Flash 1.19

Who Is Harrison Wells?

Barry, Joe, Eddie, Caitlin, and Cisco meet to discuss what to do next about their investigation into Dr. Wells. They are all on board except for Caitlin. She has doubts. The meeting ends abruptly when she storms off.

After the meeting Cisco and Detective West head to Starling City to try and dig up something on Dr. Wells life before he moved to Central City. They get some help from Lance of the SCPD. I can't figure out what his rank or title is at this point. I know that in the first season of Arrow he was a Detective. He later got busted down in rank. In this episode someone addresses him as Captain. That someone is Laurel Lance, his daughter.

In what has to be the goofiest and least elegant scene in this episode and possibly the whole season, Laurel admits to Cisco that she is the Black Canary. She asks him for some help with fixing or augmenting one of her weapons. He does so but there are no demonstrations on this episode. That probably happened on an episode of Arrow. I was a bit concerned when I saw that there were two characters from Arrow going to show up in this episode. On the whole the Starling City characters didn't appear as much as they have in a few other episodes which was definitely a good thing.

Barry and Eddie have to deal with a metahuman who is able to assume any form. At first they aren't sure what they are dealing with until Barry sees the guy transform into a teenage girl. Apparently he retains the ability to assume the form of anyone he has touched. He loses Flash very quickly during their first encounter. The second time around the metahuman, whose real name is Hannibal Bates, assumes the identity of Eddie and shoots two cops. Eddie is arrested for shooting the two cops. Eventually he gets cleared thanks to some sleuthing by Iris and the Flash.

Still disguised as Eddie, Bates goes to Joe's house. Barry is the only one there. He thinks it is Eddie and gets knocked out by Bates. Caitlin walks in next but she is also fooled by Bates who now looks like Barry. Bates and Snow head back to STAR Labs. Bates is acting strange but Caitlin fails to pickup on what is wrong, even after "Barry" kisses her. What's really interesting about that is that she doesn't tell anyone about him kissing her. She gets really jumpy when the real Barry touches her on the shoulder later in the episode.

In Starling City Lance takes West and Ramon to the site where Dr. Wells and his wife were in a car crash, that was depicted in 1.17 (Tricksters). Using some of his high tech gadgets Cisco finds what turns out to be the remains of the real Dr. Wells. This proves to be a crucial piece of information in swaying Caitlin to believe that the Dr. Wells they know isn't who he says he is.

Bates, still disguised as Barry, is about to shoot someone when Dr. Wells takes him down from behind with a TASER. Iris is visiting STAR Labs and insists on taking the bad guy to the police. What a stupid idea, colossally stupid. The inevitable happens, Bates escapes. Caitlin goes back to Joe's house. There she finds Barry who is still unconscious and tied up. She frees him and they head back to STAR Labs.

Soon thereafter Dr. Wells is able to detect Barry's cellphone, which Bates has, at the airport. Barry rushes there and gets into a fight with Bates. Bates changes form several times during the fight. At one point he is Caitlin, then Eddie, and then finally Iris. I thought this was very cool. Barry is able to defeat Bates at last thank to a serum developed by Caitlin. Bates gets locked up at STAR Labs like all the other villains. He admits that he can't remember who he really is.

Dr. Wells goes to see Detective West after he and Cisco return to Central City. He seems suspicious of Joe's reason for going to Starling City. He suggests that they should have another drink together some day. Joe is wary.

Finally Cisco, Barry, and Caitlin go looking for anything strange in STAR Labs. They find and enter Dr. Wells secret room where he stores the Reverse Flash costume and the digital newspaper from 2024 which has the headline about the Flash disappearing during the Crisis. They are all stunned.

I am always chagrined by how fast people leap to conclusions on TV shows, on very little or no evidence. How in the world were they able to confirm that the body was not the real Dr. Wells that quickly? Why did they assume that the shapeshifter has to be a man? In the end it seems like it is but still.

Another exciting episode. There are lots of little things that were cool. I liked how the two stories (supervillain of the week and the mystery of Harrison Wells) were layered together and interacted with one another.