What’s old is new again. Four and a half years after it was announced that Kiersey Clemons would portray the character of Iris West in The Flash movie, the actress has closed a deal to play Iris West in, well, The Flash movie. Clemons was originally cast back in 2016 when she was intended to be introduced in Zack Snyder’s Justice League before having a co-starring role in The Flash standalone film opposite Ezra Miller. She filmed her Justice League scenes with Miller, but after Snyder left Justice League and extensive reshoots reshaped the film, Clemons was cut from the theatrical version.
At the same time, The Flash movie has been a revolving door of directors as Warner Bros. has tried to get the DC film off the ground. Clemons was cast when the project’s second director, Rick Famuyiwa, was attached to take the helm, but now It and It: Chapter Two filmmaker Andy Muschietti is directing a new take on the material – although Clemons is keeping the Iris West role.
THR reports that Clemons has closed her deal and The Flash movie is now on track to finally start filming in April in London. Over the past few years, the project has run into scheduling problems with Miller’s duties on the Fantastic Beasts franchise, but the actor will have just wrapped Fantastic Beasts 3 by the time The Flash rolls cameras.
This version of The Flash movie will introduce the idea of the multiverse and is seen as the key to DC’s movies going forward. In contrast to Snyder’s original MCU-like plan to create a series of films that all connect, The Flash will bring the multiverse into the equation, which allows for Jared Leto and Joaquin Phoenix’s two different Jokers to exist simultaneously in two separate universes.
To that end, Micheal Keaton is onboard to reprise his role as Batman for the first time since Batman Returns in a storyline not unlike the Peter Parker/Iron Man dynamic in Spider-Man: Homecoming. We also know that Ben Affleck will reprise his Batman role one last time in the movie, and Sasha Calle will make her DC debut as a new version of Supergirl.
The Flash is currently set for release on November 4, 2022, and while the project’s history says not to hold your breath, when cameras do finally roll fans will breathe a huge sigh of relief.