The Flash S06E15 Review: Return of the Thawne

The Flash, Season 6, Episode 15: The Exorcism of Nash Wells

Y'know, this is actually a very solid episode of The Flash. It's just that, well, the whole concept of Eobard Thawn's ghost somehow being combined into all the different Harrison Wells-es that are folded into Nash Wells is sort of dumped upon us out of nowhere and really doesn't make a whole ton of sense even by the wacky sci-fi standards of comic books. But okay. Sure. But compared to the honestly kind of disappointing last couple of episodes, "The Exorcism of Nash Wells" is actually pretty neat. There were actual stakes, there was a decent build-up to the stuff that happened here (even if it doesn't exactly make the most sense) and even if everything happened the way I thought it was going to (particularly in regards to anything behind Nash's paper-thin backstory) it's still a solid episode.

The titular exorcism of Nash Wells involves Team Flash trying to find a way to get rid of Eobard Thawne from Nash Wells' psyche, because all of the Harrison Wellses in the world have been combined into a single being, and Eobard got dragged in because of some vague reason or whatever. I guess everyone that looks like Tom Cavanagh gets combined into Nash? Nash has never been the most interesting character in the show. His character is pretty flat and we're dragging the very obvious reveal that Allegra's alternate-Earth doppelganger is his dead daughter is very much on-the-nose.

That said, though... just because the backstory is obvious doesn't make it any less well-done when the episode actually delves deep into Nash Wells' psyche. Thanks to Nash's self-loathing, Eobard is able to tap into the Negative Speed Force and feed on Nash like some sort of emotional vampire, becoming stronger and becoming the dominant personality if he can get Nash to wallow in sorrow and self-pity over letting his adopted daughter Maya die. And I do like that we don't go overboard with the flashbacks like some other CW shows (looking at you, Arrow, Batwoman) and we just get to see the first and last meetings that Nash has with his daughter. Tom Cavanagh's acting as the sorrow-stricken Nash in that mental cave is really, really amazing, as is Tom Cavanagh's acting as the devil-like Eobard who continues to twist that knife deep in Nash's heart, telling him how it's all his fault, how the 'treasure first, everything second' mentality that costed Maya her life was Nash's fault... yeah, it's all pretty well-done.

Barry and Cisco enter Nash's mind to confront Eobard and Nash, and Cisco, as always, uses his multiversal constant of being a buddy to any Harrison Wells in the multiverse to talk to Nash and give him a great pep talk. Meanwhile, Barry and Eobard get a pretty good little face-off. Earlier in the episode when the combined Nash-Thawne was doing a combination of faking being Nash and taunting Barry over "Little Runner", Barry flipped out and pretty damn near killed Nash, but in their final confrontation in this episode, Barry ends up basically doing the same thing that Nash did -- confronting the source of their pain, the deaths of their respective daughters, and refusing to let Eobard Thawne utilize the pain of it against them. In Nash's case, it's acceptance that the responsibility for Maya's death was his fault, and in Barry's case, it's to stop letting Eobard Thawne get into his head with Nora. Sure, the episode ends with Eobard Thawne exorcised from Nash Wells in the form of red lightning being purged from his body, but, eh, he'll be back.

Meanwhile, while all of this is going on, Siri and Allimak are a duo of mirror people running around the real world. We have no idea what Eva McCulloch did to the real Kamilla, because she sure isn't in that one room that Eva and Iris hangs out in, but the mirror people are looking for another MacGuffin, the Prismatic Refractor, and there's a whole thing about Eva's husband Joseph Carver having a hand in obtaining a lot of these devices in the real world, and the mirror squad have to get the plot device before Joseph Carver hides it in his secure facilities, or Team Flash gets to it and shoves it to the authorities like ARGUS. But then they get attacked by another of Carver's supply of light-based metahuman assassins, Sunshine.

Because Barry's speed is something they can't waste, it's Killer Frost that heads off to rescue the floundering mirror duo from Sunshine. Barry tries to shoehorn his way in, and gets poor Frost zapped. Eventually, Barry decides to trust his friends or whatever, and sets up a trap with Joe and the CCPD to trap Sunshine in a room where she has no access to sunlight, and apparently arrest her and take the Refractor to ARGUS. But Siri and Allimak have already switched out the Refractor with a replica that Eva provided them. Joe ends up noticing something suspicious about Iris, especially after Wally's warning to him last episode, so, uh, some progression in that part of the storyline.

Speaking of minor progression in the storyline, Barry also ends up getting the idea of using Nora's future diary to make his artificial Speed Force. Okay, then. Honestly, I'm not very sure about the whole artificial speed force storyline, and I just hope that it leads to something that's interesting. Until we get a new Flash episode after this whole worldwide plague situation, though, this is the last we'll be seeing of Team Flash for a while, and it's a good episode to end on, if nothing else.

DC Easter Eggs Corner:

• Nash notes that he encountered a bunch of "psychic starfishes" in Earth-26, which, of course, is a reference to Starro, the giant alien psychic starfish that was the Justice League's first enemy in the comics. 
• Sunshine is original to The Flash. 
• The Cerebral Inhibitor was used in season four multiple times when Team Flash fought the Thinker. 
• Among the villains that Iris mentions to Barry is "Ringmaster", a.k.a. Beauregard Baer, a minor Flash villain who, in the comics, was hypnotized by Golden Glider to upstage the Flash as Central City's newest superhero. Ringmaster used ring-themed equipment to fight, but after being defeated by the Flash and freed from Glider's mind control, Ringmaster retired.