The Flash Season 8, Episode 20: Negative, Part Two

This week on The Flash, it's the big Season 8 finale!

So how was it? Welp, That was definitely an episode of The Flash alright! 

Sadly, Negative, Part Two was a jumbled and chaotic mess— one that was seemingly made up on the fly by the writers and actors as they desperately tried to ad-lib an ending. Nothing made much sense as the characters ran from one bewildering setpiece to another, giving the illusion that something was actually happening— even though the audience doesn't quite know what. How's that for a review!

The entire episode was an exercise in wasted potential— which seemed to be the theme of the season as a whole. Season 8 started out strong with the Armageddon "crossover," which curiously featured numerous characters from various Arrowverse shows that'd already been canceled.

The first half of Armageddon was promising, but it ultimately devolved into a murky, muddled mess that made little or no sense (sounds familiar!). 

Next up we had the Deathstorm arc. Deathstorm himself looked amazing, like he stepped right off the comic page. I had high hopes for his storyline, as it also started out strong. Unfortunately it also ultimately ended up limping to the finish line.

The last third of the season took a dull and uninspired turn for the worse though, as it gave us the unwelcome introduction of the Negative Forces. Apparently the writers loved last season's nonsensical Positive Forces so much they insisted on giving us their evil counterparts (without explaining where they came from, of course).

Strangely enough Negative, Part Two bore a VERY strong resemblance to Heart Of The Matter, Part 2, the Season 7 finale that wrapped up the Godspeed arc. Both featured an expanded Team flash battling an evil, jacked-up SUPER speedster who was trying to rule the world. In fact it's almost like showrunner Eric Wallace realized he bungled the storyline the first time and decided on a do-over.

I think the biggest problem with the episode was Thawne, who returns for the twentieth or thirtieth time since the series began. This show is positively obsessed with the character, and their constant over-reliance on him borders on addiction. They can't keep going to this same well every time they need a villain— it dried up years ago!

The season wasn't a total loss though, as there were a few highlights.

There were numerous standalone episodes, all of which were pretty well done and reasonably enjoyable. In fact I liked most of these one & dones much better than the multi-episode story arcs, or "graphic novels" as Wallace insists on calling them.

The aftermath of Frost's untimely death was quite well done too.

Methinks it may be time to return to the standalone format!

For a while it was unclear whether the show would be renewed or not, so the producers supposedly structured this episode to serve as a SERIES finale if need be. Man, what a limp and lame wrap up THIS episode would have made! 

At one point during the big third act battle, Barry stops fighting Thawne and LITERALLY sits down in the middle of the street, which somehow defeats him. Holy cow! I cannot emphasize enough just how awful it would have been if this is how the series ended after eight years.

Speaking of renewal, it was announced this week that Season 9 of The Flash will be the last. It'll return for thirteen more episodes and then that's it. Sad, but ultimately I think that's for the best. Although I've enjoyed the show for the most part over the years, it's high time it ended. The writing's clearly gone wayyyyy downhill in the past few years, and the actors are starting to look visibly miserable, as it's evident they all want to move on to other projects.

I'll miss the show and getting to write about it, but all good things come to an eventual end.

SPOILERS, I GUESS.

The Plot:
Picking up right where Negative, Part One left off, Eobard's body has just split open and the Reverse-Flash has emerged from it. Meena screams in horror at the shocking sight.

Barry asks Thawne how he's still alive, since he saw his dead body earlier. He says the Negative Forces brought him back to life, as they were too weak as a team without their fourth member. He taunts Barry, saying that killing Nora Allen birthed the Flash, while killing Iris led to the rebirth of the Reverse-Flash.

Enraged, Barry blasts Thawne with his Speed Force Lightning. Thawne seems surprisingly hurt by this, as Barry pours on the power. Suddenly XS and Impulse zoom in from 2049, and beg Barry to stop before they kill Thawne. Barry finally stops his attack, and Thawne says if he doesn't kill him, he'll just murder his future kids. Impulse points out that the fact that they haven't been erased from the timeline means Iris must still be alive. While Barry contemplates this, Thawne zooms away.

Back at STAR Labs, Cecile senses that Barry & Meena are both hurting. Yeah, no sh*t Cecile! They both just saw their significant others murdered in the most horrible ways possible. Nora says she knows Iris is still alive, and they need to figure out how to save her. Barry still believes she's dead, and wants to find a way to enter the Negative Speed Force to confront Thawne. Bart & Nora beg him to let them handle it, but Barry refuses.

Elsewhere, Iris finds herself in a glowing blue version of the STAR Labs Lounge. She looks around for anyone else, but the place is empty. Suddenly a figure appears, and she sees it's Damien Darhk. He says they have a lot to talk about.

Back at STAR, Chester says he might be able to build a tachyon generator that would open a door into the Negative Speed Force. Barry tells him to get busy building some right away. Cecile senses he wants revenge against Thawne for killing Iris. Just then she hears a voice calling her name, and sees the positive version of Psych flickering in and out of reality. He tells her she's the only one who can bring back the Positive Forces.

Elsewhere, Thawne appears in a red-tinted version of the loft from his Armageddon timeline— the one where he and Iris were married. Just then the Negative Forces appear, and Thawne asks why they brought him back. They say they chose him because of his hate, which is why Eobard had to go. Thawne says he refuses to play their games, and starts to zoom off. Deon freezes him in time, and says they're going to transform him.

In the Lounge, Damien infodumps the convoluted subplot to Iris. He tells her she's inside the Time Stone— the one he gave to Joe at the end of Armageddon. He says what she's seeing is just a remnant of his original consciousness, as the real Damien is dead. He claims the Negative Forces infected her with her time sickness, and used her as an incubator to recreate a new Thawne.

He also points out that unlike him, she's not supposed to be dead. She still has something important to do, so she can leave the Stone— IF she can figure out how.

Back at STAR, Chester rigs three technobabble harnesses for Barry, Bart & Nora, so they can enter the Negative Speed Force. He activates them, and the three speedsters instantly double over in pain. Barry says they need to find another way.

Meena says Eobard would know what to do, but he's dead because of her cursed BLOC machine. She speeds off to Fast Track Labs to destroy it once and for all. Barry follows and stops her, saying they still need the device. He has her get into the BLOC and charge herself with Negative Speed Force energy, and then transfer it into him.

At the West home, Joe sits in his kitchen and frets over Iris. Suddenly Jay and Joan appear, fresh from 2049 (yet another time traveling speedster!). They say they followed Iris' particle stream (ewww...) across time, and it led them to Joe's house. Sure, why not.

Jay finds the Time Stone in a cabinet and asks where he got it. Joe says it was given to him by Damien Dahrk, who told him he might need it some day. The Stone begins glowing, and Joan somehow knows that Iris' consciousness is inside it. Joe wonders how they can get her out of the Stone.

Meanwhile, Cecile's somehow gotten permission to take Mona Taylor, aka Queen of the Royal Flush Gang, out of Iron Heights. Cecile, Allegra, Mona and Rosa Dillon (aka the Top) go the CCC Media offices, because the producers didn't want to build a new set. There Cecile tells Rosa and Mona (who are both psychic metas) to concentrate. Wait, didn't she already absorb their powers a few episodes back? So what good are they gonna be? What the hell is even happening on this show?

Anyway, the three manage to pool their powers (?) and cause Psych to appear. He says when Iris' time sickness spread to the Positive Forces, he used his energy to boost Cecile's powers, so that she could bring them all back. Sure, that might as well happen.

At STAR, Chester detects an energy surge at Fast Track Labs. Bart & Nora zoom him there, where they see Meena transferring her power into Barry.

Once Barry's all charged up, he disappears into the Negative Speed Force. There he finds Thawne, frozen in his Armageddon appartment. The Negative Forces appear and say they're helping Thawne go through some changes, in order to restore the cosmic balance or something. Negative Deon snaps his fingers and sends Barry back to the real world. He tells the others that the Negative Forces are transforming Thawne.

