Superheroes are hot. Where in the past reading comic books and talking about it was something that was pretty much reserved for geeks (and I am proud to be a geek, thank you very much), these days superheroes have become incredibly popular in todays culture. This is partly because of the enormous succes of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. With Marvel expanding and integrating pretty much all of their superheroes, it is something that has become really unique. Marvel’s biggest rival, DC, has so far unsuccessfully tried to do the same with their superhero franchises. Last year’s Batman vs. Superman, a movie I quite enjoyed, was not received very well by most of the moviegoing audience. This year, they get to try again with Wonder Woman and Justice League. However as unsuccessful as they are on the big screen, DC has been very succesful on the small screen. Arrow has been one of their most popular shows, and when a show has that many fans, it is almost inevitable that a spinoff series at one point will get a green light. And so we now have The Flash, but is that series as good as Arrow?

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The Flash focusses on Barry Allen, a young man who through an accident, becomes the fastest man on Earth. As a young boy Barry loses his mother in a strange incident. His father is accused of the murder, and is sent to jail. In the first season, Barry tries to find out who is behind the murder of his mother. He receives help from the mysterious but kind dr. Harrison Wells and a team of friends at S.T.A.R. Labs. But as the season progresses, and Barry gets more comfortable in his role as the new protector of the city, The Flash, he will find out that not everything is as it seems….With new and more powerful enemies appearing every day, The Flash will certainly have his hands full. Will he find out who is the real enemy though?

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Arrow is a show that is very dark, and even though it has it’s funny moments, overall the series has a very serious tone to it. The Flash is the complete opposite of that. The best way to describe the show is just by simply one word: fun. The Flash just simply puts a smile on your face whenever you watch it. I would not go so far as by calling this show a comedy, there are too many serious events happening to call it that. But it does have a very light tone to it, and that is refreshing especially when considering that The Flash has it’s origin in Arrow. The cast of characters is one of the show’s stronger points.

Barry himself is played by Grant Gustin, an actor that I myself had never heard of before, but I doubt that there is someone out there who could have been better suited to play the part. Grant just seems born for the role, and it really shows in the way he plays the The Flash. The other actor who is worth mentioning is Tom Cavanagh who plays the role of doctor Harrison Wells. His sense of calm, and mysteriousness is for me one of the highlights of the entire show. The other castmembers are also very good in their own ways, and only add to the strength of this series.

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This first season has a lot of great and wonderful episodes. Sure there are a few episodes that are not as good, but pretty much every tv series has it’s ups and downs. Another thing that is a lot of fun is the fact that many characters from Arrow make guest appearances. It really is great to see how these two shows work so very well together, and now with both Supergirl and Legends of Tomorrow joining the same universe it can only get better. The Flash is a perfect example of how a spinoff series can definitely grow to be as good and sometimes even better than the original. For those of you that thought Arrow was too dark at times, I highly recommend checking this series out. You can watch it even if you have never seen Arrow as the series only references some small things that happened in the aforementioned show. Basically this is just a fun series, which should appeal to pretty much every superhero fan out there.

I give The Flash season 1 a 9 out of 10 score.