Hi folks! Welcome back to our weekly recap of The Flash. It’s been more than a month and I was anxious to get back to write about your favorite show! This week’s episode is named “The Flash and the Furious”, because of course, is there another movie that can be referenced? Let’s dive right in.
1. Keeping up with the team
After the prologue scene, we have a basic scene in S.T.A.R. Labs where we can catch up with the members of Team Flash. Barry, Iris, Caitlin, Cisco, Sherloque and Nora are doing the usual stuff, Cecille is coming back to the courtroom after maternal leave, & _Baby Giraffe_ Ralph is visiting her mother.
The most important thing is the reveal of where Joe West has been. As you remember, Jesse L. Martin took a medical leave due to a back injury in real life, but the writing team gave us an explanation for his fictional absence, turns out he is visiting Wally with newborn Jenna, and he is not thinking of coming back to his house, where he was attacked by Cicada. Finally, TVLine reports that he will be coming back in episode 15.
2. How convenient, meta sutures and ice-healing
This episode’s subplot involves a discussion between Cisco and Caitlin. After a long time with his wounds, Caitlin finally takes the shreds of Cicada’s daggers that dampened Cisco’s powers. He says that he has been enjoying coming back to a normal, “pre-meta” life, after all, not being pursued by a villain every week must be relaxing.
Then he comes with the idea of using the shreds to find a way to permanently cure metahumans, to change the lives of every who doesn’t want their powers. Caitlin/Killer Frost is not amused with the idea and destroys his experiment, having a “cure” in the wrong hands can be dangerous and forcing a cure can be a little… fascist-y. Finally, by the end of the episode, they go to the old lab of Caitlin’s dad, where she proposes to help him find a cure, but there are going to be ground rules, like never forcing it into anyone.
At first, I did not like the idea of them tackling the classic “there’s a cure” story, because, you know, it usually ends up being a “hero’s dilemma” until the end when they decide not to use it. But It is going to be interesting to see how this story develops and how it might affect the whole Arrowverse.
3. Wait, I have seen Ghosts in muscle cars before…
This week’s main villain is Silver Ghost, a girl with a Meta-key that can control any vehicle she wants. Barry ends up unabled to control his phasing and locked-up in the pipeline, reading Heat Wave’s cheesy romantic book, a nice crossover Easter egg.
With that, Nora’s in charge of dealing with Silver Ghost, who frees Weather Witch to make a rogue all-female team, hey that could be nice, a Rogues Gallery of women.
This crosses with Cecile’s plot, she’s in charge in the Weather Witch trial, and with her meta-convenient powers, she feels that Joss really regrets her criminal past. She even asks XS for help, she wants to prove that she is sorry for her actions, but fucking Nora, all impulsive, doesn’t believe the Witch.
It is nice to see that some rogues are human and do feel regret for their actions, I mean, we have seen that before with Leonard Snart and Mick Rory, but having a villain saying she deserves jailtime is meaningful. The rogues are coming back eventually in the season, and I’m hoping for a nice redemption story.
4. Sherloque v. Nora
This episode also followed Sherloque’s investigation of Nora, how did she managed to travel back in time? How does she know the speed-force language? And, is she being mentored/manipulated by someone?
Of course, we as an audience already know this, but I like what the writers are setting for the rest of this season, there will be an eventual revelation and it’s going to hit hard on Barry and Iris to know that she’s being helped by Eobard.
This episode’s cliffhanger scene was Sherloque asking Gideon for Nora’s files, but they where erased by herself, which implies that she was told by Thawne to do so.
Continued below5. Goddamnit, Nora
Finally, I want to rant a little about Nora. I have been enjoying this season, I think that the creative team are inspired, and the actors really enjoy their work. But there’s one thing I’m not satisfied with, and it’s Nora.
I get the idea of developing Barry as a teacher for future generations, but it feels a little forced, just like that whole Flashpoint mess that lasted two or three episodes, I feel that it’s still early in Flash’s career to teach a daughter, he could be teaching Kid Flash or Jesse Quick.
Don’t get me wrong, I truly am loving the plot twists that are happening in this season, like Cicada seemingly being relegated to make space for the return of Reverse Flash, who is manipulating Nora. But she’s just annoying, she’s impulsive, she makes wrong choices all the time and put the team in troubles more often than any villain. I get it, that’s the way she is being written, maybe the writers expect just that from their audience, but damn, she just makes everyone’s lives harder.
BONUS: Wait… was that a Batmobile prototype with emojis? ‘Cuz I’m all up for a Batman that uses emojis.
And that’s it for the mid-season premiere, I liked this episode and how it sets up some storylines that will be interesting to explore. What did you think of it? Leave your comments below and join us next week for our take on episode 511, “Seeing Red”.
