‘The Flash’ Season 2: Jesse L. Martin Discusses Francine West And Patty Spivot, Teddy Sears Discusses Earth-2
The Flash season 2 has started off being frequently about relationships. The hurt from The Flash’s former mentor relationship with Reverse-Flash, Caitlyn Snow with Ronnie Raymond, Iris West and Eddie Thawne, Barry and his father, Caitlyn and Jay, Jay and Barry, and obviously you get the point. One of those relationships in season 2 has yet to fully have an impact is Iris and Francine West. Comicbook, among others, had a chance to discuss Francine West and other topics with Jesse L. Martin Tuesday.
Martin was asked about his first reaction, upon hearing the news that Francine West would be coming to season 2, and he surprisingly didn’t know almost anything about the character that was once Joe West’s wife.
“Well, I was actually elated. There wasn’t a whole lot of talk as to what happened; I didn’t even know her name, so all of a sudden she had a name and there was going to be some sort of return. I didn’t know what the circumstances were going to be, and you guys have found out that she had a drug problem and it put our daughter in jeopardy. That’s pretty much why she ended up leaving — a stint in rehab, also. But she never really explained why she never came back until now, so it was much easier for Joe to pretend that she died than to explain why she was gone and she wasn’t part of Iris’s life.”
Jesse L. Martin said that the relationship between Joe West and Patty Spivot will be “bumpy” and she will be “kept in the dark a lot,” which is not unlike his past partner. Spivot will not be too happy about it.
“We get into a lot of bumpy situations because there’s so many little things I can’t tell her, you know what I mean? To put her on the metahuman task force but then sort of keep her in the dark as to what’s happening in most cases, any strong woman won’t take that well. So you’ll get to see how she actually reacts to it, but it’s another kind of mistake that I make with another partner.”
The Flash season 1 saw Barry navigating potential relationships, all the while wanting to be with Iris. For anyone who knows the background behind Patty Spivot, she is this season’s “love interest” of The Flash season 2, and Joe West apparently encouraged it at some point.
“Yeah, there’s a couple of awkward situations. There’s a whole thing floating around, about when at work, how much do they show their relationship? It flips back and forth: There’s a point where I encourage him to sort of be free with it and then I see them being free with it and I don’t like it, so [laughs] there’s kind of a back-and-forth.”
Teddy Sears plays an even more influential character than Patty and Francine, but so far in season 2, fans haven’t been introduced to much of Jay Garrick’s background and Earth. Sears told DC All Access that The Flash fans will get to see more of Earth-2 going forward.
“I know that has been an ongoing discussion as to sort-of how much, but the idea of two parallel earths happening simultaneously, you imagine that on one earth they have perfected some things that they haven’t on Earth-2 and vice versa.”
The Flash season 2 brings new relationships, new characters, new Earths, and lest we forget, characters back from the dead. Season 2 seems to be shaping up to be more epic than season 1, and certainly shows endless possibilities for the future.
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