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irlZaphod posted:Aside from the Killer Frost stuff, which is dragging on somewhat painfully long, the only storyline which Caitlin has really had in the almost 3 seasons has basically been doomed romances. Longbaugh01 posted:Honestly, anything having to do with romantic relationships on this show has been bad, but focusing on Caitlin and Cisco specifically, you see how much of a dumpster fire it's been. I think this is what happens when you're somehow mandated to cram these things into a show despite it being inorganic. The only relationship on the show that so far hasn't been somehow annoying is Joe's, and even then I don't understand the necessity for it outside of "Let's give Joe a girlfriend!" and "We need more relationship stuff!" Basically, they need to simplify everyone's relationships except Barry's, but instead of that they just try to tell complex stories in much less time than they need and then end up throwing them away when they start getting in the way of the main plot. Also, they have absolutely no idea what Caitlin is for. Like, they need her to be the team's doctor, but outside her few seconds per episode of medical techno-babble they don't have anything for her to do.
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Apr 4, 2017 07:14
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STAC Goat posted:I mean, Black Lightning's a cool character who fits into the kind of "B-Team" nature of the Arrow-verse and has built in support team and family drama with his daughters. Plus it diversifies up your field of heroes with a character that has a bunch of topical stories to tell. Fingers crossed that Richard Roundtree guest stars as Soul Power. 
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Apr 4, 2017 09:43
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The only thing that would save Caitlin at this point would be to have her embrace her Killer Frost side but become an antihero instead of full-blown stupid evil. It could even be something she switches on and off when she needs it, like drinking a Jekyll/Hyde potion or something.
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Apr 6, 2017 15:48
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Does anyone else feel like Flash - the programme, not the character - still hasn't gotten over the missteps of season two, or is that just me? I've been watching it this season and while there's been a lot I've liked, I nonetheless cannot help but feel as though the disappointment I felt about season two is still casting a wee bit of a shadow over it. I actually liked season three of Arrow for the most part (haven't seen season four yet - I'll get to it) which I understand a lot of folks didn't but I still felt like it was better than Flash season two. Might be alone in that as well.
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Apr 6, 2017 15:58
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Wheat Loaf posted:Does anyone else feel like Flash - the programme, not the character - still hasn't gotten over the missteps of season two, or is that just me? I've been watching it this season and while there's been a lot I've liked, I nonetheless cannot help but feel as though the disappointment I felt about season two is still casting a wee bit of a shadow over it. Season 2 had a lot more problems and they fixed a bunch of those but introduced some other ones. The Savitar storyline is okay but has largely reduced Iris's character to a victim which is a bad turn for her. Having Cisco - the comic relief character - gain a little more depth is a good thing, but they did it by making him a mopey bastard who hated Barry for awhile (luckily that's over). Between LoT eating up a lot of their best villains and Hamill filming Star Wars, they really haven't been able to maintain fun, recurring villains like they did in season 1 (although I liked Kadabra and hope we see more of him, and there's room to flesh out Mirror Master). They've also always struggled with having too many characters, and any time you want to focus on a few the others get kind of pushed to the side; while I like Julian I think he could be a recurring character rather than a regular, I'd rather lose him to give more time to Wally or Caitlin or Wells. Season 2's entire first third was like a soft launch for LoT, and that just started everything off badly and it never really recovered. I don't think you're going to see anything as bad as that again. There is still room for improvement though.
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Apr 6, 2017 17:53
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Mirror Master was boring.Wheat Loaf posted:Does anyone else feel like Flash - the programme, not the character - still hasn't gotten over the missteps of season two, or is that just me? I've been watching it this season and while there's been a lot I've liked, I nonetheless cannot help but feel as though the disappointment I felt about season two is still casting a wee bit of a shadow over it. I think this season is better than 2, but nowhere near 1, and I'm not sure the show will ever reach that level again. I'm not sure if it's fallout from 2, but it doesn't help that twice now at panels the cast and some of the showrunners have said "Hey we know you're disappointed with this season. We'll do better next time we swear!" Something about that makes it seem like they've psyched themselves out or are overthinking what made Season 1 so great. It doesn't help that the formula now since and because of Season 1's success is INTRODUCE MYSTERIOUS VILLAIN AND MAKE HIS REAL IDENTITY A SHOCKING TWIST. Seriously, they need to stop that and go another way. Arrow did it this season, but they really hadn't before (maybe a little in season 1 iirc) and they also did a much more competent job of misdirection and making the reveal not feel like contrived bullshit. Speaking of Arrow, yeah 3 was ok but I have bad news for you since season 4 is much worse. Thankfully this season (5) is good again. I'd almost suggest you skip 4 entirely, but I'm a completion-ist and there are a lot of plot points from 4 that have carried over to 5. (And Legends whose season 2 will probably end up being the best out of of this season's CWDCTV shows.)
