Chicago Redshirt

Let me elaborate. RF attempted to take the tachyon device from Mercury Labs but was somehow foiled. It seems to me that he basically has infinite opportunities to steal the device while it's at Mercury Labs. If something actually stopped him from taking it in the first place -- a forcefield or whatever -- he could just wait till that forcefield is down and grab it. Or he can seek out other opportunities to steal it. Even assuming for argument's sake that whatever kept him from being able to steal it out of Mercury Labs is an insurmountable obstacle, why not just steal it as soon as STAR Labs gets it and that obstacle is removed? Why play out the ruse of being trapped?

Cal is Calvin Zabo. So here are some comic spoilers:

Point of order: Red Tornado is nowhere close to the conventional level of Barry's speed, as far as I know. I do not even think Red Tornado can go faster than the speed of sound.

Enjoyed it but there are many things I don't understand. 1. Why Harrison didn't just take the McGuffin in the first place. Surely, there's some time he could have just stolen it using his speed before it was suggested to be used as bait. 2. Why he needs the McGuffin. Assuming his access to future info isn't just limited to copies of the Central City Citizen, shouldn't he just be able to build a McGuffin for himself, based on future knowledge that he either has or can get? 3. Why Harrison outed the RF's existence, in general. He could have just taken all these things and done most of these actions as himself, or just worn a ski mask or something, instead of giving Barry cause to be suspicious. 4. Why Harrison apparently participated in the ruse of the trap, instead of just taking the McGuffin after it was voluntarily given to the Flash Mob. 5. How the rest of CCPD is (according to Joe) unaware of the existence of metahumans. Obviously, there is no reason they would be aware of the precise STAR labs name for them, but clearly there should be some level of awareness at a minimum of people doing weird and unexplainable things -- Weather Wizard and Multiplex (police were called, and someone had to haul off all these dead duplicants), Girder (police were actually shooting him while he was in metal form, if I recall) and Mist (I would think there'd have to be some recording of him breaking into the prison by going gaseous). There would presumably be some reports made to the cops after the various weird things being reported on by Iris. I suppose Joe may have played a role in downplaying the weird factor in at least some of these things, but I think some of these things would have to be known to more than just a few cops.

On another topic: The "I'm under the influence of something that makes me overact on repressed feelings" is a tried-and-true trope, whether it's the virus from Star Trek's "The Naked Time," the Asgardian rage stick from "Agents of SHIELD" or Red K from various "Smallville" eps or whatever. I hope in coming episodes that Barry tries to deal with the fallout from the things that enraged him that he still has to deal with on a week-in-week-out basis: Caitlin's mothering, Singh's harsh treatment of him, Joe's so-far inability to get justice for his father, Eddie both hunting him and hooking up with his woman, and Iris not knowing who the Flash really is.

There's a difference between Caitlin not noticing Barry's anger as being Prism-induced at first and Iris not. Barry has certainly been angry without Prism influence before, Caitlin has seen him be angry. What Barry said under his influence to Caitlin is within the realm of normal behavior. It's in my book a fair point. Caitlin has been acting towards Barry with Ronnie in mind, both in the sense of "Ronnie got hurt and I don't want Barry to get hurt" and in the flirtation sense. When Flash went to confront Eddie, he was far, far more irrational and out of character than Barry had been with Caitlin. He was behaving far differently than the Flash had ever done. Iris explicitly noticed that and commented on it. I think it speaks poorly of Iris that she would let this one out-of-character act would overshadow all the good Flash has done and not believe his explanation.

In the scene at the end of the episode, Flash told her that he was being affected by a meta-human and that had messed up his head. She also intuited that the fact that he had been going around risking his life helping people meant that he wouldn't normally turn around and start hurting them instead. Iris presumably knew about the Prism attack at the bank, where all the people raged out and attacked each other. Witnesses did see a red streak, according to Joe. So presumably blogger Iris, who has been tracking Flash sightings, would know about people getting suddenly getting enraged. We don't officially know what Eddie knows. (And of course there's a decent possibility that Eddie But presumably, they do know at least some of his life-saving efforts.

Anyone who follows the Simmons AF recapper know if they are going to do a similar recap for the first part of the cross-over?

A lot has happened to Ollie to make him so serious: multiple murders of, serious bodily harm to and kidnappings of his family, friends and lovers, years of being in kill-or-be-killed scenarios that have left him mentally and physically scarred and the two major terrorist attacks referenced in this episode. However, he does have his lighter side, which occasionally he is able to let out. He actually showed it some in this episode with his interactions with Felicity, for example. The fire guy is Ronnie. Presumably, Flash is going to say that there was no sign of Ronnie in the vicinity of the particle accelerator, so the smartest presumption would be that he was dead. From all they knew, he was last seen doing something to try to shut it off that was certain suicide. However, the particle accelerator makes the impossible possible, so maybe it appeared to disintegrate him, but he somehow reintegrated elsewhere.

