Is The Iron Fist Casting Racist?

It was recently announced that Finn Jones would be portraying Danny Rand AKA Iron Fist in the upcoming Netflix Marvel series and of course people took to Twitter to complain about how this is racist. Now i'm not going to pretend I know a huge amount of Iron Fist (And don't lie, neither do you) but here's what I do know about the character. He's a white guy from New York who found a fictional mystical city called 'K'un-L'un" and learned some magical martial arts from that place. So I have to ask, why is this racist? The character is white, not Asian, could they have cast an Asian actor? Yes, but the same way how they could have cast a black actor, a hyspanic actor, etc, etc. His race isn't an important factor to the character (I assume). But complaining that they cast a white guy in a role that is previously white is a non-issue. White washing exists in Hollywood and there are plenty of roles going to white guys uneccessarily (Just look at the upcoming Gods of Egypt, a white guy born in Egypt? Yeahhhh-no). So why do people want an Asian actor to play this character? Because he knows Martial Arts? Cause that's pretty racist.

-Danny

The Flash "King Shark" Review

KING SHARK! KING SHARK! KING SHARK! KING SHARK! KING SHARK! KING SHARK! KING SHARK! KING SHARK! KING SHARK! KING SHARK! KING SHARK! KING SHARK! KING SHARK! KING SHARK! KING SHARK! KING SHARK! KING SHARK! KING SHARK! KING SHARK! KING SHARK! KING SHARK! KING SHARK! KING SHARK! KING SHARK!

Oh yeah, Diggle too.

DIGGLE! DIGGLE! DIGGLE! DIGGLE! DIGGLE! DIGGLE! DIGGLE! DIGGLE! DIGGLE! DIGGLE! DIGGLE! DIGGLE! DIGGLE! DIGGLE! DIGGLE! DIGGLE! DIGGLE! DIGGLE! DIGGLE! DIGGLE! DIGGLE! DIGGLE! DIGGLE! DIGGLE! DIGGLE! DIGGLE! DIGGLE! DIGGLE! DIGGLE! DIGGLE! DIGGLE! DIGGLE! DIGGLE! DIGGLE! DIGGLE! DIGGLE!

But that stuff with Wally sucked. And Argus. Everything else was awesome. 9/10.

-Danny

Boy, The Cell Saga Was A Mess-And Here's How You Fix It.

I’ve talked before about the never ending list of flaws that persist in the Dragonball Z series, but something that has really been on my mind recently is The Cell Saga (Mostly because of TeamFourStar). What’s bugging me about it? The whole story is one giant incoherent mess! Okay so let me summarize the plot of The Cell Saga: A young man named Trunks shows up from the future warning our heroes that soon two Androids will appear and will be far more powerful than they can handle, two Androids appear as he predicted, but they turn out not to be the Androids he knows from the future, thus revealing two new Androids who quickly destroy the old ones, as well as freeing Android 16 along with them. These guys are our new villains for a little while until an entirely new villain comes around called Cell who is another Android that destroys the previous Androids and absorbs them to constantly transform into a new form. In the end he is killed by Gohan and everyone lives happily ever after.

So can you see the main problem here? This story is so inconstant, they can’t settle on what villain they want and change their minds over 3 different times. The reason for this is Kazuhiko Torishima, the editor of Dragonball Z who supposedly hated the original Androids, Androids 19 & 20 and made Akira Toriyama (Creator) change the villains midway through story, but thankfully it was still early days and there was nothing so far to contradict what had been set up, so he invented Androids 17 & 18. But Torishima still wasn’t happy and made him change it again to Cell. And hey, this brings us to our next problem, Cell is just a carbon copy of Frieza. Single villain who has multiple forms developed over the saga, starting out as an ugly first form, then a muscular form and finally a sleek and arrogantly powerful form (Another element forced on by Torishima). Because of this, the story really doesn’t develop a focus until the end, an ending that really had no build up to it of Gohan being the hero. Yes there was foreshadowing of his hidden potential but nothing concrete saying it would be unveiled in this storyline. So this story from a lot of perspectives, just doesn’t work, so I’m going to do something I haven’t really done before, I’m going to fix the Cell Saga by rewriting the story right here.

