Jessie Robertson reviews the first episode of The Flash season 5…
Speedsters, we’re back! And The Flash…..is back!
And when I say back, I mean back to form!!! In any review, it’s imperative to focus on the strengths and things to be worked on; that’s what we’ll be doing here – oh and by the way, because I forget to say this year after year…
SPOILERS!!!!!!
The Positives:
– Jessica Parker Kennedy, who plays Nora Allen, is an absolute delight! From her cute cameos last year to her whirlwind introduction of adorability in our opening scene, she’s a huge breath of fresh air for this team and I for one am looking forward to seeing what she brings to the show this season.
– What I mean by a return to form is during the first 2 seasons (largely) we would get teases every week, of different developments to come, future characters, and future Flash references to drool about, Easter Egg heaven. In the latter 2 seasons, the show found itself bogged down by heavy dramatic storylines where the fun and the pontification were lacking at an all time low. The Flash anyways lends itself to this type of fun teasing as there’s all kinds of time traveling, time changing, different realities, so you would expect it; well Nora brings it all in spades!! So much great Egg Hunting for all us DC nerds was packed into this one great episode, everything from constant references to the amazing Flash Museum, references to other more obscure DC Characters like Lightning Lad and Ryan Choi (another Atom), and my favorite: talk of an impending King Shark v. Gorilla Grodd fight, are you kidding me right now?!?! Yes to all of this.
– But that’s not all; we got the famous Flash ring and the new red suit debuted. There was a lot of chatter online over the summer about how Grant Gustin did or did not fill out this new suit and he halted it all by saying, wait! and we did and it looks phenomenal.
– Not to mention my own personal bias: I’m a Dad of 2 daughters so anything Dad/Daughter related just kills me (you can imagine how much I weep everytime I see Logan!). So, I was in for all the feels on the Barry-Nora relationship, while also completely understanding the Iris- Nora dynamic as there’s just a thing with Moms and Daughters. Barry’s speech to Iris about missing her 1st’s was so well done and Grant shows why he was the perfect person to play this Flash.
– Let’s not also forget about the first episode callback! The newspaper article was dropped like a truth bomb and was so well done and pays off so hard for longtime fans, this episode was on fire.
The Not So Positives:
– One thing that’s stay fairly consistent; the boring villain of the week. I did love the fourth wall break of Nora mentioning he’s a one and done and thank god; but you know what, in episodes where so much happens and so much story breaks, it’s okay to not fill out the villain as much. Besides the Caitlin exposition dump, which I also didn’t care for, that investigation scene paid off little to none as I never really understood what his powers actually were!
– Also, Team Flash is picking up in Team Arrow’s wake of keeping secrets from each other; they never learn! I get if that’s part of what we’re doing this season but I just hate we started out that way.
– Ralph’s time travel lesson was pretty great but Wally’s explanation of time, from the Legends, dropping terms like “Soft” and “Fixed” time events is a joke; the Legends (and this show) have lost all credibility when trying to explain time, so just let it be and don’t try to explain it away.
That’s it, I don’t have many complaints, this felt like a season 1 and 2 episode and I loved just about all of it. We saw our big bad of the season and it looks a bit like, well, I’ll not spoil it, but label me curiosity piqued!
Rating: 9.5/10
Jessie Robertson
