It looks as though Barry may have met his match in this week’s Flash as he faces a dangerous metahuman… otherwise known as Firestorm.
Compared to last week’s somewhat lacklustre affair, this week’s Flash is a breath of fresh air. Rather than rely on a villain of the week, this episode rather smartly handles the characters it already has and allows them to play out a love drama.
This week’s episodes has quite a few curve-balls, some of which are hurled better than others. We begin seeing Barry trying to decide what to wear on his date with Linda. Fairly standard comedy stuff here, Joe threatens to shoot him if he changes one more time, standard. Linda and Barry have real chemistry, as evidenced by their date scenes. A shame, then, that Iris has to throw a wrench in the works. Meanwhile, Joe and Cisco team up, and Caitlin attempts to help Ronnie/Dr Stein before a catastrophe occurs.
I’ve never been particularly secretive about my dislike for Iris, her actions in this episode do little to change it. It seems at this time there is little point to her character beyond being one of Barry’s friends. Like Eddie, despite an apparent amount of importance she is barely a peripheral at times. Linda understandably is less than pleased when Barry bales on her twice as the episode goes on, but it is Iris who ultimately puts the relationship in jeopardy.
The plot involving Dr Stein and Ronnie sharing the same body comes to a head this week. It’s a totally bizarre set of circumstances and one that will undoubtedly have further part to play here. What we see is two men who both have people they love in their lives in a situation that could end up killing a lot of people. Caitlin is the emotional anchor here, which is odd considering her efforts to move on last week and the possibility of her being interested in Barry being presented. Having said that, the story doesn’t feel stilted, though it perhaps needs to shift a little to avoid becoming so in future.
Cisco and Joe go on their own little detective spree this week. There’s a hefty amount of science mumbo jumbo thrown into the mix to try and convince the audience that what they’re saying makes any sense. The upshot of it all is that they make a breakthrough in the investigation: an older version of Barry was present on the night of his mother’s murder. Granted this should come as no surprise to fans, many of whom had already sussed that Barry will go back in time to try and prevent the murder from occurring. On the flip-side, there is also a niche who believe that Dr Wells himself is an older version of Barry. I personally subscribe to the former theory. Dr Wells simply isn’t old enough to be an older version of Barry.
So there’s no real action to speak of in this episode. A brief fight between The Flash and Firestorm provides some suitably cool special of effects of the latter flying whilst leaving a flaming trail. It also has a slight dig at a certain Marvel hero when Barry uses the phrase: flame on.
The episode ends on something of a cliff-hanger, we’re not sure what’s become of Ronnie or Dr Stein, and doubtless the intent is to keep people suitably interested until the reveal. For a mixed bag of a series so far, ‘Flash’ certainly has its moments, and this episode shows what it can do when those come around.
Do you think Firestorm survived the explosion at the end of the episode? How was Barry involved with his mother’s murder? Let us know what you think in the comments below…
