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Loved It? Hated It? What did you think of "Killer Frost?"

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  • #31
    Originally posted by YutG
    May not be PC but did he try using V9? When he got his powers back did he rescue Caitlin? What I am really looking for was effort on Barry's part. If it was Iris do you thing he would have done the same thing?
    V9 would have given him superspeed, but also messed with his head and caused his health to deteriorate. Having seen what it did to Trajectory, he probably figured that V9 was too volatile to depend on.

    From what I remember, when he got his powers back, the city was immediately attacked by Zoom's metas. Barry started dealing with them and at some point during that time, Zoom released Caitlin. Not trying to excuse him, but it's not like he was sitting around doing nothing. Zoom kept him busy.

    Don't know if Barry would have done anything differently if Iris was in Caitlin's position. If the situations were exactly the same, I think his options would have been equally limited. Only thing that he might have done different is agree to use the particle accelerator to get his powers back sooner than he did.

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    • #32
      While I think Barry has had heroic moments over the course of the series, it's the self-interested side of him and what I'd call the 'meta entitlement attitude' aka that his powers give him the right to act with little to no accountability (even more prominent after his Speed Force sojourn), that has irked me about him. So while he has had altruistic moments, those times when he did save people or change time allegedly for the greater good, but motivated by selfish intent -- all of this takes a shine off his heroic status, a status that I feel at times he's given carte blanche to enjoy just because he is The Flash. It's a cumulative effect, to the point where we find ourselves in S3 and wonder if he could ever make amends for Flashpoint.

      I think that's the crux of it: his spotty track record of doing good deeds out of a sense of duty or justice, and doing good deeds to serve his self-interest doesn't make him look ideal as a hero, at minimum. I'm sure they'll come up with something that'll Febreze some of the stink of his less creditable actions. I mean, it'll do for the purposes of the show and maybe it'll look like enough that Barry endures a period where Cisco can barely tolerate him, Caitlin is tormented by her KF tendencies and Wally is struggling with abilities that may consume him.

      Witnessing that and feeling powerless may be a form of penance, it may be good enough for some Flash fans (perhaps not for me). There is something to be said about taking the hero out of his comfort zone and seeing how he'll react, but maybe even this is too uncomfortable for the series or some viewers. But the odds are he'll get what we wants at the end, with the team back to normal and never losing Iris' love. The unknown is if the whole experience will sink in, he learns something about it and -- this is key -- he applies these lessons to his future behaviour. That would be the litmus test in S3.

      Maybe it's the Batman fan in me, I don't necessarily have a problem if, like Bane, Flashpoint did break the hero's back (figuratively/thematically) but the ordeal makes him stronger as a character at the end of the road. (Yes, I know, too dark for Flash, Arrow is The CW's "Batman", etc.)

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      • #33
        Or Barry could go down the Walter White road, creating ever more complex situations and problems while still telling himself he's doing it for the greater good.

        But that would make the show go down a much darker road than it started on.

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        • #34
          President Luthor, I don't have a problem with Barry been taken out of his comfort zone (again, to a certain degree because no hero show should ever have to completely deconstruct its main character). The problem, again, is that I feel people are looking for some kind of "punishment" that just isn't there. What's the worst thing that can happen to Barry for his actions? He can't be taken to the authorities for changing the timeline. The only other thing I can think of is Cisco and Caitlin cutting all ties. But the show won't go there. Not because they want to protect Barry (if they did, they wouldn't have created this whole mess in the first place), but because the show is too anchored on a Team Flash concept where Cisco and Caitlin feature heavily. It's the same reason why they got cold feet (pun intended) and didn't permanently turn Caitlin into Killer Frost. They don't know what to do with Cisco and Caitlin if they take them out of Team Flash. So everyone will keep working with each other and it will be awkward and intense and you'll never know when Cisco or Caitlin will bite Barry's head off. At least HR will be around to take the sting out of some of those scenes.

          All that said, I feel there is one aspect in this whole storyline that's been overlooked in regards to Cisco and Caitlin. Are they victims of Barry's selfish decision to time travel so that he could save his mother? Yes. But also, they have been accomplices in their own way. In the last 2 seasons, has either of them ever discouraged Barry from time traveling? When he time traveled last year to get advice from 2015!Eobard, Cisco and Caitlin went along with everything. When he time traveled to save his mother in the season 1 finale (and potentially ruin the whole timeline just like he did here), Cisco and Caitlin were there to cheer him on: "May the speed force be with you" and all that. None of them ever stopped to wonder "wait a minute, how will changing an event from 15 years ago affect us or the rest of the world?". It's not like they didn't know. Eobard and Stein had warned them. If Barry saved Nora the first time he went back, we might have had the same sequence of events that ultimately got Dante killed. Would Cisco have blamed Barry for that, knowing full well that he supported Barry in his quest? And yes, I understand that Barry created Flashpoint without telling anyone, but would Cisco and Caitlin have objected to it anyway? Doubtful.

