‘The Flash’ Season 4 Spoilers: EP Teases The Thinker’s Superpowers

Although The Thinker’s comic book counterpart is known for controlling other people’s mind using his invention called the Thinking Cap, “The Flash” executive producer Todd Helbing revealed that CW’s version of the DC villain doesn’t do a lot of mind control.

“Like always, we take the villains and put them through our ‘Flash’ television blender,” Helbing told Rotten Tomatoes when asked about the Thinker’s (Neil Sandilands) superpowers. “It’s not that we fully re-imagine every single one of these guys or girls, but we certainly give them powers that we think fit better organically in our show. So we’ve done the same thing with The Thinker here. It’s not so much mind control as it is just he is the ultimate chess master. There’s some metahuman capabilities on top of his thinking capacity, but I can’t spoil it for you.”

While viewers have yet to find out The Thinker’s set of metahuman powers, it’s pretty obvious that Sandiland’s character is unlike any other major villains the series has had before.

“It’s been a lot of fun for us [to have The Thinker as Season 4 big bad] because the way we approach him is completely different than any of the other villains and not just in regards to him not being a speedster,” Helbing told IGN. “I would certainly say he’s the most psychological opponent Barry (Grant Gustin) has faced. He’s the smartest man on the planet, so he’s thought every variation of the moves whenever he makes a move. He knows how things are going to play out before they play out.”

“He’s a guy that simultaneously built a chess board, all of its pieces and then started moving them around,” Helbing added of the Thinker, who also goes by the name of Clifford DeVoe. “He can create any scenario he wants for Barry, then solve ones he wants as well for his own purposes.”

While Helbing was tight-lipped on when exactly the Thinker will appear on the show, the exec producer told The Hollywood Reporter that fans will “get to see him pretty early on” in the new season.

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