Captain Cold has finally made his debut on The Flash… and it seems Barry Allen will be getting a cold reception as he goes up against this classic DC villain.
I’m not going to take back what I said about The Flash cramming too much in to its episodes, but this week’s one was all the better for it. We have our first leading villain who isn’t a meta-human, and Felicity Smoak drops in to see Barry.
‘Rogue’ is a term that in this episode indicates someone going it alone. Quite a few characters find themselves vulnerable in circumstances where they need to have focus. Barry himself tries to foil an armoured van robbery, only to have to let the crooks go in order to take an injured security guard to a hospital. Leonard Snart is out to steal a diamond, and winds up holding cryonic gun to help him achieve this. Barry finds himself pitted against a villain who susses out his weakness.
This is our first cross-over (of sorts) with Arrow. Granted, Felicity is the only character appearing, but there are plenty of references to go with. She integrates well with Barry’s colleagues, and her expertise in hacking winds up playing a major part later on. The writers even find time to have Barry, Felicity, Iris and Eddie go to a quiz together. It’s a fairly predictable outing wherein which we have the whole messy romantic situation brought to the front and center for a few scenes.
This episode boasts some top-notch effects. Whether it’s from the cryonic gun, or a crashing train complete with Barry zooming in and out to save everyone, it’s quite a remarkable accomplishment. It’s also amusing that The Flash is called ‘The Streak’ by the people of Central City. Like Arrow’s moniker of ‘The Hood’, it’s interesting to see the traditional name not being latched on to straight away.
It also turns out that when The Flash takes an emotional swing it’s a heavy hitter. Turns out that we get some direct conflict in Team Flash this week. Cisco is the one who made the cryonic gun that Snart uses, in case Barry turned out to be a villain. His logic is undeniable, but seeing how hurt Barry is at finding out this fact (coupled with having to accept that he couldn’t save someone frozen by Snart), it’s a wrenching scene. Add on to that, we see Dr Wells openly angry, and it’s a little bit scary because we’ve seen the lengths he will go to to protect Barry. It’s clear that’s his main thought here, but it also means that eventually he is likely to eliminate Cisco and Caitlin if he feels it necessary.
Leonard Snart follows a long line of boring villain characters. Sure, he has a unique look and a cryonic gun (who wouldn’t want one of those?), but he doesn’t have any development or personality to go with it. He doesn’t even make any bad puns. His presence in stealing the diamond creates a bit of a gaff when his team quits because they believe the museum will be crawling with police. Snart only has to threaten to freeze one guard before he gets what he wants.
Joe and Eddie, I think, might be the only police in Central City. While I know it’s necessary to keep main characters in focus, it does strain credulity to think that Joe works on every case featured in an episode. Though it is nice to see Joe getting some scenes with characters besides Barry and having a chance to tell things from his point of view.
Interestingly, Iris seems well aware of Felicity’s interest in Barry, but is apparently still unaware of the latter’s feelings for her. While it’s clear she’s a great friend to Barry, the plot line is starting to wear thing. It’s more a question at this point of where they are going with it, does it mean getting rid of Eddie, Iris or perhaps even Joe in later episodes? It’s a little strange that they seem to be hinting at Felicity being romantically interested in Barry when promotional material for season 3 of Arrow shows her and Oliver getting close.
Do you think the romance subplot needs to be toned down? Who do you think should drop in next from Starling City? Let us know in the comments below…
