Review: The Flash 3×03 – Magenta

Wells and Jesse return – with a big surprise – as The Flash season three settles down…

 

Season three is definitely upping the speedster content this year. In the first two episodes, we had Kid Flash, Jay Garrick and The Rival and episode three brings us Jesse Quick – Well’s daughter who returns from Earth-2 with an all-new skillset!

The development is an expected one – after she was hit by the particle accelerator last year – but it’s welcome nonetheless. Giving Barry an upbeat female sidekick should make for a fun new dynamic. For this episode, though, the maneuvering to get Jesse into a position where she can go out superheroing made this one slightly humdrum.

But at least with Jesse came her father, “Harry” Wells. Tom Cavanagh’s ever-evolving character has always been a favourite so I’m glad he’s finally back. Seeing him as a more caring – less murderous – father than last year was also interesting, though not as big a change as we might have expected from previous seasons.

Something else that worked was – surprise surprise – the metahuman of the week, who was unusually nuanced for The Flash. Rather than the typical ‘evil for the sake of it’ bad guy she was just a troubled teenager. A little more character work on the antagonists like this would not go amiss in future.

Unfortunately, Wally’s character took a bit of a retread this week, as he returned to his whiny ways of last season. While it’s understandable he’s upset that the Speed Force didn’t choose him, jumping in front of a car in a bid to kickstart his powers was a bit much. It also seems very clear now that Wally is going to shun the STAR Labs gang and go to Doctor Alchemy for help. Come on, Wally, you’re smarter than that!

All in all, an episode with good and some less good elements, then, but I’m still excited to see where all the different storylines develop.

 

Speed Thoughts:

• Julian is looking increasingly shifty. What do we think? Is it too obvious that he’s Alchemy?
• As Cisco’s still a little down, Joe nabbed some of the episode’s best lines with his “dad cop” routine and calling Barry his “second daughter.”
• I should probably mention Barry and Iris’ dates. They were fairly charming scenes but does the fact that The Flash keeps getting in the way of their romance spell trouble down the line?

 

Rating: