Tragedy is tearing the family apart on The Flash. In “Armageddon Part 3,” Barry (Grant Gustin) makes a desperate move to stop Despero (Tony Curran). Iris (Candice Patton) and Cecile (Danielle Nicolet) are at odds about how to find Barry.
Last week, Barry discovered that he completely forgot that Joe West (Jesse L. Martin) is dead. This also caused some erratic behavior from Cecile. Barry escaped to the Hall of Justice to get away from Despero. Black Lightning, aka Jefferson Pierce (Cress Williams), was there, ready to help his super friend.
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The first thing Barry says to Jefferson is the word “injustice.” This is a code word among the super friends, warning them that one of the heroes has lost his way. Barry doesn’t want to destroy the world. He feels he has become a danger to the super friends and to the world. The only solution is for Jefferson to take Barry’s powers from him
Meanwhile, Team Flash convenes in Chester’s (Brandon McKnight) garage to come up with a way to find Barry before Despero does. No one really knows what to do. One thing for sure is that Iris trusts Barry. And she thinks that he may be the only one thinking straight. What if he forgot about Joe because Joe is actually alive. This idea sets off Cecile who seems to forget she’s talking to Joe’s oldest daughter. Iris wants to investigate his death and Cecile wants no part of it. The two of them decide to work separately. Allegra (Kayla Compton) goes with Iris. Chester and Caitlin (Danielle Panabaker) stay with Cecile.
Joe died when he got hit by a train. Iris has footage of the accident. Joe was trying to avoid walking into someone. He fell onto the tracks just as a train passed by. The train came at full force and hit Joe. The footage that Iris got looks like it was tampered with. So Iris and Allegra go to the train station to look around. While they are there, Iris sees strange particles flying around. Allegra can’t see them and thinks iris’s time sickness may be affecting her. It’s almost time for Deon (Christian Magby) to visit Iris, so his treatment must be wearing off.
The station manager was there the day that Joe died. He describes the day to Iris and Allegra, saying the train that hit Joe was early that day. Iris asks about the footage the CCPD gave to her. The manager says when they have football games, the broadcast messes with their video equipment. He shows her another video of the footage. That video doesn’t look like it was tampered with so there’s no doubt that Joe is dead.
Cecile decides to use her psychic powers to find Barry but she needs some help. Chester designs a helmet to help boost her powers but she needs even more help. There is someone who has basically the same power as Cecile but she pretty much hates the Flash. Cecile finds The Top aka Rosalind Dillon (Ashley Rickards) hustling guys at a pool hall. After exchanging verbal blows, Rosalind agrees to help Cecile only because Cecile can get her parole restrictions lifted.
Jefferson tries to change Barry’s mind about giving up his powers. He can relate to Barry’s pain of losing Joe. All Barry can think about is how Despero was right about him. He modifies Jefferson’s watch that activates the Black Lightning suit. The next time he activates the suit, he will have the power he needs to destroy the link between Barry and the Speed Force. They give it a try, but the link to the Speed Force is too strong.
Allegra did some digging and says that she used to take that same train every day. It was never early, the train was always late. Also, two days before the accident the train passed an inspection. But the hydraulics failed on the day of the accident. It doesn’t add up. Iris says she was wrong. The last six months are the worst of her life. Allegra gets it. She’s lost hope before. She passes the file to Iris, telling her there’s always hope. Iris sees the particles flying around again and leaves to return to the station.
Chester finishes his Telepathic Crown, a neural conjoiner for Cecile and Rosalind. The power of their minds is increased, giving them the ability to hear multiple people at once. Cecile can’t handle it, but Rosalind likes it. Cecile tells them to turn it off but Rosalind says she is letting her emotions get in the way. Once Cecile does that, she finds Barry, but they overload the Crown. Chester says he can reconfigure it to get it running again. What they don’t know is that Despero is watching them so they lead him to the Flash.
Deon finds Iris at the train station and she shows him the particles. She thinks someone is altering reality and wants to show Deon. She asks Deon to undo all of her treatments. If he does that, Iris could start moving in and out of other timelines. Iris isn’t scared though. She knows whatever is happening to Barry has to do with the particles.
