The Flash season 6, episode 5 review: Kiss Kiss Breach Breach

“Sometimes the truth is the hardest lie to see through.” Spoilers for The Flash season 6, episode 5 follow.

Barry and Iris are going on vacation, possibly their last one ever, leaving Team Flash to take care of Central City by themselves.

Meanwhile, Nash Wells continues his search for The Monitor on Earth-1.

The new team leader

So far this season, pretty much everything has been Barry-centric, which makes sense as he’s possibly about to die during Crisis on Infinite Earths. However, it has felt like some of the other characters haven’t been getting the best treatment because of that, most notably Cisco last week. But now, we have a Cisco-centric episode that plays into his decision to take the metahuman cure at the end of last season, as well as Gypsy and Breacher making their return.

Well only Breacher’s back as Gypsy has been killed, leading to this episode becoming a murder mystery that builds Cisco’s current relationships as well bringing his past fill circle. It’s also just wonderful to see Danny Trejo back as Breacher no matter the context.

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By doing this, the show allows Cisco to start to become a new Barry, just like Barry wants him to. Not in that he’s going to become a Crime Scene Investigator like Barry, but rather having him learn what it means to take charge even in the midst of personal tragedy.

He learns the tenacity that Barry has built up to this point on the show and refuses to give up. So, even if it may not have felt perfect to make Cisco the leader of Team Flash after Barry dies before, it does so now.

The real problem with this storyline falls on Kamilla and the mystery itself. To start off, Kamilla and Cisco are a good couple and are nice together. They haven’t gotten much to do since they got together, but they play off each other well. The problem lies in Kamilla being brought to the crime scene and being part of the investigation. Sure, she works with Iris at the Central City Citizen, but it’s never been established that she’s an investigator. She’s just a photographer, so it’s a bit unbelievable that they would just bring her into the investigation given how the character has been built.

As for the mystery, it’s not really all that engrossing, even though it tries to be. It feels like the twists are trying too hard to be twists and that the narrative is focused solely on that rather than a compelling mystery.

Nash and Joe

After the reveal that Nash has been tracking The Monitor, it’s unsurprising that the one on his tail is Joe. Ever since season one, Joe has been very cautious of every new Wells that has shown up, so it makes sense that he would be about Nash as well. And that distrust causes both to make mistakes and get trapped underground after a cave-in.

This part of the episode really moves nothing forward for the season narrative, which is a bit disappointing given the end of last episode. There’s a lot that could’ve been done with Nash’s search for The Monitor, yet nothing really does. It has some great character moments that build Nash, but it just seems like there could’ve been more to this part of the episode.

Frost on the hunt

With Ramsey on the loose, it only makes sense that Frost would be on the hunt for him. In her mind, it’s partially her responsibility that those people died in the previous episode, so as much as she’s out for justice, she’s also out for revenge. But even though Frost is angry, Caitlin still feels compassion for Ramsey.

This part of the episode is probably the best encapsulation of what the season has been so far for Ramsey and Caitlin/Frost. Both have been trying to figure out who they are during this season so far and in this episode, they both realize who they are. Ramsey is the villain that is selfishly out to save himself, while Frost/Caitlin has realized that she’s a hero, even if she can’t save everyone. Even if it’s not the focus of the episode, it’s an excellent pay-off to the build that has been happening all season.

Despite a lacking mystery and narrative, the character moments and relationships add another solid installment of The Flash to this season.