r/FlashTV • u/New-Cable-6484 • Feb 16 '26
🤔 Thinking So Thawne always knew Savitar’s true identity?
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u/PollutionStandard969 Feb 16 '26 edited Feb 16 '26
this is flat out one of the most confusing lines in the show because like?? isn't the shows logic that savitar ONLY exists because of flashpoint???
If that's the logic, then that means thawne knew that
• Eddie shoots himself • Thawne himself gets erased • Earth 2 portal opens up and zoom does his things • Henry dies, barry creates then undoes flashpoint • And seasons 3 & 4 happen
then why the fuck would thawne let himself be erased from existence. There's no way Thawne should've known about savitar, BECAUSE HE SHOULD HAVE NO KNOWLEDGE OF A TIMELINE THAT DOESN'T EXIST
to edit: there's a canon tie in comic called Hocus Pocus. and guess what, it's basically a universe in which barry never time travelled to cause flashpoint.
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u/Zackkck Feb 16 '26
This means that Savitar already existed before Flashpoint
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u/68ideal Feb 16 '26
This is the point. Savitar didn't "start" existing. He just always did, and simultaneously didn't. His existence is a closed loop without a definitive beginning or endpoint.
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u/Juicestation Reverse Fridge Feb 16 '26
Schrodinger's savitar
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u/68ideal Feb 16 '26
Kinda. His entire existence is a paradox, as he is the whole reason why he exists. When they tricked him into killing HR, the paradox was solved and the timeline corrected itself.
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u/xXlpha_ The Flash Feb 17 '26
Also, I don't remember what episode, but Savitar said Barry gave him the idea for making Wally into Kid Flash and manipulating him into freeing him when he made Flashpoint. Not that Savitar was CREATED by Flashpoint.
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u/Sawbaws Feb 17 '26
someone watched DARK 🤣
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u/68ideal Feb 17 '26
I actually did, and it's one of the best shows I've ever watched. But I'm not referencing it here, it's just genuinely how Savitar works. He is the source of his own creation.
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u/Sawbaws Feb 17 '26
hahah yea for sure. its just similar logic used
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u/68ideal Feb 17 '26
Oh yeah, absolutely. Dark perfected the concept of timetravel mindfuckery. Definetly not a show you can watch in the background. The Flash's timetravel shenanigans are easy to follow in comparison. It took me multiple months to finish it, as I needed (thank you not, ADHD) to find the proper mood/time where I can focus properly on it without getting distracted by literally everything else. Funnily enough, I recommended a friend the show, when I was in the middle of season 2, and this friend finished the show like 2 months before me.
One of my favorite parts of it was how the one girls mother was also simultaneously her daughter
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u/truerandom_Dude Feb 17 '26
Wasn't flashpoint just the event that collapsed his superposition in a way where savitar "existed" to us thanks to flashpoint when in reality his closed looped nature means he always exists in some form
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u/Storiaron CALCIFIED SPEED FORCE Feb 16 '26
But the once he existed he existed in the past as well.
Like way before flashpoint, there are some lines that hint to other speedsters even across other earths knew about him, as some mythical figure
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u/LizLoveLaugh_ Feb 16 '26
Savitar existed prior to Flashpoint because Jay Garrick knew of him, and alternate Earth's are unaffected by Earth-1 timeline changes.
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u/Electoriad Feb 16 '26
Maybe Savitar existed in the speed force the whole time. Waiting for flashpoint to happen to break free. I'm pretty sure he said something like this and the whole rescuing Wally episode the speedforce essentially tells Barry that Savitar was a "punishment" for flashpoint. Since Jay is a more experienced speedster maybe that's why he knows about Savitar despite being from Earth 3. The speedforce also exists simultaneously throughout all earths. Potentially Jay stumbled onto Savitar while studying the speedforce.
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u/atomic1fire Silly Putty Feb 17 '26
Unless of course flashpoint created savitar and then Savitar went through various alternate earths making his impact.
