Hi folks! Welcome back to our weekly recap of The Flash. This week’s episode is named “Mother”, it was supposed to be last season’s finale before it was cut short by the pandemic. Overall the creative team had to make four big choices here: deal with the aftermath of last episode, the new Speed Force, the defeat of Mirror Monarch, and the departure of certain characters, let’s dive right in!
1. The aftermath
This episode started right where we left off, the team awakens after Barry defeated them and they discover him crying and asking for help for Iris. Then, Barry apologizes for his actions as a genius without feelings and everybody forgives him immediately.
Actually, I was a little bit surprised here, there was no drama after his actions, there was no resentment, not even a fight in the team, everybody understood that Barry was not being himself and they moved on; and that has all my respect. I mean, after six years of working together, of conflicts and resolutions, the team has matured and the reasonable reaction to a “betrayal” like Barry’s is to move past it, they know who the team members are are and who they aren’t, they trust each other, and they are a family that is not going to be broken as easily.
2. Invasion of the Mirror Snatchers
Now, Eva McCulloch has a new plan, to put every human in the world in the Mirrorverse and create a new, more peaceful world with her own mirror-children, a plot device that reminded me of Edgar Wright’s The World’s End. Of course, this world is in trouble, Joe and Cecile are alone in the Police Precinct and Joe ends up tempted by a mirror-Cecile to join the Mirrorverse.
And the problem is, Barry is powerless again, fortunately a new (or old?) Wells came to help, turns out that the original Harrison Wells from this earth is brought back to life because #Crisis and he has the ability to travel in time…
3. Iris’s Spark a.k.a. The Power of Love
Just like every Wells before him, Harrison inspires Barry, and reminds him that he was chosen as the Paragon of Love, he can save the world, not trough his powers but trough Love, and I think what came next was the cheesiest storyline that we have seen:
The Speed Force was strong, right?
Well, Barry and Iris’ love is way stronger than that, in fact, it is so powerful that she alone was able to power “organically” the Speed Force generator Sphere that the team built, singlehandedly bringing back Barry’s powers and more*.
And, I mean, it was incredibly cheesy… but I love it! I was listening to a podcast where the hosts were talking about the “magic” of comics and how our suspension of disbelief is heightened in the medium to the point that we fall in love with people in funny costumes and secret identities hidden by glasses. And this scene was exactly like that, a love so big that it creates a Force that nurtures the universe itself, of course that it can happen in this show, that’s why I love it.
4. Time to start over
Another great choice by Eric Wallace and his team is how they finally defeated Mirror Mistress Monarch; she is technically faster than Flash, and the entire world is being affected by her, so, how could Team Flash win? Well, after half a season stuck in the Mirrorverse, Iris saves the day!
Yeah, it wasn’t the team breaking the villain or The Flash incapacitating her, it was Iris who chose to talk to Eva, Iris showed McCulloch the world that she was creating and how imperfect and unfair it was, the baddie got to have her moment of redemption, with the help of Barry and Iris.
So, the team is finally back together, Kamilla is back, Singh and the rest of the victims are back, and they all have a chance to start over. Even Eva has this opportunity, he goes back to the Mirrorverse to create a world built on love instead of hate.
Harrison also chooses to go back in time and start over, living in the four years that he had with his wife. This is hard for the team, but Allegra has the opportunity to write her own story and the team will have to learn to work without a Wells, at least for the meantime.
Continued belowFinally, let´s talk about Dibny and Dearborn’s chance to start over.
5. A farewell to Sue and Ralph (for now?)
The most hurried part of this episode, which would have been season six’s finale before the pandemic was the resolution of Sue Dearborn’s story, last time we saw her, she was framed by Eva as the murderer of Joseph Carver. They simply appeared with a hard drive that had the video that exonerated her, and Ralph had his face burnt, then, they leave the team to destroy other criminal enterprises around the world.
Of course, this storyline was cut short due to the firing of Hartley Sawyer, in fact, he didn’t appear in this episode, instead his face was burnt in an explosion and left the team with a mask on. It is very sad to me because he was becoming my favorite character and now, he will be eventually written off the show. I hope that they change their minds and bring back a recasted Elongated Man, because he became a big part of the team’s dynamic.
BONUS: *When I said that Iris brought back Barry’s powers and more, I was talking about the cliffhanger scene of the episode, where we are shown a string of four streaks of lighting of different colors, which probably means we are going to get in the Four Forces, a fairly recent concept which I’m not very fond of. Let’s see how they are handled here.
And that’s it for this episode, it was really packed and closed well this storyline, I’m a little sad that we won’t have any more Sue and Ralph but I’m happy with where the show is right now and how Team Flash is configured for the next story. What did you think of this episode? Leave your comments below and join us next week for our take on episode 704, “Central City Strong.”