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Apr 6, 2017 19:59
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Longbaugh01 posted:it doesn't help that twice now at panels the cast and some of the showrunners have said "Hey we know you're disappointed with this season. We'll do better next time we swear!" People keep bringing this up in this and other threads and it mystifies me because, yeah, they've said it twice, once before this season - which is a large improvement over the last season - and once about next season. I just feel like the narrative is building that they keep making empty promises over and over again, but they've already at least partially fulfilled the original promise. I am willing to believe that they are trying to learn for next season as well, and admitting "yeah we have heard the criticisms" is to me a good sign, as opposed to pretending nothing is wrong.
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Apr 6, 2017 20:36
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Guy A. Person posted:which is a large improvement over the last season I disagree. Also, maybe you're right about that point you responded to, I'd like to see you take a crack at the other point I made about them using the same formula over and over again despite them saying they recognized the criticism and genuinely want to improve. Then why not start there after last season's trainwreck?
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Apr 6, 2017 21:08
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You may disagree with the "large" part, but you agreed it was better. In response to your other point, I do think the formula is different outside of "faster mystery speedster". Season 1 -> 2 in retrospect was the exact "mentor character shows up and we all like him but whoops he is an evil speedster (oh and also has been making me fight villains specifically so I get faster for his own benefit)" gimmick. The villain's motivations and methods and the story beats were all largely the same with small variances thrown in, but it was just the same story done way worse. This time you had the Alchemy storyline in the first act, then the Savitar "oh it's another, faster speedster :yawn:" reveal, but then after one episode (not counting the crossover break) immediately shifted to the future Iris death storyline. Again, there's lots of issues with this season's arc but it is playing out much differently than the last two, it's not the exact same story beats and motivation like with season 1 and 2. The fact that they are making his identity some big reveal is lame and a rehash of course, not going to argue that. It would be rad if they literally left it at "he is an ancient speedster but your future self pissed him off". Then again if the speculation that it is future Barry are true that will be a much better reveal than Season 2's. If conversely we find out that Savitar is Joe and that he wants Barry to get faster so he can do (something) with his speed, then I'll eat my words.
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Apr 6, 2017 21:49
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I kinda hope they keep introducing a new Harrison Wells every season. Guy A. Person posted:Between LoT eating up a lot of their best villains and Hamill filming Star Wars, I read this, realized I didn't remember Hamill from the show. Then I looked up on IMDB and found out not only was he the Trickster, he reprised his role from the 1990 Flash series (that I don't think I've watched). That's pretty cool. It's like the nod to the 90's Superman show where Dean Cain and Teri Hatcher have parts in Supergirl, except he's actually playing the same character. irlZaphod posted:I liked Barry and Felicity. It was one of the things that reeled me in. Stumbling onto one of the first episodes of the Flash S1 ("Going Rogue") while channel surfing was what got me into the DCCW universe in the first place. It was definitely a good show then, and Barry/Felicity had a lot of chemistry, while it also was obvious that both were pining for the one they couldn't get. The show had more of a monster-of-the-week thing going, with Barry's getting to know his powers and the consequences of the particle accelerator mishap as the main overarching plot instead of some immortal enemy. Visits from Starling City were fun, because Ollie was the realistic and serious character that rarely smiled and came from a whole different setting, a show with a quite different tone. Flash was silly and the gang came up with nicknames for the villains, then Ollie came in and was like: "seriously, guys, this is not a game". I really miss that show. I still like all the DCCW shows despite their flaws, but I long or the days before time travel and the speed force.
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Apr 6, 2017 21:59
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But maybe they only really had chemistry in a "We both have unrequited love for someone, we should just settle and get together" kind of way.
