My name is Barry Allen and I hate timelines.
Following the events of the season 2 finale, Barry Allen has managed to live a perfect life with his two perfect and alive parents. Barry going back in time to save his mother has now given him an alternate timeline, where he can finally have the happy family he has always desired. But that means he isn’t as close to Joe West, which really upset me more than the fact that he and Iris aren’t star-crossed lovers in this timeline.
Speaking of Iris, I have to say that she stood out during this episode. This new timeline has given us a more confident and outspoken Iris – something that has been desperately needed to improve in her character throughout the first two seasons.
Just like the original Flashpoint story arc, Barry starts to lose his memories of his actual life. Thawne, now kept captive in a glass cell, warns Barry about this new timeline and how it could take both of them down. Barry (obviously) chooses to ignore him – they’re enemies, why should Barry trust him right? “Who’s the villain now, Flash?”, Thawne yells out, but even this doesn’t phase Barry in the slightest. Even after countless warnings from Thawne, Barry goes about his day with his well and alive parents. He’s finally happy.
In Barry’s perfect world, Central City doesn’t know of The Flash, but they’re familiar with Kid Flash. That’s right, we finally get to see Wally West in action. Sure, it was only for one episode and we don’t know whether we’ll actually get to see more of that, it was nice while it lasted. I’ve always liked Wally and wanted his character to grow, rather than just be the son Joe never knew about and tried to connect with. Wally’s becoming a real part of their family and it’s great to see.
Joe, however, appears to be an alcoholic, who doesn’t necessarily care for Barry Allen. And from the looks of it, it seems as though Iris and Wally aren’t even close to Joe.
This perfect world also does not have a STAR Labs. No Harrison Wells, Cisco Ramon and Caitlin Snow working together with Barry to help him save their city. But of course, Carlos Valdes was undeniably hilarious in this episode (he always is, let’s be real) and even as a snotty billionaire who claims to not care, he’s still the same Cisco who does want to do good.
Barry eventually kidnaps Caitlin in order to get the band back together, while he tries to convince them that he is from a different timeline. Here, Caitlin is an ophthalmologist, and she’s obviously still a genius. Confused at first, Caitlin soon helps the team out while Barry and Wally are on the field.
Wally, who thinks he can take down Clariss by himself without thinking it through first, gets stabbed a few moments into the fight. Now, this is what really convinces Barry that he needs to go back to his actual timeline. And this got me. We’ve always seen Barry Allen to be the type to always put everyone else first. Even though him and Wally had a rocky start in season 2, Barry does already consider him a part of his family and wants to save his life.
So inevitably, Barry needs to go back to Thawne for help. The sociopath that Thawne is, he tells Barry that he wants to hear Barry asking him to kill Nora.
And once again, Barry has to make the sacrifice of letting his mother die so that his life goes back to normal. I don’t think we’re going to go without a season where Barry doesn’t have to make this decision.
My only beef with this episode was how rushed and forced everything felt. It lacked that sort of emotion and despair that made the original story arc so iconic and powerful. I thought that we’d at least get two or three episodes of ‘Flashpoint’, where we could see the arrogant Cisco change his ways, Caitlin and Ronnie living a happy life before it was taken away again. But so easily, both had changed minds about the situation at hand to help a stranger.
It doesn’t help that the episode had the less than memorable villain, the Rival (Edward Clariss). Sure, him and Kid Flash had some sort of beef, but there was no emotional connection – we got no backstory, nothing. Did Clariss kill someone from Wally’s life? Did he try to hurt Iris? Nothing.
Eventually, Thawne helps Barry get back to his timeline, giving us yet another ‘Nora Allen gets stabbed’ scene. And all is back to normal.
Except it’s not.
In this timeline, where Nora and Henry Allen are dead while Wally is alive, Iris West is no longer in contact with her father Joe. Flashpoint is infuriating.
The episode ends with Clariss relieving a mysterious message on his mirror that reads “Alchemy” – giving us this season’s new villain.
I’ll be honest, I wasn’t very impressed with the Flashpoint arc’s debut episode. While Grant Gustin always brings emotion and depth to the character and the story, there was so much missing. Of course, it is a TV adaptation and can’t live up to the original story and it is just the first episode so I’m not discouraged from continuing to watch the series. But after hearing that even ‘Arrow’ would be affected by Flashpoint, I just assumed we’d have something with Oliver and Barry.
But we still have a whole season to go, including a much anticipated crossover with Supergirl – so there’s loads to be excited for!
