The Flash season 8, episode 6 review: Impulsive Excessive Disorder

“What is up with you two tonight?” Spoilers for The Flash season 8, episode 6 follow.

Nora West-Allen and Bart Allen return to 2049 and temporal fissures quickly begin to open up in the past. So, they try to figure out how to fix it using The Flash’s rules for time travel.

However, the more they try to fix it, the more they mess it up.

Here’s everything that went down in The Flash season 8‘s midseason premiere, “Impulsive Excessive Disorder”.

Past imperfect in The Flash season 8

Taking off, not post-

Armageddon

, but from the finale of season 7,

The Flash

season 8 returns with a focus not on Barry Allen, but on his and Iris’ children Nora and Bart. Temporal fissures have opened up along the timestream and they think that they are the only ones who are able to stop the changes to the timeline.

It’s a solid premise to an episode, but it doesn’t really do much. It’s not a bad episode really, but just not one that’s all too interesting either. And really, it’s hard to even talk about the changes because the actual changes happening to the timeline often feel so small as the episode goes on that it really reduces the worrying feeling that changes such as these should have.

And while it’s nice to see Nora back once again (she’s one of this writer’s favorite characters on the show), the issues are with the show’s portrayal of Bart. Jordan Fisher continues to give a solid performance in the role, but the character just still feels so annoying so often and, well, way too impulsive. This works, to an extent, for the comics version of Impulse as he’s a literal child there, but this Bart is an adult, so his impulsiveness just falls flat for the most part. His childish actions just don’t feel right most of the time simply because no adult should act like he does in this episode.

A new character, and potential love interest for Bart, in Avery is introduced in this episode and well, she’s over-the-top. It’s like this character is trying to be an adaptation of Avery Ho from the comics, fast-talking and all, but where as there is a reason for how over-the-top she talks in the comics (she can’t control her newfound speed), here, her fast-talking is just basically her personality. If she’s used more as the season goes on, she could definitely be developed into a more interesting character, but she falls a little flat here.

https://twitter.com/CW_TheFlash/status/1501724525712396290?s=20&t=C8_yiwOTMMfbNFDL_ew-8w

Thawne returns

New characters don’t just appear in this episode though as Rick Cosnett makes his return as Eddie Thawne for the first time in five years. No matter what’s going on in the episode, it’s so great to see him back. He was genuinely one of the best characters in season 1 and honestly, just one of the best characters in the show.

However, just like Tommy in Arrow season 1, Eddie was the love interest who died after having the best arc in the entire season. And, again like Tommy, it’s always great to see him return in any form.

However, it’s still disappointing as he really doesn’t do much in “Impulsive Excessive Disorder” besides make it clear that this episode takes place in 2013 and before the first season of The Flash. That’s really about it, which is frustrating. That said, Cosnett still gives a really great performance in the role and it will never not be great to see him return.

Royal Flush

We also now get the new origin for the Royal Flush gang that first appeared within the Armageddon crossover. Nothing about it is interesting in the slightest. It’s a simple “Bart and Nora accidentally created a villain” origin and there’s nothing more to it than that. At this point, it’s just wishful thinking to never see any incarnation of the Royal Flush Gang in the Arrowverse again.

The Flash season 8 makes its return with a relatively lackluster episode that isn’t necessarily bad, but isn’t anything to write home about either.

What did you think of The Flash season 8, episode 6? Are you glad that the show is back on screens? Let us know in the comments below!