We are back, Flash Fanatics, with a rather different episode of The Flash on The CW this week. In a sudden turn of events, we ended up getting an episode mostly focused on Killer Frost. This review is for The Flash season four, episode five: Girl’s Night Out. In case you do not remember what happened last week here’s the scoop.

RECAP

Last week we finally met the metahuman “Breacher” played by the one and only Danny Trejo. We learned more about Gypsy and how Breacher is the leader of the police force that assassinates criminals traveling across the multiverse. Along with the anti-hero, we were also greeted with the new recurring guest star this season, Ralph Dibny, the Elongated Man. The stretchable human quickly found a place on team Flash and Barry also learned that Clifford Devoe was beginning his search for him.

Episode 5X05 Review “GIRL’S NIGHT OUT”

This week’s episode was focused on the ladies side of team Flash. The episode was split into two different storylines. The men tackled their internal problems while the women went after the external. Barry and Iris prepared to have a bachelor party, but since this is a comic book show, everything went sideways. Barry, Joe, Cisco, Harry, and Ralph found themselves stuck in a bar fight with no powers while Iris, Caitlyn, Cecile, and Felicity found themselves fighting against crime lord Amunet.

Typically, the comic book shows on The CW suffer from the drama portion. Arrow’s later seasons proved how The CW’s leash on the D.C. shows can easily bring them down from fame. Tonight’s episode, however, actually was able to benefit from the romance genre. In a surprising turn of events for the station, an episode focused on drama was actually really good. The episode certainly had several plot holes, but was enjoyable overall and provided more of what fans were anxiously waiting to see in Killer Frost.

Ralph Dibny finally revealed more about his personal life. His proud accomplishments include being the number one customer at some of Central City’s highest class bars. Ralph took the entire team to his favorite bar in all of Central City after seeing the team relaxing at home about to enjoy a champagne. As we already learned, Ralph is one of the biggest screw ups in D.C. Comics history. One of the biggest jokes from season one of The Flash was that Barry’s high metabolism meant that he had to eat over thirty thousand calories a day to withstand a healthy diet. He could also never actually become drunk due to alcohol having absolutely zero effect on his body. Cisco created a special substance that could help him solve his one time desire. This substance resulted in one of the worst nights Barry ever had. Every scene had him nearly spitting out secrets and random sentences. In an almost CollegeHumor like skit, the show had one of its most humorous episodes in its entirety.

It’s time to talk about the female side of the story. The CW has been infamously known for bringing down shows thanks to its pressure on writers to include more drama into their shows. While The Flash has fell victim to this trap, it is yet to actually make it its downfall unlike its older brother Arrow. As usual, the writers continued to use Arrow’s Felicity Smoak in an actual, excusable way. The character has been pulling down Arrow with an iron anchor, but on The Flash,  she always somehow finds a way to grab the audience’s attention. The character continues to slow down Arrow season six, but luckily, the scarlet speedster was able to escape that ship. There’s nothing to fear here Flash fans, the character had a minimal number of lines and never interrupted the shows pace.

Caitlin Snow was put under ice and Killer Frost stole the spotlight tonight. The episode introduced one of the very few modern day D.C. villains who was first introduced in the comic one shot, Flash: Iron Heights. Criminal mastermind and metahuman, Amunet is the D.C. Universe’s Magneto, the metahuman that can control various common metals. The main focus of the storyline was to help develop the relationship between Killer Frost and Caitlin Snow. Killer Frost has constantly had control over Caitlin Snow since the beginning of season three, but this episode showed how the two are slowly learning to coexist with each other and accept their differences. Caitlin is one of the very few Arrowverse characters that have remained on their team since their show had begun. The writers have ferociously tried to incorporate the iconic villain into the show without messing with the fan favorite scientist. I’m happy to say that the writers might have finally figured out the solution to this ongoing problem. Killer Frost is not exactly “killer” anymore. The character slowly has fused into Caitlin’s mind. You can expect her to most likely be referred to as just “Frost” for now on. This is not the first time that Killer Frost has been an antihero. We saw her reach a similar solution in the storyline from both the comics and the hit fighting game from last console generation, Injustice: Gods Among Us.

The team of women helped save a metahuman who’s tears were made of dark matter. Later at night,  the metahuman was captured by Clifford Devoe. While it’s unknown who this metahuman actually was, we did learn that Devoe might be stuck in his chair. Devoe’s chair is weaponized just like the X-Men’s Charles Xavier. Its entirely possible that the character might be paralyzed from the waist down. The character seemed to only be able to move his upper back bones and hands. It will be interesting to see if the show’s villain this season is actually at a disadvantage. At the comic con panel, the actors mentioned that the character would have some slight physical changes from his comic appearances so this might be what they were talking about.

Overall, we got a solid episode this week. Besides a few plot holes and some really cheesy dialogue, there were some really great moments between Caitlin’s split personality and Joe and Barry’s father/son relationship. The women of the Arrowverse have never received the spotlight on both The Flash and Arrow, but this season has had more of a push to give these characters a larger purpose in the plot of the season. There was nothing too memorable in the episode, but it helped bring out the more comedic side of The Flash. The show has been transitioning back to its original tone and tonight definitely continued that trend. I would not expect anything massive to happen until the four way crossover finally begins at the end of the month. Last years’ “Invasion” crossover finally began the major season stories so it’s safe to assume that season four will receive the same treatment. The only D.C. comic show on the network that has really started their major plot points was Legends of Tomorrow, except that show will tie into the crossover so it was expected. The first teaser for the crossover was also released during tonight’s episode and it was really disappointing because it was only a total of three seconds of actual footage…

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Predictions

In recent news, we learned exactly who is or might be leaving the Arrowverse before the midseason finale during the “Crisis on Earth X” crossover. The episode will be split into two nights and clock in at a whopping two hours each night. If you do not want it to possibly be spoiled, then do not read ahead from this point on.

Recently, we learned that actor Victor Garber was going back to Broadway. It’s likely that half of Firestorm will be leaving Legends of Tomorrow permanently, but if he does indeed survive, then we could see him make a few appearances in season four of The Flash. While I do not believe that Martin Stein will actually get killed off, I think the actor is definitely taking a break for a while. In other news, we learned that Wentworth Miller’s character Leonard Snart might be making his final appearance in the Arrowverse. Miller has been known for making these “I’m leaving for good post” before, but this time it actually seems like the actor is leaving for good. Last time he pulled this stunt was Legends of Tomorrow season two. The actor returned to reprise Leonard Snart except he was a member of “The Legion of Doom” and fought against the Legends during the back half of the season.

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