Okay so to start off with, we’re going all the way to end, as in, the future. The future that Trunks originated from shows everyone dead apart from Gohan, great, establishes the threat instantly and showing how powerful they are by actually succeeding. Then Gohan as the last hero of Earth and Trunks’ mentor dies, still doing great so far, fully sets up Trunks’ character arc here and his relationship with Gohan, not to mention just being a brilliant death scene. So then we see Trunks go back in time, warn everyone, they train but I’m moving Piccolo and Kami’s fusion scene to here rather than after the Androids show up, and then finally we see Androids 19 & 20 show up instead.

Now everything in this section is going to play out the exact same, but because we see Trunk’s future first instead of after the saga, it also adds that level of confusion and tension, we know these aren’t the androids but the characters don’t, so who the hell are they? Then finally when Androids 17 & 18 are introduced, we finally get answers on why it was different, Trunks created a butterfly effect (Still going along with the original shows canon) meaning things will play out differently in this timeline, this gets rid of any pre-destined events, paradoxical narratives, wibbly wobbly-timey wimey. Also, I’m getting rid of Android 16, yes he’s a great character and the only death in Dragonball to actually stick, but I’m afraid he just adds nothing to my version of the story, as well as Goku’s illness, because that’s another tired cliché of excuses to get Goku out of the way. So the Androids beat the shit out of everyone (Including Goku) and Android 18 never kisses Krillin (Because that was insanely dumb) but I am giving him the opportunity to be a bit of a badass and Solar Flare the Androids giving everyone a chance to escape.

So with our heroes outmatched with no chance of victory, Mr. Popo reveals the Hyperbolic Time Chamber, which can’t be used without a Guardian on the lookout and Kami forbid it while he was in charge because of what a place like that can do to someone psychologically (Otherwise why wouldn't they have used it before), thus Dende becomes the new guardian and they can train in there again. Now this is where I’m switching the line-up, in my version Vegeta and Goku go in there together first because they believe they have the best chance at defeating the Androids so it’s more important they train first. So while they’re in there, Androids 17 & 18 are tearing up the planet for the whole day. Now one of the bigger faults with Dragonball Z is that the Z Fighters never really did anything, and granted while they know they're not powerful enough to beat the Androids, they can at the very least distract them for a little bit. See this gives them a chance to show that they're not entirely useless and their bravery and stubborness means they just won't go down. So Piccolo, Krillin, Tien, Chiaotzu & Yamcha. Gohan & Trunks staying behind because it's too dangerous to risk their lives. Even though they have no chance at victory, the Z Fighters do not give up, no matter how badly they are hurt, and trust me, they get hurt, a lot. Eventually Trunks almost tries to fly down to help them, worried his future is starting to come true, until Gohan is able to calm him down and remind him blind anger never solves anything. Here Gohan reminds Trunks of the future version of him, and after he calms down he even jokes about how ever as a child he's still mentoring him.

Finally, the day is up and Goku & Vegeta exit the time chamber, stronger than ever, ready to take on the Androids. So they fly down and now Gohan and Trunks enter the time chamber together to train, the reason why I’m doing this is so we can actually get development of Trunks and Gohan’s relationship, seeing how even with their ages switched they are still very compatible, as well as seeing Trunks have to be Gohan’s mentor instead of the other way round like he’s used to, really creating a contrast there. So while they’re in there and training and bonding, Goku and Vegeta go to fight the Androids, arriving just before they kill the Z Fighters, giving them a chance to escape. Goku and Vegeta vs 17 & 18, and in typical Dragonball fashion the fight goes on forever, epic fight scene, multiple explosions and attacks, as well as seeing some good tag team from Goku and Vegeta, because even if the two can’t stand each other, they make perfect fighting partners, and having spent a lot of time together they’ve come up with some new strategies, really showing their relationship in a way we’ve never seen before, an actual mutual respect from one another.