Just then Chester detects a burst of negative tachyons over Central City. Cut to downtown, where multicolored bolts of lightning strike the pavement and cause a flash (heh) of intense light. When the smoke clears, we see a black-suited Thawne, now transformed into the Negative Reverse-Flash. No, really!

Negative Reverse-Flash tells the fleeing crowd there's no point in running, and begins murdering people left and right with his energy blasts. Barry watches all this on the news (no idea how the reporters got there so quickly) and realizes Thawne now has the powers of ALL the Negative Forces combined. Why? Don't know!

Back in the Time Stone, Iris figures her unfinished business is Barry. Damien says she's right, and has to discover how to escape on her own. He says her connection to Barry is still there, and all she has to do is reignite it. She begins glowing with energy and disappears. That was easy!

Elsewhere, Thawne continues his rampage through the city. Barry, Bart, Nora and Meena zoom the crowds to safety, and then confront Thawne. They begin running circles around him and blast him with their lightning. Suddenly Thawne switches places with Bart, causing him to get blasted. He then uses Negative Deon's powers to send Nora and Meena a billion years back in time (?). Barry runs off, and Thawne chases after him.

At CCC Media, Psych tells Cecile and the others they have one chance to defeat the Negative Forces. He hands Cecile his purple mask and tells her to put it on. He explains that the mask will absorb her powers and transfer them into him. She puts it on and screams in pain. Suddenly the mask vanishes, and so does Psych (?).

Barry then confronts Thawne, who's now faster than he is. Thawne throws a lightning blast at Barry, but it stops in midair. The Positive Forces then appear, and tell Barry they're holding back the blast. They then join hands as their power flows into Barry— making him equally matched with Thawne.

Thawne says he's still stronger than Barry, and extends a couple of purple psychic tendrils from his back (which is part of Negative Psych's powers). Barry grabs one of the tendrils and uses it to hurl Thawne into a car. Yeah, that all happens.

Back at the West house, the Time Stone begins glowing and Iris suddenly appears. Joe's overjoyed to see her, and the two hug. They see a news report on the battle between Barry & Thawne, which is destroying the city. Iris says Barry's doing more harm than good, and asks Jay to zoom her downtown.

Barry and Thawne continue their battle. Iris and Jay arrive, and she tells Barry he has to end the fight in order to save Central City. Thawne says he'll never stop till one of them is dead. Yeah, that's the way battles to the death work!

Barry orders Jay to get Iris to safety, and tells Thawne he's tired of fighting. He then... sits down in the middle of the street (!). Yeah, that happens too. Thawne's confused, as is the audience. He fires a blast at Barry, but it goes right through him for some reason. Thawne hisses that he needs more power (what else is new?). The Negative Forces oblige, charging him with even more of their multicolored energy. 

Thawne then lets loose with a mighty wave of energy that sweeps through the city, destroying everything in its path. 

Barry slows his breathing like he's meditating, and suddenly the wave stops and reverses course, as time begins flowing backwards. I guess Barry's using Positive Deon's power to do this? 

The energy of the Negative Forces is evidently too much for Thawne to contain, and he screams in agony. He says it wasn't supposed to end this way as his body disintegrates. Don't worry, I'm sure he'll be back next season.

Barry finally stands, and we see his eyes are glowing with the power of ALL the Positive Forces. He snaps his fingers and brings back Meena and Nora from the past. They look up and see the multicolored energy of the Positive Forces roiling in the sky. Barry says it's the universe resetting itself. Because of course it is.

We then get a mega-wrap up, as all this season's dangling plot threads are sewn up. Joan confirms Iris' time sickness is finally gone. Gideon says there's no trace of Thawne anywhere in the timeline. Meena says the BLOC has stopped working, and Barry says it's because the Negative Speed Force is gone. Iris give Meena Eobard's yellow necktie, which they found in STAR Labs. She thanks them for everything and says to call if they ever need help.

Chester scans Cecile and says all her extra psychic powers are gone, and Rosa and Mona's have been restored. Team Flash toasts their success, and Cecile inadvertently displays some telekinesis, implying she may have kept a few residual powers after her glowup.

Flash brings Tinya Wazzo to CCC Media, where Iris reunites her with her mother Renee. She explains that once Positive Deon was cured, he rescued her from the time stream and brought her back to the real world.

Back at Caitlin's apartment, she's STILL in the Technobabble Chamber that she entered last week. It begins malfunctioning, and Chillblaine shuts it down. He opens the door and is shocked by what he sees inside. A woman's voice announces that she's a friend... she thinks.

At the loft, Barry and Iris engage in some gag-inducing patter about their intense love and how they're lightning rods for one another and all the usual hooey. Iris says the Negative Speed Force is still out there, looking for a new avatar. Barry says when that day comes they'll be ready for it.

2049:
We see an unknown lab full of equipment. A blue crystal sits on a desk, and suddenly begins glowing...

Thoughts:

• The episode begins right after the previous one, as Thawne tears his way out of Eobard's body and begins taunting Barry.

In the past, Barry's always had to run in order to build up a charge of Speed Force Lightning before releasing it as a blast. In this episode he just straight up fires at Thawne completely out of the blue, going all Super Saiyan on his ass. 

So why the change? Is he using a residual charge from last episode? Or did the writers forget he's not supposed to be able to do this?

• As Barry's trying to kill Thawne, Bart & Nora arrive from 2049 and plead with him to stop.

That's fine, as the whole "Stop Killing The Villain Or You'll Be No Better Than Him" thing has been a standard trope in comics since the beginning. My problem with the scene is... how the hell did the kids know the EXACT moment that Barry attacks Thawne in 2022? 

Yes, they saw the younger version of Iris disappear in 2049 as she was pulled back to 2022, but it's a big year. I don't see any way they could possibly know the precise moment to which she returned. I suppose we could be generous here and say the kids sensed and tracked her temporal trail back to the past, but they've never shown that kind of sensitivity before.

• So Barry attacks Thawne because he blames him for Iris' death. But why? Thawne's definitely a dick, but he had nothing to do with it! Negative Deon yanked Iris from the future and materialized her in front of Barry's deadly Speed Force Lightning blast. Thawne didn't even appear until AFTER she was killed. If he's gonna go after anyone, it should be Negative Deon, not Thawne.

• For some reason there's currently a lot of Cecile hate floating around fandom. Eh, I don't hate the character, but I do sometimes question why she gets as much screentime as she does. 

Like in this scene for example. We see Barry and Meena quietly having a discussion, as Cecile watches them from the next room. We then hear the "Cecile Telepathy Sound Effect," as she helpfully says, "They're both hurting."

Yeah, no sh*t, Cecile! Barry was just bamboozled into killing his own wife, while Meena watched in horror as Thawne literally tore his way out of her fiancé Eobard's body!

Her obvious declarations are starting to remind me of Counselor Troi on TNG— who was certainly one of the most useless characters in all of Trekdom.

• We then see Iris isn't dead after all, but standing in yet another weirdly lit dimension. Jaysis, this shot gave me definite Mirrorverse flashbacks! And that ain't a good thing!

• Iris discovers she's inside the Time Stone, where she encounters an "echo" of Damien Darhk. Several things here.

First of all, I totally called this! Well, sort of. Earlier this season in Armageddon, Part 5, Damien handed his Time Stone to Joe, saying, "It's a gift. Father to father. And I think you're gonna need that some day." 

At the time I said, "It's obvious from the big closeup we get of 'Chekhov's Time Stone' here that this scene's setting up a future storyline for Joe. One in which he needs to travel back (or maybe forward!) in time for some reason. Expect to see this return later in the season."

OK, so Joe didn't use it to travel through time like I predicted, but the Stone DID come back to play an important role in the show. 