Rainbow Raider/Prism has the ability to manipulate other emotions too -- make people scared, jealous and what not. Because he only showed the rage/red ability, calling him Rainbow Raider/Prism doesn't make much sense in this context. Although I wish that Caitlin or Cisco had lampshaded "Roy G. Bivolo" -- a play on the mnemnonic for the colors of the rainbow in their order (Red Orange Yellow Green Blue Indigo Violet.) It also seems like going with rage seems like a bad call because what people might do in rage is unpredictable. I'd second most of the consensus about how well done the episode was in general, how it was pretty weak that we didn't see Prism taken down. A few other random thoughts: 1. So Ollie is one of Iris's "I get to cheat with" people. I wonder if Eddie knows and who the other two are. Surprised Barry didn't ask. 2. Eddie and the anti-Flash task force doesn't make so much sense to me, at least as focused on the Flash. I mean there have been documented instances of metahumans causing as much death and destruction as they have and up till now nothing indicating Flash is a problem. I mean if Eddie is more than he seems, it might make sense. But what would make Capt. Singh approve it? That Flash stole his Big Belly Burger? 3. I guess Joe can think about looking into a pro career since he did end up thanking the Arrow. 4. So the cops didn't bother to ask who rented the storage unit that the crook was using? 5. I love Felicity offering a Hannukah present. 6. I love Barry burning Ollie about Huntress and Deathstroke. 7. Cisco was on fire.

In2You, I'm not sure what you're referring to in terms of her hiding from Eddie that she spoke to the Flash. I could have tuned out a scene to that effect, because Eddie is (so far) pretty dull when he's not high on pain meds. But I don't remember any scene in which Eddie has shown any awareness that the Flash exists.

We don't know what exactly Iris's blog contains. (At least, they haven't shown it in detail on the show. They may have created a fake blog, but I'm not going to search it out.) We know that Iris and Flash have had at least a couple in-person conversations. We don't know if she has blogged about them or not, but it would make sense to me at least that she would have, since she is trying to show that the Flash is real, and what better way than to say "I spoke to him"?

We don't know how much the actual media is covering stuff, or covering stuff up. I would imagine if there were a Flash in the real world, people might be hesitant to cover him because it would just be so unbelievable. In any case, there are two possibilities where Iris's writing about the Flash might put her in danger. 1. Criminal thinks she knows more about the Flash than she has put on her blog and abducts/tortures/kills her trying to get that info. 2. Criminal thinks she is a Flash fanboy and abducts/tortures/kills her to hurt Flash.

It's partially a genre thing, same way a station full of cops can't stop a man with a freeze gun, or a man dressed up as a clown etc. Also, Eddie tried and got shot for his trouble. Especially after that the SWAT folks might not want to risk anyone else. Or they might have been set up to snipe him once he reached the roof. At that point, the maximum loss would be the one hostage.

I'll fanwank that either the person who was pulling Lovecraft's strings decided to cut off the hit, or Selina is going to stay one step ahead of the assassin for now. We are obviously going to see the lead assassin back at some point.

If you buy the notion that even with the particle accelerator technology it was still a one in a billion chance that resulted in Barry getting speed, I'd say it'd be a reasonable hypothesis that it would be even more improbable that someone could have gotten Barry's speed before that technology existed to create/facilitate it.

The headlines are worse in the Flashless universe...To explain a little further requires comic book spoilers:

Freeing Tony only worked because reasons. A realistic Tony would have said, "Thanks for freeing me, peace out." No reason for Tony to stay and fight other htna the show wanted him to do a heel-face turn and die. They are all DC heroes, and thus, presumably not dead. I can't screencap, but I can freeze-frame and look: The Flash-less Central City Citizen of April 25, 2024 has the following headlines: "Return to Sender: U.S. Post Office Shuts Down Permanently" "Wayne Tech/ Queen Inc Merger Falls Through" "Red Skies Threaten" (the picture accompanying this article seemed to have moving clouds) "Carla the Woolly Mammoth Charms At Zoo" The restored timeline Central City Citizen had the following headlines: "Flash Missing Vanishes In Crisis" "Wayne Tech/Queen Inc Merger Complete" "Red Skies Vanish" I don't remember the details of the Arrow episode well enough to be 100 percent sure, but I believe the story was that he had been convicted in Central City, wanted to see his sister before she died, busted out of prison to get to her, committed crimes in an attempt to get her treatment, got caught by Team Arrow, and was sent back to Central City. Barry doesn't know (presumably) about what happened to Stagg or that Wells manipulated Plastique into trying to kill Eiling. For all he knows, Tony is the only time he sacrificed someone. Wells pretending to personally know every person who was killed because of the accelerator "accident" helped convince that Wells is a good guy at heart with an arrogant, manipulative, indifferent exterior, rather than a guy with a good-seeming exterior, but am arrogant, manipulative, indifferent core. I don't think it's nonsensical. I doubt that in the real world if a criminal wants a temporary parole to see a loved one before she dies that he would get one.

