9. The Flash Season 9
You see that image of The Flash, Green Arrow, Kid Flash, and Spartan above? That is one of the very few glimmers of brilliance that The Flash‘s ninth and final season contained. It was a rare moment that reminded all of us of how incredible this show once was and made us all nostalgic like a final season is supposed to. Unfortunately, the same can’t be said for the rest of the season.
Even with a fantastic season opener and a promisingly great villain in the Red Death, the show’s “graphic novel” format had run its course at this point. Batwoman‘s Javicia Leslie was delightfully campy as the Red Death but the storyline amounted to nothing after five episodes, and was then immediately followed by an “interlude” which featured nothing but filler episodes. This left the show with just four episodes to tell its final ever storyline.
A final season is supposed to be all about looking back, but The Flash‘s was stuck in the present, operating like any old season. Secondary characters were given far too much screentime, Caitlin was disrespectfully “killed off” without a mourning period so that lookalike Khione could be rushed into the equation, and the show’s primary characters were lost in the midst of all of this. To make matters worse, Khione’s arc never amounted to anything; she was there and then she wasn’t. It was all so pointless. And speaking of amounting to nothing, the series finale – while solid on paper – lacked the emotional resolution that it should have had, with it all feeling very rushed, underplanned, and just like the ending of any old “graphic novel” arc.
The Flash has been worse than it was in season 9 (see our next slide), but those mistakes were forgivable as the show figured itself out post-Crisis. What isn’t forgivable is knowing what those mistakes are and continuing to make them in a shortened final season when the focus should have been on wrapping up this wonderful show on the high note that it deserved.
The fans were ready to love season 9, but this just wasn’t what it should have been.