The Flash season 8, episode 5 review: Armageddon, Part 5

“Nothing like a second shot at life.” Spoilers for The Flash season 8, episode 5 follow.

Armageddon has been averted and The Flash has fixed the timeline, but that doesn’t mean that the Reverse-Flash will go down without a final fight.

But the changes to the timeline have some unexpected consequences in “Armageddon, Part 5”.

Here’s what happened in The Flash season 8, episode 5.

Saving Eobard Thawne

Now that the timeline has been restored, Team Flash is happy and everything seems like it’s right in the world. Except for one tiny thing. Eobard Thawne is still around, even after the timeline has been fixed, but with a wrinkle himself: He’s slowly disappearing from the timeline and attempts to get Barry to save his life before he disappears forever.

This makes for such a great moral dilemma for Barry and the rest of Team Flash in deciding what to do with Thawne. Arguably, the most logical thing to do would to just let Thawne disappear from the timeline because of the pain and misery he has caused. However, the moral thing to do, what heroes should do regardless of who the problem is happening to, is to save the harmed party, no matter what. It’s a great dilemma that isn’t necessarily new to superhero storytelling, but something that hasn’t really played out in The Flash like this before.

Enter Joe West, who has been restored to life following the fix in the timeline, and can only utter bewilderment at his children even contemplating letting Thawne die. Joe has always been the moral center of the show and he always will be and this episode once again proves that in the best way. And, it gives us what is arguably Jesse L. Martin’s best performance on the show, at least in several seasons.

Green Arrow returns in The Flash season 8

Mia Queen has made her return to the Arrowverse! Finally! It feels like it has been forever since the “Green Arrow and the Canaries” episode of Arrow premiered, so it’s wonderful to see her reappear in the universe as she is one of this writer’s (and several more of our staff on this website) favorite characters in this universe.

So, after the disappointing reality that Green Arrow and the Canaries would not be developed further, it’s nice to see that the story set-up in the backdoor pilot for that series is being continued in some form, even if it is just this little bit.

Mia is harder in this episode and doesn’t quite fit in with the rest of the team, which is how Oliver always felt in the crossovers, so it feels right. Other than simply enjoying seeing her again, though, there’s no real purpose for her to be in this episode story-wise. Really, all she’s used as is a pawn for Despero to attack Team Flash, which is incredibly disappointing for such a great character.

Despero revealed

As for Despero though, the ruse that he’s actually the good guy from the future is finally shown – well, told (which is slightly disappointing) – to be nothing but a lie he was telling Barry. Throughout the entire event, it has felt that the more comic accurate despot Despero was lying underneath the surface and that was absolutely true. We get to see his completely ruthless side much more in this episode, especially when he begins to mind-control Mia.

As for the final fight between The Flash and Despero, it’s genuinely one of the best fights in the entire series. It’s very clear that the CGI budget was being withheld for this final fight and it very much shows. No, obviously, the CGI isn’t as good as you might see in say, Avengers or Spider-Man: No Way Home, but for this series? It’s leaps and bounds better than a lot of the CG work that has been done in the past, especially in the last couple of seasons. It’s really great to see.

This fight also leads to Barry finally getting his comic accurate golden boots. The whole “he needs to earn the golden boots thing” was dumb and all, but actually providing a story reason as to why he gets them in the middle of the event was a nice touch and they look so good.

The Flash ends its “Armageddon” crossover on a high-note, even if there are still a few missteps along the way in the finale.

The Flash season 8 will now embark on its midseason hiatus and will return The CW on a new night for the first time ever, airing on Wednesday nights at 8:00 p.m. ET. from March 9, 2022.

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Have you been enjoying The Flash season 8? What did you think of the “Armageddon” event? Let us know in the comments below!