Second, the idea of an "echo" of Damien inside the Stone was lifted directly from Star Trek: Generations. There, Picard entered a cosmic energy ribbon called the Nexus. Inside it he found a remnant of his pal Guinan, who advised him and showed him a way out of the supposedly inescapable realm.

Lastly, when Iris sees Damien she asks him if she's dead. He says, "No, you're not. What happened to you is far more interesting than that." Yeah, well, we'll be the judge of that, Damien! 

Narrator: "As it turns out, her plight was NOT far more interesting than death."

• Man, Cecile's really in love with that boob arrow necklace! She wears it every week!

• Cecile violates Barry's privacy again by reading his thoughts, and is shocked when she realizes he wants to enter the Negative Speed Force to kill Thawne. Did she really need telepathic powers to figure that out? He thinks Thawne killed Iris. It's only natural he'd want him to pay!

• Welcome to Exposition Theater, where dialogue is replaced with stilted explanations!

Iris: "Okay, so if I'm alive, then... where am I?"
Damien: "You're here inside my Time Stone."
Iris: "The talisman that you and Barry used to wipe out anachronisms during Armageddon."

Haw! I'm surprised she didn't start that incredibly awkward sentence with "As you know..."

• A couple weeks ago I mentioned that lately the show's seemingly jettisoned any semblance of pseudo science it once had, and replaced it with outright Harry Potter-type magic. Magic that allows literally anything to happen so the plot can progress. Case in point:

Damien: (to Iris) "See, unlike me, you aren't supposed to be dead, which is why the moment that the Negative Forces annihilated your body, the stone spared you. It senses that you still have something important to do."

So the Time Stone is apparently sentient, has its own agency and can even spare people from death if it deems them worthy. Magic!

• It's always great to see John Wesley Shipp return as Jay Garrick. Heck, I'd watch a whole series just about him as an elder statesman speedster!

• When Jay and Joan appear in the West house, they tell Joe they've been following Iris' particle trail across the timestream. Which is apparently a thing they can do. More magic!

Joan: "Those particles that were left behind... they're Iris' consciousness, and now, I think they've somehow ended up inside the Stone."

Wait, what are these particles she's talking about? Iris was in 2049 when Negative Deon pulled her back to 2022. He then placed her square in the path of Barry's Speed Force Lightning blast, which killed her. After she died, her body dissolved into a mass of green particles, which then floated into Eobard's body and transformed him onto Thawne.

Are THOSE the particles that Joan's talking about? If so, they wouldn't have left a trail from 2049, as they didn't appear till 2022. Were there some other particles we didn't see? Did the writers read their own script?

• Cecile enlists the help of Rosa Dillon (aka The Top) and Mona Taylor (aka Queen of the Royal Flush Gang) to help her bring back the Positive Forces. A couple things here:

First of all, Mona was currently being held in Iron Heights Prison. Somehow Cecile managed to have her temporarily sprung. How'd a plain old attorney convince a judge to do that? Your guess is as good as any.

Second, Cecile stole Rosa and Mona's powers in the last couple of episodes (something the two of them even point out to her!). So I'm not sure what help she thinks they're going to be to her here.

• FINALLY! For the past month or so, Cecile's been "leveling up" and gaining new powers left and right, as the writers were seemingly turning her into freakin' Professor X.

I didn't have a problem with her glow up per se, but I did feel it was poor form for it to just happen, without even a hint of an explanation. We finally get the reason for it this week.

According to Positive Psych, Iris' time sickness spread to all the Positive Forces. In order to survive, they needed to "tether themselves to someone in this reality." Psych chose Cecile, due to her "boundless potential."

So even though the time sickness weakened him, he was still able to open her mind and secretly boost her powers so she could save the Positive Forces. So why didn't he slip her a little psychic explanation while he was at it, so she'd at least understand what was happening and why? Good question!

• The Negative Forces transform Thawne into a new avatar for the Negative Speed Force. He then appears in downtown Central City, as... get this... the NEGATIVE REVERSE-FLASH!

I love it. It's so utterly ridiculous it makes me smile.

Also wouldn't Negative Reverse-Flash be the OPPOSITE of the Reverse Flash? So technically he'd be the Flash then, right? I kid, I kid.

• I like the look of the Negative Reverse-Flash costume for the most part, what with its striated muscular system texture. There's just one major problem with it— the way the cowl's cut makes it look like Thawne has a big old double chin. Not a good look for a supervillain!

• Negative Reverse-Flash then goes on a rampage through downtown Central City. Wow, he doesn't pull any punches either, as he just straight up blasts and murders hundreds of people. No question about it, those citizens are dead!

• Amazingly, we then see Team Flash watching Thawne's murder spree live on TV, from the safety of Fast Track Labs— without lifting a collective finger. Are you freakin' kidding me?

Bart does take time to make a quip when he sees Thawne's new duds, asking, "Who's his new tailor? Satan?" Haw! It's funny because hundreds are dying!

And of course they watch Thawne on Channel 52, the only TV network in all the Arrowverse.

• For some reason, Negative Reverse-Flash has the power of ALL the Negative Forces. But... the whole idea of creating him was so the Negative Forces could reclaim their former strength. If they lend him their powers, won't that just make them weaker again?

I guess they're doing so Thawne can definitively defeat Barry, but... it still doesn't make a lot of sense. Especially when the Positive Forces pour all of their powers into Barry— making he and Thawne equal again.

• Go Go Power Rangers! There's really no other way to interpret this scene.

• Barry, Bart, Nora and Meena confront Negative Reverse-Flash in front of a large, garishly-lit edifice.

In reality the part of the building's played by the Vancouver Art Gallery. You can tell from the stone lions and unusually paved courtyard.

• Thawne makes quick work of the speedsters, blasting Bart and sending Nora and Meena a BILLION years back in time! Wow! A billion years into the past! That would have actually been cool to see the two of them struggling to survive in a prehistoric world. But no, seeing Barry sit on the ground and ignore Thawne was good too.

By the way, a billion years ago the atmosphere only contained about 2% oxygen, which isn't enough for a human to survive for more than a few minutes. So Nora and Meena should be dead.

• Positive Psych appears to get his powers back from Cecile. It's probably just me, but his purple & magenta costume reminds me of Gambit's from the X-Men. He's even wearing a brown trench coat, which was standard superhero issue in the 1990s!

• Positive Psych conjures up his old mask and tells Cecile to put it on, as it will then transfer all the powers she's absorbed into him. When she asks why he picked her for this task, he says:

Psych: "There's a reason you were given all these powers, Cecile. The powers you absorbed were enhanced by the one thing that I lack... your ability to care about people."

Holy crap, I spit out my drink when I heard that last bit! Jaysis, that was definitely the best line of the episode. Maybe even the whole season!

 • Barry & Thawne then begin an epic battle in the middle of town. At one point Thawne uses Negative Psych's powers to manifest a couple of purple tendrils from his back and tries to grab Barry with 'em. 

Methinks someone on the writing staff saw Spider-Man: No Way Home and really liked Doctor Octopus.

By the way, Psych first used his tendrils back in Season 7. There they looked much more electrical than the blubbery, phallic-looking ones Thawne conjures up.

• Barry then attacks Thawne, punching him across the city at superspeed. Thawne counters by 

using the Still Force to materialize what looks to be a WWII plane and drop it on Barry. OK, now that was pretty cool!

Note that both Barry and Thawne have all the powers of their respective teams of Forces at this point, and you can actually see them in action here. Thawne pulls the plane down with a burst of green Negative Still Force energy, apparently reaching into the past for a fighter plane. Barry then uses the blue energy of the Strength Force to catch the plane and toss it aside. He then disappears in a puff of purple energy, which I assume is the Sage Force. Not sure how psychic energy pertains to teleportation, but there you go.

• With Damien's encouragement, Iris is able to escape from the Time Stone. For some reason when she appears in the real world, the Stone vanishes. I guess the writers didn't want Joe having access to a functioning time travel device?

