This episode of The Flash had some big reveals, at least one big swerve (if you’ve been watching the preview clips), and some uneven results – but it still adds up to an episode that will have serious impact moving forward. Who IS Harrison Wells? Yes, WE know…but the fun is watching Barry, Joe and company figuring it out piece by piece.
SOME SPOILERS AHEAD
This episode brings us an “Everyman” who can shape shift, which brings in multiple opportunities to have our favorite actors play the bad guy (if only for a few moments). Throughout the episode, the villain (Hannibal Bates) takes on the look of different people after simply touching them. Bates has used this ability, gained through the accelerator accident, to commit crimes for years while framing innocent people. There is the battle throughout the episode to track him down, to stop him while he creates havoc…and that’s where we have that one BIG swerve…
SPOILER SPOILER SPOILER
You know that preview clip we’ve been watching, the one where Eddie Thawne kills two cops? The one where we all thought, “THERE, THAT’S what we’ve been expecting from him!”? Well, not so fast…that was our shape-shifter framing Eddie by taking over his appearance and committing the crime. Yep, a swerve…and a bit of a let-down as well. Still, there are some other interesting slices of chaos in the episode, including when “Barry” (actually our villain taking on Barry’s appearance) kisses Caitlin. That resulted in several slightly funny bits that ran through the rest of the episode – slightly funny, though not over-the-top.
However, none of this was the real point of the episode, titled “Who Is Harrison Wells?”
The real point was the investigation Joe and Cisco conducted in Starling City, tracking down the facts of the car accident that killed Harrison’s wife Tess. While there, Cisco meets Black Canary – who asks for his help in upgrading her sister’s sonic device (and yes, he does so, creating the “Canary Cry” upgrade – nice way to get that name in the show). And, Joe and Cisco use a special Tachyon-tracking device at the scene of the accident to find…
Harrison Wells’ body!
This is the final straw that brings Caitlin around from her prior reluctance to believe that Harrison Wells could be something other than a friend and mentor.
Before we get to the Epilogue, let’s note one major relationship update – Eddie confesses…a bit…to Iris in order to win back her trust. He confesses, “I’ve been working with The Flash”. That does work…at least for now…and now we go to…
EPILOGUE: Cisco, Caitlin and Barry are reviewing the 3-D virtual mock-up of S.T.A.R. Labs and spot a room that shouldn’t be there. Using the tachyon tracking device that found the real Wells’ body, they find the secret room that “Harrison Wells” has been using since Episode 1, INCLUDING the yellow suit…AND the headline from April 25, 2024 when the Flash goes missing in the Crisis!
SUMMARY: Parts of this episode were a bit over-reliant on special effects, with our “Everyman” bad guy constantly switching bodies but never revealing his “real” look until the end of the episode (or at least as close to that “real” look as Hannibal Bates can remember, since he can’t fully recall just how he really looked before). It falls into the trap of a lot of shows when shape-shifting is brought in…the chance for all the actors to play the “bad guy” for part of the show. It works to an extent but was a bit over-used, with seemingly everyone except Joe getting copied during the episode. At the same time, the reveals that were shown in this episode are significant, and should have major repercussions for the rest of the season. I’m a bit disappointed in the swerve involving Eddie Thawne, but I am very stoked to see the group find that secret room…that should take things to the next level for the rest of the season. Not the best episode of the season, but one that will definitely have an impact. What do YOU think? Leave your comments below!
I like the episode this week and was a good bounce back from the Bug Eyed lamedit… This episode was more of a set-up episode, but when they found the room I was like “ooooooooo *&^% is about to go down” (said with a bit of Kevin Hart impersonation).
This was a better episode, but still felt a bit below average for the series. In typical CW fashion, we found another excuse to get a new couple to kiss each other. And, as has been the case with all guest appearances from Arrow, each guest star was practically announced with herald trumpets, accompanied by an incessant amount of gushing from our main characters. I’m glad we have two shows connected like this, but they need to make these crossovers more natural.
So, am I crazy, or was the DA meant to be Cecile Horton?
I liked the episode pretty well aside from some characters’ sudden idiocy. I wish people didn’t have to act inexplicably dumb to further plots sometimes (this is a complaint about characters in pretty much every type of fictional media and genre, not just The Flash), and it was fairly blatant in this episode. What was also weird was that Iris seemed a lot more observant than she usually does, so it’s like things were inverted.
The stuff with Joe and Cisco’s roadtrip was great, and Lance was more likeable than he’s been in weeks. Plus, anything with Wellsobard was as great as usual.
I didn’t really mind last week’s episode, but yeah, this one’s an improvement. It’s going to be an interesting chess game watching them try to hide what they know from Wells. Presumably at some point his cover will be blown to the point where it won’t be worth killing everyone who finds out, but they aren’t there yet.
That conversation toward the end, with Joe and Wells…. I kept trying to read the subtext there
Lia, I’m with you on the idiot ball problem. I sort of excused one of the lapses as “Well, they need to demonstrate how the powers work, so they can’t use the serum yet…” but it would’ve worked better if they’d dosed him anyway & just misjudged how long it would last, or gotten stuck in traffic, or something.
That’s one of the things that really impressed me about the first half of this season of SHIELD, that people would only do stupid things if it was in character for them and not just because the plot required it.
I have a feeling that Wellsobard knows they’re on to him and is just playing with them. If not, he’d have to be incredibly stupid not to have kept them from finding the Doom Room…which I guess is possible given the other people acting foolish in the episode, but hopefully not. I like the idea of him being the smartest and craftiest person on the show. And he’s been giving off an aura of suspicion for quite some time now.
Yeah, that’s the thing: sometimes characters aren’t very smart and they make dumb mistakes. But Caitlin and Barry aren’t supposed to be so clueless and it’s aggravating to see them as such.
I agree in part. Some of the goofiness is over the top and unnecessary. But, I can actually understand Barry and Caitlin’s reluctance to a degree, Barry more so than Caitlin. Barry believes his survival of the accident is directly due to Wells’ intervention, and Wells was a hero to him even before the accelerator accident, so I can see him not being ready to accept the truth. I can see the same thing for Caitlin up to a point, though I agree she has stayed reluctant to accept the truth for far longer than is reasonable. Cisco’s goofiness was to an extent balanced for me by two things – the fact that Black Canary was still depending on him for his technical expertise even if he was acting a little goofy…and the fact that once again Cisco showed his genius with the upgrade to the Canary Cry. All that being said, yes it was a little over the top at times.
I think their reluctance to believe Wells is the Reverse Flash is entirely understandable. It’s how they acted with the Everyman situation which was kind of dumb; Caitlin and Iris (and possibly Wells) should have injected him with the serum before putting him in the car. And Team Flash knew a shapeshifter was on the loose, so they should have been a lot more suspicious when their friend (Eddie, Barry) was acting very unusually and/or out of place. And then Barry shouldn’t have hesitated when he saw Everyman shapeshift into people he cared about, because he knew darned well who it was. That’s what I’m gumbling about.
I’m actually glad that Caitlin was reluctant about Wells, because it’d be hard to believe if she suddenly just turned against him with no real proof. Now, of course, she has it, but she didn’t before the final scene.
You are absolutely right about how they handled Everyman. Totally agree.
Wellsobard…hehehehe