In ‘The Flash’ recap, Barry tracks down the next meta-human targeted by Clifford DeVoe while Harry tries to develop a weapon to stop him…
By Damon Martin — Editor/Lead Writer
‘The Flash’ returned on Tuesday night following a Winter Olympics hiatus with an overall cookie cutter episode focused on another meta-human being targeted by Clifford DeVoe but there were still plenty of worthwhile reveals during the hour.
When we last left ‘The Flash’, Barry was released from prison after finally out smarting ‘The Thinker’ by having Ralph morph into the old version of Clifford DeVoe before he started hopping from body to body, which forced the judge to put an end to his sentence because if someone isn’t dead, there hasn’t been a murder committed.
Barry begins to get back into his old life, although certain parts aren’t as easy as others, and now he’s forced to put all of his time and effort into stopping DeVoe.
Also for the first time, we are starting to see cracks in DeVoe’s master plan as he’s been forced to jump from meta-human to meta-human to sustain a healthy body but it’s becoming abundantly clear that time is running on him. What will be interested to see over these next few episodes is what the end game is for DeVoe?
Is the 12th meta-human from that bus ride bombarded with dark matter the one that will be stabilized and keep him alive forever or is there another plan he has in mind to keep him alive rather than jumping from body to body/
Plus Harry returns from Earth-2 this week and finds a new friend in Cecille as her mind reading storyline continues, but it finally pays off — at least initially — with a weapon used against DeVoe.
With that said, let’s recap the latest episode of ‘The Flash’ titled ‘Subject 9’…
Back to Life, Back to Reality
Barry Allen has been released from prison but it doesn’t take long to find out that no longer being behind bars doesn’t mean people aren’t still suspicious about what he did or didn’t do. When Barry returns to the police precinct to start back at his old job, he finds a lot of odd stares being cast in his direction before Captain Singh tells him that he’s being placed on indefinite suspension while the department continues to investigate the curious return of Clifford DeVoe.
Without a job, Barry tries to rededicate himself to stopping DeVoe once and for all and that means finding the remaining meta-humans from that bus that was bombarded by dark matter several months ago.
Because Ralph is one of the targets, Team Flash has adopted the ‘buddy system’ where somebody stays with him 24/7 to ensure he’s protected just in case DeVoe attacks. Cisco has taken that job up until now with Ralph coming up with an idea on how to track down the other meta-humans.
Thanks to a lost and found box from the bus station, the team starts digging through items left behind and they stumble onto a demo CD from a country artist named Izzy Bowin. A quick vibe from Cisco shows that Izzy is a she who is an aspiring musician and completely unaware of the kind of danger she’s in from DeVoe.
When Barry and Ralph approach her about protecting, Izzy isn’t convinced and uses her powers to stop them dead in their tracks. It turns out Izzy can manipulate sound waves so it’s almost like she can create a sonic boom with her powers. Izzy makes a quick escape, but Barry and Ralph are determined to find her again before DeVoe can get his hands on her.
Meanwhile back at DeVoe’s evil lair, he’s lashing out at Marlize as his recent transplant into Becky Sharpe isn’t lasting as long as he had hoped with her body already deteriorating at a rapid pace. Marlize theorizes that adding all these different meta-human powers is eating away at the body at a quicker rate than even DeVoe could have expected.
That means DeVoe is going to be forced to speed up his plan of attack, which lands him in direct conflict with Team Flash after they track down Izzy for a second time.
When Barry and Ralph arrive, they return as the Flash and Elongated Man to try and convince Izzy that she’s in real trouble. Just then, DeVoe shows up to collect his next meta-human but Izzy blasts him with her sonic boom and he’s hurt badly. Marlize shows up and pulls him back into whatever portal they use to escape, but Barry realizes something very important to their current battle against DeVoe — Izzy can hurt him.
Back at STAR Labs, Izzy is still not convinced that she needs to join Team Flash to go up against DeVoe but Ralph takes his turn offering the inspiring speech of the week to get her to stay. Ralph then begins her hero training, but it’s a slow moving process.
Barry finally decides to step in but pushes too far, too fast and Izzy ends up getting hurt, which then leads to her exit from the team. Iris knows that Barry desperately wants to stop DeVoe but he’s not realizing how hard he’s pushing to get the job done and now Izzy is gone.
If You Could Read My Mind
Harry returns from Earth-2 where he’s depressed over his relationship with his daughter and his inability to help Team Flash defeat DeVoe. He runs into Cecille, who is having her own problems as her mind reading ability refuses to shut off even when she’s sleeping.
Harry decides to help her out by building a machine that will inhibit the brain waves from permeating her mind, but the contraption is gigantic and far too cumbersome for her to wear when she sleeps. During the ensuing argument about her not appreciate his work and Harry not being realistic about what he’s building, he finally reveals the insecurities he’s feeling about his relationship with Jesse and inability to stop DeVoe.
Harry finally reconfigures the device into a much smaller package but while explaining to Cecille how it works, he realizes that reversing his technology may provide a way for the team to stop DeVoe from transferring his consciousness from body to body.
When Harry reveals this information to the team, he also comes up with a name — the cerebral inhibitor — and that clicks with Barry and Iris. Last season when dealing with Savitar, they brought him to STAR Labs where he made mention of this spot being there they created the cerebral inhibitor to deal with DeVoe.
Barry gets excited thinking that they finally have a way to stop DeVoe with a weapon that can prevent him from taking over another body.
Take On Me
Thanks to some online research, Team Flash tracks down Izzy just as DeVoe arrives to collect his latest specimen. Barry attempts to slow him down but DeVoe’s gathered powers stop him dead in his tracks. Thankfully, Ralph is quick reacting enough to put the cerebral inhibitor on him but the plan soon fails when DeVoe uses Kil%ore’s powers to hack the technology and render it useless.
Remember, Savitar said they used the cerebral inhibitor against DeVoe — he never said it stopped him.
The battle ends when Devoe uses one of his force fields to trap Barry and Ralph outside while he connects his chair to Izzy and transfers his consciousness into her. Ralph is visibly shaken because he was growing close to Izzy and now she’s gone.
DeVoe disappears after taking another body and he begins to conspire with Marlize on an effort to track down the remaining three meta-humans that will act as part of his final plan.
Meanwhile, back at Team Flash, everybody is a little down in the dumps after failing to stop DeVoe yet again but they finally have a break through. Cisco begins to figure out that perhaps the way that DeVoe and his wife are traveling to all these locations in a split second is by using a pocket dimension.
Basically it’s a fold in space and time that in theory would allow someone to travel in between our dimension and another one. Barry then realizes that perhaps that’s how DeVoe has stayed off their radar because not only is he traveling through these pocket dimensions — that must be where he’s hiding his lair as well.
Before the episode ends, Barry pays a visit to Ralph in his detective agency where he finds his friend rather down in the dumps over what happened to Izzy. As it turns out, Ralph isn’t depressed as much as renewed with purpose to stop DeVoe at all costs. Ralph has even figured out a way to make the ‘buddy system’ work for Barry after printing up new business cards that say — Barry Allen, Private Investigator.
Ralph and Barry will now team up as a detective duo by day while stopping crime at night and hopefully figuring out a way to put an end to DeVoe once and for all.
‘The Flash’ returns with a brand new episode next Tuesday night at 8pm ET on the CW.