All Over: His "outfit".
- Retcon: Originally, he was Wallace West's uncle. After the original Wally returns, Daniel is retconned into being Wallace's father.
- Serial Killer: His first story arc, "Reverse", has him killing people affected by the Speed Force; his first victim being Albert Lim/Turbocharger in issue #19. He later kills Floyd Gomez/Sprint, Marissa and now has his sights on the Flash. The more of them are dead, the more Speed Force he gets.
- Set Right What Once Went Wrong: His motivation is to go back in time and prevent the event that estranged Iris from him and ruined his life.
- Sensor Character: Can sense those connected to the Speed Force.
- Successful Sibling Syndrome: Iris carving out a successful path for herself fueled Daniel's bitterness about how his life turned out and contributed to his Start of Darkness.
- Supernatural Gold Eyes: When in "costume", his eyes are always a bright, glowing, uniform yellow.
- Time Master: He has the traditional speedster power set, but he can also "rewind" time — the more Speed Force energy he has, the further back in time he can "rewind" to. By killing numerous other speedsters to absorb their speed, then temporarily stealing Barry's, he's able to go back in time to try and kill his father before he ruined his life.
- There's No Kill like Overkill: He appears to kill Marissa with a flurry of blades, but her autopsy reveals lacerations, burns, electrocution, and extraction.
- Tragic Villain: He clearly thinks he's this, and has at least some justification due to his abusive father and generally awful childhood. However, it's clear that in reality he's a selfish superpowered murderer who cannot accept his own part in driving Iris away, and how his life in general has turned out.
- The Un-Favourite: Daniel West's father hated him for supposedly causing the death of his wife and made no secret of the fact.
- Unknown Rival:
- To the returned pre-Flashpoint Eobard Thawne, who expressed a distinct contempt for the idea of there being another Reverse-Flash in Barry's life. It's also true in a meta sense, as of the two Reverse-Flashes associated with Barry (Eobard and Daniel) Thawne is by far the one with the greatest impact on and significance to Barry's life, compared to Daniel's relatively brief tenure.
- Interestingly, it's also kinda subverted in practice — Daniel was meant to be the original Reverse-Flash of the New 52, so there's no indication he ever knew of Thawne's pre-eminence with the title. From his point of view Eobard is actually the unknown one.
- Unwitting Instigator of Doom: He's the major reason Future Flash became the way he did. Even Eobard can't boast causing such an enormous change in Barry's character.
- It was Reverse-Flash's use of time-travel to alter his own past in #24 that leads to the Speed Force rupture that causes Future Flash to "lose" time whenever he runs, leading him to be "late" for multiple tragedies, including...
- ...Daniel's accidental killing of Wallace/crippling of Iris in the future timeline, which is what leads the future Barry Allen to become so bitter and withdrawn.
- In addition, Daniel gets captured by Grodd at some point — when the gorilla devours his brain, he becomes able to access the Speed Force and time travel. This leads to Grodd causing even more damage to the timeline, eventually prodding Future Flash into his Start of Darkness by killing the gorilla, followed by his time-travelling to stop his enemies' worst excesses by ANY means and eventually trying to kill his past self.
- Villain Decay: Initially presented as a new Arch-Enemy for Barry, Daniel lost his status and importance quickly after his introduction arc was over. He was unceremoniously moved to New Suicide Squad to make room for the reappearance of Professor Zoom after the latter gained a new level of recognition in the 2014 TV series — then Dropped a Bridge on Him mid-Heel Realisation there. Meanwhile Thawne constantly made snide remarks about Daniel's use of the name, not even acknowledging him as a successor like he did Hunter. Hunter himself was also later revealed to be alive, further distancing Daniel from the top of the Reverse-Flash chain. Additionally, in contrast to Eobard and Hunter, who both drove almost the entirety of the Rebirth run of The Flash in one way, Daniel was merely the villain of a single arc.
- Villain Issue: He gains his own issue in DC Comic's Villains Month which details his Start of Darkness. Interestingly enough, it's told in reverse-chronological order.
- Villainous Legacy: He's only present in The Flash for one major story arc ("Reverse") before moving to New Suicide Squad and dying there, but the memory of what he did and his relationship with Wallace continues to be a plot point in the Rebirth era, leading Wallace to search for the truth of what happened to him and why his father lied to him, eventually contributing to the rift between Flash and Kid Flash.
- Would Not Hurt A Child: Develops this during his time on the Suicide Squad — it's the principle motivation for his Heroic Sacrifice, as otherwise the time bomb would have annihilated a village full of kids.
