Hey youtubers it’s Charlie and this is going to be my Flash Episode 7 video.
There were a ton of great easter eggs and the Barry Allen character turned another giant
corner in terms of his development.
Lots of great Harrison Wells moments that both answered and raised more questions.
My position on who he is didn’t change much but we can examine the evidence.
Careful for spoilers in case you haven’t seen the episode.
Starting with TOP 5 moments.
Number 5 - Meet Farooq aka Blackout
He’s another casualty of STAR Labs but he’s one of the first to demonize Harrison Wells
in the eyes of Team Flash.
I think being scientists, Caitlin and Cisco are a little more flexible on the matter.
Doing what is necessary versus doing what is right.
Barry has the same alignment as Superman, which makes him a total boy scout.
So Farooq isn’t a villain.
In the comics he did work with the Rogues.
We mostly see him during the Flashpoint storyline.
Which is really cool because Barry getting his powers back in the episode looked like
a scene from that same comic.
In the context of the story he’s the most powerful source of electricity on earth.
Or you could think of him as the world’s most powerful conductor.
Which is why Harrison Wells wants to study him.
He’s one of the few things The Flash is vulnerable to.
And going with the canon of the show, he only steals the energy of the speed force, as if
Barry Allen’s cells stored energy the same way Superman’s cells store solar radiation
and that’s what gives them both their abilities.
Don’t worry about the specifics.
The show is always really good about explaining the science behind what they do, so when Harrison
Wells starts messing with Farooq’s DNA we’ll get details.
For Now, Farooq is going to chill in
the meta prison.
Number 4 - Barry Allen is jacking around too much
The Flash as a character takes himself much less seriously than say Batman, Superman,
even Green Arrow.
He’s a lot more like Hal Jordan, which is why they usually only break through barriers
both mental and physical, after getting their asses handed to them.
They’re not super zen characters, so Barry getting his butt kicked all the time is a
very necessary part of the process of unlocking his potential.
Harrison Wells reaction was way more subdued than I thought it would be, we kind of saw
the real Harrison slip out when their lives were all on the line.
We’ve seen him lose it in front of Cisco back when he learned about the Cold Gun.
All his energy is bent on getting Barry to a hundred percent.
That’s the stratosphere of power where Barry can phase through solid objects, break into
other dimensions and travel through time.
Like he said, More Speed is the Key.
Number 3 - The Clock King is Back
It may have just been me, but it seemed like Robert Knepper’s performance was decidedly
more comic booky than when he was on Arrow.
It almost sounded like he developed a whole new accent.
One that sounded a lot more like the Clock King from the Animated Series.
He also spoke a lot more lines out of the comics.
For instance, anytime he did wordplay with time and clocks, those lines were right out
of the comics.
Like when he said “Time and Time wait for no man”.
I loved his performance but the police station scenes felt a little uneven with the Star
Labs scenes.
I’m still not super connected to the Iris character yet, so when she was kidnapped it
just didn’t quite feel like Arrow when the old Count Vertigo threatened to inject Felicity.
To be fair that was Arrow Season 2 and The Flash hasn’t even finished half of it’s
first season yet.
So I’ll give Candice Patton and the writers the benefit of the doubt.
It’s really hard for all the other women on Arrow and The Flash to hold screen time
with Felicity.
That just means that anytime any other women are on screen with Felicity, you’re attention
will typically be drawn to her.
You’re always going to be drawn to the strongest character on screen when there are a bunch
of people in focus at the same time.
I really did love Iris’ line when she said “sometimes a girl has to save herself”.
That’s very telling for where all the ArrowVerse females this year.
They’re all seriously stepping up their game.
Powers or no Powers.
Number 2 - Barry Gets His Powers Back and Then Some
Using an electric charge to get his powers back was a very similar thing to what happened
in Flashpoint Paradox.
In the comic he had to completely re-create the accident that gave him powers the first
time.
There were all the chemicals and they had to use a bolt of electricity.
On the show they used the Treadmill because Cisco had jacked it’s power way way up.
That’s why it’s able to go so fast when Barry Runs on it.
It has like megawatts of electricity going through it.
When he said it didn’t work it was also a reference to Flashpoint.
In the comic Barry had to get struck by a bolt of lightning twice, the first time it
just burnt him like crispy chicken.
The second time it worked and he was able to heal himself almost instantly.
Flashpoint in general was a big time travel story, so it’s no coincidence
that the show is pushing into more time travel.
Mostly via Harrison Wells computer Gideon.
Now that Barry has broken through a big mental barrier we might see him phase through something
in the back half of the season.
There’s still a lot of stuff he has to learn to do before that and he still has to have
his Empire Strikes Back moment where he confronts the Reverse Flash and gets his ass handed
to
him big time.
The producers were talking about that recently so after my top 5 moments I’ll explain what
they said.
