After a rush of episodes meant to set up the new status quo of the series, Flash truly hit one out of the park with “New Rogues”. As it not only set up the return of The Rogues, the arrival of Jesse Quick, and a new character, but did some good buildup for other characters too.
It was very fun to see Wentworth Miller back as Leonard Snart, albeit, in a way that doesn’t “rewrite” the Legends of Tomorrow death he suffered…yet. In fact, how he was used was very creative, as he inadvertently created Mirror Master. Another fun tidbit was how MM’s girlfriend was not only another metahuman, but had apparently be captured via the “new” timeline. These two are members of the Rogues in the comics, so for them to arrive together was very fun. Oh, and Harry talking about the more comic accurate version of the villain being on Earth-2 was also fun.
Visually, this was a very cool episode. The use of mirrors, speed, and even the vertigo effect was all nicely played. In a way, The Top was what Count Vertigo should’ve been in Arrow instead of a drug lord, so it was nice to see the actual vertigo effect come into play here.
Also fun was seeing Jesse not only don her super suit, but help Barry out on the job. Yes, she did go through the typical “I’m not ready to be a hero” thing after a rookie mistake, but thankfully they didn’t dwell on it too long. It was good to see the romantic tension between her and Wally get broken, even if it was more-or-less doomed from the start.
Unlike Barry and Iris, who had a fun, yet very realistic, bump in their relationship with how Barry felt being with Iris…so close to Joe. This is something that honestly could only have been done in Flash because of Barry’s relationship with Joe. So it didn’t feel forced at all. This provided some laughs, as well as an interesting ending…even though I think it conflicted with what happened in Season 01…but hey, timelines…am I right?
The only “down” part of the episode was the “Harrison Wells Roulette” story. While I get that they wanted another smart person on their team with Harry going back to Earth-2, scanning the Multiverse for a replacement Wells felt like a big gap in logic. Yes, both in S1 and S2 of the series there has been a Wells to guide them much of the way, however, they have solved their own problems many times. Also though, are we to believe that in ALL of the Multiverse, that ONLY a Harrison Wells could solve the equation? Now yes, this did allow, and will continue to allow, Tom Cavanaugh to wow us with his versatility as an actor…but did it have to be like this?
Finally, Caitlin’s evolution into Killer Frost took a very exciting turn, as she not only let loose her powers to free Barry from a mirror prison, to her hair and lips changing colors, its clear she won’t be able to hide it for much longer, and where it’ll go is anyone’s guess.
“New Rogues” was easily the best of Flash Season 03 in my mind, and I hope this kind of quality continues as we go forward. It wasn’t perfect, but it didn’t need to be, it just needed to be good, and it was definitely that.
4.5 out of 5 nerds
Todd Black
Todd Black is reader of comics, a watch of TV (a LOT of TV), and a writer of many different mediums. He's written teleplays, fan-fictions, and currently writes a comic book called Guardians (guardians-comic.com). He dreams of working at Nintendo, writing a SHAZAM! TV series, and working on Guardians for a very long time!
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