This review no longer completely serves as my thoughts on the episode as a whole, and instead consists of a bunch of inconsistencies in Thawne's "Reverse Flashpoint" timeline. I think the episode was fine, Thawne would absolutely do something like this to get at Barry, and Barry using Damien Darhk's daughter as a reason to get Darhk to help him was very smart. That last part in itself didn't overdo the "love" aspect of the show as much as last season did, and definitely fit with Darhk's character. Despite that, I can't give the episode anything higher than a 6 / 10 because of the time travel rules being broken or ignored here.
And for those of us keeping track, I got Flash Frustration Bingo again this week! That's two weeks in a row now, and I'm going to go knock on wood so that I don't jinx myself.
For starters, the episode begins with an exposition drop from Thawne as he tells Barry about all the changes he made to the timeline. I never doubt that Thawne makes changes to the timeline just by breathing in the wrong direction, but it was established last episode that Thawne tapped into the Negative Still Force to make the timeline changes. This week though, we see him running around at super speed in a bunch of flashbacks. So not only did the Negative Still Force stop being a thing even sooner than it started being a thing, but Barry apparently never noticed him showing up and smashing STAR Labs, or saw him kill Joe? The Speed Force didn't warn Barry that his history was changing? And NOT A SINGLE CAMERA IN CENTRAL CITY PICKED UP THAT THE REVERSE FLASH WAS RUNNING AROUND STAR LABS AND THE TRAIN STATION KILLING PEOPLE? AND THERE WERE NO GUSTS OF WIND IN CCPD LOCKUP WHEN THAWNE WAS FRAMING BARRY FOR FEDERAL CRIMES? That last one hasn't been mentioned since "Armageddon, Part 2", so I guess that's just getting retconned too at this point!
Cameras have been able to track Speedsters movements since SEASON 1!. If there was footage of Joe falling onto the tracks, there would've been footage of a streak of red lightning pushing him onto the tracks. Simple as that. But I guess cameras can't pick up Speedsters movements anymore? That's just one of the *many* retcons this episode adds to the pile by the way. We're only seven minutes in at this point, and I've already found several plotholes that any competent writer would've accounted for.
As for plotholes, we've just scratched the surface. I don't think it's any secret that Flash fans know Rick Cosnett is coming back to play Eddie Thawne and possibly Cobalt Blue during the latter half of season 8, so here's something the writers may want to consider. Iris fell in love with Barry after Eddie tragically took his own life to stop the Reverse Flash in season 1. Eddie was Thawne's ancestor, so if Eddie died before he had a kid, Thawne would never be born. So here's a question that nobody in the writers room bothered to ask: What happened to Eddie during "Reverse Flashpoint"? I know there's the classic Savitar saying, "The more you do it, the less the rules apply to you" (referring to time travel), but are we really supposed to buy that as an explanation? Maybe because this is the newest incarnation of Thawne, Eddie's death doesn't affect his birth because Barry and Iris's love brought him back from the dead (yes, that's a real thing), but if that's the case, where is the "Reverse Flashpoint" version of Eddie? He still would've fallen in love with Iris, he still would've found out the Flash's identity, but he wouldn't have taken his own life because in "Reverse Flashpoint", Barry is the Reverse Flash, and his death wouldn't make it so Barry didn't exist because Barry's from the present day. Eddie has to live so that Thawne can be born, and Thawne can't be with Iris until Eddie dies, so where is Eddie, and why isn't he with Iris anymore? This episode spits in the face of the show's established lore, and for what reason? If you're going to bring Rick Cosnett back later this season, that means that he's *clearly* still an important part of this show's lore, so where is he during "Reverse Flashpoint"? You can't have it both ways here, writers! He's either important enough to bring back or he's not!
And that's not the only plothole in the first five minutes of this thing. Thawne says that he was finally able to kill Barry as a child, so why is Barry even alive to become the Reverse Flash during "Reverse Flashpoint"? If Barry Allen died as a child, then there should be no Reverse Flash in this new timeline, since there's no Adult Barry to become the Reverse Flash! And that creates an even BIGGER plothole when you remember that without Barry, Thawne never even exists! Thawne can't exist unless Barry exists, since Thawne wanted to BE BARRY as part of his own origin during season 1, which means he needs to learn that Barry Allen is the Flash in the future so he can travel back in time and kill Barry's mom! If Thawne changes the future and prevents Barry from becoming the Flash, wouldn't that mean that Thawne just ceases to exist? If that's the case, Thawne would essentially Grandfather Paradox himself.