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kjetting posted:I read this, realized I didn't remember Hamill from the show. Then I looked up on IMDB and found out not only was he the Trickster, he reprised his role from the 1990 Flash series (that I don't think I've watched). That's pretty cool. It's like the nod to the 90's Superman show where Dean Cain and Teri Hatcher have parts in Supergirl, except he's actually playing the same character. They've done this a few times and it's really cool. The most obvious connection is Flash dad, but they also brought back Tina McGee (the love interest and 90's version of the star labs team) and Julio Mendez (the best friend in the old series) as same named characters. I'm waiting for the inevitable trip to Earth 3 where we find out it literally is just the 90's series 20 years later and with a few cosmetic differences.
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Apr 6, 2017 22:06
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Guy A. Person posted:Then again if the speculation that it is future Barry are true that will be a much better reveal than Season 2's. If conversely we find out that Savitar is Joe and that he wants Barry to get faster so he can do (something) with his speed, then I'll eat my words. I agree with most of what you said and you're right I believe it's improved but I wouldn't say large. I actually like the idea that it's a future Barry--even if that's predictable as hell--especially since they've maybe been setting that up since the last crossover and maybe it'll get Barry to stop being a selfish gently caress-up, but that doesn't take away from the mystery-villain's-identity thing (which they doubled-down and used TWICE this season) that continues to be a lynchpin. If they do it again next season, then I don't know what the gently caress.
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Apr 6, 2017 22:29
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I don't know why people keep calling it speculation when Savitar has literally said "I'm the future Flash." every time they ask who he is. Do you guys want him to hold his ID up to the camera?
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Apr 6, 2017 22:33
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pee out my butt posted:I don't know why people keep calling it speculation when Savitar has literally said "I'm the future Flash." every time they ask who he is. Do you guys want him to hold his ID up to the camera? No, but I'd like you to make some more snide posts across threads. Also, the real obvious hint imo is the whole "He's the very first speedster" thing.
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Apr 6, 2017 22:40
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Longbaugh01 posted:I agree with most of what you said and you're right I believe it's improved but I wouldn't say large. Yeah I think that's where we are at an impasse: I think the improvement is large enough that their first "it'll get better" promise isn't void, you don't. But that also answers my original question in any case. I think our reasoning is similar and certain stuff just bugs you/impresses me more, which is totally fair.
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Apr 6, 2017 22:41
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Guy A. Person posted:Yeah I think that's where we are at an impasse: I think the improvement is large enough that their first "it'll get better" promise isn't void, you don't. Actually I don't think it's void. I just think it's becoming a trend. I also think--like I said earlier--that maybe they've psyched themselves out, and in trying too hard to improve, they're making missteps. There's a lot of ground between "listening, responding, and using constructive criticism" and "Everyone panic! They hate our show! We need to fix this poo poo and fast!" and I'm wondering if the showrunners have been going too far towards the latter. Anyway, it's just speculation.
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Apr 6, 2017 22:59
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Longbaugh01 posted:Actually I don't think it's void. I just think it's becoming a trend. I also think--like I said earlier--that maybe they've psyched themselves out, and in trying too hard to improve, they're making missteps. There's a lot of ground between "listening, responding, and using constructive criticism" and "Everyone panic! They hate our show! We need to fix this poo poo and fast!" and I'm wondering if the showrunners have been going too far towards the latter. Anyway, it's just speculation. The biggest problem I think they have is that they are trying to make Barry sad all the loving time and I get it, when a hero isn't in danger or moving towards a goal, where is the drama. The issue is that the Flash was suppose to be fun with moments of pathos, not moments of fun with ALL PATHOS. Or at least having Barry be the "Good" guy. The best episode this season was with Magenta because Barry not only talked her down but acted like a human being and told her what happened to her was awful but people car. Like, an actual power of love ending done in way that didn't make wretch! Season 1 worked because Barry learns about his fun powers and you lead up to this big mystery. Season 2 COULD of been good if they had built up the Jay/Barry dynamic more but they were more into telling us than showing us and then the roster bloat kinda hurt. This season has worked, somewhat, because the character motivations make sense and they haven't worried too much about building anything else.
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Apr 6, 2017 23:56
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kjetting posted:I long or the days before time travel and the speed force. 
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Apr 7, 2017 04:28
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Tiggum posted:Those were both in season one though. He meant he longs for the days when the show didn't exist.
