A welcome distraction By. TC

This weeks episode of The Flash was a welcomed departure from the current status quo, without completely abandoning the overarching story of finding the means to defeat the big bad of this season. Cisco Ramon (Carlos Valdes) draws closer to developing the metahuman “cure” which Barry Allen (Grant Gustin) seeks to use against Cicada (Chris Klein). The latest development sees Barry Allen and Ralph Dibny (Hartley Sawyer) enter an underground black market, where they almost immediately run afoul of the owner of the market. Upon witnessing weapons that could prove quite formidable to the CCPD, Barry almost blows their cover attempting to purchase the “Toastmasters” (see our article about those guns), after Ralph warns Barry to keep his cover. This leads our heroes into a situation where they’re forced to perform an equipment heist, in order to obtain the illegal device that they sought from Goldface (Damion Poiter).

Damion Poitier-Goldface The Flash 2019

Meanwhile, Iris Allen (Candace Patton) laments the ineffectiveness of her publication and attempts to play things a little less safe by reporting on and investigating Cicada. Nora Allen (Jessica Parker Kennedy) continues her mission of throwing Sherloque Wells (Tom Cavanagh) off the trail of her deceit, by seeking assistance from Eobard Thawne (Also Tom Cavanagh) in order for them to continue their mission of stopping Cicada and thus changing history. Iris’s investigation finds her in the rather precarious position of being in Orlin Dwyer (Cicada’s) home. From where we are in the season, the tension was rather light, as it was highly doubtful anything serious would befall a member of “Team Flash”. What we did receive, is a weakness that the team will no doubt expose within the next few weeks.

Orlin Dwyer and Iris West Allen (Chris Klein) (Candice Patton) The Flash 2019

Returning to the duo of Barry and Ralph, we’re treated to a wonderful buddy outing, where Barry seemingly embraces his undercover villain persona of “The chemist” with Ralph, simply being Ralph! Goldface as the Villain of the week was rather one note, yet effective as a foil to Barry and Ralph’s overall objective. His meta ability wasn’t overly impressive by the show’s standards, yet the removal of Barry and Ralph’s powers for this episode did provide a fun first-person shooter inspired scene, complete with Rob Zombie’s “Dragula” thumping in the background. We leave our heroes essentially where we found them by episodes end, with the exception of Sherloque refocusing his efforts in finding Cicada due to discovering a shocking secret about his ex-wife’s earth 1 counterpart. Ultimately we’re left with a fun distraction from what has become a somewhat stale status quo. The villain of the week formula was the backbone for The Flash for many years, and although some have complained about that particular direction, it’s sometimes nice to see the show fall back into old habits.

Ralph and Barry team up “Goldfaced” The Flash 2019