Tonight’s episode saw Barry Allen take his first tentative steps in moving on from Iris and that lucky woman comes in the form of Malese Jow’s Linda Park. And I have to say I am happy that Linda is played by Jow. I’ve been a fan of hers since The Vampire Diaries and I honestly think the reason why I stopped watching that show was her character Anna got killed off effectively ending her relationship with Jeremy.

But let’s get to our meta human of the week first.

It is Shawna Baez, whom Caitlin will later nickname Peek-a-boo. Shawna’s power is her ability to teleport but we see that she can only teleport if she can see where she is going. Shawn is using her power to break out her boyfriend, Clay Parker, out of Iron Heights.

When Barry goes to investigate the crime scene, he tells Joe that he found traces of some particles that lead outside. The two men deduce that Clay must have teleported out. While still at the crime scene, Joe instigated an actual face to face meeting between Barry and his dad. It is touching as father takes his son’s hand that must have been the first time in a long time.

Henry hears about the case that Barry is working on takes it upon himself to help his son. Later we see Henry talk to Joe and Barry about what he’s found out about Clay. Apparently, Clay was working for a local hood named Marcus Stockmeyer and he owns him lots of money. It is because of that Clay doesn’t want to leave Central City just yet with Shawna.

Back at STAR Labs, Team Flash investigate the particles that Barry took at the scene and determine from the DNA that their metahuman is Shawn and not Clay.

While out for coffee with Iris, who bemoans the fact that her only assignments are to cover the Flash, Barry is alerted to a bank robbery in progress.

The Flash comes on the scene and briefly catches Shawna but she starts to teleport away and he is unable to catch her as she and Clay get away with the cash. They get away because Clay shoots the Flash but with his speed manages to catch the bullet so it only grazes him. Pretty cool as he quips to Caitlin that he is faster than a speeding bullet.

Barry informs Team Flash that Shawna’s power is she can teleport and the team will continue to investigate to find a weakness.

When Clay and Shawna present Marcus with the money owed, Marcus is about to kill Clay when Shawna teleports him to protect him. Marcus is intrigued by this and now won’t let them go as he can use her powers for his schemes. Before any more plotting can occur, the police arrive but Shawna and Clay teleport away.

The reason why the police knew where Marcus et al where was a tip that Henry learned in Iron Heights. Unfortunately that got him stabbed and is rushed to the hospital infirmary. Barry isn’t happy that Henry risked his life but he tells his son that he wanted to feel useful and wanted to help his son, who has so often helped him. Barry learns that one of Marcus’ men, Julian was responsible for his attack.

So as The Flash, he whisks Julian out of prison and he knows that he is caught “escaping” that 5-10 years is going to be added to his sentence. The Flash wants Julian to talk about where Marcus could be. Julian says that Marcus is going to rob a money transfer truck from the Federal Reserve that contains millions.

Shawn and Clay are tailing the armoured truck, she teleports in and grabs some cash. As they start to getaway in a tunnel, the Flash stands in front of them. Shawna and the Flash teleport battle and when Wells informs Barry that he needs to turn off the lights as Shawna cannot teleport if she can’t see. So the Flash takes out all of the lights in the tunnel stopping Shawna, unfortunately Clay has escaped, abandoning his girlfriend/

Shawna is placed in the particle accelerator prison where Cisco says she can’t teleport out as there is one-way glass in her cell. Shawna tells Barry that despite Clay abandoning her, she still loves the guy.

Cisco Follows the Pied Piper

The particle accelerator’s other prisoner is Hartley Rathaway, who told Cisco in the last episode that he knows what happened to Ronnie and where to find him. Cisco doesn’t believe him but does take what Hartley said about Ronnie and does his own investigation of FIRESTORM. When Caitlin sees this, she asks Cisco to drop his investigation and that she has moved on from Ronnie. Cisco doesn’t believe her.

Cisco visits Hartley to ask him what he knows. Hartley mentions that Dr. Martin Stein was at STAR Labs the night of the explosion and the question that Cisco needs to ask is why Stein didn’t leave. Cisco wants to know why but Hartley refuses to answer as he rather show him, Cisco refuses but curiosity getting the better of him, he handcuffs Hartely and lets him out so he can tell what he knows about Ronnie. As they step outside of STAR Labs, Hartley points out a shadow bomb in one of the walls and Cisco asks if it is Stein. Using a distracted Cisco to his advantage, Hartley hits him and attempts to escape. The two tussle for a bit until Cisco pulls out a device that release a sound wave that causes pain in Hartley’s cochlear implant. Hartley finally agrees to stop playing games and will show Cisco what he knows about Ronnie.