• Iris has Jay zoom her to the scene of the battle, where she tells Barry he has to stop fighting Thawne before the two of them destroy the city. Thawne then hisses, "She's right. We'll never stop, till one of us is dead!" Well, yeah. How else would it work?

Reminds me of the Harry Potter books' similar "Neither can live while the other survives."

• Barry then tries a novel strategy to defeat Thawne, by sitting down in the middle of the street and refusing to fight anymore! Because that's what you want to see in a superhero show— the characters taking a break and resting comfortably during a big battle. 

Once again, keep in mind that the show hadn't been officially renewed for a ninth season at the time this episode was written. Meaning THIS very well could have been the epic, last ever battle between Barry and Thawne. And it features Barry meditating in the middle of the street!

• Thawne then tries out a brand new power by blasting Negative Speed Force Lightning out of his feet— which acts as jets and effectively gives him the ability to fly! Dollars to donuts this ability's forgotten and never used by any speedster ever again— much like last season's Speed Force Lightsabers!

• Thawne fires a mighty blast of Negative Speed Force energy at Barry, but for some reason it passes harmlessly through him. ???

I think maybe Barry's doing a zen thing here, where by not fighting he uses Thawne's powers against him or something? Or maybe the Positive Forces are helping by canceling their evil counterparts' powers? I honestly don't know at this point. Much like the writers!

• When Thawne sees his attack isn't working, he calls on the Negative Forces to give him even MORE of their powers. They do so, but it's too much for his body to handle and he seemingly disintegrates.

YAWN! How many times have they used this same tired, hackneyed denouement on the show? Probably at least once per season!

• There were a lot of guest appearances in this episode (Jay Garrick, Damien Darhk, etc), but the REAL star this week were the Multicolored Lightning Effects Over Central City, which had a good fifteen or twenty minutes of screentime!

• OK, maybe I'm just dense, but I'm struggling to understand just what's supposed to be happening in this episode.

As near as I can tell, the Negative Forces decided they didn't want to share the universe with their Positive brethren. To that end, they somehow gave Iris a time sickness, apparently knowing she'd spread it to the Positive Forces and weaken them. 

The Negative Forces were also pissed off at Barry for inadvertently killing the Negative Speed Force, and wanted him dead as well.

The Negative Forces then cooked up a convoluted plan— they resurrected Thawne, reconnected him with the Negative Speed Force, and poured their combined powers into him as well. He'd then be strong enough to wipe out the Positive Forces and Barry too.

In order to counter this plan, the weakened Positive Forces leveled up Cecile so she could somehow save them (I think). Once they were restored, they put all their powers into Barry, so he'd be an even match for the souped-up Thawne and defeat him. Which is what happened.

Is that it? Did I get it right? Somehow I think my explanation makes more sense than what the writers actually came up with. 

• A few weeks back when the Negative Forces first appeared, I asked just how they came to be. 

If you'll recall, back in Season 7 Team Flash was trying to create an artificial Speed Force after the real one "died." Barry and Iris then accidentally created a new Speed Force through the Power Of Their Eternal Love. 

Unknown to them, they also spawned three other ones— the Still Force, the Strength Force and the Sage Force. Each of them then latched onto ordinary citizens, who then became the avatars for these powerful cosmic Forces.

For reasons, the Four Forces considered Barry and Iris to be their parents— literally, not figuratively!

So where'd the Negative Forces come from? Did Barry and Iris inadvertently create them as well, and we're just now finding out about it? It makes sense, right? If they created the Positive Forces, it follows they must have generated their negative counterparts as well. 

Unfortunately there's been no explanation for their existence so far, which seems like a pretty big oversight on the part of the writers. 

I assumed we'd finally get an answer to this important question in the season finale. Nope! Not a word! No confirmation that Barry and Iris spawned 'em, no line about the Negative Forces splitting off from the Positive ones— nothing!

We do get a microscopic hint as to their origin after Thawne implodes. Barry and the others look up and see numerous multicolored ribbons of energy floating in the sky. Nora asks what's happening, and Barry says it's the Universe resetting itself.

I'm not sure, but from that I think the writers were trying to suggest that the Universe needs constant balance. So when the Positive Forces were created, it took it upon itself to form Negative versions to counter them.

Note that there's little or nothing in the episode to back this up, as it's just me spitballing here. You can always tell a show's in good hands when the audience has to do the writer's job for them!

• Once Thawne's defeated yet again, we get the traditional season-ending wrapup.

Joan examines Iris and says all traces of her time sickness are gone. That was easy! She's been suffering from this temporal malady since the back end of Season 7, and suddenly she's cured through the Power Of Love or some such hooey. Actually I'm not sure how or why she was healed. I guess the Positive Forces cured her? Feh.

There's another "leveled up" as Chester scans Cecile and says all her extra powers are gone and she's back to normal. Cecile tells him she's gonna miss being leveled up. 

She then gestures and causes a coffee cup to fly across the room into her hand, implying she still has some residual powers. That'll come in handy, since they seem determined to make her part of Team Flash.

There's also a throwaway line about Rosa and Mona getting their powers back (courtesy of Psych, I guess).

The Flash then reunites Tinya Wazzo with her estranged mom Renee, who's now out of the Still Force. I still don't understand why Tinya was on the show this season in the first place. Are they gonna make her a member of Team Flash next season? If not, then what the hell was the point of featuring this character on the show?

And over at Caitlin's place, we see she's STILL inside the technobabble chamber, which she entered in the previous episode (!). Suddenly the chamber malfunctions, and Chillblaine rips open the door. He's shocked by who or what he sees inside. 

Apparently whatever's inside is none of our goddamned business, as the audience doesn't get to see it. I guess we'll find out what's going on next season.

I have no idea where they're going with his particular storyline, unless the chamber's created an unholy genetic combination of both Caitlin and Frost?

• Back in Into The Still Force, Chester had a scare when someone seemingly used one of his online inventions to blow up a building. It ended up being an accident, and he assumed the crisis was over. As he left his lab, we saw a Mystery Hacker secretly download all his files.

So what happened with that? Did the writers forget about that little subplot? Apparently so, as it's never addressed or mentioned again. Maybe they're saving it for Season 9?

• Iris tells Barry the Negative Speed Force still exists and will be searching for a new avatar. Barry says they'll be ready for it when it comes.

We then cut to 2049 (what the hell is it about that year?), where the camera pans across a lab full of equipment. It stops on a glowing blue crystal as the screen fades to black.

I assumed this was a callback to an object or character from a previous episode that I'd forgotten about over the years. I did a little research, and it turns out it's not, as no one else knew what it was either.

Most fans agree that this crystal's foreshadowing an appearance by the villainous Cobalt Blue. In the comics he was Malcolm Thawne, a secret twin brother of Barry Allen (it's a long and complicated story, so don't ask). He can generate a powerful blue flame to fire blasts, form energy constructs or give him superspeed (of course). 

From what I gather Malcolm is also the adopted brother of Eddie Thawne, meaning if he does appear on the show he'll probably be played by actor Rick Cosnett. So we have that to look forward to.

The Flash Season 8, Episode 19: Negative, Part One

This week on The Flash we get the first half of the big Season 8 finale, as Team Flash (or what's left of it) takes on the Negative Forces, Thawne dies and gets better (yawn!) and Iris finally returns from her vacation, er, I mean the time stream or wherever the hell she's been.

Overall this was a pretty lackluster and muddled episode, as little or nothing that happened made the least bit of sense. That said, it did feature a truly shocking ending that came out of nowhere, and allllllllmost made up for the rest of it. Not quite, but almost!

As for Iris' return... meh. Her lengthy absence has proven that the show doesn't really need her, and can do just fine without her. Which is kind of what I predicted would happen when Candice Patton took her extended leave from the series. 

There seems to be a lot of Candice Patton hate brewing on the internet lately for some reason. Personally I don't actively dislike her, but I can't say I'm a fan either. She's always seemed cold and aloof on the show, and has little or no chemistry with the other actors— especially Grant Gustin! That's not good, since the two of them play husband and wife!

As I keep saying, Barry's had more chemistry with Meena Dhawan in just a couple of episodes than he's had with Iris in eight seasons! Maybe Candice Patton's just not that great an actress. Or maybe she doesn't get along with her co-stars. Or maybe she's just not into the gig and phones it in every week, I dunno. 

Whatever the reason, her absence has only spotlighted the problem!

SPOILERS!

The Plot:
2049
Nora and Bart are playing a videogame when they get a holographic call from 2049 Iris. She tells Nora she liked her article, and wants her to write a followup. Suddenly the call's interrupted as the 2022 version of Iris appears in their apartment.

She tells them she's been lost in the time stream for weeks or even months. She asks where Barry is, but Bart says he's off planet with Jay (???). Nora tries to zoom Iris back to 2022, but they run into a Still Force barrier, and figure Deon's preventing them from time traveling. Iris clutches her head in pain, but then it passes.

2022
The Flash and Chester are at Fast Track Labs, where they're monitoring Meena Dhawan's speedster training. She's now wearing a cool black version of Barry's Flash suit. Meena runs on a treadmill, while her boyfriend, the Original Eobard Thawne (who's no longer evil) checks her vitals.

Suddenly Meena flies off the treadmill, crashing into the wall. Thawne tells her she's not invincible, and warns that she's pushing herself too hard. She snaps at him and zooms off. Flash follows to talk with her.

Flash catches up to Meena, who says the usual, "I'm not a hero" mantra that's so popular on this show. She says she's afraid she'll never be as good as him. Flash removes his mask and reveals his secret identity to her (of course!). He then gives her a Patented The CW Pep Talk®, telling her she's stronger than she knows or some such crap. He names her "Fast Track," and the two speed off together.

On Lian Yu, Deon confronts the Wells version of Thawne, claiming he's there to give him back his speed. Thawne asks what it'll cost him, and Deon says nothing much— just his life. He snaps his fingers, and Thawne instantly ages a couple hundred years and falls dead to the floor (!).

Back at STAR, Chester somehow detects temporal energy on Lian Yu, so Barry speeds there in a flash (heh). He finds Thawne's corpse, and makes the incredibly intuitive leap that Deon's responsible. He figures Iris' time sickness has corrupted Deon and turned him evil (even though it's not doing that to her).

At the West home, Joe's furious with Cecile for going out patrolling at night with her newfound powers. She says it's fine, as she's leveled up and can now induce vertigo in addition to her other abilities. He says that sounds a lot like Rosa Dillion's (aka the Top) powers. Right on cue, Rosa shows up at their door.

She says her powers are gone, and accuses Cecile of somehow stealing them from her. Cecile says she was near Rosa's house when she was out patrolling and thwarted a mugger, and theorizes that she can now absorb the powers of any psychic metas in the area. Rosa wants her powers back, and Joe says he has an idea.

2049:
Nora and Bart take Iris to Jay Garrick's wife Joan for examination. She detects negative tachyons in Iris' body, and says they're multiplying. Iris clutches her head in pain again, and Joan says eventually the strain will be too much for her. Nora says she's going to 2022 to find Barry.

2022:
Meena continues her training at her lab. Suddenly three of the Four Forces— Deon, Psych and Fuerza— appear. Meena asks who they are and what they want, and Deon says they're there to kill Eobard. Meena tries to speed him to safety, but Deon snaps his fingers and freezes them in time.

Just then Barry arrives, and Deon freezes him as well. Barry manages to exert enough Speed Force energy to counter Deon's powers, and hurls a blast of lightning at him and the others. This frees Meena and Eobard from their time lock. The Forces recover, and Barry asks what they want. Deon confirms they're all the NEGATIVE Forces, and they're tired of sharing the universe with their positive counterparts.

Eobard asks what any of this has to do with him, and Negative Fuerza says he's not the Avatar and his mere existence makes them all weak. Negative Deon cryptically says Barry will pay for what he did, and he and the other Negative Forces teleport away. Barry, exhausted from fighting against Negative Deon's time lock, collapses. Chester radios for Meena to bring Barry back to STAR.

Meanwhile at Caitlin's apartment, we see that she and Chillblaine have somehow built the cryo pod he proposed last week. He says with it, they'll be able to reactivate any trace of Frost that's still rattling around in her consciousness, and eventually figure out a way to give her a physical body again. Caitlin agrees, and steps into the pod. Chillblaine activates it, and the pod fills with chilled fog.

Back at STAR, Barry recovers from his ordeal with Negative Deon. Nora arrives from the future, and says she wasn't able to bring Iris back with her. Barry points out that there were only three Negative Forces, as there was no Negative Speed Force with them. He theorizes that when he severed Thawne's connection to the Negative Speed Force, it erased Negative Nora. He says that must be what Negative Deon was talking about when he said Barry had to pay for what he did. He says the Negative Forces are hoping Iris' time sickness spreads to the Positive ones and kill them. Then the Negative Forces could take over the entire universe. Sure, why not.

Cecile and Rosa go to Iron Heights to talk with Mona Taylor, aka Queen of the Royal Flush Gang. Why? It's not exactly clear. Anyway, Cecile asks Queen to read her mind. Mona tries, and suddenly screams that her powers are gone. Apparently Cecile absorbed hers as well! Rosa says Cecile's becoming one of the most powerful metas on Earth.

2049:

Joan tells Nora and Bart that Iris might not survive another time sickness attack. She says defeating the Negative Forces is the only way to save her. I love how all the "scientists" on this show pull the most outlandish notions possible out of their heads, and everyone instantly treats it as fact.

2022:
Back at STAR, Eobard asks Meena what's wrong. She says becoming a speedster was HIS dream, and she feels like she took it from him. She says she never wanted speed in the first place— only to help the world. He gives her another Patented The CW Pep Talk®, telling her that working alongside the Flash IS helping save the world. He says he's extremely proud of her, thereby guaranteeing he'll be dead by the end of the episode.

Meena wishes there was some way she could give her speed to Eobard. Just then Barry enters, and says there is, as he announces he's going to teach Meena to share her powers. Well there's no possible way THAT idea could go wrong.

Multicolored lightning begins flashing over Central City, as the Negative Forces move in. Barry tells Cecile, Allegra and Chester (!) to go out and try to stall them. Barry gives Eobard his old Reverse Flash ring (where the hell did THAT come from?), and he suits up in his old Reverse-Flash costume. Meena then enters the BLOC to charge herself. She worries that the device is powered by the Negative Speed Force, but Barry says her and Eobard's love for one another will cancel out any evil impulses. Oy.

Out on the street, the Z Team (Cecile, Allegra and Chester) confront the Negative Forces. Cecile uses her leveled up abilities to somehow negate Negative Deon's powers. Allegra blasts Negative Psych, who teleports away and begins taunting her. Negative Fuerza comes after Chester, but he surrounds her with an impenetrable forcefield that saps her strength.

Meena exits the BLOC, and Barry shows her how to transfer her power into Eobard. The speed flows into him, and he says he's never felt so alive. Suddenly he says he's being filled with hate (of course!), and Barry tells him he has to find a balance.

Eventually the Negative Forces manage to free themselves and teleport away. They reappear in STAR Labs, where they confront Barry, Meena and Eobard. Barry gives them one last chance to leave, and Negative Deon laughs, saying there has to be a sacrifice. The three speedsters then attack the Negative Forces. Flash manages to take down Negative Psych and Negative Fuerza, while Negative Deon freezes Fast Track and Reverse-Flash in their tracks. They eventually escape, and he teleports away from them.

