So, one of the things I skipped talking about last week on The Flash was how Joe’s not in fact a widower. Important this week, because his ex wife really wants to see their daughter. Joe managed to lie to everyone and say she died, which I guess was easier to do back in the late 90’s/early 2000’s. Joe has a problem with this; not only will money not keep his ex away, but he’s worried what Iris will think of him when she finds out about it. Which she’s certain to do whether he tells her or not, as her ability to find incredibly hostile real estate scammers at the beginning of the episode demonstrates.
As it turns out, Francine was a horrible junkie for prescription pills. He stuck her in rehab when she overdosed while watching a then very young Iris and letting her play with the stove. She disappeared from the clinic she was in, and Joe was left to raise Iris on his own, deciding that he should fabricate the Mother his daughter deserved. The scene where Joe tells Iris the whole story is excellently acted; you can really feel the emotion that Jesse L. Martin puts into his delivery.
Jay spends most of the episode working on stabilizing the anomaly that’s just chilling in the basement level of STAR Labs. In case you were wondering, yes, his solution involves vaguely theoretical bullshit. Because the answer in superhero anything tends to be vaguely theoretical bullshit. Why else do you think radiation is the answer to everything? In real life, you’d get amazing cancer powers, all I’m saying.
The real plot for this episode revolves around Lisa Snart, and by extension, her brother. She saw him get abducted after they pulled a job, and she actually asks Cisco, and by extension Barry, for help. Cisco tracks down the cold gun, and they quickly find Leonard. The bombshell being that he is willingly working with his father, Louis Snart.
Lisa can’t believe this, because she dramatically points out that her father is a brutal piece of shit that beat on them when they were kids. When Papa Cold got locked up, Leonard wound up raising her. So yeah, she could’ve turned out worse. So, sure, they’re all criminals, but at least Leonard has a sense of honor about him; an unwillingness to make a plan that could reasonably fail.
And boy, is Louis Snart an asshole. An asshole that saw Mission Impossible III, because he really seems hot on the idea of putting tiny, high power bombs in people’s heads. Like the tech guy he’s using for his jobs, for example. Which winds up being a mistake on his part, because Barry and Joe get called in to investigate the suddenly headless corpse someone found. Which in turn leads to Cisco realizing that, hey, Lisa was knocked unconscious shortly after seeing her brother get “kidnapped”, let’s check her for trace elements of explosives!
Barry’s only solution? Infiltrate the crew as a replacement for the headless techie, while Cisco works on getting the bomb out of Lisa. Leonard reluctantly vets Barry with his father, and they immediately set out for the job. And it really seals Louis as a total bastard, because his solution to every problem in his plan is to murder said problem. Which really highlights how efficient his son is when it comes to planning. Also, his greed.
Leonard hates his father, so it’s really no surprise that once the bomb is removed from Lisa, he shoots him. Honestly, ripping of head bombs is like ripping off the plot of Superman III; it’s likely to wind up putting you in federal prison.Which is where Lenny goes, pretty much without protest. He even gets honorary metahuman status, since Iron Heights now has a wing capable of containing them.
Dr. Stein collapses again at the end of the episode, and this time it’s made clear that it’s a Firestorm related event. The plan next week seems to be “get a compatible younger person involved in the whole mess to save him”. I’m not super well versed in the comics, but I think it’s supposed to be the second Firestorm.
And Dr. Wells (or is it?) walks through the completely unguarded but still functional anomaly. I have no clue if they’re having Tom Cavanagh look slightly menacing on purpose, or if he’s actually Zoom, or what. But I’m going to hazard a guess and say that there’s an agenda at play.
Final Thoughts:
- I honestly hadn’t noticed that Joe always wore his ring. It’s one of those little things that’s hard to spot on the fly like that.
- It’s funny how Caitlin pulled out all the stops in an attempt to keep Jay in their world.
- I really have been wondering if Ronnie is, in fact, dead. Jay passed through the anomaly just fine, and it makes me think he might be on the other side having the same problems as Dr. Stein.
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