The fight continues for several hours and just as it seems as though our heroes have won, Goku is killed from a sneak attack, leaving all of the Z Fighters in shock and Gohan sensing it all the way in the Time Chamber explodes with emotion. His hidden potential established long ago in prior sagas is finally unleashed, Gohan, at his young age is the most powerful Super Saiyan the universe has ever seen. Trunks is able to convince him to not exit the time chamber yet, as even with all of this raw energy, if he can’t maintain it and control it then it’s useless. This is where we see the big change, future Gohan let that initial anger and rage fuel him, form his fight around that which inevitably lead to his downfall, he wasn’t raised to fight on anger, but love for his friends and family, not to kill, but to protect, Trunks reminds him of that. Back on Earth, Vegeta is able to run away from the androids, badly injured and with his pride shattered, completely in shock over what happened and makes it back to the lookout. With Goku dead and the Dragonballs unable to revive someone who has already died (Cause I’m sticking to that rule), all hope seems lost. The Androids continue their rampage of destroying city after city with the Z Fighters spirits broken.

Eventually the Androids simply make their way to the Lookout to finish the job, the Z Fighters terrified to do anything, unlucky for the Androids, their time is up. Gohan and Trunks emerge from the Hyperbolic Time Chamber, matured, more powerful than ever and ready to kick some ass. The fight begins, Gohan and Trunks versus Androids 17 & 18. With this fight we see the contrast from where these two started, Trunks was a whiney kid with no patience or sense of scale for how dangerous the androids were, and that version of Gohan was unguided and fueled by anger rather than love, letting his hatred get the better of him and clouding his true potential. Now the two are no longer mentor and student, in any sense, they are friends and partners, stronger than their fathers before them and prepared for their fight.

During the epic battle it looks as though Android 17 has the upper hand on Trunks, ready to finish him off, but Vegeta steps in front to take the blow, killing him, for the first time in his life he does something no one would have expected, him to act like a father. Finally showing pride in his son and Trunks respecting his father, he is more fueled to win the fight than ever, because this isn’t just Gohan’s story, it’s Trunks’ story as well. Now because it’s two heroes against two villains this is a fight we’ve never seen in Dragonball Z before, it’s always been Goku fights the big baddy while the others maybe deal with the henchmen. But there are no henchmen here and Goku is gone, a two v two fight like we’ve never seen before.

After a long and strenuous battle, they end it with that epic beam struggle, similar to Gohan vs Cell but with Gohan/Trunks vs 17/18. And like that battle, Goku’s spirit contacts Gohan to back him up, likewise Vegeta appears by Trunks to support him, with their spirits by their side, nothing can stop these two, the overpower the Androids and obliterate them into nothingness. The battle-is-won. With the fight over, Goku passes on the duty of protector to Gohan, now the strongest hero in the galaxy, there to protect Earth from any foes who dare cross them. With Trunk’s future no longer existing, he knows it’s not long before he disappears too. He says his farewells to Gohan and the team, happy he was able to help save the world, and asks Gohan to look after the baby version of himself, implying Gohan will one day have to train Trunks to be the next savior of the galaxy once Gohan’s time is up.

So as you can see with the version I’ve come up with there is more of a theme of passing the torch in the story, the villains are better established and there’s less inconsistencies and fully realised character arcs, not just for Gohan, but for Trunks as well. Not to mention creating a better relationship between the two, as well as Goku and Vegeta for that matter, ending their arcs too. I doubt people would be happy with me killing off Goku in such an unceremonious manner, but the shock value was just too much to pass up, besides it still led to the development of other characters and no one would have seen it coming. Also yes I would have ended the Dragonball Z franchise here, but it wouldn’t be impossible to do another story arc.

This was a fun experiment to try and retell the story of one of my favourite shows, regardless of how awful it can be sometimes. And who knows, maybe I’ll do one for Dragonball GT sometime, because lord knows even though I love that series it has some serious plot issues.

