- Title: The Flash – The Darkness and the Light
- wiki: link
While delivering an episode that pits the Flash (Grant Gustin) against another meta-human from Earth-2, and allows one of the show’s recurring characters to do double-duty in the episode by playing two distinctly different versions of herself, “The Darkness and the Light” also introduces the S.T.A.R. Labs crew to the Harrison Wells (Tom Cavanagh) of Earth-2. Despite being only super-powered thief on her own world, Dr. Light (Malese Jow) proves to have murderous intentions towards both her Earth-1 counterpart and the Flash when she shows up in town to do Zoom‘s bidding.
The episode spends a good chunk of its time allowing each member of the cast to react to the new Harrison Wells in their midst. From Joe‘s (Jesse L. Martin) shoot first ask questions later attitude to Barry’s more reasoned approach, each deals with the doppelganger (who may be less evil but from what we witness here is even a bigger asshole than the original) in their own way. Wells introduction, and his plans to help Barry fight Zoom, sadly puts a kibosh on Caitlin (Danielle Panabaker) and Jay Garrick‘s (Teddy Sears) possible romance, but other members of the team make out well in the love department. Despite temporary blindness thanks to Dr. Light, Barry manages to salvage his first date with Patty Spivot (Shantel VanSanten) and Cisco (Carlos Valdes) makes a new acquaintance in a coffee shop girl (Ciara Renee) who we can expect to see more of in the near future as The Flash continues to lay the groundwork for Legends of Tomorrow.
Speaking of Cisco, the truth about his emerging powers finally comes out allowing him to not only come clean with his friends but also help find the evil version of Barry’s old girlfriend from another world. This plus the apparent inclusion of the other Dr. Wells seems to strengthen the team even if they do lose the support of Jay who argues against Barry rushing into a battle against Zoom which the elder Flash believes the Scarlet Speedster is woefully unprepared for. Given how much of the season remains, I’m going to the guess that he’s right.