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Apr 7, 2017 04:30
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Tiggum posted:Those were both in season one though. I looked it up. There sure was a time when Barry didn't know he could time travel and that the speed force was a thing that had a mind of its own. While there was evidence later that the Flash's existence was a result of time travel, the episodes where Barry (accidentally) realized he could run fast enough to jump through time and change events in the past were S1E15/16, and the first "controlled" time jump back to his mother's last moments was of course in the season finale. And from there on it went full out with time travel, parallel universes, the speed force as a place you could travel to that could take on whatever appearance it wanted to, and immortal enemies wth season-spanning plots. Reverse Flash may have been a "season spanning villain" but wasn't really introduced until about halfway into the season, and as far as I remember he was never the "main" plot, just something in the background that turned out to be more and more important until the season finale. At first it was just Barry figuring out that another speedster existed and could be his mothers killer, then there were the short clips of wheelchair-Harry getting out of his chair when no one was around, and gradually revealing his identity as reverse-flash to the viewers, until team Flash got suspicious and kept working with him wile simultaneously working on a plan to defeat him.
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Apr 7, 2017 08:22
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kjetting posted:I looked it up. There sure was a time when Barry didn't know he could time travel and that the speed force was a thing that had a mind of its own. That's great, but didn't we all know it was probably Reverse Flash from the first time his mother's murder was shown/described and therefore Eobard Thawne who is always from the future?
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Apr 7, 2017 08:29
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Longbaugh01 posted:That's great, but didn't we all know it was probably Reverse Flash from the first time his mother's murder was shown/described and therefore Eobard Thawne who is always from the future? Maybe you did. I'm probably not smart/observant enough. I'm not going to re-watch the episodes, but I remember the reveal as: In early episodes when Barry remembers the fatal night we see speed streaks. Meaning: possibly a speedster involved. BA later figures out that himself. I think Barry sees Reverse Flash himself for the first time about halfway through the season, and connects the dots that the yellow speedster could be involved in his mothers death. Barry then realizes that in his memories there where streaks in two colors, and possibly that meant two speedsters. (Still no reason there has to be time travel involved) In ep 15 Barry accidentally time travels. I think he even realizes uncharacteristically early that this could mean he would be able to save his mother. Parallel to this we get a reveal of Harry getting out of the wheel chair, having Gideon show him the future newspaper, that he has the yellow mask, that he needs some apparatus to give him energy. Back then, even if he turned out to be the killer of Barrys mom, Wells was already an adult when it happened and there would be no reason to think he would have to be from the future (except the future newspaper being a clear hint). I don't remember the name "Eobard Thawne" being introduced until pretty late in the season. But hey, it's been two years and I may be misremembering. BTW, wasn't there a line somewhere about Barry being the designer of Gideon, or am I remembering that wrong as well? I wonder if that thread will be touched again.
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Apr 7, 2017 08:56
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kjetting posted:Maybe you did. I'm probably not smart/observant enough. No, you just didn't have foreknowledge from the comics.
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Apr 7, 2017 09:08
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kjetting posted:Parallel to this we get a reveal of Harry getting out of the wheel chair, having Gideon show him the future newspaper, that he has the yellow mask, that he needs some apparatus to give him energy. Back then, even if he turned out to be the killer of Barrys mom, Wells was already an adult when it happened and there would be no reason to think he would have to be from the future (except the future newspaper being a clear hint).
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Apr 7, 2017 09:26
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McSpanky posted:No, you just didn't have foreknowledge from the comics. This. I just read up on wikipedia now and found out that the idea of Eobard Thawne having killed Barry's mother was from the comics. I mostly know the Flash from appearances in other titles, and the reveal that reverse flash killed Barry's mother seems to be from a 2009 comic, which makes it many years after I was even remotely updated on superhero comic books. I have no idea when that happened, but I remember sometime later picking up a Spider-Man comic where Spider-Man was suddenly named Ben and his clone named Peter was living his private life while he was out crime-fighting and I decided that maybe I should just stick to Alan Moore and the like.
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Apr 7, 2017 09:45
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kjetting posted:This. You chose... wisely.
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Apr 7, 2017 10:32
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McSpanky posted:You chose... wisely. Hahahahahahaha. No poo poo!
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Apr 7, 2017 11:09
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Comics are awesome. The big problem with this season is the whole future knowledge bullshit. It never works well and is never written well. It's pretty much dominating every interaction with Iris and making her completely one-dimensional. As someone mentioned, it's made the show lose a lot of the monster-of-the-week stuff which made Season 1 entertaining.