-Danny

Gravity Falls "Weirdmageddon 3: Take Back The Falls" Review

I’m struggling to find a place to begin with this, it’s the finale to Gravity Falls, my personal favourite show currently airing on television and…well…now it’s not on television anymore, there’s a Gravity Falls shaped hole in my heart. So did the show go out with a bang? Let’s find out. This is Weirdmageddon 3: Take Back The Falls, where Dipper & Mabel are reunited with the remaining townsfolks and they all combine their efforts to bring the fight to Bill, by building a giant fighting robot out of the Mystery Shack, complete with T-Rex for a hand, Gobblewonker in the back, and a Totem pole cannon…Pacific Rim be dammed. After a long and strenuous battle, they are finally able to beat Bill, the town goes back to normal, Dipper & Mabel celebrate their 13th Birthday party and say their goodbyes as they leave Gravity Falls.

Okay so where to begin with this hour long episode, let’s take this in chronological order of events, first of all the big battle with the Mystery Shack Gundam, damn if that wasn’t an awesome scene. It’s nice to see a whole bunch of characters come together to help fight and plenty of callbacks to earlier episodes coming back to help as well, like the shrink ray, the Gobblewonker, etc. The fight scene itself was epic as all hell and seeing everyone contribute to the fight is a nice touch. Then once they’ve arrived in Bill’s mansion we learn a big piece of the mystery that was yet to be answered, the pentagram we’ve seen for the past 2 seasons finally explained. We get people matched to their symbols and we learn it’s a prophecy meant to be the only way to kill Bill (hehe, movie references). The problem I have with this is that it turned out to be entirely useless as they don’t use this to defeat Bill which means this mystery was entirely pointless, shame. But that wasn’t the only disappointment, then they finally do kill off Bill but have to sacrifice Stan’s mind in order to do so, a noble sacrifice and a very well done scene…only for it to mean squat because Stan gets his memories back anyway…huh.

Then we get our happy ending of everything going back to normal and Dipper & Mabel’s birthday party, then they say goodbye to everyone and honestly the goodbye scene is the best scene in the episode. So which goodbye did I think was the emotional anchor for me? Was it Dipper & Wendy? Mabel & her friends? Nope. It was Mabel & Waddles, even the damn thought that those two were going to be separate was enough for me to be shouting “NO! You cannot separate Mabel & Waddles! Don’t do this to me Gravity Falls!” and then when Waddles starts grabbing onto her skirt, Mabel’s in tears, oh my god it’s too much to take! Thank god Stan & Ford forces the bus driver to let Waddles on the bus. Then we get a montage of what everyone’s doing now and it all ends on a happy note, firmly planting that Gravity Falls flag in my heart that will now act as an empty void.

Now let’s get to some character stuff! Dipper & Mabel, their story finally comes to a close, even though there wasn’t much development for them in this episode, but to be fair it wasn’t needed, we got so much of it in the previous episode, this was all about showing why Dipper & Mabel work great as a pair. Dipper is smart, Mabel is creative, Dipper patient, Mabel compassionate. The two make a perfect pair and seeing their story come to a close together, their bond stronger than ever, goddamn if I won’t miss them. But Stan & Ford are the real hero twins of this episode, finally bringing their differences aside so they can save the world and actually forgive each other for their past mistakes. Stan’s sacrifice felt right, it was a good character moment and would have been a fine way to end the character, which is why I’m kinda pissed they undid all that. But on the other hand, seeing Stan & Ford travelling the seas like they always said they would, fighting giant monsters was a pleasant sight to see, and if it wasn’t for the sacrifice Stan made I would have said that was the perfect place to end their story.

As for all the other Gravity Falls town members, Soos becomes the manager of the Mystery Shack, which is just really sweet to see. Wendy doesn’t really change but hey, her goodbye scene with Dipper was really sweet. The Northwest family kinda ends on a downer of them going bankrupt…yeah we don’t really get any happy closure on them, especially for all the Dipcifica shippers out there. Ol’ Man McGucket becomes a millionaire and ends it on a funny note, as it should. Oh yeah, speaking of McGucket, we finally get a scene between him and Ford, and it’s sweet as all hell. Blubs and Durland finally profess their love for each other but don’t kiss because apparently Korra isn’t the only show with gay restrictions. Gideon is now a nice kid, but still has his Mad Max thugs to beat up bullies (I’m glad they stuck around).