My Number 1 moment was of course Harrison Wells plan unfolding more in front of our
eyes
Lots of questions answered, but I didn’t feel like they significantly answered yes
or no, who is he really?
Let’s start with the language he used when he was talking to his computer.
“The future is still intact”.
Then he said to Cisco “Of all my inventions, The Flash is the most important”.
Right off the bat I think we have a modified Flashpoint Paradox storyline going on here.
Originally the producers said they’d be sticking really close to the Flash Rebirth
storyline.
Which is a totally different series of events.
Now I think it’s a combination of both comics.
Rebirth is the story of Barry Allen’s origin story.
Flashpoint Paradox is the story of what happens when Barry and The Reverse Flash mess with
the timeline.
They’re both responsible for messing things up, but Barry is the one who has to fix it.
Right now it seems like Harrison Wells is the self-appointed protector of the timeline.
He has a futuristic computer, so I still think he’s either working with someone from the
future like the Reverse Flash or he is the Reverse Flash in the future and the version
of him we’re seeing is stuck in the past without powers.
Time Loops can get confusing, so I’ll give mad props to the writers on Flash for explaining
the Paradox in a really relatable way.
I highly recommend you read Flashpoint Paradox or watch the animated movie if you’ve never
seen it.
It’s another Geoff Johns story.
Just the fact Wells named his computer AI Gideon says a lot too.
Gideon was a Judge of the Isrealites in the Hebrew Bible.
His story is part of the Book of Judges.
Gideon is also considered a Saint in the Catholic Church.
This is an oversimplification but he’s chosen by God to get the Israelites to believe in
the one true god and turn away from false idols.
He succeeds, but then after his death everyone starts worshipping another god again.
In Flashpoint, the Geoff Johns comic, there’s a character named Libra who’s name in latin
means “weighing scales”.
The symbol implies balance.
Harrison Wells has a lot of those ideas in his character.
He’s not overtly good or bad, he’s trying to balance the future.
That doesn’t mean that he’s the Libra character from the comics, that character
secretly turned out to be someone else in disguise.
So here’s my big question for you guys.
Do you think he’s the Libra character or do you still think he’s Professor Zoom?
Remember, he’s going to develop a method for stealing the Flash’s powers.
But he could also use that to steal the Reverse Flash’s powers too.
So not evil but not good either.
The biggest easter eggs I saw outside of Libra and the Flashpoint stuff were the names Harrison
rattles off.
They’re all lesser comic book characters.
He named Ralph Dinby, Elongated Man.
Will Everett, Amazing Man, Al Rothstein, Atom-Smasher from JSA, Bea Da Costa, who was a hero named
fire, Grant Emerson aka Damage and of course Ronnie Raymond, who we know is going to come
back in a couple episodes as Firestorm.
If you spotted any other easter eggs in the video that I didn’t mention just write them
in the comments.
Overall I gave the episode a B plus, amazing Flash story at Star Labs with an uneven Police
Story with Clock King.
I’m not really sure if the episode even needed Clock King, although Robert Knepper
was amazing as always.
Always more prison break actors.
I love that the show has snagged so many of them.
Tom Cavanagh once again, the most interesting character in the episode.
I’m starting to understand why he chose this role.
Arguably he’s big enough to headline his own series.
Usually when a bigger actor signs on for a part like this it’s because secretly the
lesser character they’re playing becomes way way more important later in the series.
I’m totally feeling the Caitlin, Cisco, Barry Team Flash jam that’s going on.
They all work so well together they feel like family at this point.
Just like Team Arrow.
And that’s the reason why I think both of these shows are so much better than all the
other comic book shows.
They focus on the characters and not so much the spectacle of superpowers.
Joss Whedon had this rule about writing that said ‘fall in love with moments’ as in
moments between characters ‘don’t fall in love with moves” moves being the big
reveal of Harrison Wells having a secret future computer.
That means nothing if Barry and Team Flash hasn’t gone through some journey together
that ties directly to the Harrison Reveal.
Team Flash is like a family right now, so when Barry Learns what Harrison is really
doing, it will have this big resounding impact and we the audience will all be like “holy
shit”
Greg Berlanti, Andrew Kriesberg, Geoff Johns and all the other writers are really good
at focusing on moments, not moves.
Which is why the episodes are so much more fun to watch.
Which is why it almost doesn’t matter who Harrison Wells ends up being, we’ll be so
connected to the characters that it will be all about the betrayal inside Team Flash not
the Who part.
On to big news,
The producers said that when Barry meets the reverse flash.
He’ll be blurring his face, so Barry won’t see who the Reverse Flash is and neither will
we, the audience.
They’re going to hold that card close to the vest.
Probably till the finale next year.
Next week is the big two part crossover.
If I have time I’ll do an extra bonus video for it.
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It’s going to be an awesome two hour movie on television.
Think of it like TV Justice League.
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Thanks for watching, see you guys tomorrow.
High Fives!