The Flash, Season 2, Episode 5: The Darkness and the Light
So um, yeah, while I was a bit harsh on the Jax Jackson character last episode's review, I actually liked this one a fair bit. We get introduced to two characters -- this show's version of Dr. Light, which I'll talk about later, and Earth-2's Harrison Wells. And after a pair of relatively sub-par episodes, this one kicks things back up a notch as Earth-2 Wells, heretherefo referred to as "Harry" as per Cisco's nickname, is not the Eobard-Thawne-Harrison-Wells, or the barely-a-character original Harrison Wells. Harry is, well, basically the Tony Stark of his universe, a super-rich scientist. Who, in his original universe, is quite antagonistic with Jay Garrick. He's responsible for the particle accelerator explosion on his world, though apparently events happened differently there and it is a secret known only to himself and Jay. And he makes money off of the metahuman phenomenon by, uh, creating smartphone apps that detect metahumans. He's also a gigantic prick.
Also can we give a round of applause for Tom Cavanagh's acting chops? This is like the fourth version of distinct Harrison Wells that he's played, from "kindly but mysterious" fake Wells persona from early season one, "good guy man" real Harrison Wells, "hammy vengeful villain with hints of his fake mentor persona showing" Eobard Thawne Harrison Wells and this "dickwad dude" Harry.
And after a bit of a thankfully truncated 'you didn't tell me' moment between Barry and Joe, Harry quickly reintegrates himself into the STAR labs team and rubs everyone from Jay to Cisco the wrong way. And basically every single character notes how eerily similar Harry is to their original Wells that betrayed them and kills a whole bunch of people and fucked their lives up, while Harry himself is just frustrated at being compared to Wells.
Harry and Jay have a fair amount of friction, and it's a shame we saw so little of Jay after his debut in episode two. He barely does anything in episodes three and four, shows up here, has arguments with Harry, kisses Caitlin, then leaves in a huff because Barry wants to actually take down Zoom... instead of helping Barry train. Because, y'know, Jay is an actual speedster who has actually fought Zoom before and would be useful alongside Harry? I mean, leaving the kid would be a bigger death sentence than helping him, you'd think. And, again, as much as I don't want to bitch about Patty, when a major character like Jay Garrick is ignored just to have more cutesy awkward dating fluff... I don't really like it.
But the foreshadowing for Zoom is pretty cool as he's built up to be far scarier than most of the villains in the show, especially the previous big bad, Reverse-Flash. And Zoom, whose lower face is a horrifying-looking skull thing. And Zoom has Harry's daughter captive, and that's the big reason for Harry to bring the fight against Zoom, whose motivation so far seems to be him simply wanting to be the only speedster in existence.
Also, it's a nice little foreshadowing with the metahuman-detecting app that Harry outs Cisco as a metahuman to his friends. I'm still entirely uncertain why throughout the past four episodes Cisco is hiding his powers from Barry and Caitlin. I mean, I get it, Wells says something about his power being a tragedy, but come on. Wells is dead. And a douchebag. And there really is no indication that Barry, Caitlin and the rest will ostracize Cisco for having abilities or whatever. But thankfully that's out in the open without much drama, and Cisco's gotten the nickname Vibe, which ironically enough is dubbed by Caitlin and Barry instead of Cisco himself. He seems to not have full control of his power, but hey, it works as the plot demands, so whatever.
The villain of the week is Dr. Light, specifically the female one, and I honestly want to go on a big rant on how first Atom Smasher, and now Dr. Light have been turned into disposable villains when they're really heroes, and if they wanted villains with that kind of power all they have to do is look a bit harder, hell, the more prominent male Dr. Light is a villain... oh. Oh! Oh, this Dr. Light isn't Kimiyo Hoshi! It's Earth-2 Linda Park! A bit of a strange plot twist, but definitely a well-done one. Definitely better and more relevant than the Jax Jackson bit last episode. Sorry. Still a bit bitter for the sake of Jason Rusch. Dr. Light is relatively well-done, too, with her actually having a personality, again, which is a bonus -- she doesn't want to kill, but is forced to thanks to being shit-scared of Zoom and all that.
The way Dr. Light way defeated is a bit odd, too. Barry finally learns how to make speed clones, an ability displayed by Reverse-Flash last season and ironically enough taught to him by Harry in this episode. Dr. Light can't shoot the shadows one by one, so she does this big area attack. Barry moves faster and creates more speed clones... and Dr. Light goes back to shooting things one by one. You dumb, alternate-universe Linda Park. It's nice to see Linda Park back, too by the way. Both versions.
Also Caitlin and Jay are randomly kissing um what okay? I mean, it's not like you can't fall in love again after your husband dies, but your husband died like five episodes ago? And that was after a whole season's full of "Ronnie is my one true love I need to find him" and all that. Man, this show is just bad with romance plots, isn't it?
The B-plot is some comedy romance stuff as Cisco and a blinded Barry tries to walk through a date with Patty, who thankfully figures things out before Barry embarrasses himself too much. I honestly am indifferent to this. She's not annoying, but I definitely still don't like her that much since she takes up a crapton of screentime -- like when Barry is all wishy-washy despite Patty already asking him out like two or three times. I dunno. Just not that big of a fan, I guess. Kiss. Yay. Don't care. Honestly, they could've really made Patty a lot more interesting. Or at least not annoying. How does this show manage to bungle up most of their main female characters? Jeez. Not that I hate romance or whatever, but this is a show that would definitely benefit with it being toned down. A whole lot. Like, look at Iris! She's a lot better now that the stupid love triangle bullshit is no more. Patty's just... kinda annoying all around.
I think they're trying to repeat the success of Felicity Smoak with Patty, introducing this mostly brand-new bubbly fun female character, but while Felicity was introduced gradually and the audience grew to like her, Patty is shoved down our throats like a bad fanfiction character. And it's great if she had some actual plot relevance beyond being the love interest, but beyond adding some drama between Joe and Barry she's mostly not done much.
And Cisco himself gets rejected by the barista at jitters... who at the end of the episode reveals her name to be... Kendra Saunders! Hawkgirl to those who don't know. Huh! I thought Cisco making a girlfriend was yet another in uninterseting, rushed and badly-handled pairing like Caitlin and Jay, but I was honestly caught off guard by the Hawkgirl revelation. So good job, show writers.
We get some nice little Easter Eggs again, with Jay Garrick mentioning that Atlantis exists in Earth-2, that one of his best friends (obviously Aquaman, though not named outright) hails from there. Also, Atlantis floats over water, which I'm pretty sure happened once or twice in the DC comics. We have more hints courtesy of Caitlin about 'powers making people evil', referring to, y'know, Killer Frost. Dr. Light here is a bit of a combination between the first Dr. Light, Arthur King, who is a male criminal, and the second Dr. Light, Kimiyo Hoshi, who is a female hero. Though obviously the decision to make her alter ego an alternate Linda Park is obviously original to this show.
So yeah, as much as I may bitch, I still really think this episode is solid, abrupt romance for Jay and Caitlin aside. We've got a fair amount of good stuff... Harry, Dr. Light, Vibe, hints of Hawkgirl, stuff like that.
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