Despite his reservations, Deon removes the treatments. The particles show up everywhere. Deon sees them and says they are decaying temporal isotopes. He says someone tapped into the Negative Still Force to rewrite the timeline. Joe wasn’t supposed to die, but someone changed the past to make sure he did.
Caitlin voices her concern for Cecile’s anger at the mention of Joe’s name. Cecile says no one understands what she went through, but Caitlin does. She went to the same thing when Ronnie died. She feared her grief and thinks Cecile is too. Cecile says she feels everyone’s grief so she pushes her own grief down because it’s too much. Caitlin reminds her that her strength as an empath comes from feeling all of her feelings, even the hard ones.
They are interrupted by an alarm on Chester’s phone. Someone at STAR Labs turned on the particle accelerator. That someone is Despero. He takes over the minds of the technicians working in STAR labs and they kill the CCPD guards. Despero puts his hand on the accelerator and absorbs its power.
Cecile and Rosalind power up again and are able to broadcast, showing Barry with Black Lightning. Despero shows up and invades their minds. He tells them to show him where the Flash is. Rosalind knocks out Caitlin and Chester. She offers to let Despero inside of her mind if they can kill the Flash together. Despero doesn’t need her and invades her mind, knocking her out. He turns to Cecile and tries invading her mind, but Cecile is stronger.
Cecile fights back, forcing Despero out of her mind. Chester and Caitlin wake up, but Rosalind is out cold. Caitlin checks on her and says she’s barely alive. Chester gets a location on Barry, saying he’s at the Hall. Cecile says Despero got inside her head, so he knows where Barry is too.
Black Lightning continues to try and break the link between Barry and the Speed Force, but it’s taking a toll on Barry. He says they need to take a break, but Barry needs to complete this before Despero finds him. He didn’t tell Jefferson about Despero and how he wants to kill Barry. After hearing the whole story, Jefferson refuses to continue. Barry gets angry and throws lightning at Jefferson. One way or another, they are going to finish.
Barry reminds Jefferson that he promised to keep the world safe. Jefferson says protecting Barry is keeping the world safe. They start fighting with lightning. Barry says they called the safety protocol “injustice” because if one of them goes rogue, the rest of the world doesn’t stand a chance. He runs circles around Jefferson and they fly into Oliver Queen’s Green Arrow suit case.
Barry looks at the damage. Jefferson reminds him that Oliver sacrificed his life to save Barry’s life. He did it because Barry is the best of them. Oliver wasn’t a quitter and Barry can’t quit either. Barry apologizes for losing hope. Jefferson asks him the questions he asks his students. Where’s the future? Right here. Who’s life is it? Barry’s. What is he going to do with it? Live it by any means necessary.
Despero shows up, knocking Jefferson back and putting his hands around Barry’s neck. Iris and Deon show up. She tells Desepro that Barry was framed. Black Lightning blasts Despero’s third eye before he can end Barry. Iris tells Barry to find out who framed him. He has to go to the future to do that, but he doesn’t have enough of the Speed Force to go to the future. Deon gives him Still Force that will pull him to any weird temporal activity. Barry puts on his cowl and goes through a portal. Despero says they just killed this world and leaves.
The Flash arrives in the future and sees a sign that says “West Party.” He goes into the venue and finds Eobard Thawne (Tom Cavanagh) giving a speech. Cecile, Ryan Wilder (Javicia Leslie), Alex Danvers (Chyler Leigh), Allegra, Chester, Ryan Choi (Osric Chou) and Iris are all there. The speech Eobard is giving is about how he fell in love with his fiancee … Iris West. Eobard and Iris see Barry. Their shocked faces make everyone turn to look. Ryan asks what everyone is thinking. What is Barry Allen doing there? They all look at him in disgust.
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News Editor, Senior Contributor, and Press Editor. Coordinate breaking news, trailers and press releases. I also contribute reviews, recaps and interviews. Creator of the Indigenerd Wire, a column dedicated to the Indigenous creatives in pop culture.
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