Arrowverse Couch Club Season Two, Week 7: The Flash Season Premiere

SPOILER ALERT!

And then there were four! Welcome back to the Arrowverse Couch Club, where this week, we’re welcoming The Flash back to our screens as it returned for its seventh season. With Barry’s speed nearly depleted and Iris still trapped in the Mirrorverse, the team didn’t miss a beat in picking up their ongoing fight against Eva McCulloch (Mirror Mistress?) Elsewhere in the Arrowverse, new parties made their move to secure the Desert Rose on Batwoman, Tobias continued his crusade against the Pierces and Freeland on Black Lightning and Clark began working to better understand Jordan’s powers on Superman & Lois.

Batwoman – “Do Not Resuscitate”

  • Even though her clinic has now been shut down, do you see Mary eventually getting to re-open it or maybe even starting up a new one?

Black Lightning – “The Book of Reconstruction: Chapter Four”

  • Despite everything else that happened this week, this episode left us with one giant question above all else: Is Jen actually dead?

The Flash – “All’s Wells That Ends Wells”

  • Assuming that this actually sticks for the duration of the series, was killing off all the Wells the right move or should the show have continued to find a way to keep him on the team?
  • Now that it’s been revealed that Eva’s been a mirror duplicate this whole time, how could this change her mission and Team Flash’s attempts to stop her going forward?

Superman & Lois – “Heritage”

  • Do you think Lois quitting the Daily Planet was the right move, or could it have been better to try and change things from the inside?
Which version of Wells have you enjoyed seeing the most?
  • Thawne
  • Harry
  • HR
  • Sherloque
  • Nash
  • Other

0 voters

Lastly, what episode was your favorite this week?
  • Batwoman – “Do Not Resuscitate”
  • Black Lightning – “The Book of Reconstruction: Chapter Four”
  • The Flash – “All’s Wells That Ends Wells”
  • Superman & Lois – “Heritage”

0 voters

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While I wouldn’t expect her to try and start back up right away considering that Jacob’s now fully onto her, I do think there’s a good chance we’ll see Mary get a second chance at this further down the road. One thing I could see her doing in the short term is going back to Gotham University to finish getting her medical degree. It’s not that she needs the extra knowledge, but if she’s official, than Jacob and the Crows have a weaker case for shutting her down again. Regardless of how she goes about it, I certainly can’t see Mary stopping completely in her attempts to heal people. The main impacts of this move will likely just be slowing her down and forcing her to think even more carefully about how she operates. And whether or not she does decide to finish getting her degree, I’m sure she’s still gonna have her hands full in trying to treat Ryan’s kryptonite wound

I’ve gone back and forth on this one. Since Salim Akil talked about his plans to include both Jen and Anissa in the Painkiller spinoff a couple weeks ago, I took that as a confirmation that Jen would ultimately survive Black Lightning despite her early exit. Whether or not the show actually gets picked up is irrelevant in this situation, as Akil and his writers still have to keep preparing and moving forward as if it’s going to happen unless they’re told otherwise. So if they plan to have Jen appear on that show, regardless of what capacity it is, she’d have to be alive for that to happen. But there are still some ways where this might not actually be a confirmation that she has to stay alive

For one, Akil’s exact quote is that “if Painkiller gets picked up, you’ll probably see” Jen and Anissa, so it’s not a 100% guarantee. Even if it was, they could also just go w/ flashbacks and/or hallucinations of Jen that Khalil could see. And even disregarding both of those things, even if Akil had explicitly said that Jen would absolutely be appearing as she is in the present, it could still end up being a complete lie meant to cover up her death and make it all the more shocking. It’d hardly be the first time something like that happened before in terms of TV/movie producers messing w/ our expectations so as to try and throw us off, so it’s just one of many things I have to keep in mind before we hopefully get an official confirmation next week. While this certainly looks very bad for Jen, I also keep thinking back to how the season premiere ended w/ her dropping out of the sky, making it look like she could fall and die, only to then see her in the next episode completely fine as if nothing had happened. I doubt they’ll completely gloss over her completely disappearing in the same way, but perhaps something similar could still happen where this issue is solved faster than we’d normally expect

Though I certainly sympathized w/ Barry when he asked, “How can I be the Flash without a Wells on this team?” I think I do understand finally retiring his character, especially in a way that allows Barry to fully regain the Flash mantle again. While I’ve loved seeing Wells in his various incarnations over the years, I’ll also admit that the last 2 versions – Sherloque and Nash – did feel a little more tired than Thawne, Harry and HR. Though they still could’ve possibly continued post-Crisis by essentially having a rotating roster of Wells inhabiting Nash’s body, if the writers weren’t as confident in their ability to keep him fresh going forward, then perhaps this was the best move. Like w/ any good character death, the fact that he got to go out a hero – and deliver one last “Run, Barry…run!” was a pretty great sendoff to someone who’s meant so much to the team over the years

