Jessie Robertson reviews the twelfth episode of The Flash season 2…
Iris West can be my fly-flag girl anytime!
Tonight there was an anamoly, like the Singularity. We had one really compelling inner struggle going on and one really contrived flat story with an awful payoff. Where should we begin?
As usual, Tom Kavanaugh (Harrison Wells) knocks it out of the park, playing up to the strengths of old Wells, as well as to the vastly different characteristics of “Harry” that both make him more irritating as well as more sympathetic. Harry does everything he can not to do the thing he wants to: help Zoom steal the Flash’s speed so he can have a chance at saving his daughter, Jesse. But, this Wells isn’t just a pragmatist; as much as he pushes his Earth-1 friends away with his gruff demeanor, he has slowly come to respect them as people, as heroes and despite his often angry façade, he enjoys being one of them. But, as he tells Barry, point-blank, “I will betray you.” This is Harry’s way of dealing with something; as he tells Barry, life isn’t gray; it’s black or white; there are no maybes: it’s either yes or no. But, he’s trying to rationale his actions by saying “I’m not betraying Barry, I’m saving Jesse.” Whether his motivations are right or wrong, he is helping a manipulative, psycho killer and his actions caused another human (iris) to be severely injured, and more importantly to him, put more doubt in the heart of the one man who may be able to save his daughter whom he hasn’t considered, Barry Allen. It’s a wonderful play of emotions and quick moments that Wells catches as the episode progresses. They left the “speed collection” and “nitrous grenades” jargon at a minimum this week and executed a well-balanced story of deep emotion.
On the other hand, the West family soap opera unfolds. Let me quickly break it down; Iris sees her dad trying to be someone else to appease Wally and get closer to him when she knows how valuable his fatherly skills are to a child. She also knows about Wally’s racing. Yeah, we get it, he likes fast things, they remind him of car rides as a kid, Iris isn’t buying it. So, she starts digging and finds there’s a very bad man and a lot of maiming and death on the end of this race circuit. This discovery and confrontation of the man in charge would normally take place over many scenes in an episodic hour of television, but its’ mashed together rather quickly. Joe doesn’t want to get involved and it’s not until Team Flash tracks down all of the Tarpit (too slow)’s known associates, one of them being Braun, the man behind the racing ring, where it all ties together. I will try to withhold judgement too quickly or harshly, because this may come to fruition, but Braun being interlaced with Tarpit, who most def. will try to kill him, wraps this thing up with a nice bow before justice is served. Of course, the Flash saves the day as Tarpit meddles with the race to get at Braun, but the above written storyline (wisely so) steps in and trumps this awful and rushed schlock. Then, we see Wally come wait by his sister’s side, who has seemingly seen the light of his actions and gets off with no consequences. I hated every bit of this.
8/10- Even on the Flash’s worst days, it still provides a seemingly unending barrage of jokes, fun character moments and cheesy villains to keep us entertained, and this was a strong Dr. Wells episode.
Other Notes:
– I have a feeling the West family soap opera will get even more confusing as Barry seems to be resenting Joe’s treatment of Wally without him around; it’s subtle but it’s there.
– The special “tar” effects looked amazing, delivering once again.
– Hold on, did Cisco create the first Meta-human Tinder?
– Whenever someone asks (out loud, mind you) who is the greatest computer hacker you always answer “Felicity Smoak” Always.
– When Barry speeches up the team on his views of how to deal with Wells betrayal, it’s a great Barry moment; his optimism is one of the glowing traits of the Flash that set him apart from the other big players of DC.
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Originally published February 3, 2016. Updated April 15, 2018.
