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FLASH: SPOILER Review 1×11 – “The Sound and the fury”

The Flash (1×11) – “The
Sound and the fury”
Written by: Alison Schapker & Brooke Eikmeier
Directed by: John F Showalter
This week’s episode opens with Barry chasing the Royal Flush
Gang (though a different group than from the Arrow season 1 episode) who are on
dirt bikes; the scene displays some smooth teamwork between Wells and Barry as
he leads Barry through the streets using their monitors allowing Barry to herd
the group together and take the ignition keys out of the gang’s bikes.  Barry returns to the Lab and as they
celebrate their work, Cisco says they need to celebrate with a picture.  After Barry takes a “selfie” as
only he can, he and Wells talk about how Wells felt for a hero for a moment and
Barry replies; “You’re pretty good at it.”
Barry returns home for dinner to find Iris picking up some things
she forgot when she moved out.  As Joe
sets the table he tells Iris she has a message from Central City Picture News.  She returns the call and then informs Joe and
Barry that they’ve offered her a job as a beat reporter based on her blog.
Wells has returned home as well, and as he settles in for an
evening of listening to opera he receives a call.  There’s no one on the other end of the call
but suddenly the music stops before a voice says “We both know what you
did.”  Wells puts down his phone and
goes to a safe to grab a gun.  Moments
later, the skylights above him begin to shatter, he uses his speed to avoid being
showered with glass but gets blown back when another blast blows in the window
next to him.
Barry, Joe and Eddie arrive at Wells’ home to investigate
the next morning.  Wells downplays what
happened to him the night before as a prank but Joe is unconvinced.  Wells then leaves him to book a hotel room as
Cisco and Caitlin arrive.
Wells flashes back to two years before at STAR Labs where is
playing chess with his protégé, Hartley Rathaway.  Rathaway is a brilliant but arrogant young
man, but Wells seems to care for him a great deal.  Cisco arrives and Wells introduces him to Hartley
who is less than impressed with the new employee’s attire.  Harrison dismisses Cisco and when Hartley asks
why Wells hired Cisco wells replies, “I have a good feeling about
him.”  He then soothes Hartley’s
ruffled feathers by declaring “You’re still my guy.”
Back in the present, Eddie has questioned the neighbors to
find none of them were vandalized.  Eddie
then points out that while Wells says he was under the windows when they
shattered he’s not so much as scratched. 
Meanwhile, Barry has used his speed to rebuild one of the shattered
windows and finds no point of impact. 
Wells has arrived and when Barry points out his findings and suggests
this wasn’t simple vandalism Wells tells him he already knows Hartley did it.
Later at STAR Labs, Wells has gathered up the team,
including Joe and briefs them on Hartley. 
Wells declared him pivotal to the construction of the accelerator, when
Barry asks why they’ve never mentioned him before.  Caitlin explains that Hartley wasn’t very
friendly, Cisco declares “He was mostly a jerk, but every once in a while
he could be a dick.”  Joe asks why Hartley
would attack Wells and he explains that they had a falling out when he was
fired from STAR Labs.  Barry and Joe then
leave for the Station.
Cisco recalls one of his early confrontations with Hartley.  Hartley challenged Cisco grasp on engineering
concepts before Caitlin breaks up the sparring to introduce herself to Cisco before
she leaves for a weekend out of town with Ronnie.  After she leaves Hartley declares that he
believes Cisco will quit or before in less than a week and leaves.
At the Central City Picture News, Iris is at an editor’s
meeting receiving a slightly warmer reception than Cisco received from Hartley
from a senior reporter named Mason Bridge.  When the editor, Eric Larkin,
calls the meeting to order he pairs Iris with Bridge to show her the ropes.  Bridge resists but is shot down, and Larkin
asks for story ideas.  Iris offers one
but the editor asks her instead if she had any Flash-related stories.  When she says no he dismisses the group.
At the Station, Barry’s showing Joe how he believed Hartley
used sonic equipment to attack Wells’ home. 
Joe asks Barry why he thinks Wells never mentioned Hartley before and
when Barry starts to shrug it off Joe reminds him of Wells’ dead girlfriend and
suggests Barry doesn’t know Wells’ as well as he thinks.  Eddie comes into Barry’s lab saying there’s
an attack at Rathaway Industries.
When Barry arrives at Rathaway Industries, he sees that
Hartley using gauntlets that emit powerful sonic waves.  With them he is able to blast out windows and
damage cars and even blow Barry back. 
Barry then uses his speed to disarm Hartley.  Hartley then tells Barry that he can
“hear” the radio signal Barry’s using to talk to STAR Labs and that
he’s discovered Dr. Wells’ “Secret.”