2049:
Iris, who's been resting comfortably, suddenly wakes and says "It's a new moment in time!" Nora and Bart figure she's seeing things that are happening in 2022 that are changing the future (???). Iris says she can see Negative Deon killing Eobard.

2022:
The two sides regroup, and Negative Deon tells Barry he can't win. Barry tells Meena and Eobard he has an idea, and to keep the Forces in place. He then zooms off, while the other two run superspeed rings around Deon and the others.

2049:
Iris says she has to see what's happening, as the sacrifice isn't Eobard.

2022:
Barry runs several miles down the street and turns around, building up a massive charge of superspeed lightning. He approaches the Negative Forces and lets loose with a mighty blast of Speed Force lightning. Meena and Eobard move out of the way, as the energy blast heads right toward Negative Deon and the others.

At the last microsecond, Negative Deon snaps his fingers and 2022 Iris is yanked into the present— where she's hit squarely in the chest by Barry's blast, killing her.

Barry catches Iris' lifeless body, as Negative Deon says she's not the only sacrifice. He and the other Forces teleport away, and Iris' body disintegrates into glowing green temporal energy. It floats through the air and enters Eobard's body.

Eobard screams in agony and clutches at his head. He tears his skin open, revealing the Wells version of Thawne inside him!

Thoughts:

• We open on this view of 2049 Central City that we've seen several times before. Not sure if I ever mentioned it, but this is actually downtown Portland, Oregon— with a few holograms thrown in.

• We then check in with Bart & Nora, who're playing what appears to be a 2049 version of the Nintendo Wii!

Seriously, they're even holding little controllers in their hands! The only real difference between this game and the Wii (which was discontinued back in 2013) are the glowing headsets.

We then get a POV shot of their game, and... boy, is it something. I would have expected WAY more realistic and compelling graphics for a game that won't be invented for another twenty seven years. Maybe this is an older system, and Bart's just really into vintage gaming systems?

• The kids then get a holographic phone call from Future Iris, who's alive and well and living in 2049. A couple things here:

As I've been saying for weeks now, Future Iris' existence is a HUGE mistake on the part of the writers. The whole reason for the "Iris' Time Sickness Causes Her To Disappear" storyline is to make the audience fear for her safety or even think that she's dead.

Kind of hard to get too worked up about her vanishing when we see she's perfectly fine in the future! If she's OK in 2049, then why worry about her in 2022? 

Heck, her kids are even with Iris in the future as well, meaning she HAS to return at some point soon in order to start having them!

Secondly, take a look at that holographic image of Future Iris. Who'd want to talk to someone's transparent head for an entire phone call? Why does allegedly "advanced" technology in sci-fi shows always look worse than what we already have today?

• Future Iris' holographic phone call is disrupted, as Present Day Iris suddenly materializes in Bart & Nora's living room.

Boy, I can't wait for her to find out how Team Flash sat back and played D&D for months instead of trying fo find a way to rescue her from the time stream! That's gonna be one awkward conversation!

• After she materializes, Present Day Iris asks to talk with Barry. Bart tells her he's "off world" with Jay. Wait, what? 

What the hell does that mean? Surely they don't expect us to believe humanity's colonized other planets by 2049? That's only twenty seven short years from now— not nearly enough time for something like that. And even if there were planetary colonies, how the hell would Barry & Jay casually travel to 'em? Are there commuter spaceships in 2049? Or did Barry & Jay run through space?

Maybe Bart meant they're on one of the alternate Earths that aren't supposed to exist but do? Either way, his little offhand remark didn't make much sense.

Also, Bart just confirmed that Barry's alive in 2049! Which means his scheduled disappearance in 2024— which we've been seeing on the front page of The Central City Citizen for the past eight years— must not be that big of a big deal!

• Nora tries to zoom Present Day Iris back to 2022. Unfortunately some sort of temporal barrier prevents Iris from leaving. Nora then travels back in time by herself to let Barry know what's happening.

Note that Nora's gone to 2022 & back literally every time she's appeared all season. In fact she travels through time like most people enter their kitchen.

What happened to all the warnings about the negative consequences of speedster time travel? What happened to Barry cautioning Nora that her temporal activities could create another Flashpoint? And where are the Time Wraiths, whose sole purpose is to protect the timeline from meddling speedsters— except when they don't?

• Meena gets a proper speedster costume this week, and man is it a thing of beauty! She looks exactly like she stepped out of the pages of the comic! In fact this may be the most comic-accurate costume they've ever featured on the show.

The only thing missing here are the glowing white lines, which I really wish they'd have tried to incorporate. Ah well. It's still awesome.

Annnnd then Meena puts on her cowl and ruins everyone's fun.

Holy crap, that's a bad look. It's like she pulled a big black condom over her head! Plus it's so tight it makes her look like some sort of pinhead. They definitely needed to ditch the cowl, let her hair flow free and just give her a domino mask.

I guess it could have been worse though. They could have gone with her look from the comic, in which she had a ridiculously long, gravity-defying ponytail sticking out the top of her cowl!

• Last week we found out that Meena had a heart condition. In fact it led to her becoming a speedster, as she had a heart attack and Eobard quickly shoved her into the BLOC to save her life. 

This week Meena's obsessed with training, and constantly pushes herself to the limits of her endurance. Eobard mildly cautions her about working out so much, and Barry makes a very brief mention of her heart rate, but that's it. At no point does anyone mention anything about her potentially having another heart attack. Did the BLOC permanently fix her faulty heart?

• Meena doesn't think she's cut out to be a hero (yawn), so she runs away in shame. Flash follows and gives her a Patented The CW Pep Talk®, telling her that anyone can be a hero or some such hooey. To prove his point he removes his cowl and reveals his "secret" identity to her. Meena's gobsmacked to learn that he's really Barry Allen.

Honestly there're already so many people on the show who know his true identity that it took me a minute to realize that Meena wasn't one of them.

• As you can probably tell, I am NOT a fan of this show's constant maudlin Pep Talks. That said, the one between Barry & Meena this week was pretty well written— and acted! Check it out:

Barry: "You'd be surprised at people's capacity to rise up and help others during a crisis. They just need to be given the opportunity. That suit, that's your opportunity. I think you're gonna be surprised at how well it fits, but you have to give yourself the chance."

Meena: (smiling) "Damn, that's good."

Barry: "I have my moments."

Meena: "Fine. I'll give it a shot."

Of course one reason this Pep Talk is more bearable than most is due to the delivery of Kausar Mohammed as Meena. I love the relationship between her and Barry, as they've had more chemistry together in the last couple weeks than he and Iris have in eight seasons! I really wish it was possible for them to become a couple.

• When Barry's Pep Talking Meena, there's a poster on the wall next to him that prominently features a skull.

Nothing happens in a shot like this by accident, so I'm wondering if this is a not-so-subtle clue that someone near and dear to Barry's gonna die soon? Like at the very end of this episode?

If that poster placement WAS deliberate, then it's actually kind of cool. Obvious, but cool.

• When Meena decides to go all in and become a speedster, she says she needs a codename. Barry says she's already got one—"Fast Track." Named after her company, natch.

Lucky for Meena she didn't call her business "Amalgamated Scientific Research and Development LLC!"

• Negative Deon appears in Thawne's cell, where he kills him by aging him hundreds of years in an instant for reasons. A point to everyone who had "Thawne Dies For The 79th Time" on their Bingo cards!

• Last week Cecile went out on patrol to test her newfound psychic powers, and we saw she was being tailed by a Mystery Woman hiding in the shadows. I said based on the back of her head, it looked like Rosa Dillon, aka the Top. A few things here:

First off, it turns out the Mystery Woman was indeed Rosa. Score one for me!

Secondly, Rosa shows up at the West house this week, accusing Cecile of stealing her powers and demanding she somehow give them back. This finally explains HOW Cecile's suddenly becoming Professor X and started gaining new abilities left and right. Unfortunately it doesn't tell us WHY.

