The Flash: Who Is Savitar?

The Flash is finally back this week, which means we're one step closer to finding out who Savitar is. But unlike the big mysteries surrounding big bads of the past, there isn't too much discourse about the identity of Season 3's speedster villain. Instead, most Flash fans have reached a general consensus -- and one that would seriously shake up The Flash universe.

Based on the evidence, the most likely identity of Savitar is... Barry Allen (Grant Gustin)!

It's OK if you need to take a beat and process that info bomb, because it's a doozy. Since Savitar has begun wreaking havoc on Central City, Barry has been tormented by this seemingly unbeatable foe. That's why Savitar being Barry would be the biggest twist The Flash could throw at us, but it's also the theory that makes the most sense.

How are we so sure Barry is Savitar? Let us count the ways...

"I've already lived it." When Barry was gone into the speed force, Jesse Quick had a little run-in with Savitar who revealed, "I knew you would come for me. ... I know everything that happens. I've already lived it. ... I have such plans for you in the future."

Savitar saying "I've already lived it" definitely implies he's from the future, but there is a huge difference between knowing the past and living the past. That's why Savitar's choice of words has led many to believe he's a member of Barry's inner circle and has lived through all these struggles already.

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This isn't the only moment Savitar has treated members of Team Flash as though he knows them well. He previously discussed H.R.'s (Tom Cavanagh) struggle to find his place in the group and even mentioned Cisco's (Carlos Valdes) interaction with Reverb -- a moment only Barry was present for. In all these instances, Savitar doesn't speak about the issues from a distance. Everything feels extremely personal to him and he appears to know each member of Team Flash intimately -- which he would if he had once been one of them.

"I'm the future, Flash." If this theory is correct, The Flash might have confirmed Savitar's identity months ago. When Savitar used Julian (Tom Felton) as a megaphone to share his prophecy with Team Flash, Barry asked Savitar who he was, to which the villainous speedster replied, "I'm the future, Flash." At least, that's how Team Flash interpreted those words. However, if you switch up the punctuation a bit, you could also read his answers as "I'm the Future Flash," thus revealing he is either someone who took up the Flash mantle in the future or is literally a future version of Barry Allen. Savitar has since used that same phrase a few more times, which is either the writers going really heavy on the foreshadowing or a total red herring. (We're betting the former.)

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He's the first speedster. Both Jay Garrick and Abra Kadabra have said that Savitar is the first speedster. And while it's possible Savitar was granted speed on another earth, The Flash has always shown Barry Allen to have been the first speedster on Earth-1.

Additionally, when Barry asked Savitar if he was responsible for creating him, Savitar replied, "I created myself." This is either the egomaniacal ramblings of a mad man or he meant that Barry's actions in the past led him to turn into Savitar, thus he created himself.

Barry already warned us about an Evil Barry. During theLegends of Tomorrow portion of the massive four-way crossover last fall, Barry sent Rip Hunter a message from the year 2056. In it, Future Barry revealed he made a choice that drastically affected the timeline and that when Rip and his crew returned to the new timeline they shouldn't "trust anything or anyone, not even me."

Duality is the theme of the season. A significant portion of this season has been exploring the duality of the lead characters: Wally (Keiynan Lonsdale) discovering he was a speedster in Flashpoint and chasing that identity, Caitlin (Danielle Panabaker) doing everything she can to repress her evil alter ego Killer Frost, Julian learning that he was unwittingly the villain Alchemy, etc. What would be a better cherry on top of that theme than to reveal that the sweet-hearted Barry also contains his own dark side?

There's already precedent for it. In the comics, Savitar is a Cold War pilot who becomes obsessed with speed and gains a cult following. And while there's always a chance Savitar's identity will follow that storyline and he'll be revealed as someone we've never met before, that's highly unlikely (and would be a major disappointment, tbh). But The Flash does love to draw inspiration from the DC comics and put its own spin on it -- something they might be doing by combining the Savitar storyline with a complicated Barry vs. Barry storyline.

In The Flash comics, Barry travels back and forth through time much more than he does on the show. Based on how much chaos Barry's few trips on the series have caused, it should come as no surprise that the comics show Barry 20 years in the future when he realizes that time is disappearing because his travels have torn apart the Speed Force. As a result of this, Barry was unable to prevent the death of Wally West. And so Barry decides to travel back in time and seal the rift in the speed force when it began and hopefully prevent Wally from dying in the process. But in order to do that, Barry must go back in time and kill his enemies. Although he doesn't enjoy being a murderer, Barry justifies it to himself by saying that these murders won't matter if he undoes the timeline.

Eventually, Murderer Barry confronts Young Barry, who is horrified to see his future self as a seemingly power-obsessed monster. What Young Barry doesn't know is that Murderer Barry is killing all these people -- and plans on killing his younger self -- to prevent all the future horror he caused by messing with the timeline (which is, conveniently, already an issue our Barry has been dealing with all season).

In the comics, the Future Flash is also sometimes referred to as Blue Flash because of his glowing blue supersuit. And while Savitar's armor is far different than the sleek get-up of Future Flash, it does emit a similar blue glow. Coincidence? We doubt it!

And so although the storyline doesn't match up completely, we think there are more than enough similarities between the two to securely position Barry as the most likely suspect in the "Who is Savitar?" debate.

The Flash airs Tuesdays at 8/7c on The CW.

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