Hi folks! Welcome back to our weekly recap of The Flash. This week’s episode is named “The Speed of Thought” and I don’t think we have ever seen Barry as at-his-worst as in this episode, and we are seven years into their misadventures! Let’s dive right in.
1. Some of us have to lose
We begin this episode with a funeral for Nash and the rest of the Wellses, with the team creating a hall in S.T.A.R. Labs for their fallen friends. And we have an opportunity to check on the mourning of the team. Cisco laments his inability to be there to say goodbye and Barry having feelings for the sacrifice (more on that later).
But the most important thing here is Allegra’s mourning, she had the opportunity to have a father in Nash and he had the chance to have a daughter, but she reveals that she pushed him away out of fear that he might abandon her just like her dad and other father-figures. Now, she really lost him and there won’t be a chance to form that bond that they both needed.
Unless… you know, another version of Wells came along *wink wink*.
2. Superspeed thinking
The main plot here involved the fact that Barry finally has the Artificial Speed Force, and he gained a new ability: thinking super fast. This began as a fun premise, with Barry and Cisco discussing science-y gibberish, which I love despite not understanding at all, I just say “Yeah, that makes sense”.
The problem is that Barry is not currently at his best, emotionally speaking. Which means that when Joe gave his advice, telling him that what makes Team Flash so effective is their humanity and love, he wasn’t listening, and started doing dubious things.
3. When your heart is a weapon against yourself
Barry expresses his angst because every big baddie they come across has used his heart, his good faith against Barry himself. So, he became emotionally distant, that is a natural consequence of his ability to thing more “objectively” due to the Speed Thinking, but it also is a response to his belief that the villains use his emotions to take vantage.
We see the first result of that change in him when he allowed Mirror Mistress to attack Caitlin/Frost to prevent the infinitesimally low chance of losing the negative particles they took from the villain, and that is not the worse Barry did!
4. The worst of Barry Allen
Which one was the worst?
Barry realized that they had a limited quantity of negative photons, which meant that they could either pull out Singh and Kamilla or just Iris, and he chose to save Iris, not because of love but because she might know more about the mirror-verse and Eva and could help better to the team. He deliberately chose to not disclose that information to their friends, he attacked them to avoid being stopped and did left Singh and Kamilla trapped, he betrayed everyone instead of searching for a better solution.
But not only that, while Eva McCulloch was being interviewed in live TV, he showed the video of her death, showing that she is not the real Eva but the mirror-version. Instead of approaching the villain with compassion and a more humane way of defeating her, Barry exposed her, he broke her mind and provoked her to become more unstable than before, effectively making her more dangerous than ever.
5. “Expendable”
And I am aware that Barry is being dominated by the Speed Force, but I think that this is the worst version of him that we have ever seen, and we know very well that he has done bad things before! I actually am impressed that showrunner Eric Wallace and his team are daring to drive the character in those kinds of negative directions.
You know, in order to any character to grow, he has to overcome extraordinary challenges, and they are aware of The Flash’s final destination, he is part of the Pantheon of DC Heroes, not only he is a hero, he has to become an inspirational Legend for the future, so, not only it makes sense that he has to hit rock bottom, and they are doing that, we have the most conflicted Barry Allen, he is going through hell, but it will pay out, he will come out as the hero Central City needs and the Legend the world deserves.
Continued belowAt least that is my hope.
BONUS: So, every time we start a season, we have to wait a couple of episodes to see the new version of Wells we are going to have, but this time, we didn’t have to wait so long for the answer, the big reveal is that, somehow, the Original Harrison Wells from Earth-Prime, the one Eobard Thawne impersonated, is alive! I really didn’t expect that twist and now I have so many questions.
And that’s it for this episode, I think I ended up being a little bit philosophical at the end, but it only means that they are going to a great path, Eric Wallace is showing his best version of this show, and I welcome these changes. What did you think of this episode? Leave your comments below and join us next week for our take on episode 703, “Mother”.
