Things are moving fast in Central City; even The Flash is having a hard time keeping up. The Atom and Felicity pay Barry and company a visit, Iris gives Eddie an ultimatum, Felicity finds her nemesis in the villain of the week and Caitlin and Cisco learn the identity of the Reverse-Flash on The Flash: All Star Team Up. Spoiler alert!
The Atom Lives
Felicity is back in Central City and this time she brought a friend along with her, Ray Palmer/The Atom. Luckily for team The Flash their arrival couldn’t have been more perfect timing as they were in desperate need of Felicity’s and Ray’s particular talents to face off with a swarm of mechanical bees being controlled by The Flash villain of the week: The Bug-Eyed Bandit.
After a disappointing square-off with the Arrow on Arrow, we finally got to see The Atom in action in against a reincarnation of his comic book rival The Bug-Eyed Bandit. Well done, The Flash writers. While I’m still not over the fact that The Atom looks and behaves a lot like Iron Man, I was glad to see that after Ray’s visit to Central City, the superhero may be returning to his old self as it was hinted at that the superhero intends to “go smaller.” Alright, it’s about time! I just hope they we get to see The Atom as the way he was intended sooner rather than later.
The Bug-Eyed Bandit
Just when I was running out of excuses to talk about The Walking Dead, The Flash goes and gives me a reason to. Good news everybody! Beth, from The Walking Dead, is still alive. We can all rest easy now. She did however cross over to the dark side and decided to become a mad scientist. But on a serious note, Emily Kinney—the actress known for playing Beth on The Walking Dead—did a great job bringing on her best bad girl persona in her adaptation of the DC comics villain: The Bug-Eyed Bandit.
Now since there have only been two Bug-Eyed Bandits in the DC comics, and none of them were female, the writers pretty much re-imagined the character for the sake of the show—which is genius. It’s good to shake things up a bit from time to time, right; which is exactly what they did. The new, and arguably improved version of the Bug-Eyed Bandit was a great amalgamation of the both her comic predecessors—which happened to be a father and son—but the writers didn’t stop there.
Aside from the fact that the Bug-Eyed Bandit is a noted villain of The Atom, there were other great Easter eggs throughout the episode. For starters there was the shout-out to Hudson University, the famed university in the DC Comics Universe where Professor Martin Stein—yes the same Martin Stein who is one half of Firestorm—first began the project of the same name. Then, of course, there was the homage to Brandon Routh as the one and only man of steel circa 2006 as he made his grand entrance in The Atom suit. Apparently, I’m not the only one who can’t seem to shake Routh as Superman.
Dinner Gone Wrong
As if Barry Allen’s love life couldn’t get any more awkward, Felicity goes and invites him to dinner along with Ray, Iris and Eddie. Barry Allen, fifth wheel. The funny thing is that Barry wasn’t the only one who was feeling uncomfortable. There was plenty awkward to go around, starting with Felicity being overly concerned for her former flame—ahem, Barry—and ending with Iris and Eddie’s ill-timed and not-so-subtle public quarrel.
Sadly to say for Iris and Eddie fans, that was only the beginning of their communication problems. By the end of the episode, despite Barry’s attempt to help explain the actions of his romantic rival, Iris was back at her dad’s place and had given Eddie an ultimatum for him to fess up about whatever secrets he was keeping from her. That should turn out well, given that relationship ultimatums usually do.
Hero No More
Now that Barry is certain that Dr. Harrison Wells is the Reverse-Flash, he is having a wee bit of trouble trying to keep his feelings toward his former mentor to himself. After all, the man was one of his heroes. But times change and now Barry, Detective West and Detective Thawne have to figure out just how Dr. Wells was able to kill Barry’s mother 20 years ago and equally as important, why. In meantime, however, Barry is collecting as many allies as he can and pretty much telling anybody who’ll listen to what he has learned. Enter Caitlin Snow and Cisco Ramon. The only problem is whether or not either one of them will be on board with any plans to thwart Dr. Wells. Stay tuned.
The Flash airs Tuesdays on CW at 8:00pm EST/7:00pm CST.