Criminal Minds alum Damon Gupton lands major Black Lightning role
While at Comic-Con this weekend, it was confirmed that Gupton will be a series-regular on the CW midseason superhero show Black Lightning, playing a detective by the name of Inspector Henderson. At first, this is going to be more of a foe than a friend to Black Lightning (Cress Williams), more than likely because vigilante justice is not the sort of this that tends to be celebrated and/or embraced by law enforcement. They want their cities and their streets to be safe, but they also want it done under their own terms and without so much interference coming in from else. That includes crime-fighters with masks and powers who get in the way of investigations.
Over time, though, Henderson may come to trust Black Lightning and realize that his intentions are to help rather than being a danger to society. There is that inevitable fear that someone with such capacity to be great good has the capacity to be evil, and nobody wants to be around in the event that this switch is flipped. That’s one of the reasons we always have sympathy for the police in the traditional comic-book cops vs. heroes dispute that we’ve seen so many times over the years. One recent example of that is Quentin Lance versus Oliver Queen on Arrow.
Gupton was a series regular for the second half of Criminal Minds season 12 as Stephen Walker, a brilliant former student of Agent Rossi (Joe Mantegna) who was very useful during his brief tenure at the BAU. The character will be written out of the show following the news of Gupton’s exit earlier this summer. One of Damon’s other notable credits is the newly-concluded A&E series Bates Motel.
Other cool Black Lightning news
As if getting Gupton wasn’t enough to have you psyched, know this: You’re also getting on board the show former Dexter star James Remar in the role of Peter Gambi. He is a longtime friend of Black Lightning’s alter ego Jefferson Pierce and a source of advice/father figure through the better part of his life. Notice the Harry Morgan similarities already? Well, there are some in terms of him being a mentor, but that may be all of it. We gotta see the show air before we know for certain!
What we do know for certain is that this has been a pretty tremendous past year or so for Remar, who lands this role after serving as a guest-star on such shows as Gotham and also NCIS: Los Angeles. These two men should give the series even further clout, though it already had pretty good standing given how well-received the recent trailer was when that debuted at the convention. The video footage in general has been fairly positive to date.
Alas, there is no definitive word as to if Black Lightning will someday be a part of the superhero universe with Arrow, The Flash, Supergirl, and Legends of Tomorrow. The one thing we can say is that it won’t happen in the near future. Down the road? Who knows.
Share your thoughts regarding these castings below! (Photo: The CW.)