But let’s talk about the big baddy of the show, Bill. I’ve stated before that this is one of my new favourite villains, he’s like The Joker if he was Omnipotent, just having the sickest sense of humour possible while still posing a legitimate threat. Hell when he transformed into that red demon version of himself he was actually terrifying. Bill was everything a great villain needed to be, threatening, funny, sadistically cruel (He has a couch made of human skin for crying out loud!) and he was as brilliant as ever in this episode.

So those were my thoughts on the final episode, it was really good. Some plot points were redundant or disappointing but 90% of them were really good. The characters were excellent, the animation was marvelous, the emotions were riding high and it’s an enjoyable finale to an excellent show. 9/10.

Gravity Falls is a show like no other, it’s like a cross between Twin Peaks and The Simpsons. Comparing it to other TV Shows on TV right now it has the most engaging dramatic story like no other, while simultaneously being the funniest show on TV. Nothing else got me as excited for the next episode, nothing had this many excellent characters, Mabel, Soos & Bill in particular will go down as my favourites but I love so many. On top of all that it had excellent animation, a talented voice cast, creative monsters and even when it took recycled formulas it found a way to make them interesting again. It’s writing, it’s animation, it’s atmosphere, it’s story, it’s characters, it’s voice talent. Everything was top notch and that makes this one of the best television shows of all time. 10/10.

-Danny

…Shit we never learned Dippers real name!

Batman As A Symbol

One of the key themes in Batman Begins when it came to setting up Batman is the idea of him as a symbol, that he is someone that can inspire people, people they can look up to and believe they can be a better person because of it. Honestly, even though I love the movie and a lot of adaptations have taken up this stance with Batman (Both before and after Begins) it’s not Batman…at all. When you talk about a superhero, specifically a DC Superhero that is a symbol of hope, someone to look up to and believe you can be better…that’s not Batman, that’s Superman. Superman is the symbol of hope and inspiration that people can be better, that’s why he doesn’t wear a mask and freely interacts with the public. Batman is a legend, a myth, he doesn’t inspire hope in the public, he injects fear into criminals to dissuade them from becoming criminals in the first place. Bruce Wayne has seen and experienced tragedy first hand, his parents gunned down in an alleyway right in front of him, that night, Bruce Wayne died and in the ashes Batman was born, and that’s why Batman exists, to make sure no other eight-year-old boy will ever have to go through the same type of trauma. That’s why he took in Dick Grayson, because he was a reminder of his own failure, a boy who went through the exact thing that inspired Batman to become Batman. And it was so important that Dick didn’t end up like Batman, he still has a sense of humour, a life outside of crime fighting, an optimistic attitude. It’s why I dislike the idea of John Blake or Terry McGuiness becoming Batman after Bruce Wayne, because that destroys the entire concept of why Batman exists. He is Batman, so no one else will ever have to be Batman.

Legends of Tomorrow "White Knights" Review

A nuclear superhero in Cold War Russia, that's actually pretty clever show, I’ll give ya that. Also you may have noticed no Arrow review this week, that's because honestly I’m bored of writing about that show. Now I put it into the Supergirl category of "I'll review it when I feel like it" (Though Supergirl is actually more interesting). But I'm not here to talk about that, I'm here to talk about Legends of Tomorrow and in this episode we see the gang travel to the 1980's Russia at the peak of the Cold War. They find out Savage is working on creating his own Firestorm so the team has to break into a Russian facility to steal their research and assets.

