The Flash 3.05 “Monster”

Spoiler Warning!

It seems like everybody’s talking about AT-ATs these days. Marvel’s massive hit Captain America: Civil War featured a Spider-Man quip where Team Iron Man successfully made an attempt to take down Giant-Man. In The Flash, Barry, Cisco and Caitlin’s attempt doesn’t quite work out as well as it should, mainly due to the fact that the giant dinosaur terrorising the streets of Central City is actually a hologram, being projected from somewhere in the City.

“Monster” is a pretty solid standalone episode that may not be perfect, but with this season having suffered a decrease in quality from the previous two, there’s still plenty of promising moments here. On paper, it seemed like a classic case of a standalone episode, but there was enough about Monster to make it un-skippable, with enough good moments to make it work in places. It may not have quite been as good as the show can get, but on the whole, Monster shows how to defy expectations and further advances the storyline, particularly Caitlin’s, in an interesting way.

Caitlin’s slow descent into becoming Killer Frost is an interesting step that will no doubt have tragic ramifications for her, Cisco and Barry. It seems the powers that she’s been developing are taking control and becoming more and more involved in her life. It’s certainly nice to see that she’s given something to do this season other than play damsel in distress/love interest for Jay Garrick. It was also good news that The Flash found an inspired choice to play Caitlin’s mother, with Susan Walters stepping into the role to fill the same bond that the likes of Joe has had with Barry, Wally and Iris, or as Harry with Jessie. And speaking of Harry Wells, there’s a new Wells in town, only this time he isn’t exactly a scientist unlike the previous two.

This was a great way to keep Tom Cavanagh on the show (again, an actor who consistently impresses regardless of the character he’s portraying) and the fact that they got HR Wells on board was an awesome one. There was even a cool Hitchcock reference thrown in there between Wells and Cisco when Wells referenced a movie that was never made on this Earth, but was on his, revolving around a murder mystery on the Titanic. Wells’ mystery was pretty cool and although it may not look like we’ll be seeing as many different incarnations of Wells as there are Tatiana Maslanys on Orphan Black, it was certainly a fun move and a nice way to see Cavanagh’s character impress.

Also, Tom Felton impressed this week with his portrayal of Julian Dorn even if this storyline was rather predictable. Felton’s used to playing characters with a hatred for the main protagonist, so it was nice to see him realise that he was wrong about The Flash and about Barry. Both find themselves on a path to becoming friends by the end of the episode. How well Julian will take the inevitable revelation that Barry is The Flash (because he’s probably the only one that doesn’t know at this point) remains to be seen, but I’m going to predict that he won’t take it as well as others have in the past.

The villain of the week wasn’t exactly somebody to write home about. He was simply just a kid who was playing way out of his depth. Had things gone south it could have been Julian who killed him, but thankfully The Flash was there in time to sort things out. It was certainly an interesting way to wrap up a solid episode. If only the premise of a Godzilla monster terrorising Central City could have been handled better this episode had the potential to be really awesome. Unfortunately, the lack of action was one of the main weak spots of this episode and it suffered as a result. On the whole, there was still a lot to like about Monster, with plenty of new potential to explore going forward.

What did you think of “Monster”? Let me know in the comments section below and check out the next episode of The Flash next Tuesday at 8pm on the CW.