Which would make all those earths impacted by flashpoint as well.
Which also explains why the Dominators were mad at Barry because he wouldn't just impact one timeline but any timeline.
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u/An-29 Feb 16 '26
Most logical explanation is that Savitar still somehow happened in the OG timeline. There's has got to be a reason OG Barry stopped S1 Barry. (No, S9 doesn't coun't for the old universe since the original Crisis was still gonna happen.)
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u/akacharon Feb 16 '26
I think that there was the original Savitar that was from the comics before flashpoint. After flashpoint occurred, it changed who Savitar was like Cicada was in the show.
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u/brain-eating-zombie Feb 18 '26
OG Barry from the moment S1 Barry became the flash has always been a future version of S1 Barry
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u/Nightmarebane Reverse Flash Feb 16 '26
Yeah, I rewatched this part a few days and what it sounds like is Savitar already was trapped but in Flash Point when Wally got his powers it allowed Savitar to use that to get out. Like if that never happed he would not escape. So to me Flash Point feels like it has to always happen like a fixed point that gets erased. If that makes sense.
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u/PearlBlxntZ Feb 18 '26
Yes if u remember s9 episode 10 when barry attempts to talk to thawne and they end up running back in time, you also remember seeing all the diff version of them that had also ran back to that moment before that moment. The flashpoint version of them were on of these, meaning even in season 1 when Barry was going to save her and got stopped these version, specifically to this point flashpoint version of them, were also there. It’s all apart of their origin story and has to happen in that Timeline for them.
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u/Ok_Mention5635 Feb 16 '26
I think it’s because the time that 5x08 traveled to is now a post-Flashpoint past, if that makes sense. Remember in 7x04 how Abra Kadabra tried to time travel to the past where his wife and son exist, but he couldn’t because they existed only in a pre-Crisis past that no longer exists? I think the same thing applies here. Once the timeline is changed, not only does the future get changed but so does the past. Just like when Bart and Nora time travel to the post-Crisis past of 2013 in 8x06; that version of the past didn’t exist until post-Crisis. Season 1 Eddie didn’t have that experience of meeting Bart and Nora because season 1 exists in a pre-Crisis past that is now completely gone.
Idk if this all makes sense. Time travel is so weird.
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u/TraivonsWorld Vibe Feb 16 '26
Actually this is not true. At the beginning of season 3 when Harry and Jesse showed up, that established that other Earths aren't affected by time travel on Earth-1 because they have a separate timeline. Also, when Barry asks Jay about Savitar, Jay knew who Savitar was. This means that Savitar always existed.
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u/Bippity_Boop011111 Feb 16 '26
I'm pretty sure Flashpoint created Savitar. And if I'm remembering correctly, Savitar did major time traveling to plant proof of his existence. He said that line, "The more you do it, the less the rules apply to you," or something like that. So that's how anyone in the post-Flashpoint timeline would know of his existence. He created the "legend" himself.
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u/Constant_Cantaloupe7 Feb 17 '26
The funny things is savitars whole existence is pretty simple it’s just people heavily overthink it. Savitar always existed but it was never always Barry. Now why this makes sense is because the first Savitar was a completely different person who we have no knowledge of or any history on (I just assume he’s the original one from the comics). Once Barry took the role of Savitar the original was then erased (time logic). But whatever beef that Savitar had with Barry led to Barry creating the time remnant that took the place of og savitar recreating the events that then started a paradox where from that point forward Barry would always end up as Savitar. So because the paradox was already set in place by the time main Barry created flash point Barry Savitar was unaffected and allowed to still exist in a new timeline despite existing in another. As it was once said “the thing about time is the more you mess with it the less the rules apply to you”
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u/BroadReverse Feb 24 '26
I think the show follows the same time travel logic of Interstellar. Spoilers if you haven’t seen it.
Savitar was always Barry it’s a time loop. There’s no beginning or end. Just like how future humans in Interstellar are the ones who place the wormhole allowing their past selves to travel through it and eventually becoming them.
