Thursday, November 5, 2015

The Flash Season 2 Episode 5 "The Darkness and the Light" - Recap and Review

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In the previous episode, we saw that it was Dr Harrison Wells (Tom Cavanagh) from Earth 2 who rescued Barry Allen (Grant Gustin) from a certain death at the hands of the gigantic King Shark.

The opening scene is set in Earth 2 about 8 months ago. Dr Wells is introducing his latest innovation in the series of Metahuman Awareness Apps. This one is in the form of a watch that alerts the nearby presence of a meta-human.

Jay Garrick (Teddy Sears) stops by and makes his displeasure known. He considers Dr Wells as being responsible for the presence of meta-humans on Earth-2 to begin with. Harrison Well's daughter, Jesse Wells (Violett Beane) is also present.

In our present world, everyone is taken aback by the sudden re-appearance of Dr Harrison Wells. Detective Joe West (Jesse L. Martin) even fires at Dr Wells, leading the Flash to pull a Superman and stop the bullets.

Meanwhile, Cisco Ramon (Carlos Valdes) tries to pick up Kendra Saunders (Ciara Renee) to teach Barry the necessary skills of the game. Kendra Saunders is Hawkgirl in Legends of Tomorrowthe upcoming series that brings together the characters from both Arrow and The Flash. Cisco fails miserably in his first attempt.


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The villain-of-the-week sent by Zoom to kill Flash is Dr Light (Malese Jow). When the Flash encounters the supervillain, he is shocked to realize that she is the alternate version of Linda Park, whom Barry dated briefly in the previous season. Taking advantage of the Flash's indecisiveness, Dr Light blinds him.

Barry's temporary blindness does not stop him from going on a date with Patty Spivot (Shantel VanSanten). This was a genuinely hilarious sequence and due credit to Grant Gustin for pulling this off so nicely.

Just about the same time, Jay Garrick and Caitlin Snow (Danielle Panabaker) keep an eye on Linda Park. They take this measure since Zoom's previous assassins have murdered their doppelgangers on our Earth.

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Just as they are about to get intimate, Dr Light appears and is about to kill Linda. Iris West (Candice Patton) shoots off Dr Light's helmet. The supervillain does kill an innocent bystander before fleeing the scene.

Once Flash recovers from the loss of his sight, Dr Harrison Wells recommends that Flash capture Dr Light in order to bring Zoom to this Earth. Wells has already deduced (using his app) that Cisco himself has developed superpowers. He forces Cisco to use his powers on Dr Light's helmet and he is able to find out her location in the third attempt. Flash creates a Speed Mirage” to trick Dr Light and subdues her. 

This is not the first time that the show writers have used Cisco's new found powers to locate a hostage/criminal. It stuck me that he is the equivalent of Cerebro”, the device used by Professor Charles Xavier to track down mutants.

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In the closing scenes, Cisco, Barry and Caitlin frequent the same store they had done earlier. This time, Kendra herself obligingly provides her phone number to Cisco. She explains that she is new to the city and is apprehensive of all the meta-humans running around.

Cisco celebrates his success with Barry and Caitlin. Since he too has meta-human powers now, Cisco looks for a name. Caitling suggests Vibe and Cisco is taken up with it. Unknown to them, Dr Harrison Wells is spying on them. 

The final scene is again set in Earth 2. Zoom (voiced by Tony Todd) is forcibly keeping Wells' daughter, Jesse as his hostage.

This was an OK episode. The absence of Victor Garber's Dr. Martin Stein was strongly felt. On top of that, this alternate version of Harrison Wells is a bit gruff and less humorous. Same goes for Dr Light. Perhaps, the show writers want to differentiate between the two alternate version of characters this way.

The casting of Tony Todd as the voice of Zoom is promising. Tony Todd is a terrific actor especially in the horror genre. He would definitely lend the necessary gravitas and an edge to Zoom's voice.

Yet another enjoyable aspect of the episode was the reference to Atlantis. Jay Garrick mentions that he has a friend (presumably Aquaman) from Atlantis and that on Earth 2 Atlantis is above water.

Speaking of Jay Garrick, he is apprehensive about Flash facing the Zoom and takes his leave. When Caitlin wonders aloud later if she will ever Jay again, Barry replies that as a true hero, Jay would appear at the right time.

The preview for the next episode indicates that Zoom will be paying a visit to our Earth. Hopefully, that episode will pick up the steam.

Recommended watch to fans of The Flash/DC Comics.

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Image Sources: Berlanti Productions, DC Entertainment, Warner Bros. Television, The CW Television Network

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