The Flash
Episode Title: “Grodd Lives”
Channel: CW
Director: Dermott Downs
Writers: Grainne Godfree and Kai
Yu Wu
Genre: Action,
Adventure, Drama, Fantasy, Sci-Fi
Runtime: 43
min
Rated: TV-PG
Original Air Date: May 5, 2015
As the title indicates, the majority of
this episode revolves around Gorilla Grodd. Grodd is the product of
experimentation by General Eiling and Harrison Wells and their
attempts to create a telepathic and telekinetic soldier. Well, Grodd
holds a grudge. There have been a rash of gold robberies in Central
City and when Joe and the Flash apprehend the culprit he's revealed
to be none other than General Eiling. The last we saw of the general
he had been taken by Grodd, after being delivered to the sewers by
Wells. Grodd has broken his mind and is using him as a puppet,
ostensibly on orders from Wells/Eobard.
Grodd was well done, the CGI the best
one can expect from a show with such a limited budget. We got our
first good look at him after he had kidnapped Joe. This episode had
a definite horror movie vibe, and the tension was strong enough that
when Grodd was forcing Joe to turn his gun on himself I believed that
it might be the end of the line for Joe. Eventually the team figures
out a way to stop the psychic barrage that Grodd is capable of and
Barry set himself up to deliver another super sonic punch. Amazingly
Grodd was fast enough to catch Barry and hurl him away. The device
Barry was using to block Grodd's telepathy was damaged during the
fight, only Iris talking to Barry was enough to get him to focus
through the attack and stop the gorilla. Although the good guys won
the day Grodd escaped and will hopefully wreak havoc in the future.
Due to the tidbits revealed here and there, and now this episode,
Grodd is one of the more developed secondary villains this season.
Speaking of Iris, don't let the help
she gave Barry at the end of the episode fool you. She trapped Barry
into lying to her again, it should have served as no surprise that
with no new information he was going to continue the same lies. When
she finally confronted him on it she resorted to that favorite line
from our childhoods, she's not angry, only disappointed. Honestly
her unwillingness to see the validity of their motivation for lying
to her got old pretty quickly. It doesn't take much critical
thinking to know that everyone's concerns for her safety were
warranted. After some heated discussions with Barry and Joe she
finally came around, and I'm glad for the end of that aspect of the
story.
The rest of the episode revolved around
Eobard and Eddie. It's fun to see Tom Cavanagh really embracing the
villainous side of his character. The changes in the way he's
playing the character since the big reveal are great. One of my
favorite little things was seeing him jump down a number of steps on
a ladder. After pretending to be paralyzed for a year he's reveling
in his freedom. The way he antagonized Eddie was very effective.
First telling him that he's one of the only Thawnes to never amount
to anything, and then showing Eddie the newspaper from the future,
revealing that Eddie will not be the one to marry Iris. I doubt it's
enough to get Eddie to change sides, but the pleasure Eobard takes in
torturing him just that little bit was evident. Eobard revealed the
next step of his plan when he finished manufacturing what he called a
key. He plugged it in to a wall and the camera zoomed out, showing
the inside of a particle accelerator. I may have missed something,
but it was unclear whether it was the accelerator at STAR Labs or a
new construction. If it's a new one then it must be part of his plan
for returning to his time, if it's the one in STAR Labs then it would
seem that emptying the pipeline of its metahuman inhabitants is the
next step in his scheme. Either way I can't wait for the next
episode.
Conclusion:
Aside from the Reverse Flash, Grodd may be the more well-developed
villain on the show, and he's a ton of fun. With Iris finally on
board with Barry's secret I have hopes that they'll allow her to move
on and contribute more to the show than the obstacle she's been for a
while. Wells/Eobard has become even more entertaining with his
secret out of the bag, having become a true bad guy. I hope we don't
see his demise at the end of the season, I feel like the show would
suffer if the threat of Eobard's meddling was somehow snuffed out
completely in the future.
Rating:
8.25/10
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