But speaking of the team, my main problem w/ Wells’ death is the fact that Cisco and Caitlin weren’t there to say goodbye to him/them. Aside from Barry, these 2 have been the most impacted by the Wells, and the fact that they’ll now only be able to send him off after the fact instead of being there for when he died just doesn’t feel right. I understand that the only reason Caitlin went away for a while was to accommodate for Danielle Panabaker’s pregnancy, but seeing as how filming started for this season at least 6 months after she gave birth and that she was apparently ready to go when they started shooting, it seems like it would’ve been easy enough to bring her, and Cisco, back a little earlier than expected. I know they’ll be back next week, but Wells’ death would’ve been even more powerful if Cisco and Caitlin had been there to complete the original trifecta

There are some aspects of both side’s missions that won’t change at all. Eva will almost certainly still be determined to wipe Black Hole out of existence and continue expanding her power, while Team Flash will still work to stop her from hurting others in the process and ultimately save Iris. Part of what’s interesting about this reveal is how it could stand to break Eva even further than she’s already been broken. She’s lived for 6 years under the belief that she’s the original Eva McCulloch, so seeing video evidence that that’s actually not the case could very well be a turning point for her. She could say that it ultimately doesn’t matter and that she still needs to complete her noble (in her mind) work, or she could choose to fully brace her inhumanity and throw any semblance of morals aside in the pursuit of greater power

What’s also interesting is how this could affect Team Flash’s approach to dealing w/ her. Her powers still make her an incredibly difficult opponent, but finding out that she’s a mirror duplicate would open up a number of different new ways to take her down. There could also be a heated debate about whether or not they even consider her to be human, which would also tie into a debate over whether or not to “kill” her as opposed to locking her away. While it seems inevitable that the team will figure this out about Eva soon, I’m sure she’ll also be determined to keep that fact from them for as long as possible

Given the amount of control that Edge was exerting over her material, it’s hard to argue that she could’ve gotten results while still writing for that paper. I suppose she could’ve tried playing along for a bit while getting her actual articles out in another way, but even if she tried hiding her identity while doing so, I figure it’d eventually come out that it’s her. Granted, just self-publishing right away would get her fired immediately, but she might’ve figured that anonymously publishing would only last so long, thus giving her fewer viable options for taking down Edge from w/in the Planet. But that certainly doesn’t mean that the decision to quit was cut-and-dried as the fully right move

While there’s no doubt that her name alone will bring plenty of attention to the Smallville Gazette, it’s still only a 2-person operation that won’t have nearly the reach that the Planet does. Plus, w/ Lois now set to use the Gazette to launch her attack against Edge, there’s a very good chance that the local readers who have kept the paper afloat will be alienated by this new direction. Sure, getting national attention will be huge for the paper in the short term, but I wouldn’t be surprised if Chrissy has second thoughts about Lois’ long-term impact on the paper. Given all the local support for Edge, a lot of people in Smallville could end up cancelling their subscriptions and stop buying papers, and once the Edge story is inevitably wrapped up, where will money from the paper come from? Lois is gonna have to do a lot of work to transform the Gazette into a media source that expands well beyond Smallville if she wants to be able to have a career that helps sustain her family. Because I’m not really sure what Clark’s been doing for work since he got laid off, so unless he’s been able to use his Superman connections to get money somehow, this decision to quit could be met w/ more scrutiny if she struggles to make a similar wage as before. But it’s for all these reasons and more that I completely support the move. I’ve always loved seeing deep dives into Lois’ journalism career, and adding these new layers onto it should just prove to make her arc this season even more interesting

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Every time we have seen the clinic is had been full of people that Mary and others are helping. (except when it is conveniently empty for hostage taking…) It feels like a staple of life in that area and I don’t see Mary giving up on that. She knows she can help people and she has helped people. She isn’t stopping anytime soon.

I had no idea this was coming. I loved Tom Cavanaugh in every version of Wells that he has played. I hoped to see more of Nash. It felt weird because Harry told him that the Team helps ‘Wells’ be better. And then he off and killed himself. I know it was for a good cause. But we have seen Nash struggle with trying to be good for a while now and for dying to be the only solution that works… it just didn’t really sit right with me.

