‘The Flash’: Candice Patton Wants Malese Jow To Return As Linda Park

Candice Patton would like Malese Jow to reprise her role as Linda Park on “The Flash.”

During last month’s San Diego Comic-Con, Patton revealed that she’s been campaigning for Jow’s return to the CW series because she thinks that her character, Iris West, and Jow’s Linda have the potential to form a strong female friendship.

“I keep advocating for Linda Park to come back because I feel like they, of all the characters, could have a really great female friendship,” Patton said (via Comic Book Resources). “I don’t know if that’s something that’s going to happen. But we’ve got Caitlin (Danielle Panabaker), we’ve got Gypsy (Jessica Camacho), Jessie Quick (Violett Beane), who’s kind of taken off for now. … The female friendships [on the show] are kind of not as strong, but I don’t know. We’ll see. Maybe Season 4. Maybe.”

Due to the show’s lack of defining moments between female characters, some people have seen “The Flash” as a “boy’s club,” which arguably makes sense. For instance, Caitlin and Iris’ relationship hasn’t become deeper despite knowing each other for three seasons now.

During a panel at DragonCon in 2015, Patton briefly explained why she thinks female friendships don’t shine as bright as male friendships on the series. “I think it’s hard when you only have two [main] female characters on the show,” Patton said (via Comicbook.com).

Although Patton told Comic Book Resources in the same year that “there’s a friendship” between Iris and Linda, and that Iris and Patty Spivot (Shantel VanSanten) “have the potential to have a very amicable friendship,” both Linda and Patty moved out of Central City before those friendships could develop.

Linda and her Earth-2 metahuman doppelgänger Doctor Light last appeared in Season 2, episode 6, entitled “Enter Zoom.” In the episode, Linda masqueraded as Doctor Light as part of Team Flash’s plan to catch Zoom (Teddy Sears). But after the plan failed, Linda moved to Coast City to protect herself from Zoom and Doctor Light, who escaped from S.T.A.R. Labs.

Although Linda left Central City and Doctor Light went missing, Jow told Screener in 2015 that there are more stories to be told about her characters, so it’s likely that fans haven’t seen the last of them yet. “I feel like there is a lot of potential with Linda and Doctor Light, so we’ll see where the writers take the storyline,” the actress said at the time.

“The Flash” Season 4 premieres on Tuesday, Oct. 10 at 8 p.m. EDT on The CW.