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Apr 7, 2017 11:25
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irlZaphod posted:As someone mentioned, it's made the show lose a lot of the monster-of-the-week stuff which made Season 1 entertaining. When thinking of things I think have gone wrong since the beginning of Season 2, I honestly never thought of it being less episodic as one of them. I suppose there's something to be said for that, but I also think this show can be dominated by serialization and still be better than it has been since S2 began.
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Apr 7, 2017 11:47
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There's different degrees of serialisation. You can have "every episode counts" serialisation like a lot of contemporary dramas do. You can have "either/or" serialisation like The X-Files where the MOTW episodes and the mythology episodes are clearly delineated. And you can have Buffy serialisation (or probably some other more contemporary show if you like, but Buffy's still the template for most of these CW shows and shows in that region even 20 years later), where it's got episodic stories mixed in with an overarching storyline, which is what I think Flash had in its first season. There's something to be said for having done-in-ones. Part of the problem is that you can have enough storyline but not enough story (if that makes sense) and breaking it up a bit helps a lot. The periodic Rogues episodes you had throughout season one were always reliably entertaining and great at stopping the Reverse-Flash plot from dragging more than it could have, which is obviously something that's been lost a bit as a consequence of Miller and Purcell moving over to LoT. you had Captain Cold as a really solid recurring secondary villain and the series hasn't really had that in seasons two or three.
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Apr 7, 2017 12:22
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They kinda blew their load on villains in season one and two so unless we keep going back to the same ones we really don't have many left to see (and they killed a lot of them). Which is why the show needs less episodes.
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Apr 7, 2017 13:13
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Invalid Validation posted:They kinda blew their load on villains in season one and two so unless we keep going back to the same ones we really don't have many left to see (and they killed a lot of them). Which is why the show needs less episodes. Boy, looking at the list of Flash villains, you are right. They really have used the majority of them, and some of them I don't even remember that well on the show. I saw Captain Boomerang on the list and I was like "oh there's one! wait, nope, he was in one of the first crossovers." I probably would have remembered him more if it had been after I binged Spartacus though and grew to love(hate) Ashur.
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Apr 7, 2017 13:21
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Invalid Validation posted:They kinda blew their load on villains in season one and two so unless we keep going back to the same ones we really don't have many left to see (and they killed a lot of them). Which is why the show needs less episodes. Or to just not kill its villains. Recurring villains are fine, they're only a problem if your heroes can't manage to stop anyone without killing them.
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Apr 7, 2017 13:21
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Arrow was able to use Ra's al Ghul so maybe Flash could get somebody else's villains when he's finished killing all of his.
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Apr 7, 2017 13:37
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Wheat Loaf posted:Arrow was able to use Ra's al Ghul so maybe Flash could get somebody else's villains when he's finished killing all of his. Soon after this, all the villains in the DC universe will be exhausted and Barry will move on to the other Earths in the multiverse to quench his bloodlust.
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Apr 7, 2017 13:51
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Longbaugh01 posted:Soon after this, all the villains in the DC universe will be exhausted and Barry will move on to the other Earths in the multiverse to quench his bloodlust. The big crossover event of Arrow season 9/Flash season 7/Supergirl season 6/LoT season 6 will be the heroes travelling the multiverse trying to resurrect the one hero capable of stopping Barry Allen's rampage: Eobard Thawne.
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Apr 7, 2017 14:03
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This season of Arrow has a fairly original (or at least re-purposed) villain so it's not like Flash can't do the same. I guess the problem is that most regular people should be no match for Barry, but the writers have never had a problem with making Barry pretty incompetent and in need of a pep talk whenever it suited the script. 
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Apr 7, 2017 14:10
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gently caress it. If Savitar doesn't end up being Barry then just make Barry the big bad next season. Barry versus everyone else. And I mean everyone!
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Apr 7, 2017 14:14
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irlZaphod posted:I guess the problem is that most regular people should be no match for Barry, but the writers have never had a problem with making Barry pretty incompetent and in need of a pep talk whenever it suited the script. Remember the time Zoom stuck him in a flimsy-looking glass box and he forgot he could phase through things until Zoom phased through it to beat him up?
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Apr 7, 2017 14:29
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Wheat Loaf posted:Remember the time Zoom stuck him in a flimsy-looking glass box and he forgot he could phase through things until Zoom phased through it to beat him up? To be fair, I'm pretty sure he tried phasing and it didn't work because he wasn't phasing fast enough or some other dumb technobabble bullshit.
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Apr 7, 2017 14:38
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