Flash Executive Producer Talks Crossover With Arrow With Brandon Routh

The Flash executive producer Andrew Kreisberg talked to IGN about the upcoming Flash/Arrow crossover in which Felicity and Ray Palmer (Brandon Routh) travel to Central City. He also discussed the challenges of working with The Flash and Arrow’s shared universe.

On Barry having a tough time

“It happens to come at a particularly bad moment for Barry, but that’s partially why we did it. The first episode with Felicity, episode four, she came along at a time where her experience in being a part of a crime-fighting team definitely helped Barry overcome what he was facing that week. Similarly, when she comes, he’s having a crisis of conscience that in some ways only somebody like she can help him through. It’s a really fun episode.”

On TV crossovers

“Sometimes it’s a real hinderance because, even in the room, we’re like, ‘Oh, Oliver’s missing? Call Barry. Have him run all over the place until he finds him.’ So when it serves us, it’s absolutely great, but the more we talked about it, sort of bringing all that up on the Flash side of things — especially given all the Flash stories and knowing that Oliver is missing — it sort of created more problems than it was worth. Because if you address it on the show, then they seem sort of unsympathetic that they’re not throwing all their STAR Labs research to finding Oliver. So sometimes discretion is the better part of valor.”

On Arrow

“But then Ray and Felicity are coming — and that one, actually, because the air dates changed, we’re trying to square the circle on what was happening on Arrow when they come to Flash. So hopefully it won’t feel too much like an evergreen episode, because we felt like it really worked the first time around… There’s [also] an upcoming thing in a Flash episode, which feels like a throwaway, but it actually describes an event that happens in the flashback story this season on Arrow. We do stuff like that. For us, it’s so much fun, and hopefully the audience finds it fun. Like last season, with all the mentions of the Accelerator on Arrow.”

On The Flash

“I think one of the great strengths of The Flash is just how close everyone is on the show. They tend not to have these raging conflicts the way we giving everybody on Arrow. [Laughs] That show’s more of a soap opera — and I don’t say that derogatorily. I mean, I’m one-third responsible for it. [Laughs] But there we always think to ourselves, ‘How can we hurt these people more?’ You know, ‘What’s the worst thing we can do to Thea, and what’s the worst thing we can do to Laurel? What’s the worst thing we can do to Oliver?’ That’s where the drama comes from. I think part of the strength of The Flash is that the drama comes from how these people who have banded together and love each other and trust each other deal with conflicts that come their way.”

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Flash Executive Producer Talks Crossover With Arrow With Brandon Routh