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The Flash Review – Season 1, Episode 9: The Man in the Yellow Suit

By Nick Tylwalk

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Barry Allen has believed that a man in yellow was responsible for the death of his mother for a long time. Tonight, in the midseason finale of The Flash, he’ll come face to face with that man for the first time.

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It’s a confrontation that might not go too well for our hero, judging by the various still images we’ve seen of an injured Barry. Still, it’s a confrontation he’s been seeking, so he’s going to have to face down “The Man in the Yellow Suit.”

(Oh, and we’re going to see more Firestorm too!)

Let’s get running!

Not-So-Fast Summary: It’s Christmas time in Hollis, Queens Central City, and Barry Allen is chasing a yellow blur.

Earlier, Barry helps Joe West decorate, and then undecorate, a tree at super-speed. None the wiser, Iris West comes in with egg nog, and she and Barry exchange gifts. Ever the thoughtful guy stuck in the Friend Zone, Barry got Iris an exact replica of her mother’s wedding band, one she lost a long time ago. In return, he gets a microscope. Eddie Thawne shows up too, and Barry goes right back to being a third wheel.

Barry got the S.T.A.R. Labs science crew gifts too, but Harrison Wells isn’t in a festive mood. Cisco Ramon and Caitlin Snow tell him it’s because the good doctor had his accident around this time of year, ruining it for him.

At Jitters (Iris seems to like hanging out there even off-duty), Eddie asks Iris if Barry was acting weird and wants to know if he has romantic intentions. Iris laughs it off before getting an early Christmas present: a key to Eddie’s place. She agrees to move in with him. Elsewhere, Caitlin is finishing up some shopping when she senses someone following her, the man walks away and she follows, when suddenly he turns around and his head and hands burst into flames. She’s a little weirded out because it sure looks like her dead fiancée, Ronnie Raymond.

At Mercury Labs, where a scientist tells the security guards that they are working on “the future,” the man in yellow attacks. Barry, Joe and Eddie all end up working the crime scene, where Barry deduces that whatever attacked the guards had to be moving at extremely high velocity. The scientist, who locked himself up to stay safe, says he saw a man inside the blur, a man in some kind of yellow suit. Naturally, Barry freaks out about it being his mom’s killer, forcing Joe to fess up about his earlier run-in with the man in yellow, when he took all the files relating to Mrs. Allen’s death and threatened Iris if Joe didn’t back off.

The men take that info directly to S.T.A.R. Labs, where Wells fills them in on how Mercury Labs was working on tachyon particle research under Dr. Tina McGee. He also tells Cisco and Caitlin to start working on a trap for the enemy speedster.

An unusually disheveled Caitlin visits Iris at work to ask her about her blog entries on the “Burning Man.” In return for some leads, Iris asks her girl to girl if it’s possible Barry is hiding a secret. Caitlin lies and assures her he probably isn’t, but also suggests just asking him.

Barry and Harrison talk to Dr. McGee, asking her if they can use her tachyon device, whatever it is, to help catch the person who invaded her lab. She says no. At S.T.A.R. Labs, Cisco thinks he’s made a breakthrough in creating a force field to catch the “Opposite Flash,” but he realizes that Caitlin is lost in her own thoughts. She dishes about seeing Ronnie, and even though Cisco doesn’t believe her, he seems to be persuaded to help find Raymond.

Then it’s flashback time, as Bary thinks back to the night of his mom’s death again. Yep, definitely the same guy in yellow. Iris snaps him back to the present, though with some bad news — for him anyway — about her moving in with Eddie. And … he still won’t tell her how he feels. Iris leaves, but Barry notices the man in yellow standing on a rooftop across the street. He rushes over there and demands to know why his mom had to die. Reverse Flash (let’s just start calling him that, okay?) says that to find out, Barry will have to catch him.

The chase is on, and the speedsters end up at a football field. Reverse Flash taunts Flash for not being fast enough, backing it up by kicking the crap out of him. He also acts like Barry should know him, saying they’ve been going at it for quite some time but he’s always one step ahead. Reverse Flash cryptically says it’s Flash’s destiny always to lose, just like it was his mom’s destiny to die. Then he leaves, with Barry somewhat the worse for wear.