In Barry’s lab, the two go over surveillance footage of the night of the explosion. The video reveals Stein unleashing some sort of device and when the explosion happened we see Stein’s eyes turn white just like Ronnie’s. Cisco still doesn’t get what he is supposed to see, Hartley mentions Stein’s research in transmutation and interest in combining cells together and when we see the video advanced frame by frame, we see Ronnie emerge in the wave and merge with Stein. Again Hartley uses a distracter Cisco to take out his implant and then uses it to take down Cisco and escapes,

We definitely haven’t seen the last of the Pied Piper

Barry and Caitlin Let Loose

For SnowBerry fans, this is the episode for you. Both bemoan the state of their love lives. First off, Barry rushes off to help Iris with her story, which he promised to do during their coffee hangout but she blows him off to have dinner with Eddie’s mom.

Barry soon realizes that Iris will never see him more than a friend no matter what he tries to do. Caitlin says that she is still hung up on a guy that can catch on fire.

So Barry decides to head to a bar that is supposed to be Shawna and Clay’s hangout in hopes they catch the two (they never show up to this bar) and Caitlin meets him there.

As the evening wears on, Caitlin gets increasingly drunk and she is a funny drunk. One of the things she does is get Barry to come out and sing a karaoke duet with her. The chosen song is “Summer Nights” from Grease. Caitlin is an awful singer but Barry is pretty great. Of course he is as it is Grant Gustin brushing off his singing skills from his Glee days. I wonder when Supergirl comes on this fall, there will be an inevitable episode of Kara singing.

When Barry Meets Linda

When Barry tries to close out the bar tab, the bartender ignores him and we get our meet-cute of Linda and Barry. Linda gets the bartender to pay attention to Barry and he pays off the bill. Linda gets really flirty with Barry and even taps in her contact info into his phone and tells him what he does with that information is up to him.

Later on as Barry takes home a very drunk Caitlin, she asks if he will call the girl from the bar. Barry doesn’t know as we see Caitlin try and get undressed. Caitlin asks for help and Barry uses his speed to get her into her PJs. And Barry stays with Caitlin till she falls asleep.

Cisco Comes Clean

The next morning Caitlin is very hung over but soon sobers up when she hears Cisco admit that he let Hartley go because he knew things about Ronnie. Caitlin and Barry wonder why he would do that so Cisco admits to Caitlin that he sealed Ronnie in the particle accelerator and it his guild that led him to let Hartley go. Caitlin forgives Cisco as she believed Ronnie would have thought he was doing the right thing.

The Flash Caught on Camera

The beginning of the episode featured the Flash saving a couple after a car accident had their car flipped over with downed power lines all over. The husband thanks the Flash for saving their lives and seems proud of being able to save someone.

Even Shawna has heard of the Flash’s exploits too during their first encounter.

Also, this whole thing with Barry as the Flash helping Iris by providing her with a story is very much how in Smallville Clark did the same thing with Lois in season 8 when she was clamouring for an interview with the Blur. In that episode, Clark called Lois a great reporter, which Barry does the same with Iris. However, we had two season of Lois being a great reporter, I feel that we haven’t even skimmed the surface of Iris’ reporting capabilities as we haven’t really seen her in reporter mode. When the Flash leaves, we see that Iris has managed to snap a picture of the Flash, which makes the front page of the Central City Picture News.

Barry Moves On

We do see that Barry does call Linda as he is ready to move on. When Barry arrives at the Central City Picture News, Iris is surprised to see him as she didn’t know the were supposed to meet. Barry gently breaks to Iris that he has a lunch date and it is with the paper’s sports reporter, Linda.

 

Proud Papa

Barry visits his dad after his date with Linda, who is happy that he finally seeing someone. Henry also shows him the picture of the Flash and mentions how he saw him once in Iron Heights and thinks it weird how the Flash took Julian to get him to talk. Barry thinks his dad is silly to think he is the Flash and he would tell him if he was. Henry is a pretty wise and cool dad so plays along and says that if were able to talk to the Flash, he would tell him to be careful and that he if were the Flash’s father, he would be very proud. And then something got in my eye.

Hello, Grodd

The end credit scene features to utility workers are checking out some faulty wiring in the sewers. We noticed some writing on the wall, which says Grodd. The two workers hear a noise and investigate. We see in the darkness a gorilla that attacks both workers.

So let’s see how Grodd will play out as the season progresses but think we won’t find out next week as that episode is all about Firestorm.