Hi folks! Welcome back to our weekly recap of The Flash. This week’s episode is the mid-season finale and it’s named “Family Matters, Part 2,” to be honest I started watching it with fear, because as you know I haven’t been fully liking how the story have been developing and I was scared that this episode might be bad, but it was not at all! Let’s dive right in.
1. They are alive, obviously
Last week we left off with Iris, Alexa and Bashir lying on the ground, apparently dead, although we all knew that they were going to survive Nora’s attack somehow, I mean, Iris can’t die so unexpectedly.
Turns out that Psych is now capable of creating illusions, not just nightmares, and that’s how they survived, one could question why his change in powers, but as they said last week, when they are near Barry, the Forces start developing their full potential.
But there’s the problem that Emo Nora still wants to kill them, and they hide in the past, in the time when the Speed Force was death, but they betray Iris and flee. Meanwhile, there is a storm in Central City, and Team Flash believe that Nora is causing it, then she reveals that the other Forces are the ones that are (unknowingly?) causing the storm; so, there’s a weird shift of allegiances and I feel like the “Force Event” was a little yada-yadaed at the end, but we’ll talk about it later.
2. Frost is free
One of the problems that the storm caused was that a wall on the meta-wing of Iron Heights fell and a bunch of criminals escaped, including Frost. She has a brief subplot where she both flirts and fights with Chillblaine, who also escaped.
At the end she goes back to prison, after capturing 15 metas, and a recommendation letter from Flash, she is granted freedom on probation, which I’m sure it isn’t how it works in real life, but the important thing is that now we will have her back in the show, plus, she admits that for the first time in her life she has a crush… with a criminal that tried to kill her, no less. You know, the classic stereotype that girls like bad boys applies here.
3. Great art choices
This episode had great creative choices, first, while in the house that represents the dead Speed Force, Bashir and Alexa start communicating telepathically, and it is shown with a couple of dolly zooms, this is repeated on a later scene and I loved it! It’s a fun, vertigo-inducing way of telling us that this experience is new and weird to the Forces too.
Then, we have a big CGI fight between the Forces inside the Speed Force (I know, it’s weird), and although the effects were sometimes cheesy, I am really amazed at what they can create around a couple of takes from the actors: monsters fighting, lighting and a lot of choreography, it was fun and incredible to watch.
And lastly, what deserves all my praise, is the scene when Deon shows Nora what her future could be, some scenes of the city, all alone, all silent, contrasted with the earlier scenes in the fight full of sound effects and music, Nora is shown how she could end up alone and it is finely translated to the screen, with a beautiful scene.
4. “You get redeemed, you get redeemed, everybody gets redemption!”
As I said earlier, I didn’t fully understand which Force was a villain and who was causing the storm, but Nora is still adamant on killing her “brothers”, and they band together to stop her while Barry tries to stop the force cyclone that is forming, at the end Nora realizes that if she kills the other Forces, she would be alive alone for millennia, at the end they team up to give Barry the strength to finish the menace.
Later, we see them on a restored house, they are “ascended” into a place where they can look after the world and help Barry and, apparently, others. It is a weird ending to a weird storyline but I am mostly satisfied with it, they are on another place now and Barry and Iris can focus in their lives instead of being parents of grown-ass adults.
Continued below5. The real West-Allen children are coming
And now, what’s next to the show?
First of all, Cisco is leaving in the next episode and I’m really sad to see him go, but I’m sure we will have a heartfelt farewell. Meanwhile we were teased with what could be a new relationship: Allegra and Chester!
Then, on the last scene, Barry and Iris lament that they are not focusing anymore on their children, so they decide to have kids, and this time, they are doing it the old way! And we know they are coming soon! The first poster for Impulse was revealed this week and I’m eager to know how the story will develop.
And finally, The CW revealed that this seventh will conclude on July 20, also, the already greenlit eighth season might begin later this year, with five special “crossover-like” episodes to start-off the season before 2021 ends. So, we still have a lot of The Flash coming ahead.
BONUS: I didn’t even had time to talk about Joe! Well, as always he saved the day, but we’ll have to talk about him later.
And that’s it for this episode, overall, I could argue that this whole “Graphic Novel” felt a little rushed, because of the pandemic, but overall I did enjoyed how it ended and how it set up some stuff for the latter half of the season. What did you think of this episode? Leave your comments below and join us in two weeks for our take on episode 712, “Good-bye Vibrations,” the last one for Cisco Ramon.