I also just assumed it was a goodbye to Wells but not Tom but as it kept going it felt so final. I do hope he comes back. I’m not usually a fan of actors just playing different characters to stay on a show but how this was done was just so good every time.

And I do agree. I like Chester and Allegra but it felt wrong to not have Caitlyn and Cisco there. Still a beautiful scene but the two of them being there would have made it better.

I am very excited for how this plays out. This was a great twist. It’s interesting that Eva’s power is still active even though she is dead. I wonder of that means it can continue staying alive by using more duplicates even if Eva’s duplicate dies.

100% yes, it was the right move. I loved that scene. Lois answers to no one. She can write for whoever she wants. (Though I’m sure Kara will be upset she or Clark didn’t come to CatCo.) I’m not sure how much she will get done in Smallville but she’ll get something done. :laughing:

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Completely agree. Even if the clinic or an equivalent isn’t an option now, she’ll certainly find some other way to help others beyond just Team Bat

Very true, though I guess it also would’ve been harder to achieve this w/ all the Wells living inside of Nash’s body. I don’t think they ever explained how the swapping works. Like is it just random as to which Wells takes over or do they all manage to work it out and have control over it? And now that I think about it more, w/ so many Wells living inside just 1 body, I doubt that most of them would be OK only getting minimal time in control. It could’ve caused even more bickering among them, though that’s also definitely helped w/ the comedy as well

The showrunner did already confirm that this isn’t the last we’ve seen of Cavanagh this season, though that could still mean he’ll only have a limited number of appearances before being written off for good, or maybe he really will still be a regular going forward. I probably would’ve felt differently before this episode, but now that they’ve gone through w/ an emotional and heroic death scene, I think I actually want it to stick so as not to take away from the impact that made

Oh wow, I hadn’t even thought about this. I know making temporary copies as a distraction has been a Mirror Master trick for a long time, but making copies that still retain memories and full powers? That would make her a hell of a lot harder to take down for good. She could just keep making duplicates of herself and maybe stash them away somewhere to be “activated” in the event that the older copy “dies”

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Oh, good. I hope he stays a regular. I really do enjoy him on this show.

And Team Flash would have no idea. That’s a start to a good horror story.

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I do not see something like this keeping Mary from helping people like she had been doing. She has been doing this service for so long and I am sure she has “regular customers” who would need the help she can provide that a hospital could not. He clinics offer a service to those without insurance, a point brought home more in a previous episode where Ryan’s girlfriend wanted her to get more tests but the doctor said her insurance would not cover it. At the very least, our new Batwoman would need her own superhero doctor to help when things go wrong.
I just could not believe that her dad still sees things in such black and white terms. Nevermind the help she has been providing, it is illegal so must be shut down. He has one daughter who is a vigilante (I am going with the thought she is still alive) and another who provides medical services without a license. It seems Gotham is the perfect city where some gray areas could be covered.

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Flash: Still have to watch

Batwoman: I am actually more interested in seeing where Ocean and Alice end up given the memories they eventually regain.

Black Lightning: TCs ionosphere research is going to come in rather handy I will speculate.

Superman & Lois: Given what I blurred in last week’s thread, I should rewatch the pilot, but it definitely explains the knowledge, the use of the word kryptonite. How Luthor is this Luthor? How Justice Lord is his Superman?

Lois quitting is not entirely unheard of. I was not surprised that the local reporter was the editor and everything else. I like this version of her, including but not limited to she also being Juliet on Grimm.

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I have noticed they have been building up to this where they show at least one scene a week where she goes up into the ionosphere. The reaction she seems to get when she goes up there seems to be like a drug high like Lynn was getting from her various drugs. I wonder if this disappearance of Jen is like an overdose and maybe will be the wakeup call Lynn needs to try to get sober. MY concern is if she is dead, this will send her into a spiral into more drugs as she will want to fill the hole left by her daughter.
Part of me, skeptic though I usually am, thinks she might have died. If this is the case, it will be the second one this week (after Wells) where only a small (in this case one) group are there at the end. The reason I say this is because I had thought I had read articles that said the actress was planning to leave Black Lightning with reduced role this final season. This would be one major way to go out.
As for her appearing on the spinoff, if she was leaving Black Lightning to work on other projects I do not think one of those projects would be in the same vein. If anything, maybe she does a cameo or a flashback, but that’s it.
Also, I love love love the speech the person gave in the bar to say what Black Lightning has done for Freeland with nothing in return. It was the great motivational speech Jefferson needed to hear.
Finally, what exactly was Gambi’s plan? He has a flaw put into the guns, seeming to keep them from being deployed on time. He then tells the company about the flaw, figuring what it will delay them from rolling the out until they think of a new plan? It only delays them a shorter timeframe. I guess it gets their trust of Gambi but I am not sure it was the smartest plan from one of the smartest people.

