Anyone who knows me personally, follows me on social media or is familiar with my writing here at The AP Party probably won’t be surprised that my favorite new TV show of the fall is CW’s The Flash.
Given my love of comic books, superheroes and geek culture, you might think I enjoy this show just because it features a DC Comics hero come to life on the small screen. And in the past, I’ll admit to being blinded by what I like to call “the geek fog,” my critical judgment obscured by seeing a superhero in live-action, something that just didn’t exist very much when I was growing up (with a few notable exceptions, such as the original Superman: The Movie, Tim Burton’s Batman or even CBS’ The Flash series from 1990).
The Flash surely works because the culture now accepts superheroes in movies and TV. CW’s other superhero show, Arrow, is a huge hit. Movie theaters are full of Batman, Iron Man, Captain America, Spider-Man, Superman and so many others still to come.
There’s no need to bend over backwards to explain why someone would wear a costume and mask. People embrace the whole idea of superpowers, secret identities, arch-villains and other tropes that come with the genre. You can wear a t-shirt or cap with a comic-book logo on it and not get laughed at. I think you can actually read comic books or a graphic novel in public, like at a cafe, and not draw chuckles and sneers.
Cultural fit aside, The Flash is so enjoyable because it’s fun. Barry Allen (played by Grant Gustin) is an enthusiastic geek — perhaps like much of the show’s audience — stoked about science while bumbling around at work and in his social life. The entire tone of the series acknowledges how cool it would be to suddenly gain the ability to run superhumanly fast, while finding a group of friends and mentors that help harness that power and reach the vast potential it promises.
Like many good TV shows, The Flash benefits from a strong supporting cast. Among the standouts are Caitlin Snow (Danielle Panabaker) and Cisco Ramon (Carlos Valdes), two of the scientists who help Allen figure out what he can do with his powers and the best decision to make when fighting a bad guy or saving someone in need. Cisco, in particular, is an entertaining stand-in for the audience. Sure, he’s the guy who invents all the gadgets and can quickly determine how fast The Flash has to go to run up a wall, but he’s also the cheerleader with “Can you believe we get to do this?” glee over getting to play superhero.
The show does suffer a bit in coming up with good villains on a weekly basis, something that’s plagued other TV comic book adaptations like Arrow, Smallville, Gotham and Constantine. But the writers and producers also seem to have a long-term plan for the show, teasing future developments such as Allen’s future fate and the true intentions of Dr. Harrison Wells (Tom Cavanagh), the man responsible for the accident that created The Flash, who also appears to be holding some deep, dark secrets.
This isn’t a story about revenge, redemption or the great toll that choosing to be a vigilante or hero exacts upon the main character. (At least not yet.) It’s not dark, gloomy and brooding like Arrow or other DC Comics like Batman (or Superman, in Zack Snyder’s Man of Steel). Allen does have some pathos to him. His mother was murdered and his father is wrongly imprisoned for the crime, a mystery that continues to move the story forward. He also nurses an unrequited crush on a woman, one who doesn’t feel the same way but also now seems to be falling in love with his masked alter-ego.
And it’s here where The Flash steps into some icky territory, something that the show and its characters surprisingly don’t seem to acknowledge. It’s not the fact that a superhero action series delves into romance. That’s an accepted part of the genre. Every story is about the boy pursuing the girl (or vice versa), right? A TV show can’t be entirely about heroics and testosterone. No, the ick factor comes from Allen being in love with a woman who is essentially his step sister.
Iris West (Candice Patton) isn’t actually Allen’s step sister. Her father didn’t adopt Allen once his father went to prison. But police detective Joe West (Jesse L. Martin) took Allen into his home and effectively raised him since he was 10 years old, along with his daughter. The two of them grew up together in the same home.
From the very first episode, we learn that Barry carries a torch for Iris. But she, understandably, views him as a brother — or at the very least, as a good friend. (And if she knows how Barry feels, she makes it pretty clear that he’s solidly in the friend zone.) Iris eventually begins dating her father’s partner, which causes another set of dramatic circumstances.
In the fourth episode of the season, “Plastique,” Joe even reveals that he knows how Barry feels about Iris. Does he sit Barry down and point out that this is kind of gross, since they basically grew up as brother and sister, and give our hero a reality check? No, he smiles the smile of someone who knows a secret that isn’t being hidden very well. Of course, he knows Barry has a crush on Iris. It’s been obvious for the 15 years they’ve known each other.
But rather than act as seemingly any father would — let alone a tough cop who’s fiercely protective of his daughter, given what he sees in his line of work — Joe thinks the whole thing is cute. He laughs giddily, teasing Barry for not acting on his feelings. Maybe we’re supposed to believe Joe thinks this is a silly schoolboy crush that Barry will eventually outgrow. But it seems more like we’re being told Joe would be A-OK with Barry and Iris — whom he basically raised as son and daughter — being a couple.
After all, Barry’s a good guy. When he gained the ability to run lighting-fast, he didn’t start robbing banks or using those powers for personal gain, as so many of the other “meta-humans” affected by Wells’ particle accelerator exploding have chosen to do. That’s at least partially because Joe raised him right (though Barry’s real parents obviously have something to do with that, as well).
Maybe Joe is also just completely aware that Barry is not his son. Perhaps he treated the kid like a permanent houseguest throughout his adolescence and young adulthood, despite knowing that Barry’s dad would likely spend the rest of his life in prison.
Still, if the The Flash insists on pursuing this will-they-or-won’t-they storyline, it feels like something that could knock the series off course. Again, this seems to be a problem with superhero shows. Arrow‘s Oliver Queen always seems to have the wrong love interest (though gets plenty of action). Gotham‘s Jim Gordon has a girlfriend that the writers should get rid of, because she adds absolutely nothing to the show.
The Flash has a couple of other possibilities that seem better, such as Caitlin or even Arrow‘s Felicity Smoak, who has some pretty stellar chemistry with Allen. But both characters come with their own problems. It would be nice for the show to have a female character who isn’t relegated to love interest. Can’t Caitlin just be a character with her own story and path? And Felicity is in Starling City with Team Arrow (with her own unrequited thing going with Oliver). Long-distance relationships don’t make for good TV romance.
So maybe there is no choice but to eventually pair Barry and Iris up. Or this is building toward some further tragedy for our hero, in which Iris never forgives Barry for keeping such a secret from her and carrying on this charade. That would be interesting. Do the writers and producers have the courage to move in that direction? I suppose we’ll find out.
