Advance Review: The Flash “Escape From Earth-2” Tonight!

Tonight brings the second part of The Flash’s two-part Earth-2 story to The CW, and while there’s not as much world-building as we saw in the last chapter, there’s still a lot to like.

“Escape From Earth-2” pretty much has the episode’s goal in the title: Barry has to escape from being in Zoom’s captivity and he and Cisco need to find their way back to their rightful world. As per usual with The Flash, every time some mysteries are solved, some new ones come up: In this case, the man in an iron mask. Who is he? Ferro Lad? Wally of Earth-2? We don’t know, but what we do learn from him will prompt new questions. We also get to finally see more than a minute of Harrison Wells’ Earth-2 daughter, Jessie.

There’s some good humor in addition to the danger. Grant Gustin is a joy as his very, very, very dorky Earth-2 counterpart. Danielle Panabaker’s icy Killer Frost also brings out a certain fun that we don’t normally see from Caitlin. It’s also very amusing to see Iris (Candice Patton)’s reaction when she finds out that wasn’t her husband she was kissing in the previous episode!

Meanwhile on Earth-1, Jay Garrick tries a new version of the Velocity drug so he can stop Geomancer, who is one of the show’s least interesting villains who at least has cool powers. While I do like seeing what happens to Earth-1 while our heroes are gone, I probably would have preferred to see more of what was going on with Earth-2.

And, of course, there’s Zoom, who will never fail to shock the audience with no advance preparation. Did I manage to finish this review without revealing any of the Do-Not-Reveals? I think so! But trust me, there are twists!

Ultimately? It’s a pretty good hour or TV. Not “the best” like last week’s was, but still better than 99% of everything else that’s on TV.

The Flash “Escape from Earth-2” airs at 8PM Tuesday, February 16 on The CW. You can see some preview images here… and if  you’d like, come join the countdown to the episode on our forum!