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I will admit, I cried when Wells decided to sacrifice all Wells for the good of the Flash. A Wells has been a component of the show since the beginning, even if that first one was quite the twisty bertrayal. However, I have felt over time the Wells have become more stereotypes than characters I cared about. Sherloque was probably one of the worst offenders, but even Nash with his Indiana Jones persona did not seem to have too much depth. They added in his connection to the doppleganger of Allegra, but I do not know this was developed as well as it could have been. Then, they had him be the cause of Crisis and afterwards feel like the scapegoat for everything. Then he became selfish about trying an unproven way to get Barry’s speed back when he had another more confident way that involved sacrifice. After all he had done, the sacrifice would be worth it.
I did enjoy seeing Barry cycle through Wells. He did a pretty good job and it brought some humor to the situation.
I enjoyed how they had each of the major Wells say goodbye to Barry and Minor League Team Flash. As Wells had said before, each Wells was not perfect and often was broken when they came in, but meeting this team gave them family and purpose once again. Flash fixed them. MY favorite was the last words from Wells was “Run, Barry, Run”. Getting choked up here. Now Wells will always be a part of the Flash everytime he runs and saves someone.
My regret is that Cisco was not there. He and Wells (any Wells) had father-son relationships and were really close to not have him on the episode felt out of place. As it was, I know Caitlin was out due to the actress pregnancy, but I felt he should have at least been there, if only to help fix the speed force. Chester is a genius and Allegra was pretty smart too, but they should have all big guns in as this seemed to be a critical part of the Flash continuing.
Plus, I hold out hope for Tom Cavanaugh to make an appearance on Stargirl (Earth-2) with Jesse Quick. Barry is not aware of the multiverse surviving but it does exist. And, if they can get John Wesley Shipp to portray Jay Garrick again on Earth-2 in flashbacks for the Justice Society on Stargirl, then they have room for a Wells. The interactions between him and Pat having daughters who are superheroes would be priceless.

As for the revelation on Eva, it does make her husband not a liar, but still a head of a terrorist organization, so he probably deserved to die either way. I think it might make her a little more unhinged as she is no longer a real person. She is going to fight for her survival and now that she has no humanity, she may become even more cold-blooded.
I did like the fact that she constructed Scudder, thus tying her to the other Mirror Master. Removes just having another coincidence of another mirror superpower.
Also, upping the Top to being more of a criminal mastermind was cool use of her powers. She becomes more of a force to reckon with, as we all fell for the ditzy sidekick act. Her powers are more in line with Psycho Pirate or someone who can amplify emotions in people. Then, Cecile becoming bad@$$ by turning the tables on her. She had same powers as the Top but just was afraid of using to full potential which the villain brought out.

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I think it was the right move. It does not seem like she would be able to change things from inside the paper as it seemed people were scared of Morgan Edge. I saw the board meeting she stormed into and he let them know that heads would roll if not done his way. I do not see anyone left at the Planet who would stand up with Lois and Lois will not back down. I enjoy the fact that she is going from national paper to small town paper, but I am looking forward to the interactions with the star-struck editor of the Smallville Gazette.
However, her strong opinions will not sit well with other members of the community, such as Lana’s husband. And a smaller paper would be easier for Morgan to crush than if Lois went with another national syndicate. I guess time will tell, but now they have cut the last ties with Metropolis and this can be truly a Smallville show.
Speaking of which, I am really liking the nostalgic vibes of this show. I really feel like it is Smallville: The Continuing Adventures of Clark and Lois. I am more of a small town person myself, so I enjoy seeing the new environment, where they can be somewhat more relaxed.
The aftermath of the kiss being that the other brother gets bullied by the football team is a different way to go and I like it. They want to show the big city kid who is in charge and punish him for the actions of his brother.
The way they portray the brothers is perfect. They argue and fight with each other, but then have moments where they care about each other. Like when Jordan tells Jonathan that the Fortress of Solitude was a bust and that he does not have powers like his dad. Jonathan tells him that he saved their lives in the barn and that is all that really matters.
To be honest, this Jor-El seems more of a jerk than the one from Smallville. He does not seem to impressed, and to be honest, he does not have that imposing look he usually does. More of a retired grandfather who has become cynical of the world despite being dead for a long time.
After the mention in this episode, I realized the boys are named after both their paternal grandfathers: Jordan after Jor-El and Jonathan after, well, Jonathan. Cool.
It was interesting to see Captain Luthor’s background a little more, with him partnering with Sam Lane against an evil Superman. Then, seeing Superman, in black suit, killing all those people with heat vision was scary but cool.
It would figure that Sam Lane would stockpile all the Kryptonite to keep out of hands of enemy, but part of me also thinks he wants it in case Superman does go rogue and he needs a defense against it.

