'Arrow's Clock King Is Coming To 'The Flash'

In Tuesday night's new episode of The Flash, "Power Outage," William Tockman, aka Clock King, is making his way to Central City. Every fan knows by now about The CW crossover event on the horizon that has The Arrow squaring off against The Flash. With Clock King originally being a villain in Arrow during the series' second season, it isn't surprising he makes an appearance on The Flash to set up the crossover. But who exactly is Clock King? And what does his appearance spell for our beloved Scarlet Speedster, Barry Allen?

Clock King is not a major villain when it comes to DC Comics' pantheon. But he has appeared on Batman: The Animated Series and Batman: The Brave and The Bold. The William Tockman/Clock King we have seen on Arrow and will soon see on The Flash adheres more to his original origin story. Tockman is diagnosed with a terminal illness and turns to crime to get money to help his sister, who has health issues of her own. In the New 52 version of DC Comics' universe, Tockman is a violent crime boss who lacks the intelligence and depth we see in his earlier incarnation.

In Arrow, Clock King proved to be meticulous and brutal, with an ability to calculate a variety of factors in a fraction of a second. He has an utter disregard for human life, except when it comes to his sister. He is quite a memorable villain for someone only appearing in one episode in Season 2, "Time of Death." What's unclear is how exactly he ends up in Central City, because based on the end of "Time of Death," I figured he was arrested after Black Canary knocked him out. Maybe he escaped or was being transferred to a different prison. Either way, his presence on The Flash means the show isn't afraid of showing darker, more psychologically driven villains.

Executive producer Andrew Kreisberg told TVLine “We wanted to give Barry a real challenge… TWO bad guys!” He also said that Barry will be “fighting both a new enemy and one of our scariest and most successful Arrow villains in The Clock King.” Clock King's introduction onto The Flash means the writers are very much dedicated to the show truly feeling like a shared universe with Arrow. During Tuesday's episode, Clock King is able to hold several people hostage in the city's police department, including Detective Joe West, Iris, and Eddie. While in another part of Central City, Barry is grappling with the disappearance of his powers after facing the metahuman Farooq, who can harness electricity. So, let's just say this episode won't take it easy on Barry.

Images: Diyah Pera/The CW (2)