I’m starting to see a pattern here, the team travels somewhere, finds out Savage is working on something, they commit a heist to steal it back. Christ it’s only episode 4 and it’s already feeling formulaic, hell they do two heists in this one episode! But to be fair it’s not a bad formula, the fact that the team is so big means we get a lot of variety amongst the team members and their specific role. So in this episode we see Jax & Martin team up…again. And we see Leonard and Ray team up…again…Well at least we have new pairings with Sara and Kendra, dealing with Sara’s homicidal tendencies…again. Oh but Mick and Rip are new, talking about Rip’s dead family and how the time council people are refusing to help him…again. Okay so maybe the formula isn’t as creative as I initially thought.

But with that being said, just because we’ve seen these pairings before doesn’t mean we can’t get interesting scenes between them. Jax and Martin were definitely the highlight of the episode for me, their relationship is beginning to strain because of Martin constantly undermining Jax’s decisions…even though he is perfectly right to because Jax keeps making stupid decisions, but regardless it’s Martin’s motivations behind it, how he cares for Jax and just wants to keep him alive. Likewise, Jax refuses to listen because of course he’s pissed off at Martin, he dragged him on this mission and forced him to leave behind his old life, on top of that having your actions second guessed all the time would make a man question what the point of him being dragged along was. We also got a nice scene where Martin finally discusses how Ronnie’s death impacted him and how he doesn’t want that to happen again.

Then there was everything with Leonard Snart, a very Snart centered episode. We get some more of him and Ray bantering back n forth, but we also get a nice bit near the end of him showing genuine concern for his team, because even though he’s a villain, he’s a villain with a code, and that code involves never leaving a man behind. We also see more of Ray’s code, he’s not willing to sacrifice a life, innocent or guilty if there is something that can be done to prevent it, a very traditionally heroic DC trait to have there Palmer, I like it.

Now Mick though he didn’t have a lot to do in this episode we do get more than usual. We see how he functions separately from Snart and how he is quite intelligent in his own way, at least when it comes to reading people and acting on instinct. Also anyone who is a fan of Rocky IV is a good person in my books. Rip I didn’t really see the point in his story, an old friend of his tries to tempt him to give up and he considers for some reason? Why? He knew the council would be furious with him, hence why they’ve been chasing him, and if they give up now then nothing will have changed, I’m not sure why he would ever be tempted to give up. Honestly this just seems like filler and nonsensical repetition.

Sara and Kendra was okay, it was nice to see these two interact and work out their very similar problems with each other. But the thing is Kendra’s issue of losing control wasn’t even set up before this episode and is anyone else sick of their constant moaning about their issues? “Oh I have homicidal tendencies” “It’s not fair I turned out to be a Demi-God, I used to be normal” Christ, we get it! Life sucks! Can we please give these two something new to do!

And then the episode ends on a cliffhanger…I actually kinda like that, not to mention with the death of Carter earlier on this season it’s entirely possible that they may kill off one of the characters, in fact I thought there was actual potential that they were going to kill off Stein in this episode. I don’t want them too because I love Stein, but the fact that I can fear for a character’s life is actually quite rare for a superhero show, so good job on that.

Overall this was a fun episode, we got some good character stuff, some bad character stuff, some strong tension and a good cliffhanger. 7/10

-Danny

The Flash "Welcome To Earth 2" Review

I know I missed all of last week's shows to review, here are my thoughts on all three...Meh. But this time round we have Barry, Harry & Cisco heading to Earth 2 where they find out the Caitlin, Ronnie & Cisco of this world are actually evil Meta-Humans, Killer Frost, Deathstorm & Reverb and they are all working for Zoom. Meanwhile back on Earth 1 Caitlin tries to help Jay get his speed back so they can fight off metahumans without Barry there to help.

You know The Flash has kinda taken a downturn in the past few episodes of being disappointingly average, which makes me so happy that we finally have an amazing episode like this again. So what in this episode did I love? Pretty much everything in Earth 2. Let’s start off with the small things, the references; while they were travelling through the portal we saw references to 24th Century Green Arrow, Jonah Hex, Supergirl, which are all awesome. But then you see in Barry’s house on speed dial he has Hal, Bruce & Diana all listed on there, oh Flash you cocktease! Even just the design of Earth 2, I love the 1950’s deco style looks just like the Golden Age of comics, at the start of the episode when Barry and Cisco are just taking selfies with everything, I was kinda with them, I wish we could just explore Earth 2 and see all the ways that it’s different.

