The Flash: Season 1, Episode 2

The Flash

Episode Title: “Fastest Man Alive”

Channel: CW

Director: David Nutter

Writers: Andrew Kreisberg and Geoff Johns

Genre: Action, Adventure, Drama, Fantasy, Sci-Fi

Runtime: 45min

Rated: TV-PG

Original Air Date: October 14, 2014

The best part of this week's episode of The Flash were my many father/son interactions that we saw. Barry and Joe have what would have to be a complicated relationship, and the audience is exposed to many of the different facets of it. There's all the aspects of it you'd expect, the trouble of raising a child not your own and the rebellion that can bring, the love that grows between a father and son in everything but genetics, and the pain and hurt all of that can impart upon them. Gustin and Jesse L. Martin are both remarkable in those scenes, bring a real depth of emotion that you can see in their faces.

In Arrow, we see a support structure built around the hero of people that are already competent and confident in their abilities. Conversely, we are seeing in The Flash that Barry's support system is learning along with him, sometimes reluctantly. Cisco and Caitlin are still a little too cookie-cutter for me, they don't seem to be much more than the two stereotypical sidekick oddballs; both intelligent but one with a zany side and one always by the book. I hope to see a little more out of them going forward, but it's not a big issue at this point, the audience is still meeting The Flash at this point, no need to delve too deeply into the side characters yet.

The same can not be said for the villains though. I feel like I should know a little more about them before they're defeated. Stagg especially seemed like a villain that could hang around for a bit, not quite The Flash's Lex Luthor, but someone approaching that status. Of course, without Stagg, as is, we wouldn't have gotten that ending, and what an ending it was. After last week, I thought I had a good idea where things were going to go with Dr. Wells, now I'm not so sure. That mystery will be one of the things that keep me tuning in

Conclusion: This was a solid follow up to “City of Heroes.” I do feel like the audience needs to see that everyone that was affected by the particle accelerator disaster didn't turn into a homicidal madman, but other than that I had few issues with the episode, and what minor ones I did have can be attributed to how early in Barry's story we are, the audience has to understand him pretty well before we can starting caring about side characters and villains too.

Rating: 7.75/10