Well, fiddle-dee-dee. Now that he’s out of prison, Barry Allen is having some trouble re-adjusting to life as a civilian. Perhaps listening to music and taking in a concert will help get him acclimated again?
In the latest episode of ‘The Flash’, Barry returns to work at the police station, only to find that most of his fellow officers are uncomfortable seeing him again. With fake news inundating the media, conspiracy theories are flying around that the Clifford DeVoe who exonerated him may not have actually been the real guy. Gosh, how could anyone believe such crazy nonsense? (I’m not sure what the show is trying to say here. Are fake news conspiracy theories supposed to be believable now?) Feeling pressure from the new mayor to root out corruption, Barry’s captain puts him on an indefinite leave of absence. I’m pretty sure that violates a labor law.
Meanwhile, the team’s search for the remaining meta-humans from the bus incident leads to an up-and-coming country music songstress named Izzy Bowin (Miranda MacDougall). She speaks with a very exaggerated Southern twang, y’all. When Barry and Ralph pay her a visit at a club to warn her that she’s in danger, Izzy has big-time trust issues and uses her meta power, blasting them with a sonic shockwave. Despite this, Ralph falls head-over-heels for the girl.
Currently residing in the body of Becky, the girl who can control luck, DeVoe finds it a weak vessel and makes plans to capture Izzy and take her body next. DeVoe’s wife, Marlize, continues to be troubled by his increasingly cranky behavior, and suspects that copying his consciousness from one host to another may have degraded his cognitive functions.
Harry returns from Earth-2 and runs into Cecille, who’s suffering serious sleep deprivation due to her new telepathy. It seems that Joe’s dreams are keeping her up at night. Acting uncharacteristically generous, Harry agrees to whip up a gizmo to help block her from reading mind waves. When Cecille complains that the first prototype is too big and bulky to wear at night, he reduces it down to a portable size she can stick on her forehead. The two of them start to become friends.
Barry, Ralph and Cisco locate Izzy again at the same time DeVoe does. The villain uses the various powers he’s accumulated to easily swat the trio away, but Izzy hits him with a soundwave that actually hurts him. Marlize portals in and pulls her husband out of there. Barry and the team believe that Izzy may be instrumental in defeating DeVoe. Ralph talks her into coming to S.T.A.R. Labs with them, and Barry begins training her to use her powers. Cisco builds her a special fiddle that can direct and amplify her power.
Harry eventually realizes that the “cerebral inhibitor” he built for Cecille could be used as a weapon against DeVoe. This triggers Barry to remember Savitar mentioning the device. The pieces to their plan seem to be falling into place.
During their training, Barry pushes Izzy too hard until she’s had enough. Feeling cocky, she slips out of the lab and tries to face off against DeVoe on her own, calling him out in the same parking lot where he last tried to grab her. Unfortunately, her new fiddle fails when the strings break due to Becky’s bad luck power. Barry and Ralph race to her aid, but DeVoe uses his other powers to give Barry a brain aneurism and to smush Ralph under a heavy dumpster. Izzy sneaks up behind him and slaps the inhibitor on his forehead, but DeVoe uses his Kilg%re power to fry it.
DeVoe then traps Izzy in a forcefield, forcing Barry and Ralph to watch as he sucks out her brains and transfers his own consciousness into her body. Ralph is heartbroken. Back at the lab, Harry feels guilty for his failure. Cisco theorizes that DeVoe and Marlize escaped to a pocket dimension, which he believes he can track.
Barry has a heart-to-heart with Ralph, who offers him a job as a P.I. now that he’s been ousted from the police department. Still fuming over Izzy’s death, Ralph vows to take DeVoe down.
Episode Verdict
As if mopey Barry isn’t bad enough, now even Ralph is mopey too. Accumulating powers has made DeVoe slightly more interesting, but that’s offset by the new bodies he puts himself in. (Neither is a very good actress.) The country music gimmick is kind of dumb. This episode is a big meh. The show has had worse, but it barely held my attention.
