Spoilers The Flash - Season 4
- Thread starter dahj
- Start date
All the more reason to mine drama from their increasing social isolation - to be clear, it's the show's ignoring their increasing isolation themselves I find icky, rather than the increasing isolation per se. While I enjoy the fx-filled battles as much as the next guy, LoT is kicking Flash's ass in terms of varied locations, action, and production design, so if Flash isn't going to balance that with first-rate character work, I'll have little reason to keep watching. I like the comedic tone this season has brought, but I don't give a rat's ass about The Thinker and his plot, particularly when the Legends are facing off against Darkh, baby Dominators, and other far more interesting foes on a weekly basis.
Absolutely. I'm getting unwelcome flashbacks of Voyager, which preferred to spend all their money on the generic forehead prosthetics and battle sequences of the week, rather than developing and spending time with secondary characters. While I haven't seen the latest season of The Last Ship yet, they've done a great job so far at building out the world beyond the primary core cast. And while Iris' newspaper gig was never my favorite part of an episode, it did provide valuable changes of pace and scenery. But, much like Laurel's jettisoned DA career, it seems that every aspect of the show and its characters' lives must be gobbled up by the Team. That refusal to connect with any kind of recognizable reality helped drive me to dump Arrow, and I'm concerned Flash may be going down the same route.
Not a bad one, but I'm uneasy with the portrayal of a Native American activist as a dangerous killer. She was basically in the right, except for her methods. But I guess Ralph deciding she was right about the necklace ameliorates it a bit, though it still falls into the cliched pattern of the white male being better at protecting other cultures than their own members are.
Apparently Black Bison in the comics was male, and a Firestorm villain, but otherwise somewhat similar -- Native American seeking revenge on those who'd wronged his people, able to bring inanimate objects to life (albeit with a magic talisman rather than a metahuman power), but also having weather control powers.
The Council of Wells was kind of silly, but not entirely un-fun. And "You're a wizard, Harry" was a cute moment.
Nice hero's journey for Ralph, too. Although the implication that he hadn't cared about protecting civilians as a cop was kind of strange. Isn't the police motto "To protect and serve?"
That "stretched scene" commercial was annoying. I hate it when the Arrowverse shows do these "bonus story" shorts that are really just commercials for phones or computers. Although I guess it's marginally less annoying than inserting blatant product placements directly into the show a la Eureka or White Collar.
Apparently Black Bison in the comics was male, and a Firestorm villain, but otherwise somewhat similar -- Native American seeking revenge on those who'd wronged his people, able to bring inanimate objects to life (albeit with a magic talisman rather than a metahuman power), but also having weather control powers.
The Council of Wells was kind of silly, but not entirely un-fun. And "You're a wizard, Harry" was a cute moment.
Nice hero's journey for Ralph, too. Although the implication that he hadn't cared about protecting civilians as a cop was kind of strange. Isn't the police motto "To protect and serve?"
That "stretched scene" commercial was annoying. I hate it when the Arrowverse shows do these "bonus story" shorts that are really just commercials for phones or computers. Although I guess it's marginally less annoying than inserting blatant product placements directly into the show a la Eureka or White Collar.
Yes, clearly when Barry got super speed he lost object permanence.
Tom Cavanagh is a hoot. I just met Harry’s “friends” and that was hilarious.
My favorite is still Subways tie in with Chuck.
Seska and Cullah.
Recurring second tier characters.
The budget for those two, and their Kazon sets, and extras were folded into the sfx/cgi budget between season 2 and three,.
We could have a TNG O'Brien, or Rom/Leeta minor character, or a villain hanging out in the background sneering, for season 3 to 7, which we did not have.
Wait? Is that the Borg kids?
Voyager got more money after DS9 died.
Different money, never mind.
Black Bison's power reminded me of a character that a college friend of mine created back in the '90s -- during the indie comics boom, so he roped me into this ambitious plan to found his own comics company, although it turned out he wasn't ambitious enough to actually try to turn talk into action. It was a character whose mind could leave his body, inhabit inanimate objects, and make them move -- like Teen Titans' Jericho, but with objects rather than people. We would've called him The Animator. I think he actually would've been an animator/special effects artist in civilian life. (The character, not my friend.)
Star Labs and the Hall of Justice.
Hmmm, whenever I see Felicity or Cisco on screen for some unfathomable reason I have this sudden urge to buy a Microsoft Surface...
I found the ending with Devoe pretty interesting. Did the Thinker change clothes and put on a wig and is pretending to be a normal guy in a wheelchair or maybe the Thinker we are seeing is from the future and the Devoe in the wheelchair in "present day" is actually Devoe before he becomes the Thinker? The Thinker all plugged into his hovering chair and the lab seem more futuristic so it might be a hint that we are seeing the future. Having said that, I do really like that our villain is more subtle. Our heroes will think Devoe is a normal guy so the Thinker will continue to manipulate them. I find that more interesting that the villain being some big bad speedster again. I will note too that Devoe in the wheelchair seems very similar to Thawn as Harrison Wells in S1. Both are in wheelchairs and both are deceiving Team Flash. Hopefully, Team Flash will be suspicious of a guy in a wheelchair this time.
Well, that's a troubling sentiment. This franchise hasn't been too great with positive portrayals of disability. They flirted with it when Felicity was shot, but then just gave her a magic neural chip and never mentioned it again. If DeVoe really can't walk -- note that we've never seen him out of that "Metron" chair -- then it falls into the cliche of equating disability with villainy. That's probably not their conscious intent -- it's probably more along the lines of making him a mental adversary rather than a physical one, making him a complete contrast from the runners Barry has fought up to now -- but it still fits the pattern.
I mean that in the context of this show, our characters have experience with someone who happened to be in a wheelchair who was deceiving them. So there is an in-universe reason for them to be suspicious, unrelated to the disability itself. But I see your point of how disability might be viewed. I don't think it is malicious. I do like your explanation that the writers did it in order to better accentuate the thinker's mental powers rather than physical powers to the viewer.
Hmmm, whenever I see Felicity or Cisco on screen for some unfathomable reason I have this sudden urge to buy a Microsoft Surface...
what about Dell monitors?
No, that would be an incredibly bigoted and horrible thing for them to think -- like assuming that if you were mugged by a black man once, it means you should suspect all black men of being criminals. Blaming an entire category for the actions of an individual is the very essence of prejudice.
I mean, good grief, all three of their Big Bads to date have been white men, so by your logic, they should assume every white man they meet is an evil mastermind.
It was just a thought not something I actually believe. But I would add that Thawn/Wells in S1 was actually faking being in a wheelchair, he was not actually disabled. So the characters might be suspicious of someone faking it ie, is Devoe faking the wheelchair like Wells did to throw us off? That is very different from being prejudiced because of a person's race etc
So did I. I hope this means less of the Flash Comedy routine. Season 4 has been something of a disappointment so far. I'm really getting sick and tired of this heavy emphasis on humor. And I'm already weary of Ralph Digby or whatever the hell he is. The trailer for next week's episode looks promising.
It still feels ableist to me to talk about people in wheelchairs as if they're all automatically in the same cubbyhole, as if the chairs define them entirely.
Keep in mind that they went to this guy's house because their research turned up indications that he was the season's big bad, and then they found him in a wheelchair. If they were suspicious that he might be faking, that's not at all the same thing as picking some random disabled person on the street and suspecting them of being a villain because they're disabled.
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