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FLASH SPOILER Review: Episode 4×13- “True Colors”

The Flash (4×13) – “True
Colors”
Written by:         Jonathan Butler & Gabriel Garza
Directed by:       Tara
Nicole Weyr
OKAY!  So, Barry’s still in jail and I checked with my
handy-dandy “TV Tropes for Idiots” guide and went through the checklist:
1)     
Barry’s “seen life on the inside.”
2)     
He’s “been bullied and made friends with the
gruff inmate with a heart of gold.”
3)     
He’s helped “free an innocent man.”
That means
it’s time to:
4)     
“Make a failed escape attempt but you’re friends
get you out on an appeal.”
I know I’m
simplifying the plot to some tropes and clichés but TV is built on tropes and clichés
so it really only matters what they do with them.  It’s time to see if they took a cliché and
made it their own.
So when we
left off last week, Warden Wolfe had caught Barry using his powers and put him
in the meta wing with the other bus metas for the purposes of selling them to
Amunet.
This could
be trouble for Barry.
As I’ve come
to expect, Katee Sackhoff comes in and chews the scenery while establishing
that Barry is indeed in trouble.
Cut over to
Ralph meeting one of his old friends that gives Ralph his psychological complex
for the week: That he lets people down when they need him but I’m sure it’ll be
fine.
Speaking of
problems, Cecile and Iris go to Iron Heights to visit Barry but no dice, Wolfe
gives them an excuse of Barry getting caught up in a fight that left him in the
infirmary but fortunately Cecile is a telepath right now. Which means that her
powers are good for more than just making Joe uncomfortable.  They tell the gang and now it’s really,
really, REALLY important they get Barry out of jail.
But the best
part is, they’re kinda screwed. They can’t go to Singh ‘cause they’re
compromised by being Barry’s family. Cisco cant break Barry out because he’s in
the meta wing and Harry is on Earth 2 and probably took the key to his personal
stash of BFGs.
Good thing
Ralph turned in some more XP and leveled up his shape shifting powers by adding
mimicry.  (Remember kids, never horde the
XP even if you’re just buy a few points of damage reduction you never know when
you’ll need it.)
So now they
have a plan, have Ralph pose as Warden Wolfe and try to tank the deal he has
with Amunet.
That squared
away, let’s check in with Barry.  He’s
got a pretty good idea of how screwed they are so he tries to rally the metas
into working together to escape. 
With a
little unwitting help from the prison plumber, Barry sciences them out of their
cells and they escape into the tunnels under the prison.  Meanwhile Ralph’s successfully copied Wolfe’s
appearance but there’s a trade-off that leaves him uncoordinated.
Pretty much
most of the next act is basically, Barry escapes and Ralph plays dress-up so
maybe we should check in with the DaVoes. 
It seems that they’re upgrading Cliff’s chair to do… something and while
everything seems fine. Some cracks might be forming in their marital unity.
Marlize has taken filling her head with music in the hopes of keeping Cliff out
of her head. (One of these days there will be honest to God telepaths and we’ll
all be so embarrassed if that doesn’t work.)
At Amunet’s
bar, Ralph’s playing Wolfe to mixed results. (Don’t get too down on yourself
Ralph, it was your first time.) But on the bright side he gets out with
his  skin intact, and unknown to Team
Flash it casts suspicion on the real Wolfe and probably forced some sort of Act
III confrontation between Wolfe and Amunet.
Speaking of
Act III, Barry has successfully lead the bus metas out of the Meta Wing and
into the gen-pop wing of the prison so I think it’s time to play America’s
favorite re-capping game: 
Good
News!  Barry and company have their
powers back.
Bad News! They
don’t get too far because Wolfe’s on the scene.
More Bad
News! He throws a big fat wrench into their unity by outing Barry as the Flash
and…
Even MORE Bad
News! Amunet’s here too but that’s okay because…
Good News!
Barry’s spent the episode winning over Beck Sharpe and she uses luck powers to
save Barry and her from Wolfe, the other metas and Amunet!  (Hey, I think we might win this one!)
Just
kidding!  Worst News!  The think shows up and it turns out they
modified the chair to pull off his mind swap/power steal thing and he kills all
the bus metas before taking over Becky’s body and escaping.  Becky!DaVoe even kills Warden Wolfe while “her”
wife watches.
So what’s
the reward for another loss at GN/BN? Well, with everyone dead Barry’s
reverting to stupidly noble and refuses to break out of jail.
But remember
what I said at the start?
“Make a
failed escape attempt but you’re friends get you out on an appeal.”
Ralph poses
as Clifford DaVoe and since the guy Barry murdered is right there in front of
the judge saying someone framed Barry for his murder and crazier stuff’s
happened in Central City. I guess they’re going to let him.
Hooray!
Legal trickery works again! USA! USA!
But Team
Flash has all sorts of problems and Ralph Dibny has probably become the most
important man in Central City because he’s the only surviving Bus-meta they
know right now.
Barry and
the team aren’t the only ones with problems. The trust between “Clifford” and
Marlize is pretty much nuked and he has to use the Weeper’s powers to bring her
back in line so he can move on with The Enlightenment.
Bring on the
Country Music episode!
So, I
simplified the episode down to some tropes and clichés at the start of the
review but like I said: “It really only matters what they do with them.”
All things
said and done, they did a good job.  This
was less about the story and more about moving characters around and preparing
them for the final act.  So, I’m fine
with the standard jail break stuff because the characters were satisfying.  (Though I will say, Ralph’s lack of
confidence is starting to feel a bit repetitive.)
Also, we’ve
seen Clifford taking more and more steps beyond the line so it’s pretty much a
lock he won’t be redeemed at the end and more than likely not surviving the
season either.
Katee
Sackhoff’s clearly having fun chewing the scenery, the producers seem happy to
let her and I’m fine with it too.
So it was a
good episode.
Three Things We
Learned This Week:
1)     
Barry’s been cleared of murder.
2)     
The bus-meta are seemingly about Clifford gain
powers and might be the key to The Enlightenment.
3)     
Ralph’s control over his powers are still
growing.
Three
Unanswered Questions:
1)      Will
Clifford have to continually dose Marlize to keep her in line or was this a
permanent whammy?
2)      Can
Barry get his job back? Even though he was framed, he’s now something of a
liability for the City’s ability to prosecute people.
3)      Will
we see Amunet again?

Just another guy on the internet.