‘The Flash’ Star John Wesley Shipp Says His Jay Garrick Role Came As Big Surprise

John Wesley Shipp didn’t expect that he was going to play Jay Garrick after Henry Allen, his original role on “The Flash,” was killed off in the penultimate episode of the show’s Season 2.

“I wasn’t prepared for that at all,” Shipp said in an interview with FanFest earlier this month. “I knew that Henry Allen probably would be drawing to a close because his usefulness as a plot device, which was really to help Barry… as he was getting used to his new powers, [had already become worn out]. But I was not prepared for being the man in the iron mask, or that the man in the iron mask would turn out to be the real Jay Garrick, who looked just like Henry Allen. I just thought that was brilliant writing.”

Shipp revealed to Collider last December that he had no idea that he’s playing the man in the iron mask until a costume fitting. “I went up to do the last four episodes of the show in Season 2, figuring that Henry Allen was drawing to a close,” Shipp said. “What I didn’t know was that I would be coming back.”

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“It was really comical,” he recalled of how he discovered that his “The Flash” journey isn’t done yet. “I was at a costume fitting and I was trying on a shredded costume and I was like, ‘Wow, what’s this?!’ And (costume designer) Kate [Main] said, ‘Well, of course, you’ll be fitted for the iron mask separately.’ And I said, ‘The iron mask?’ And she said, ‘You don’t know?! You didn’t hear it from me!’”

Unbeknown to Shipp at the time, the man in the iron mask was actually Jay Garrick, and he only found out about it while hanging out with Grant Gustin (The Flash/Barry Allen) and Jesse L. Martin (Joe West) on set.

“They said, ‘So, did you hear what you’re doing this season?’ And I said, ‘Yeah, I’m the man in the iron mask. Go figure!’” shared Shipp, who played the Scarlet Speedster in the 1990s “The Flash” TV series. “And they paused and said, ‘Yeah. That’s all you know?’ And I was like, ‘There’s more?’ And they said, ‘You’re Jay Garrick, man!’ And I was like, ‘Get out of town! You’re kidding!’”

While Shipp is thrilled to be playing a speedster again, he revealed to IGN that he does miss playing Henry Allen. “I admit I miss, I have to say, the closeness … between me and Grant as Henry and Barry,” the actor said. “There was just warmth and kindness and good parenting that was going on in those scenes. [But] that’s gone. What I get now is I get to bump up against Grant’s speedster as a speedster.”

Shipp is expected to reprise his role as Jay Garrick in Season 3 of “The Flash,” which is set to premiere on Tuesday, Oct 10 at 8 p.m. EDT on The CW.