          Barry developed a God complex, especially in late season 2. No arguing there. But Caitlin and especially Cisco have enabled him to do that because of how "cool" it is to work with a speedster who can time travel and to play the heroes. Now it came back to haunt them and just like Barry has to look himself in the mirror, so does Team Flash in general, imo.

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          • #35
            Originally posted by costas22
            The problem, again, is that I feel people are looking for some kind of "punishment" that just isn't there. What's the worst thing that can happen to Barry for his actions? He can't be taken to the authorities for changing the timeline. The only other thing I can think of is Cisco and Caitlin cutting all ties. But the show won't go there. Not because they want to protect Barry (if they did, they wouldn't have created this whole mess in the first place), but because the show is too anchored on a Team Flash concept where Cisco and Caitlin feature heavily. It's the same reason why they got cold feet (pun intended) and didn't permanently turn Caitlin into Killer Frost. They don't know what to do with Cisco and Caitlin if they take them out of Team Flash. So everyone will keep working with each other and it will be awkward and intense and you'll never know when Cisco or Caitlin will bite Barry's head off. At least HR will be around to take the sting out of some of those scenes.
            I see it in a similar vein to the whole brouhaha over "how long" Oliver had to process that he had a son before telling all to Felicity: a day, a week, a month, no time limit he can take his sweet time, etc.? Some say he had about a week tops, others think he could keep Felicity in the dark forever. No consensus will ever be found. And obviously, Barry's stakes are much higher and affect everyone. The stability of time itself trumps Olicity's will they-won't they low stakes drama here.

            Re: Barry's situation, how much penance would be suitable for Barry to redeem himself for his Flashpoint sins? One extreme is some simple apology to the team, he doesn't really change his future behaviour and everyone goes along with it just because. On the other extreme, maybe he's stripped of his powers or loses the trust/confidence of Cisco or Caitlin or both. One makes him look like he can do no wrong and get away with just about anything, the other could very well change the DNA of the show, what makes it enjoyable - perhaps irreparably. I actually fall between the mid-range, maybe leaning closer to a higher and/or permanent price paid. I'd argue that, having Iris' love locked down, he's not all that concerned about any price he'd have to pay for Flashpoint at this point.

            It's not that we'd want to see Barry punished and gutted as a hero we'd grown to love on this show. I understand the fear that this may be happening and we certainly don't want a SV situation where Clark looked so damaged and flawed as a character that it didn't look good that he could ever become Superman until practically the last season.

            For me, it's more of a balancing of scales. What Barry did with Flashpoint -- there must be some accounting for it and him merely telling Cisco to move forward or Iris urging the team to do the same didn't cut it with me then, as much as story and series' tone-wise they did have to put the baggage on the shelf. This is why Cisco getting into a physical altercation with Barry was a (good) sign to me that Barry feeling bad/sorry about it isn't going to be enough to even the scales here. He will have to earn that trust back and it won't be easy or quick.

            Basically, while I don't want to see Barry and team beating themselves up over all this up to episode 22 (yes, that would be a drag to watch) -- I don't want Barry to get a pass on Flashpoint or some cop-out soft landing out of any real consequences. I want at least one big consequence to stick (it's not much to ask), one that he can't change and ideally something that personally affects him -- but I'd also be happy if the consequence is some big-picture event that he cannot reverse or fix. Somehow, I don't think the Diggle baby changing from girl to boy would count or is something that'll keep Barry up in night sweats of remorse.

            I also agree with your idea that HR's mere presence in ramping up the comedy isn't random and may be precisely because the show knew Cisco would be entering a moodier, less jovial phase and his humour relief role had to be handled by someone else, if only temporarily.

            Barry developed a God complex, especially in late season 2. No arguing there. But Caitlin and especially Cisco have enabled him to do that because of how "cool" it is to work with a speedster who can time travel and to play the heroes. Now it came back to haunt them and just like Barry has to look himself in the mirror, so does Team Flash in general, imo.
            I agree with the idea that Team Flash have been enablers in this sense aka Barry fanboy'd/fangirl'd into having a dangerously too-lofty opinion of himself. Quick to embrace what he could do, not so much in recognizing the risks inherent in putting him up on a high pedestal. They were on board with plenty of his schemes to tweak/reverse/change time, they can't plead innocent there. Sure, his Speed Force siesta played a significant role in casting a messianic tone over his mission and purpose, but they have all played a hand in reinforcing their almost blind trust in his ability to make judgment calls and do the right thing.

