The Flash: How Does The Speed Force Work And Who Can Access It?
Warning: This post contains spoilers for "The Flash."
DC's new tentpole film "The Flash" revolves around a time travel paradox storyline that kicks off when protagonist Barry Allen (Ezra Miller) leverages his connection to something called the Speed Force to attempt to rewrite the history of his father Henry (Ron Livingston)'s wrongful imprisonment for the murder of his mother Nora (Maribel Verdú). Time travel in fiction, of course, never quite holds up to scrutiny, so even those who have seen "The Flash" could be forgiven for not entirely understanding just what, exactly, the Speed Force is and how it works.
In fact, as recounted on the official DC blog, author Mark Waid introduced the idea of the Speed Force in a 1994 comic about an incarnation of The Flash named Wally West in an explicit attempt to help make The Flash's superpowers make more sense. The character's powers, then, came first, and the Speed Force later debuted as a catch-all explanation for them.
Subsequent Flash stories have since fleshed out the Speed Force as both something that imbues speedsters — anyone like The Flash capable of super high-speed movement — with their superpowers, and a plane of existence predominately accessible by said speedsters. The Speed Force, therefore, isn't necessarily a rigidly defined concept so much as a nebulous, supernatural energy that fuels The Flash's range of abilities.
The Speed Force should be important to the Flash movie franchise's future
Just like in its DC Comics source material, "The Flash" incorporates the Speed Force as both an energy source and a physical plane of sorts through which Barry passes while attempting to travel through time.
Currently, the biggest question mark about the Speed Force's manifestation in DC movie canon is the the possibility that others might access it. Since Barry Allen is the only speedster in the DC film universe for the time being, he's the only one with a demonstrable connection to the Speed Force. In DC comics, meanwhile, both scientists and aliens with supernatural abilities can access it on occasion, though its powers are far more often the purview of speedsters alone. The list of speedsters linked to the Speed Force in various comic book storylines includes the villainous Eobard Thawne, superhero Jesse Quick, and the antiheroic Godspeed, among plenty of others.
The DC Universe in the wake of "The Flash" ending, then, may will continue to incorporate the Speed Force as a place that allows for time travel, as well as a potential narrative device through which new speedsters can be introduced into DC movie canon with it serving as the source of their superpowers.