The Flash S02E16 Review: Not the Speedster You Were Expecting

The Flash, Season 2, Episode 16: Trajectory

The dates between the reviews don't show it, but Episode 16 returned after a month-long hiatus after the King Shark episode, which left us with the half-hearted reveal that Zoom is Jay! Or Zolomon. Or someone else who shares their face. This episode, extremely surprisingly, introduces another speedster into the mix and it's not Wally West or Jesse Chambers, but rather, Trajectory! Who is a character I am not familiar with from the comics, so no paragraph about me talking about the stuff I liked about her from the comics. But she's a fun enough (and psychotic enough) villain of the week, threatening enough but still nowhere as distracting from the character arc in this episode.

Barry's obsessed with becoming faster to battle Zoom, but he's not really sure how to accomplish his goal -- his attempts at jumping over a gorge (thank goodness Cisco has drones) was hilarious, but when the supervillain Trajectory starts to do some high-speed robbery, Barry has to contend with the fact that there's a third speedster that's faster than him. While Team Flash speculate about the origins of Trajectory, Caitlin inadvertently reveals the existence of Velocity-9 and its destructive side effects. It then ends up being a bit of a 'don't do drugs' allegory as Barry had to fight Trajectory, while the poor girl has to deal with an insane split personality and an increasing dependence on Velocity-9. That Jekyll-and-Hyde bit was a bit too on the nose, perhaps, but she was an entertaining villain nonetheless. 

Trajectory runs too fast, her lightning becomes blue, and she goes poof leaving nothing but her clothes behind. Running too fast and being consumed by the Speed Force, is, of course, a familiar trope to DC comic book readers, but for the sake of anyone who doesn't wish to be spoilered while reading these reviews, I will keep my mouth shut. It certainly poses some questions about Zoom's own blue lightning, and just how Barry might weaponize this against Zoom... even if 'overload the villain with the energy he wants' is yet another in a list of sci-fi tropes that shouldn't even be a thing anymore. 

Also, Jesse gets stabbed by the Velocity-9. Astute comic-book readers or show-only people who are up to date with social media will know that Jesse Chambers is destined to become the superheroine speedster Jesse Quick... yet she doesn't become Jesse Quick in this episode and instead just hops town. We get a bit of a 'daddy stop smothering me' moment with Earth-2 Wells, though, which was a nice moment to build Jesse up. Wally shows up in the bar they were hanging out with to flirt with Jesse a bit, and... Jesse's metahuman warning watch beep-beeped. Is Wally already a metahuman? Or is that just Barry/Cisco being close enough to Jesse? In any case, it would be weird for Wells to give Jesse that watch and have it beep beep all the time in response to two people that she'll be spending a relatively close distance with so yeah, maybe it's an oblique foreshadowing? 

...also what the fuck Wells how did that recording end up in your metahuman radar watch? That felt like a pointless bit of drama. 

Also, thanks to Cisco's Vibing, the cast Vibed Jay's helmet and ended up realizing that Jay is Zoom. Or someone pretending/looking like Jay is Zoom. It was a bit too similar to season 1's Harrison Wells for my taste, though I'm just shrugging and going along with this for the moment. 

It's mostly a strong episode, punctuated with some hilarious character moments from the main cast (especially in that club -- Cisco's stupid dance moves are hilariously fun), though relatively marred by giving Iris a very weak subplot with her new editor, Scott Evans... who's basically a poor man's J. Jonah Jameson/Perry White, being all 'rawr Flash is evil because that one time I exposed a well-liked authority figure as evil', with a piss-poor attempt at building some romantic/sexual tension... though Iris herself lampshades it as being 'wait what', so there's that. Iris's earlier scene with Barry talking about their 'what-if' married life on Earth-2 is also... strange. 

Overall, though, other than that one bit, a very fun episode nonetheless with a good villain and some buildup to the larger plot.