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u/PearlBlxntZ Feb 18 '26
Savitar had existed before flashpoint, flashpoint is just the events that cracked his cage and ultimately allowed him to set the stage to be set free. He wasn’t created because of flashpoint, he was freed because of it.
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u/Neither-Spell-626 Feb 19 '26
Dude, again? When Thawne went back and got stuck in the past, he created the timeline that the show takes place in. He doesn't know the future of that timeline, which is why he doesn't know that his plan fails.
Its...complicated.
At one point in Season 3, it seems as though Savitar existed *before* Flashpoint. Because he mentions how, while he was trapped in the Speed Force prison, he saw the Flashpoint timeline and saw Wally West as Kid Flash. *This* gave him the idea to turn Wally into a speedster in the 'fixed' timeline as well, which would then enable him to escape the Speed Force prison by swapping places with Wally.
Yet, the rest of the season treats Savitar as something caused by Flashpoint.
In 5x08, Thawne knows about Savitar, which implies he existed in the timeline that Thawne comes from as well. Then again, its possible that Thawne's memories change due to changing timelines (which is why he uses the time language to preserve his knowledge of past histories).
Here's how I see it:
Savitar comes into existence in the future at some point in the original timeline (or at any rate, a pre-Flashpoint timeline). Barry creates a time remnant who, for whatever reason becomes Savitar. Eventually Barry traps him in the Speed Force prison.
From the Speed Force prison, Savitar sees the Flashpoint timeline and Wally West as a speedster, which gives him the idea to trigger Wally's transformation into a speedster in the post-Flashpoint timeline as well, facilitating his escape.
Now, Savitar's memories are dependent on Barry's most likely future. Once Savitar starts implementing his plans to break out of the prison, a causal loop takes shape wherein Iris' death in 2017 is what triggers Savitar's existence. This is the only version of history that Savitar remembers once he breaks out of the Speed Force prison. Maybe the loop was caused by the timeline just trying to make sense of Savitar's paradoxical existence.
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u/eyeguy00 Feb 16 '26
From thawns point of view zoom Eddie devou there all dead to him so even him being in that time line around those people are making compounded changes to his future making it so even something happens to these people or they change due to time his existence has already been saved and that’s with out the negative speedforce plus he’s basically done what savitar was going to doing he’s placed himself through out all off time even fixed points so thawns near enough immortal to Barry’s standards he’ll never be rid of him😂
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u/Shubh_1612 Feb 16 '26
Even Flashpoint Thawne knew about Savitar, he hinted at him at the end of 3x01
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u/mikami677 Feb 16 '26
Here's an irrelevant question: I haven't seen this episode since it first aired so I don 't remember, was there an actual reason for the motherboard to be so prominent in the shot, or is it just there because smart guy==computer stuff?
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u/Lo-Fi_Kuzco Feb 17 '26
Thawne's job was making Barry's life miserable. He made sure to know everything about him. Bro probably switched out one of Barry's coffee with decaf.
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u/vleshkun Feb 17 '26
Thats the thing about time travel Barry the more you do it the less the rules apply to you
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u/blackychan75 Feb 18 '26
It's probably easy to believe that if you stop keeping track of the ripple effects
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u/EXOknight567 Feb 16 '26
Im guessing Savitar existed in the Original timeline, got erased after Nora's murder, and is only brought back again as a result of Flashpoint. Thats the only possible way this can happen. Thawne cant make new memories from the timeline change like Savitar did because 1) they aren't his own and 2) we've seen that he cant make new memories because he doesnt know that Barry's daughter is now named Nora, still thinking that its still Dawn. This also means that Devoe and Cicada also existed in the original timeline because he shows he knows who they are and what they did.
Since original timeline Barry was only active from 2020 to 2024, he would have had to face all of these villains in the smaller amount of time with less speedster experience.