Oh, and Thawne is still wearing the face of Harrison Wells, AND Original Thawne is still hiding out as 2013 Wells! If Thawne really went back in time to become the Flash and have Iris writing about him, she'd fall in love with HARRISON WELLS, not EOBARD THAWNE! And 2013 THAWNE wearing OG WELLS face would still be active during that time! And if 2013 Thawne is still active in 2013 while 2021 Thawne becomes 2013 Flash, what did Thawne change about his own past so that he could become 2013 Flash? So even if we accept that Barry dies as a child, Thawne would still have to kill his past self in order to even conceive "Reverse Flashpoint" in the first place! If Thawne so much as thinks about doing what he's gonna do, he'd cease to exist on the spot! This timeline is literally impossible if you even stop to think about it for more than five minutes!
I've already put more thought into this episode than the people making it did!
You want more proof? Here's some questions that the writers never bothered to ask themselves: When did Ryan Choi and his wife get divorced? When happened to his daughter? When did Iris and Ryan Wilder become friends? When did Damien Darhk come back to life, and how and why did Thawne bring him back? And how can you guys *still* not tell that Kayla Compton and Brandon McKnight have no chemistry!
Seriously, you could make a more compelling relationship development scene by shoving two planks of wood together! And it would probably be more interesting too! Because this episode happens in a timeline that NO LONGER EXISTS by the end of the episode, why are we even focusing on Allegra and Chester's romantic subplot? They had a one-night stand ten years ago. Okay? It's been ten years! Get over yourselves! If you guys were real humans, you would've moved on like any normal person in that time! And even if they did still have feelings for each other, who cares? All it did was confirm that Allegra heads to London at some point between 2021 and 2031, so that means she's leaving the show, which is only an improvement! Though I will admit, I did laugh when Allegra told Chester "I love you", and Caitlin reacted with "When did *this* happen?" It's hysterical to me that the characters in the show realize that these actors have no chemistry!
As for the questions I posed about Ryan Choi, this episode attempted to paint him as a heartless wreck of a person... So when did that happen? He had a wife and a daughter during Crisis on Infinite Earths, so did they die and that's when he gave up on love? Never explained! Guess that's another retcon for us to throw on the pile!
Oh yeah, and another negative for the incredibly long list, Tom Cavanagh looks incredibly stiff in the Flash suit. Don't think I didn't notice him struggling to walk forward and having to turn to his whole body to move his hand to the Gideon panel in the time vault. His face doesn't fit into the cowl right at all either, and I now see why they had to blur his face during every other appearance for the first seven seasons. It really feels like they only made one Flash suit and one Reverse Flash suit, only fitted them for Grant Gustin, and then just assumed it would fit Tom Cavanagh. It looks really, really bad, and shocks me that they chose to air this on network tv.
Also, Damien Darhk was trained by the League of Assassins, but loses a fight to Frost and Chillblaine. I mean, that shouldn't come as a surprise since Chillblaine can canonically take a bolt of Speedster Lightning and live, as determined in season 7's "Enemy at the Gates", but it was stupid, and it bugged me more than a little bit.
And don't even get me started on how Iris's love would be enough to connect Barry to the original Speed Force again! That is stupid! In fact, Barry shouldn't have any trouble running and wouldn't have to create Armageddon in order to go back to the future anyway since Barry's Speed Force wasn't drained by Black Lightning in the previous episode. And even if it was, that doesn't matter, since Barry is connected to the Negative Speed Force now, which means Barry has an unlimited source of power that grants him his Speed, and he should be able to make it back to the future no problem!
Actually, scratch that. Why is Barry connected to this timeline's Negative Speed Force at all? He's the Barry Allen from the Prime Timeline, which means he should still be connected to HIS Speed Force! This episode's time travel literally defies all rational thought!
This has to be the Flash's laziest written episode in years! Like, it is bad on a whole other level, and I thought we'd escaped this level of bad once season 7 ended! No more letting my guard down with this putrid show! I'm watching for Flash Frustration Bingo now, and that's it!
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