The Flash season 7: Hartley Sawyer will not return after old offensive tweets

Hartley Sawyer, who plays Ralph Dibny, has been fired from The Flash season 7

The Flash star Hartley Sawyer will not return for season 7 of the hit CW series.

According to a report from The Hollywood Reporter, Sawyer was fired from The CW’s hit TV series after screenshots of offensive tweets surfaced online.

In The Flash, Sawyer starred as Ralph Dibny, also known as Elongated Man. He joined the series back in 2017 in a recurring role, and Sawyer’s character has taken on a larger and more important role in recent seasons. Sawyer became a series regular in 2018 prior to season 5 and appeared in 50 episodes of the series.

According to the report, Sawyer’s Twitter account has been deleted, although it was not reported when the account became inactive.

Here’s what Eric Wallace, executive producer and showrunner of The Flash, said in a statement, via THR:

"“In regards to Mr. Sawyer’s posts on social media, we do not tolerate derogatory remarks that target any race, ethnicity, national origin, gender, or sexual orientation. Such remarks are antithetical to our values and polices, which strive and evolve to promote a safe, inclusive and productive environment for our workforce.”"

Sawyer offered an apology on Instagram, and we shared the apology below.

It’s unclear how the series will proceed without Dibny, especially considering how the sixth season of The Flash ended. The season ended three episodes early, and the main storyline for the season had not been wrapped up yet.

We have to imagine Sawyer filmed scenes for those episodes that would be shown in the seventh season. Will they cut those scenes? Will they reshoot those scenes with a different actor? We just don’t know how exactly the show will proceed at this point.

It would be very easy to recast Dibny’s character and proceed as planned. Remember, Dibny can change his appearance very easily, so a different actor could play this role without the show missing a beat.

We’ll be sure to let you know how The Flash season 7 proceeds in light of the decision to remove Sawyer from the series. We probably won’t find out what’s going to happen for a while.

The Flash season 7 has been bumped to a January 2021 premiere because of the coronavirus pandemic.

Stay tuned for more information.