Third, Cecile throrizes she was able to give a mugger vertigo in the previous episode by stealing Rosa's powers. But last week she also discovered she could take one person's emotions and transfer them to another. So whose powers did she swipe then? Apparently it's none of our business, as this is never addressed.

Lastly, after a month or two absence, we get another instance of "Leveled Up," this season's most inexplicably popular catchphrase. As Cecile spouts her theory, Joe says, "Cecile, is that why you leveled up?"

• We've seen this shot of 2049 on the show before, but I had a couple new comments about it.

First, that's the CCC Media building on the right. Wow! Looks like Iris' little home-grown business is gonna grow & expand quite a bit at some point in the next twenty seven years, as it'll have its own skyscraper!

Second, note that they're projecting the top news stories of the day on the front of the building. I kind of like that idea, and it seems like something that'll probably actually happen soon. That said though, the public's gonna need reeeeeally good eyes to read that body copy from hundreds of feet away! Maybe they should stick to simple headlines instead of the actual articles!

• The episode then goes completely off the rails as the three Negative Forces suddenly appear. Because everything on this show needs an evil counterpart, dontcha know!

I actually called this last week in The Man In The Yellow Tie, where a clearly evil Deon appeared in Thawne's cell on Lian Yu:

"It's pretty obvious at this point that this isn't the Deon we all know and love. He's clearly the Negative Speed Force, as all four of the Forces apparently have evil counterparts. As we all know, Barry & Iris accidentally created the Four Forces while trying to restore his speed. Did they unknowingly create Negative Forces while they were at it? Or did they spring up on their own at a later date?"

So points to me for correctly anticipating there'd be additional Negative Forces. We still don't know WHY they exist though, as the writers haven't deigned to tell us that yet.

• The kids take Present Day Iris to see Jay's wife Joan Williams. She scans Iris, and determines that the time sickness she's been suffering from all season is being caused by negative tachyons in her body. 

So there's a Negative Speed Force created by Thanwe, Negative Forces of all Four Forces and now negative tachyons. I get the feeling the producers just stuck the word "negative" in front of everything this season and all went home early.

By the way, the episode completely blurs over it, but there are now TWO Irises currently existing in 2049— the older one who's supposed to be there, and the present day one. I guess that fact wasn't important enough for the writers to explore?

• This episode is filled to the brim with Stupid, Overly Convoluted Plans, that make little or no sense. We'll be going through them one by one.

Stupid, Overly Convoluted Plan #1: This first one explains the Negative Forces' master plan, and why Negative Deon killed Thawne earlier in the episode. It's so, so monumentally stupid that it's actually a thing of beauty. Let's let the characters themselves explain it:

Nora: "Dad, you said that it was just Negative Deon, Alexa, and Bashir, but there was no Negative Speed Force Nora. Where was she?"

Barry: "This other Deon said I had to pay for what I did, and I took away Thawne's speed by severing his connection to the Negative Speed Force."

Nora: "Which might have erased Negative Nora."

Chester: "That must be why they're weaker now and why they blame you."

Nora: "Maybe they think that killing Thawne will somehow bring back the Negative Speed Force Avatar."

Allegra: "Hold on, if they're tired of sharing their turf, they'd want to level the playing field."

Barry: "By weakening the Forces we know. Iris' time sickness, it was never about her. I mean, they knew Deon would try to help." 

Nora: "And Mom's sickness would spread to the Positive Forces."

Allegra: "Taking them out of the picture."

Chester: "Wait, hold up, what happens if the bad Forces end up being the only ones left?"

Barry: "Then every speedster we know could cease to exist. Leaving the entire planet unprotected from the Negative Forces."

So basically Barry accidentally killed Negative Nora when he severed Thawne's link to the Negative Speed Force. This angered the other Negative Forces, causing them to seek revenge against Barry. To that end, they gave Iris her time sickness, which they hoped would somehow spread to the Four Positive Forces. This would weaken them enough for the Negative Forces to destroy them.

So how is any of that revenge against Barry? I guess because it caused his wife to disappear? And maybe cause him to lose his powers? It still seems like a lot of trouble just to get back at one guy.

Stupid, Overly Convoluted Plan #2: This week we check in with Caitlin and Chillblaine, who amazingly are STILL trying to resurrect Frost. Their plan is pure Comic Book Bullsh*t Science too.

Chillblaine: "Caitlin, why are you helping me? I thought you gave up on Frost."

Caitlin: "I had, but after I saw your designs, I realized I'll never stop trying to bring her back. I can't."

Chillblaine: "Okay, if all goes according to plan, the pod's cerebral circuitry should stimulate, and then reactivate Frost's residual subconscious left inside your mind."

Caitlin: "And then I'll get her voice back."

Chillblaine: "Yeah, and when she's with us again..."

Caitlin: "We can pick up where we left off and build her a new body."

OK, remember that for decades, Frost was a separate personality inside Caitlin's mind, who occasionally "spoke" to her as a voice in her head. Once Frost accidentally got her own physical body (through even more Comic Book Bullsh*t Science), Caitlin no longer heard her thoughts.

Apparently this episode would have us believe there's still some minute trace of Frost's entire personality rattling around inside Caitlin's head, and all they have to do is activate it and then somehow recreate the one in a trillion accident that generated a separate body for her. Sure, why not.

• Barry stares at a readout showing how the Negative Forces' powers are growing and expanding over Central City. Chester then says:

Chester: "It's all three isotopic energy masses: Electrochemical, temporal, and geothermic. They're gathering strength on their own planes of existence. That's what's bleeding through."

OK, electrochemical energy is what fuels our brains, so that's likely Negative Psych. The temporal energy is clearly tied to Negative Deon. That leaves geothermal energy for Negative Fuerza. That.,.. that doesn't make any sense! She's the Negative Strength Force. What's that got to do with heat from the Earth?

• We get another "Leveled Up" in this episode, this time from Allegra:

Barry: "Have you heard back from Cecile yet?"

Allegra: "Yeah, Joe said she was at Iron Heights and that it's important. She thinks she might know how her powers are leveling up, but she'll be here as soon as she can."

Stupid, Overly Convoluted Plan #3: In order to find out if Cecile can actually swipe powers from other psychic metas, Joe arranges for her and Rosa to visit Iron Heights. There they'll meet with Mona, aka Queen of the Royal Flush Gang, to see if Cecile absorbs her telekinetic powers.

Wait, what? Surely to Thor there was a simpler way to test this theory? As is, it's like seeing a gun for the first time, firing it at someone and killing them, then firing it at a SECOND person to see if it's what caused the first person to die.

• At Iron Heights, Cecile and Rosa bring Mona into a special cell:

Cecile: "Mona, I don't have much time, so here's how it's gonna go. I'm gonna take those off, you're gonna read my mind, tell me what I'm thinking if you can."
Mona: "With pleasure."
Rosa: "Don't get any ideas, Mona. She's taking the cuffs off, but this is a meta-interrogation cell. The walls are meta-dampened, so you won't be able to read anything except us."

OK, the meta-cuffs are obviously to prevent Mona from using her powers on anyone inside the room. So apparently the walls prevent Mona from using them on anyone outside the cell?

That's actually pretty smart. But then Cecile does indeed absorb Mona's telepathic powers, and can suddenly hear the thoughts of everyone in Central City. But... they just said the walls were meta-dampened to prevent just such a thing.

I guess we're to believe that Cecile's somehow become so powerful that she's negating the meta-dampening walls?

I really hope we're gonna get an explanation for this soon, as so far it's come completely out of nowhere and doesn't make the least bit of sense sense.

• Eobard demands to know why Meena's pushing herself and training so hard. She says she doesn't want to let him down, as being a speedster was HIS dream— one she never wanted anything to do with.

That's actually a pretty interesting take on the subject. Every other speedster on the show has always reveled in their powers and craved as much speed as possible. It's kind of refreshing to find someone who doesn't want it!

