The Flash S05E06 Review: Wanna Build A Snowman

The Flash, Season 5, Episode 6: The Icicle Cometh

Yeah, a bit of an... underwhelming episode. The search for Thomas Snow hasn't been the most exciting storyline, as much as I really do enjoy Danielle Panabaker being given a proper storyline that for once is relatively consistently written. But the payoff in this episode is honestly pretty bland. I really, really have to applaud the sheer chemistry between Barry, Cisco and Caitlin's actors, though, because that's the biggest appeal in this episode and easily the most enjoyable parts of the episode.

Basically, the team ends up finding dr. Thomas Snow locked up for years in a Tannhauser black-ops site, apparently stuck there while he's trying to cure his ALS. We get the roundabout explanation of Caitlin's powers that was hinted to be extra-mysterious, because in this post-Flashpoint timeline Thomas Snow apparently has been trying to cure ALS for years, but when he tried to cure Caitlin with the same experimental technique, it ends up creating the alternate personality Killer Frost, who Thomas calls "Khione".

And the show really ends up showing Caitlin's sheer joy at meeting her father once more amazingly well. It's not a new sort of emotion in this show because half the cast has been separated and reunited with a family member at some point in this show's history, but, again, it's done well enough that I don't particularly mind. The plot goes to Cisco's suspicion, telling Barry and Caitlin that there are a fair bit too many holes in Thomas Snow's story, especially on where Thomas's "Khione" is. I do love that conversation between Cisco and Barry where Cisco admonishes Barry for thinking that everything will end up fine and dandy, that he should stop thinking about it "as Nora's dad" but as a CSI.

Of course, turns out that the Thomas Snow that they've been interacting with all this time has been the villain all along, dubbed Icicle by Cisco, and he's trying to get STAR Labs' help in 'wiping out' the side effects of his treatment, which will kill Thomas Snow permanently. There is kind of a particularly dumb moment in this episode where Flash and XS runs into the plot device room where Icicle is cooling the room into absolute zero, and trip and fall. Okay, understandable... but then the rest of the superheroes teleport in and trip and fall too. That's just kind of sad. Of course, Killer Frost ends up returning, attacks Icicle and forces him to retreat, and we get the handwave-retcon that apparently Thinker didn't use Melting Point's metagene-wiping powers on Caitlin, but installed a mental block using Brain Storm's powers... which... why? I dunno.

Overall, though, despite the huge plot points and questions I have about it all, it's kind of watchable, I guess? I do appreciate that they at least gave an episode to wrap up the Caitlin stuff instead of putting it on permanent B-plot mode.

The actual B-plots in this episode are pretty bland, though. Cecile and Ralph are a fun duo, and they go around looking for clues -- ending up with them finding out the identity of Cicada's child as one of the victims from the destruction of the Thinker's satellite. Iris and Nora are awkward and kind of find it difficult to bond with each other while remaining professional and doing their job, while Sherloque tries to help out in increasingly awkward ways. Neither of these are particularly memorable, although the actors, once more, make bland scenes like this at least chuckle-worthy while I breeze through them.

On the Cicada front, he ends up hunting down another metahuman, a sword-armed lady called Razorsharp, and... and gets mortally wounded in the process of killing her. It kind of feels weirdly paced, honestly, and I would've rather had Cicada be wounded during the huge Vibe episode instead. This just feels kind of random, and "Orlin" the spends the couple of scenes he has after being stabbed just spouting cryptic "this will make me stronger" lines with his doctor friend/lover.

Anyway, not the best hour of Flash for sure, and it's times like this that I am so happy that the show at least has a very, very likable cast that makes sitting through this episode at least feel fun.

DC Easter Eggs Corner:

• Icicle doesn't really have much connection with Killer Frost in the comics, beyond being ice-themed villains. Icicle in the comics is the name of two different villains -- the first Icicle is Joar Mahkent, who designed a freeze gun and menaced the first Green Lantern, Alan Scott. This Icicle died during the Crisis on Infinite Earths, and was succeeded by his son, Cameron Mahkent, who is a metahuman born with ice-manipulating powers due to his father's constant exposure to the cold gun. To my knowledge, Thomas Snow isn't an actual character (or at least a costume-wielding supervillain) in the comics. 
• One of the scientists that Thomas Snow has been in contact with is Louise Lincoln, who in the comic is the very second woman to become Killer Frost, and the longest-running one to old on to that mantle. After her good friend Crystal Frost (the first Killer Frost) was accidentally killed during a confrontation with Firestorm, Louise repeated the experiment to transform herself into a second Killer Frost 
• Victor Fries, another name that Thomas name-dropped, is, of course, the alter-ego of another ice-themed DC villain, Mr. Freeze, an enemy of Batman's. 
• Raelene, the metahuman killed by Cicada, is based on Razorsharp, a.k.a. Raelene Sharp, a member of the C-list superhero team known as the Blood Pack. Just like her live-action version, the comics' Razorsharp was a metahuman who was able to transform her arms into gigantic metal blades.