Hi folks! Finally The Flash is back from a very long hiatus, with the first episode of the year, it is named “Impulsive Excessive Disorder” and we could consider this a “One Shot”, focusing on Nora and Bart Allen in their own escapade, let’s dive right in!
1. Back to the future, back to fixing the timeline
This is a standalone episode, and instead of focusing on Team Flash, we have Bart and Nora on their own adventure, it is a welcoming change of pace, I don’t know how often we will see the brothers in future episodes, but I’m glad to see them having their own episode.
After their adventures in the present last season, Bart and Nora went back to their Timeline, where when they discovered that Uncle Jay is alive, but there´s a catch, he is not married to “Rose” and not Joan, so the siblings discover that some fissures were created when they traveled through time, and now have to fix them.
2. 2013
They find the first “deviation” of the timeline and travel to 2013 to undo it and, in doing so, fixing all of the timeline. They meet Eddie Thawne and come close to other members of Team Flash, like a single grandpa Joe West trying to get a date with Cecile.
I don’t remember other moment when the story takes place in that moment before Barry Allen awakens, but it works great, the relationships between the characters we know are not formed yet, so, the dynamic is very different.
But not everything will go smoothly, for starters, Bart meets Avery, a woman working on time travel theories, and they fall for each other immediately, and they eventually reveal to her that they are time travelers, I’m sure that won’t be coming back to bite them in the ass, right?
(Also, is Avery based on Avery Ho the Chinese Flash?)
3. A single bullet could topple the world
To fix the timeline, they must stop a robbery in which Joe gets shot, it’s a fairly simple case, a dumb robber stole some jewelry, but he has never used a gun, so when he drops it, it fires itself, and now Nora and Bart are set against a traveling bullet.
Impulse decides to act, you know, impulsively, and slightly moves Joe, preventing the accident, but it doesn’t work, and it the situation even gets worse because now there will be an attack on a casino and a number of people will die.
Bart feels desperate and argues that they should ask Barry for help, but Nora is against that idea, which only makes Bart feel worse, he is making a lot of mistakes and just making everything worse, but his sister gives him a pep talk and encourages him to do better to fix the timeline by themselves.
4. The Royal Flush Gang is born early
So, why is the timeline worse now, if they prevented Joe’s death? Well, when they were talking in the open, the Queen from the Royal Flush Gang heard them (telepathically) and that inspires her to create the team even before they were supposed to form.
And they have a plan, the Casino will be full of cash thanks to the New Year’s Eve party, and they will do anything necessary to get rich, even if it involves killing a lot of people.
Fortunately for Barry and Nora, they met Avery and use her help to create a plan to prevent any more damage to the timeline; the tells them that the robbery has to happen, but the number of deaths it not fixed yet, so it could mean zero deaths if they play their cards right (get it?)
5. XS and Impulse bet on themselves
So, the plan is, Bart saves the hostages while Nora finds the bomb, but then the King discovers that something is happening, and the heroes have to use a plan B. Hoping that Impulse’s impulse works this time, Bart reveals himself to the Queen as a manager for the casino, but she knows that he is hiding something, fortunately Bart thinks on his future with Avery and the villain spares his life, at least temporally.
Continued belowThe RFG flee the scene of the crime, and Nora discovers all the bombs, effectively saving everybody in the building, and even indirectly helping Iris match with Eddie and Joe match with Cecile. And that’s it, the day is saved, and this little side-adventure is done.
I really love the dynamic between this version of Nora and Bart, both Jordan Fisher and Jessica Parker Kennedy seem to enjoy their characters and enjoy working together, and I hope to see them again soon. Also, it’s really great to see so many characters of color in the screen, even the newest character, Avery, could have easily been a role for a white person, but instead they chose Piper Curda, and although brief, she matched the vibe of the show perfectly. Kudos to Eric Wallace and his team.
BONUS: At one point in the episode, Bart says, “The Elon Musk of your generation” and I just want to say, that is a very big mistake, Elon Musk is not a genius, he is an Apartheid Profiteer that, like every billionaire, faked his way into his “genius” status.
And that’s it for this episode, overall, a great episode that every fan and newbie can enjoy without being lost too much. What did you think of this episode? Leave your comments below and join us next week on Boom Tube, for our take on episode 8×07, “Lockdown.”