• Sorry, FX Team, but black lightning that somehow still glows just doesn't look right. It looks pasted on top of the scene, rather than a part of it.

Stupid, Overly Convoluted Plan #4: Actually this one isn't all that convoluted, but it's definitely stupid!

Barry needs help in order to fight the Negative Forces. To that end, he tells Meena to charge herself with Negative Speed Force energy, then shows her how to share it with Eobard to make him a speedster too.

Wow, what a plan! Giving a formerly psychotic villain his powers back seems like a wonderful idea, and I don't see any way it could ever possibly go wrong!

Meena has the same concerns about this idea, but of course Barry says Eobard won't turn evil because of the Power Of Love. Jaysis.

• Once Eobard's all charged up with speedster energy, Barry gives him his old Reverse-Flash ring, which apparently contains his costume.

So how is it Barry has the Reverse-Flash's ring? Good question! One that I can't fully answer, as I'm not sure the writers even understand it. Here's what I know about it:

Thawne's Reverse-Flash ring first appeared way back in Season 1's The Man In The Yellow Suit. He stored his costume in the ring, which used some sort of future tech to cause it to grow to human size once it was released. The ring also acted as a key on several occasions.

The Reverse-Flash was wearing the ring when his ancestor Eddie Thawne killed himself, which wiped Eobard out of existence. For some unknown reason, the ring survived. 

Barry had Cisco try to reverse engineer the ring, so he could have one of his own to store his costume in. Unfortunately Cisco wasn't able to figure out the futuristic tech. Barry eventually got his own Flash ring from his daughter Nora West-Allen, who brought it to him from the future (thus making his ring a bootstrap paradox). 

Eventually the Reverse-Flash ring was put on display in the Flash Museum sometime around 2030. At this point in time Thawne had been resurrected, and was mentally manipulating Nora. He talked her into taking the ring from the museum and using it to open the STAR Labs Time Vault for reasons. 

This future timeline was erased when Cicada's dagger was destroyed (don't ask), but Thawne managed to survive somehow— along with his ring. 

At some point after that, the ring came into Barry's possession. Just how did that happen? Your guess is as good as mine, as I gave up trying to figure out Thawne's chronology lonnnnng ago. I suppose we could chalk it up to Crisis, since that seems to be the producers'  answer for just about everything on this show.

Bottom line: Barry has Reverse-Flash's ring because he does.

• The three Negative Forces appear, and Team Flash— kind of— shows up to confront them.

OK, Allegra I can definitely see, as she's the second most powerful member after Barry. Cecile as well, as she's "leveled up" her powers lately. But why's Chester there? What the hell's he gonna do? Fling his Black History Month oaths at them?

To be fair, he does eventually produce some sort of force field that envelops Negative Fuerza, but she gets out of it pretty easily.

• Speaking of Negative Fuerza, why's she stay in her "Alexa Rivera" form all through the episode?

If you'll recall, when she first appeared back in Season 7 she could morph into a ten foot tall behemoth, not unlike She-Hulk. So why doesn't she do that here to fight Team Flash?

If I had to guess, I bet the producers are still stinging from the mocking they received due to her subpar CGI mode, and decided not to bother this time. That or they just couldn't afford to include a fully digital character this week. Or both!

• At one point Negative Psych lures Allegra away from the others, and she stupidly follows him. We then see her lurching along like she's never walked before, with her arms awkwardly raised in an unnatural position.

I assume she wanted her hands at the ready so she could blast Negative Psych at a second's notice. But surely there was a less stupid looking way to do so.

Negative Psych then taunts Allegra by projecting decoys of himself that appear all around her. Of course she frantically fires at each copy, which all vanish right before they're hit. She does this over and over, never seeming to learn from her mistakes.

Why didn't she just build up her strength and release one massive 360º blast? That way she couldn't miss and would have been sure to hit the real Negative Psych!

• All through the episode, Negative Deon activates his powers by snapping his fingers, Thanos-style. During their confrontation, Cecile foils him by using her telekinetic powers to freeze his fingers so he can't snap them. 

Wow, it's too bad he doesn't have another set of fingers he could snap on his other hand. Oh, wait...

• Negative Deon finally manages to gather his strength and snap his fingers, teleporting Cecile, Allegra and Chester outside of Fast Track Labs. He and the other Negative Forces then appear before them, and he says it's time to make them disappear permanently.

So... why didn't he just do that inside the building? Why was it necessary to move everyone outside in order to kill them?

• Barry, Meena and Eobard— who's wearing his old Reverse-Flash suit— then appear to battle the Negative forces. 

For years now, fans have been DEMANDING the return of the Matt Letscher version of the Reverse-Flash. Unfortunately the producers ignored their pleas, and steadfastly stuck with the Tom Cavanagh version— even when his appearance didn't make any sense.

Now at long last Letscher's finally back in his old suit! Unfortunately this is NOT the Reverse-Flash fans all know and love to hate. This is a touchy-feely, fueled by love version that no one asked for.

Then to add insult to injury, we don't even get the epic Flash/Reverse Flash rematch everyone wanted. Instead Eobard wears his costume for three minutes tops, and pretty much stands around doing nothing. 

Sigh... What a complete and utter waste of a guest star!

• During the battle with the Negative Forces, Barry takes Meena and Eobard into Flashtime with him, so they can secretly discuss their strategy while the rest of the world's frozen in time. OK, that was actually pretty darned cool!

• After battling the Negative Forces for a bit, Barry decides he's had enough. He zooms around the city, building up a massive charge of Speed Force Lightning. He then fires a huge blast at the Negative Forces. 

At the last possible instant, Negative Deon snaps his fingers and somehow teleports Present Day Iris from 2049 and materializes her in front of him. She then takes the full force of the blast, and Barry watches in horror as she's killed. A couple things here:

First of all, it's really too bad that a guy who can run so fast that time literally seems to stand still had no way to zoom his wife out of the way of the blast. 

Secondly, the fact that Iris was actually killed here means that Barry fully intended to murder the Negative Forces! Holy crap! What happened to the whole "Heroes Never Kill" thing?

Lastly, it was nice of the Negative Forces to all stop trying to kill Barry so he could cradle Iris' lifeless body in his arms for a few minutes. Classy!

• Stupid, Overly Convoluted Plan #5: We then finally learn the full scope of the Negative Forces' Plan B. Like their earlier strategy, this one's so ridiculously complicated and unlikely that it's a wonder to behold:

The Negative Forces are still pissed at Barry for robbing Thawne of his powers, which destroyed the Negative Speed Force. In order to restore the cosmic balance, Negative Deon killed Thawne (?). He and the other Negative Forces then attacked Barry, knowing he'd retaliate. Negative Deon then yanked Iris from 2049 so that Barry would accidentally kill her. For some reason, this caused Iris to disintegrate into a ball of Negative Still Force energy, which drifted over to Eobard and was absorbed into his body. Thawne then literally tore Eobard's body in half and emerged from it as the new Negative Speed Force. Sure, why not.

I have many questions about this so-called plan. Why did Iris' body turn into a ball of glowing AfterEffects particles? Why would her negative TEMPORAL energy resurrect a speedster like Thawne? Doesn't he get his power from the Negative Speed Force? And even if temporal energy could somehow bring him back, why the hell would he materialize INSIDE of Eobard?

The answer to each of these questions is apparently none of our goddamned business, as none of this is ever addressed or explained.

• Holy crap! Now THAT was an ending! Thawne literally tears Eobard in half and emerges from inside him, like something out of a Cronenberg movie.

It was horrifying, incredibly bizarre and completely unexpected. I loved it! Too bad the rest of the episode didn't have an impact like this!

This ending was clearly inspired by 2017's The Flash #26. The only real difference is the cover features the Reverse-Flash emerging from within the Flash, and not Eobard. Despite that, it's obvious the producers were paying homage to that comic here.