            Is it simply faith in a good friend, or naivety in trusting that someone chosen to be greater than man will automatically know how to use such powers wisely?

            So while Barry still holds responsibility for any Flashpoint fallout, Caitlin, Cisco, Harry, Joe, Iris and to a lesser degree maybe even Oliver as a mentor are no innocent lambs re: Barry and his over-confidence. If they weren't so willing to place confidence in him as a hero without maybe being more cautious or keeping him on a shorter leash, even if he pushed back against these restraints ... maybe he'd have more sense than he's shown in meddling with the space-time continuum (often!) like he has. Who knows.

            It was ultimately Barry's choice to save Nora, he can't avoid this fact, the fallout of this choice is on him. But to have the confidence/smugness to actually make this choice, to think 'yeah, I can do this and should do this' -- well, that confidence stemmed from plenty of factors, including the team's easy-going attitude towards his powers and their largely kid gloves treatment of his previous mistakes. That's why when they did decide to lock him up in that (illegal, this cannot be stated enough) STARLabs cell last season for his own good, it was both welcome and long overdue. They showed they appreciated the risk he posed and, yes, feared what he might do with such power. Like Barry, I'm not sure the lessons learned then actually stuck with them.

            Team Flash were enablers to some extent re: his current God complex, that much is clear.

            Comment


            • #36
              Now that he's unemployed perhaps he should surrender his title as the Flash as well and look into becoming a metahuman negotiator. He's better at talking them down than being The Flash and figuring out ways to combat them on his own. I think his biggest hindrance is having a team behind him to do the thinking. They need to get rid of all that and really hone in on Barry's ability as a scientist to research and learn ways his speed can work for him. He pretty much has all the time in the world to read up on and learn the physics of it all.

              And as much as I appreciate Iris being there for him and giving him a boost, they need to save that for their pillow talk. I liked it when she called him on his faults and challenged him into making decisions for himself. I'm over him not being ethical in his approach and morally going against the code of what superheros are. As somebody mentioned, he really is the evil in this story -- Eoboard was not wrong in calling him the villain.

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              • #37
                I think it really is time they stop spoon-feeding him the right thing to do, whether it's the team, Jay, whoever. It's S3 ... dude's gotta learn at some point that he either has the mettle to be the hero he believes himself to be or not. While seeing the team work together is fun, his over-reliance on them has played a part too in restricting his own independence as a character - and the lead one at that.

                If he gets a slap on the wrist for his Flashpoint actions, suffers little if any blowback personally and everyone affected by his deeds inexplicably shrugs it off as not that big of a deal ... I'd find it hard to disagree with Eobard.

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                • #38
                  I've said it before, and I'll say it again: nothing would please me more than to see the "Team Flash" dynamic shattered. There's no way it happens, though. It's in the DNA of all these Berlanti shows, unfortunately. Supergirl has to work with the DEO. Flash has to work with S.T.A.R. Labs. Green Arrow has to work with Felicity and a bunch of rookies, for some reason. The Legends are an actual team (with a stupid name), more or less. Best case scenario on this show is Killer Frost gets off the leash for multiple episodes next time. Maybe they'll get rid of HR at some point and won't replace him with yet another Wells. But I'm confident that until the end of the show, there will be a group of people standing around S.T.A.R. Labs - half of whom have no business being there - trying to solve the Flash problem of the day. It takes me back to the days of Clark always running to the Daily Planet to ask Chloe how to do things. Ah, memories.

                  I assume Cisco still supposedly works with the CCPD from time to time, and that's a much better use for S.T.A.R. Labs than simply assisting The Flash. I'm thinking he may have helped imprison Mirror Master, at least. Think about all the wasted potential when all their resources are devoted to Barry.

                  Anyway, yes, everything Frosty Caitlin and Julian said in this episode about Barry were true, which makes things a bit awkward for Barry. It's too bad Caitlin thawed so quickly and gave Barry a hug, assuming she's not playing them all. At least Cisco might not be so quick to jump back into Barry's arms. *insert fanfic*

                  Speaking of Cisco, I hadn't realized he didn't know Dante was previously alive, but I did expect this thing to become an issue when they needed to milk some drama out of it again. I'm glad to see it.

                  And back to Caitlin. Are they seriously just going to let her walk around freely like nothing happened? Prison may not be the best place for her to work out her issue, but she did assault multiple people, and the only real basis for assuming "it's not really her" is because she's a friend. I'm having another flashback to Smallville, where Clark got to pretend none of the red kryptonite stuff happened.

