TV REVIEWS: FTN Reviews The Flash Season 5 Episode 3: The Death Of Vibe

While not shining in the best ways, “The Death Of Vibe” did a solid job of keeping Season 5 compelling in the wake of certain…oddities.

First and foremost, the twist with Cicada being both himself and not who Sherloque Wells thought he was was great. For the guy they caught was actually the original Cicada (in both the show and the comics), but because of Nora’s meddling with the timeline, it got changed, and now a new Cicada is here, and he’s come much earlier than he should’ve in the timeline. Oops.

In fact, Nora’s purpose for this season I feel really grew in this episode, as not only is she learning about the “family business” of screwing up the timeline (which Barry frequently does), but now we know it wasn’t exactly her idea to come back and stop the satellite, she had a push in that direction. But from who? Guess we’ll find out.

I’m also glad that Cicada was the focus of the week and not some random metahuman. His attack on Joe was actually really good, and it showcased the comic book origin that Cicada wants the Flash and the metas dead because of an attack on his family, which we know is true because his daughter is in a coma, and who knows about the wife.

Meanwhile, Caitlin made some serious progress on her “find her dad” front. Granted, the revelation came because of some things that apparently she was supposed to find decades ago, but hey, it’s a start. And apparently…the dad may already have an eye on her…

Sadly, not everything did work here. Like the arrival of Sherloque Wells, a French version of the legendary detective. And while he is very much like our Sherlock, he’s still a Wells, and thus, has many faults, including being lazy and scamming people out of money so that he can pay his ex-wives…no, seriously. He’s got seven.

Granted, Team Flash “needs” a Wells, but was this the best they could do? Guess we’ll see how tiresome this one gets after a few episodes.

Then there’s Ralph. While I liked how he helped Caitlin figure things out, the “hostage” scene was completely unnecessary and it just confirmed that he really doesn’t have a place on Team Flash right now, especially with Cicada as the villain and XS now on the team.

Still, “The Death of Vibe” was another solid episode, and if this continues, this season will be very good.