It's been a long and messy road for Wally West on The Flash. He was just a simple street car racer, until his mother died and Joe West became aware that he had a son. Adopting him immediately into their family, as the Wests do, Wally became an odd-man-out at S.T.A.R. labs, and after Flashpoint, was given powers by Savitar via Alchemy, ones that led him to become the Fastest Man Alive.
The show has since backtracked on that fact, reasserting Barry's speed dominance, which was a missed opportunity in a lot of ways. But in Season 3, The Flash was struggling to include its ever-growing cast in meaningful plots, and couldn't really justify having two Flashes. Barry wasn't a good mentor, and Wally never really found his place with the team.
After some fits and starts (like joining up with Earth-2's Jesse Quick ... until they broke up... and then heading to some mountain retreat while the writers figured out what to do with him), Wally appeared briefly at the start of this CW season on Legends of Tomorrow. What have we here! At the time, I wrote about how Wally should absolutely join the Waverider crew, especially since the writing was already on the wall about Firestorm's departure. Wally makes so much more sense on Legends than he ever did on Flash. The Waverider team is more reliant on tech than metas and could use the help, sure. But even more importantly, the Legends are all about going back and forth through time -- something a speedster knows (or should know) all about. Wally could be incredibly helpful to them.
Legends of Tomorrow has always been a landing ground for wayward characters that didn't quite fit in elsewhere, and one of the things I really respect about it is how the show is never afraid to shake up the cast when things aren't working. Of the current Legends crew, I wouldn't have gotten rid of Jax and Stein necessarily to make room for Wally, but Kid Flash certain works as an upgrade to Firestorm's abilities.
So yes, to get to the actual announcement: according to EW, Keiynan Lonsdale is officially joining Legends of Tomorrow as a series regular, and will first be part of the team in Episode 13 (Legends returns with Episode 11, taking over Supergirl's Monday spot in a few weeks). I'm looking forward to seeing how the show utilizes him and his powers. (But will he still have to be called Kid Flash?)
Legends of Tomorrow returns to The CW Monday, February 19th.