                  Now, despite thinking Caitlin's and Julian's criticisms of Barry were on the mark, Iris had a decent point. How do we know Dante wouldn't have died or that Caitlin wouldn't have developed powers anyway? The timing is certainly suspicious, but I doubt the time wraiths could prove Barry guilty beyond reasonable doubt in a court of law. Now, Julian's presence and Joe and Iris's spat, both of which predate Barry's Flashpoint sojourn (and the latter of which was the most inconsequential of all changes), seem much more obvious consequences. And, of course, the Alchemy plot to give people their Flashpoint lives is pretty obviously Barry's fault, given everything we know. I would also call BS on Iris's argument, but like I said, reasonable doubt.
                  Last edited by nate-dog1701d; 11-27-2016, 10:47 PM.

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                  • #39
                    Originally posted by nate-dog1701d
                    Now, despite thinking Caitlin's and Julian's criticisms of Barry were on the mark, Iris had a decent point. How do we know Dante wouldn't have died or that Caitlin wouldn't have developed powers anyway? The timing is certainly suspicious, but I doubt the time wraiths could prove Barry guilty beyond reasonable doubt in a court of law. Now, Julian's presence and Joe and Iris's spat, both of which predate Barry's Flashpoint sojourn (and the latter of which was the most inconsequential of all changes), seem much more obvious consequences. And, of course, the Alchemy plot to give people their Flashpoint lives is pretty obviously Barry's fault, given everything we know. I would also call BS on Iris's argument, but like I said, reasonable doubt.
                    Yeah, those are the only certain Flashpoint consequences, along with Diggle's child becoming a boy (which is probably something they will address this week). The other alterations could very well have happened in the original timeline as well. Although in Dante's case, even if he did die in the original timeline, it happened later than it did in the current one (if we assume that Thawne returned Barry to the same point in time from which he created Flashpoint).

                    Good thing you mentioned the Time Wraiths, because I had completely forgotten about them. And looks like the writers have as well.

                    Comment


                    • #40
                      I was under the impression that Barry came back three months after leaving - i.e. the amount of time he spent in Flashpoint. That's why I thought it was significant when Caitlin mentioned that her powers manifested three months ago. I don't remember if they said when Dante died.

                      Diggle's child is a hilarious change. I guess I'm mildly impressed that they even acknowledged the timeline change on Arrow.

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                      • #41
                        I'm incredibly late to this party, but I feel this episode was a very well directed one and I was very much looking forward to seeing what would happen if/when Caitlin became Killer Frost, and for the most part it paid off.

                        Regarding KF calling out Barry for his past actions, it was nice to see that she didn't pull any punches on those speeches she gave him, in fact basically the whole episode was just dragging him through the mud, though for very justified reasons. I admittedly cringed when she said things that hit him right where it hurts and she mentioned a ton of people who were affected by him, but at the same time I thought about all of those people and the context regarding them because she was leaving out some things. For example, she said "just like you helped your mother?" which cuts pretty deep but I kept in mind that Barry going back in time to help his mother is what caused all of this in the first, and even his past self warned him about that, so really him not helping his mother was for the best. Then she brought up Eddie and Ronnie, both of whom made their own decisions to sacrifice their lives IIRC, in fact Eddie killing himself at the end of season 1 and (temporarily) erasing Thawne from the timeline is what caused the wormhole to open, which in turn led to Ronnie dying, again. Wally ends up getting speed powers so her sarcastically saying "like you helped Wally" is funny because he actually did help him, better since a lot of people were getting sick of Wally whining and moping about not having powers previously to the point where he jumped in front of a moving vehicle just to see if they'd activate. So really while her words were harsh, they're not that harsh when you look at the circumstances behind everything.

                        Also, it was mentioned a few posts earlier but other members of Team Flash aren't completely innocent either. They've either ignored or actively encouraged his use of time travel in previous episodes, the one where Barry goes back to try and get "help" from Wells-Thawne being a big example and the Time Wraiths being introduced in that same episode. Of course that situation ended well since Hartley came back, helped Flash and is no longer a bad guy. And then there's also the season 1 finale, where they were all okay with him going back in time to save his mom the first time, while also sending Thawne back to his time, and I think Cisco even acknowledged that him changing the timeline means they might never meet each other potentially. I guess my point is that while Barry is responsible for his decisions and the effects it has on everyone and he should see the consequences, pretty much everyone else has a hand in this as well, so basically while they're all the heroes none of them are above reproach.

                        Julian telling Barry to quit CSI because he asked him to cover for Caitlin, yeah I won't deny that's a reasonable thing to do. Of course he doesn't know Barry is the Flash and he is Alchemy.

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