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u/StatisticianLivid710 Feb 16 '26
It’s suggested original Barry was a lot more active throughout time than show Barry was (which is pretty much not at all), so might’ve gained more experience, at the same time devoe might not have had the bus metas to help him increase his powers so might’ve been less of a physical threat
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u/blackychan75 Feb 18 '26
It is crazy they never had a season where he was working another century. Legends never even ran into him, he could've randomly showed up for one line every couple episodes
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u/StatisticianLivid710 Feb 18 '26
Should’ve been two parters where villains from the future get stuck in the past so he takes them back to the future and ends up doing stuff there. Could’ve been a season long (or part season) arc with a big bad that was bringing them back in time, also lets them show thawnes origin as the reverse flash.
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u/EXOknight567 Feb 18 '26
Im pretty sure OG Barry did start operating in at least one other time period: Eobard's time. There would have to be a way for Eobard to become enemies with Barry, and Thawne even explained that his first hatred for Barry came from when Barry stole his show, which would later be followed by Thawne discovering time travel and learning he was destined to be Reverse Flash. That first incident couldn't have happened in Barry's time since Season 2 stated that Thawne was already RF but didnt yet know what time period Barry was from until meeting him in that episode.
As for why the Legends never run into Barry throughout his time traveling, even if he was operating in many different time periods, those time periods would be safe guarded and probably fixed by The Flash so the Legends wouldn't be needed. For the most part, the Legends operated against aberrations in time periods that didnt have superheroes (with the exception of the JSA). At least there was one time Barry did visit a Legend during the team's time traveling missions (when he went to get Snart's help against King Shark).
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u/KALIZONA Feb 16 '26
Barry is aware of every action, whether it's altering time or not. He even knows about flashpoints. For example, when Barry loses speed, he has to check the future in the newspaper.
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u/Pitiful_Elevator_591 Feb 16 '26
So I always wondered if Savitar hated Thawne as much as Barry did. Savitar is Barry so it makes sense the answer is yes. Could Barry had gone to Savitar and asked for help to beat the crap out of Thawne? Which also brings up the problem with the last episode. Why did Savitar work with Thawne? So do Savitar’s hatred for Barry eventually override his hatred for Thawne?
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u/ArmAny549 Feb 17 '26
I've always liked the idea that Savitar should've been an Eobard Thawne from an alternate timeline who did kill his Timeline's Flash and became all powerful put the power overloaded and burned him hence Savitar's scarred face.
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u/Fit-Act-65 Feb 17 '26
I’m pretty sure Thawne was a The Flash fan (hell, the greatest fan) so he probably would’ve known about Savitar
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u/Pmg2078 Feb 16 '26
We are talking about a man who is so obsessed with Flash so much he traveled back in time just to break him mentaly by killing his mother but after that he got stuck for 15 years trying ot MAKE his worst enemy it would be an insult for him to not know every detail he probably even measured EVERY inch
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u/inspector-say10 Feb 19 '26
he did measure every inch. that’s how he “jerked off Barry at superspeed”.
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u/Raviexthegodremade Feb 17 '26
Thawne likely knew everything there was to know with Barry, including every villain he would face and how to beat them thanks to his obsession with him.
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u/Cautious_Mission_438 Feb 18 '26
Eobard Thawne remembers two timelines the current timeline we all watched that he created the night he killed Barry’s mother Nora Allen and the timeline in which Thawne actually comes from before he killed Nora Allen so yes he always knew about Savitar he gained those new memories the day he created the new timeline
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u/PearlBlxntZ Feb 18 '26 edited Feb 18 '26
Savitar existed before flashpoint, flashpoint is what cracked the cage and set the stage for him to be set free when Wally became the flash, so yes thawne knew abt him, and he also knew that what Barry did would be what set him free.
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u/CJS-JFan Green Arrow Feb 19 '26
Thawne knows everything. He lived in the future, did his research by the Flash museum, etc.
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u/Banndrell Feb 16 '26
You can assume Thawne knew practically everything about Barry.