“Lazy Boy Joe” – as some fans jokingly referred to him for the first few episodes of season five – is no more. Long live Detective Joe West as actor Jesse L. Martin is making his return to The Flash.
In the beginning of the season, there were many scenes in which the normally active Joe was seen sitting down. The reason for his character’s inactivity, and for Jesse’s eventual leave of absence, was due to a back injury that Martin had sustained during the summer hiatus. Since the fourth episode, there have been minor but no definitive explanations covering Joe’s noticeable absence from his normal level of involvement in Team Flash. Most of them have been centering on the subplot involving his focusing on his new daughter with wife Cecile, played by Danielle Nicolet.
Producer and showrunner Todd Helbing went on record with the news that there will be an onscreen explanation as to why the rock of the West-Allen household has been MIA since before Thanksgiving. “There’s an explanation, and then there’s another sort of thing down the line that will give more explanation as to why [Joe] has been gone for so long. [I’ll] just say that S.T.A.R. Labs has [via which] he’s gone and not gone at the same time.”
Uhm, okay? Gone but not gone? Whatever that means, I’m sure we will all learn that when The Flash returns this coming Tuesday, January 15 on The CW at 8/7 Central with their tenth episode, “The Flash and The Furious.”
Regardless, welcome back, Papa Joe.