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Flash: plus Barry gets a chance to cry again, which apparently is a thing if you search online he cries a lot.
So much so that for a @dcfac challenge I drew just his crying eyes.

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1 of many issues caused by the clinic shutting down and possibly setting up a new one will be making sure those “customers” know where to go in the future. You can’t exactly advertise an illegal clinic, but hopefully word of mouth will spread quick once Mary’s got something going again, since those same people will likely be pretty desperate for a place they can receive care

While I completely agree w/ your argument that Jacob shouldn’t see things in such black-and-white terms, I also feel like he wouldn’t be too deterred by bringing Kate into this argument. I’m sure he’d say that while he’d do anything to bring Kate back, he’d also tell her to stop being Batwoman if she was still here. He’s clearly got a long way to go before he can truly see that the good they’ve done outweighs the risks/negatives

Just based off of the flashback w/ Captain Luthor and his Sam Lane, I’d say very

I hadn’t thought about it like that, but it’s a really good point. Just another good reason for why Jen shouldn’t be dead. Like maybe she manages to re-materialize but after running some tests, Gambi and TC discover that 1 more trip to the ionosphere will in fact kill her. Not only could this be the impetus for Jen leaving to find out more about her powers, but the shock to Lynn’s system, along w/ everyone else for that matter, will hopefully be what she needs to take the 1st real step toward sobriety

Not only am I really hoping this will be Jeff’s motivation for putting the suit back on, but it’d be great irony if 1 of the officers investigating Jeff was also the reason for him suiting up again

I feel like it probably meant to be more of a short-term solution, though Gambi was probably banking on it lasting a little longer. He couldn’t send the guns out into the field w/ the defect since they’d still do damage, both as intended toward metas and unintentionally to those firing them. The fact that they were able to fix the defect so quickly just means that Gambi’s gonna be even more desperate to come up w/ a way to stop them permanently

Yeah, this was such a great moment. I’ll admit that line’s become kinda stale over the years w/ how many times it’s been said, but it went back to having some real season 1 weight in this episode

One way I could see this play out is that Eva might try brushing it off and still maintain that she’s essentially human since she’s been living under that assumption for the past 6 years. But that’d likely be something that you can’t just bury, so maybe after an episode of trying to hold onto whatever humanity she has left, she just says screw it and embraces that darker side of herself

I’m curious as to whether this was always the case or just in the post-Crisis timeline. Eva never really factored into anything before 6B, so this could go either way, but it’s still 1 hell of a retcon. I guess we don’t really need 2 Mirror Masters running around, but I’m glad we still have Top

That awkward moment when Top is more like Psycho Pirate than the actual Psycho Pirate from Elseworlds

And speaking of Top, that whole sequence really confused me mainly because I noticed that the whole time, Rosa was inexplicably never wearing meta-dampening cuffs. Not only did they forget something so important, but since she still had her full powers, why didn’t Rosa just whammy everyone and escape? And why did she tell Cecille so much even before that last scene? Granted, I’m still glad Top is another Rogue that hasn’t been completely forgotten, but her scenes were just very strange regardless

I’m sure Lois was the only 1 there who had the guts to make the 1st move and stand up to Edge directly, but now that she’s made her move, I wonder if any other writers/editors will now have the courage to do the same. It’d be great if in the next episode she talks about how several staff members followed her lead and resigned in protest or something

Fun fact: The actor playing Jonathan is actually named Jordan Elsass. Maybe he should’ve been the one to play Jordan

Black suit Superman will never not be badass

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Finally saw Flash. Without inadvertently seeing some comment about what may or may not be happening BTS, it is likely we are going to see more of the Council because the speed force is also part consciousness/sentience.

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That’s a good point. When Barry went into the Speed Force he’d often see it as his mother. Who is to say he won’t see Wells.

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You bring up a good point with the Top as they seemed to miss a lot to prevent her escape but she also seemed to not want to go anywhere. I guess I was just paying attention to the cool new powers instead of that

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That could actually be a pretty awesome way to keep Cavanagh on as Wells, though it’s also another sad reminder that we’re less likely to see Nora going forward :frowning_face:

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