Barry takes him back to STAR Labs; Hartley is rather cocky
even declaring himself “The Pied Piper” before Cisco takes him down
to The Pipeline.  He and Cisco continue
to argue before Wells arrives.  Hartley
tells Wells that Hartley tracked The Flashes movements to figure out he was
working with Wells.  He then looks into
the camera and addresses Barry and tells him that Wells will betray him at some
point and that he was lying to Barry and the others.
Wells calls the team together and tells them the secret
Hartley knows, that Harrison had been warned by him that the accelerator was
too dangerous to activate but he ignored him. 
Caitlin and Cisco leaves in anger but Barry stays to implore Wells to
make it up to the other two before he leaves.
At the Paper, Larkin assigns Iris to look into the fight
between the Flash and Rathaway but she tries to help Mason in the hopes of
learning from him instead.  Mason scoffs
at the idea before leaving.  Later at
Jitters, Iris meets up with Barry with the intention of venting about her day
but sees Barry’s having troubles of his own. 
Barry tries to lift her spirits and gets some results.
At the lab, Cisco is trying to figure out Hartley’s
gauntlets when Caitlin arrives.  Cisco
tells her that Hartley was using them at the lowest setting before he realizes
Hartley wanted to get caught.  When they
check the monitors they see he’s already escaped his cell.  He calls Wells before running down to the
Pipeline only to be caught in the blast Hartley uses to escape.  He then knocks out Caitlin before starting to
hack the computers.
Wells has tried to use his powers to catch Hartley but his
speed fails him.  He calls Barry who
races to the labs but is too late to catch Hartley.  They revive Cisco and try to figure what
Hartley wanted from their computers. 
Wells says that it is his fault that Hartley’s attacked them before he
leaves to “regain their trust.” 
He calls a press conference at the Police Station and admits publically
that he’d been warned about the dangers of the accelerator beforehand.  He fields one question from Iris about his
intentions to restart the accelerator to which he says no.
Cisco is already up and trying to figure what Hartley was
after.  Wells tries to reassure the man
that he never had a favorite and Cisco had nothing to prove.  Hartley then hacks into the intercom and
challenges Barry to find him. 
They track him to the Keystone Dam before Barry takes off to
confront him.  After he leaves, Cisco
discovers that Hartley hacked into Barry’s medical records and could use them to
launch a sonic attack.  Instead of
fighting Barry, this time Hartley uses his gauntlets to attack civilians.  Barry saves them before removing the
gauntlets again.  However, he’s rigged
them to attack Barry using the speakers in his cowl.  Harrison then counters by hacking into the satellite
radios in the cars on the dam and uses that signal to destroy Hartley’s
gauntlets.
Back at STAR Labs, Harrison apologizes to Barry for
betraying his trust.  Unsurprisingly,
Barry’s quick to forgive and as a bonus he gives Wells the picture he took
earlier before leaving.  He arrives at
the Police station and had a quick heart-to-heart with Joe before heading up to
his lab.  After Barry leave, Eddie
arrives and tells Joe he finished his search of Wells’ home but found
nothing.  The two will continue to
investigate Wells however.
Down in the Pipeline, Cisco talks with Hartley and he
reveals he knows how to find and help Ronnie and they’ll need his help.
In his secret room, Wells is trying to use the tachyon
device from “The Man in the Yellow Suit” to stabilize his condition
by absorbing the speed force but it’s not working.  He doesn’t seem terribly concerned as he says
that “The real endgame is almost here.”
Pretty good episode this week, a lot of it was carried by
Andy Mientus’ performance as Pied Piper. 
The “too-smart” villain can sometimes be tiresome but he used
that to his advantage and poured on the arrogance.  There were some other nice touches like the controls
on Hartley’s gauntlets resembling the keys on a flute or the light-hearted poke
at the end of episode Barry and Joe heart-to-heart scene was fun.  Also Cisco indigence and grudging praise at
Hartley giving himself his own villain’s name was also fun.
Much of the episode seemed to be setup for later on in the
season; Iris’ new job and mentor, brewing tension between her and Barry, Joe’s
growing distrust of Wells and lastly Hartley’s knowledge of Ronnie’s condition.  Generally felt more like a deep breath in for
next than anything else.
Three Things We Learned This Week:
1)     
Wells’ abilities come from the Speed Force and
have been compromised by something.
2)     
Joe and Eddie are investigating Wells.
3)     
There is another Royal Flush Gang.
Three Questions:
1)     
What does Joe suspect Wells is involved in that
has him investigating Wells?
2)     
Have Barry and the Team graduated to holding all
the criminals they capture in the Pipeline or is Hartley a special case?
3)     
What is the “Endgame” Wells is
preparing for?

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