But regardless of all that, let’s actually get to the meat of the episode, starting with Barry. It’s funny seeing his doppelganger be so much like him but…dorkier. But then you see the reason why, his mother is still alive, his family was never broken apart so he doesn’t have that anchor weighing him down, this is of pure a Barry as you can get. Speaking of, that phone call between him and his mother was pitch perfect, almost as good as the scene in last year’s finale, it would be a perfect scene if it hadn’t been done before kinda. Also Earth 2’s Barry’s dress sense makes me think if Doctor Who ever casts American, then Grant Gustin is the way to go. Furthermore, it’s interesting to see how his relationships with people has changed, most notably is with Iris and Joe (Or should I say “Joseph”). Barry and Iris are married which he understandably finds baffling, but then that makes me question that goodbye between the two when he says he loves her, was he just playing along or are his feelings coming back? Don’t let them come back. Bury them Barry. Bury them so deep they end up in New Zealand! Seriously, don’t let that shitty plotline come back.
Oh, also Iris is a cop in this universe, because why not, and her partner is Deadshot, I love the fact that nickname works to both mean he’s a great shot and a horrible shot. Which is also partially confusing because I didn’t recall Barry knowing who Deadshot was, nor does it make sense how someone who is that bad at aiming would ever make a police officer, but hey it’s nice to see the actor back and playing a completely different type of character. Oh, and Joseph is a singer, because this show isn’t done teasing me enough about how easy it would be to do a musical episode, seriously Flash GIMME A MUSICAL EPISODE!!! But it is interesting to see him in a new lifestyle, and even more so he and Barry supposedly hate each other, which is fascinating to see…too bad they kill him off in one of the most convenient death’s ever.

Now let’s get to the big hook of this episode, Caitlin & Ronnie as Killer Frost and Deathstorm…they were fine. The best part about them was the fact that Deathstorm is still Ronnie and Prof. Stein, but Stein is just a corpse, that is so morbidly evil I love it. But my big problem with them is the fight scene with The Flash, for some reason Deathstorm is fast enough to keep up with The Flash, meanwhile Killer Frost barely does anything even though cold works so much better against Flash than heat. If anything the fact that I knew they were coming made them less entertaining to watch because I feel most of the charm of Earth 2 is what I didn’t expect to see. And then comes Earth 2 Cisco also known as Reverb! See this is what I’m talking about! What we don’t know is turns out to be the best decision! But then they had to kill him off which sucks. I don’t care if they kill off Deathstorm, but Reverb here with all these cool powers and he was willing to teach Cisco! Oh my god that could have been so cool! The potential here would have been awesome! Why waste it all with a meaningless death!?

But hey, this episode wasn’t all Earth 2 stuff, let’s go back to Earth 1, where a metahuman named…I honestly didn’t get his name, but he just seems like a rip-off of Avalanche from X-Men. Point is a metahuman shows up and they don’t have The Flash to help them, okay this could be an interesting story, seeing the regular heroes try and deal with a metahuman themselves—or you could just bring in a Deus-Ex Machina of the Velocity 7. Well okay maybe they’ll give it to Wally so we can get a taste of Wally as The Flash and—No they’re gonna give it to Jay again, making Wally’s appearance in this episode entirely pointless. Also the villain was lame, he runs off as soon as the police do…exactly what they were expected to do? The coolest part about it was seeing Jay in action again, and doing that shockwave thing with his helmet and Joe’s reaction was hilarious. But really this story feels like filler when it had the potential to be something really interesting!

In the end, this was an awesome episode, I loved almost everything about Earth 2 and I cannot wait to see more, the stuff on Earth 1 was a letdown especially when it could have been so much more. Nevertheless, I’m giving this episode a 9/10.

-Danny