He regroups with the science squad, complaining that the man in yellow is too fast for him. Wells is confident their force field will work, but he still needs the tachyon device as bait. Barry gets it by blackmailing McGee, surprising Joe in the process. And speaking of blackmail, Eddie does some of that to Joe too, insisting that his anti-Flash task force get in on the action.

Cisco and Caitlin work on tracking down Ronnie with one of their gizmoes. It works, but when they find him, he denies that he’s Ronnie. All he’ll say before he bursts into flames is one word: Firestorm.

Back at S.T.A.R. Labs, the trap is set, but Joe and Harrison both agree that they don’t want Barry there, as he’s too close to the situation. As you might expect, he’s none too happy, going off on both of them before leaving. Outside the pipeline, Cisco finds Caitlin crying, admitting that though she’s thought often about what she’d give up to spend one more minute with Ronnie, she now wishes he’d simply died. She breaks down, forcing Cisco to hold her. Hey, he’s kind of a third wheel too.

Barry goes to visit his dad in jail. More tears follow, as he explains that he finally found the main in yellow but couldn’t catch him. Mr. Allen has a Frozen moment, urging his son to let it go because he’s already sacrificed so much, including his love for Iris (yes, dad knows) in his quest to fix what happened to his parents.

Surprisingly, Barry takes that advice to heart and returns home to tell Iris exactly how he feels and has always felt about her. In case you’re counting, that’s three people who have broken into tears over the past few minutes.

Ah yes, the trap. Reverse Flash runs right into it, and Wells says they should see what they caught. Eddie seems a little freaked out, and Joe just wants to ask about the murder of Mrs. Allen. Reverse Flash ignores them to talk to Wells, and stuff is going wrong with the force field. Somehow, Reverse Flash is able to pull Wells inside with him, beating him up something fierce. Joe smashes the force field generator while Caitlin sends an SOS to Barry. Reverse Flash trashes the entire task force before Flash shows up and the fight goes outside. It goes badly for our hero again, and it looks like curtains for Barry until Firestorm arrives and hits Reverse Flash with a generous burst of flame. The man in yellow tells Flash their race is not yet done and says they’ll meet again soon. Firestorm tells Caitlin not to look for him again and flies off. Read that last sentence again!

In a bit of super-PTSD, Joe and Eddie talk, and the former gets the latter to agree to keep the presence of metahumans a secret. You know, to keep other people safe. Joe won’t admit to knowing the Flash’s identity though.

As Cisco and Caitlin tend to the injured Wells, the doctor promises on his life to find Ronnie and bring him home. At Barry’s lab, he and Joe have a surrogate father-son moment, as Joe tells Barry his arrival in the West household changed everything for the better. He also asks Barry not to give up his light, and they head home.

Guess what? Iris, Eddie, Cisco and Caitlin are there, though Harrison didn’t feel up to it. Barry lies again and tells Eddie he’s happy for him and Iris. The more interesting conversation is Cisco telling Joe that when Flash and Reverse Flash fought, he saw red and yellow lightning, the same thing that Barry says he saw when his mom was killed. Both men think that means another speedster was there on the night of Mrs. Allen’s death. Don’t do this to me show — time travel makes my head hurt!

And speaking of time travel, Wells goes into his future room, puts on a ring with a Flash logo, and uses it to open a secret compartment where the Reverse Flash costume is waiting. He attaches the tachyon device to it (at least I think that’s what it is) while saying “Merry Christmas to me” in a voice very similar to the man in yellow.

Favorite moment: Though dueling speedsters are awesome, we’ve never seen any metahumans fly until Ronnie took to the air. That was pretty sweet.

Final thought: I honestly didn’t think we’d find out the identity of the Reverse Flash tonight, but I guess it has to be Wells now. The question now becomes why he’s doing this. He claims to need Flash’s speed, but with the tachyon device, he shouldn’t need Barry any more, right? And are we supposed to believe that Flash and Reverse Flash both traveled back to the night of the murder to duke it out? So many questions for the second half of the season, but that’s what a good midseason finale should provide. January 20 can’t get here soon enough.

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