They probably figured fans of the comics would be upset if they changed either Dent or Bullock, and non-fans would adjust. (I personally hope that the Harvey Dent we're seeing is the dad of the one Batman will come to know or something, because this Harvey Dent is too old to be a contemporary of Bats). On the contrary, it seems like Falcone suspects each and every person under him would betray him potentially. He's just not going to buy Oswald's pointing the finger at Fish automatically because he'd consider the source. Oswald has a grudge against Fish because she tried to have him killed. I do like the mayor having a darker side rather than just being a puppet. And I would say Harvey's at most a total idiot only half the time. :)

Harvey Dent and Harvey Bullock are both characters from the comic books. Harvey Dent has been around since the 1940s. Harvey Bullock according to Wikipedia has been around since the 1980s. So the fact that they are both named Harvey is just coincidence.

Figured I might as well start this episode thread. Hasta la vista, Tiberius! I would have liked to see him suffer more, but to literally have a woman beat him, and one of his rape victims set him up for this humiliation and the other to actually kill him is just going to have to do. I liked the makeshift colosseum. I think I like the seasons with gladiators better than the rebellion ones, so I saw it as a good callback. I do wonder if any of the Romans had bested the gladiators if they would have just kept throwing people at them until they died or what. I'm very glad that a) Agron survived and b) Nasir did not take Naevia's silence on the possibility that Agron died to get himself some pirate booty. I don't know if it's the editing or what, but the 500-to-1 trade didn't make sense to me. Did Caesar have the 500 people in tow already when he made the trade? Did the Romans bring enough people to make it so the 500 could be kept in line? If not, why wouldn't they free themselves? Why would either side trust the other to make the trade? Why not just be like, "Thanks for my 500 peeps, enjoy dead Tiberius?" or "Thanks for Tiberius, and now here are some legions to slaughter you and them?" I also don't like that Kore gave herself up to make the trade. Yes, she and Crassus are lovers. But she's going to be a slave again, and letting people be enslaved is not what Spartacus is about.

I am confused about one thing at this point: Does/did Tiberius know that Kore was his dad's side piece? Or is he generally frightened about Crassus learning he was a rapist of a family favorite slave rather than someone he purportedly has romantic feelings for? I wouldn't mind reaching through the screen and pinching Laeta's cheeks. Either set.

I think it's important to keep in mind that we don't yet know for 100 percent sure that Sam was the father of Lila's baby. We know that Sam and Lila were sleeping together, that Lila apparently told Sam she was pregnant. We suspect because of the flashbacks that Lila was only sleeping with Sam and in love with him. However, no DNA testing has been done. For all we know, the baby was Griffin's or yet another person Lila was sleeping with.

Again, it is a question of whether you have the two elements of murder -- mens rea (guilty mind) and actus reus (physical act). You have to have them for each of the individuals for them to be guilty of murder. The only one who has the actus reus is Wes. The only way any of the others could be guilty of murder or any other crime is either through felony-murder or some sort of conspiracy/accomplice liability. I don't think there can be any conspiracy liability because a conspiracy requires a "meeting of the minds" to accomplish something. As to the mens rea, I don't think you can say that Wes had the classic "malice aforethought" guilty mindset. http://dictionary.law.com/Default.aspx?selected=1198 That is, when he swung the statue, was he thinking "I'm going to kill/really hurt this sonuvagun!" That would be malice aforethought. More likely, Capt. Save-a-ho was thinking "I've gotta save a ho." It could be manslaughter because arguably this was a killing in the heat of the moment, or because there was what at worst could be called "imperfect self-defense/defense of others" -- basically Wes was under the belief that he had to act to save Rebecca, but he was incorrect in how he acted. So really the only way this might fit as "murder" is felony murder, which sidesteps all that and just says basically "if you were intending to commit a felony and someone dies in the midst of it, it doesn't matter that you didn't intend to kill him." Anyway, as to hitting Sam in the head while he was choking Rebecca, There was no meeting of the minds to steal the computer info originally. One could say that there was once Sam went berserk. But it's still an open question as to why Wes wanted Laurel to take the flash drive, why Laurel took it, and why Michaela defended Laurel. I don't think it can be truly said that they were all of one mind on any of this. Clearly if this wasn't an idiot plot, Michaela should have called Annalise and 911 at some point before the rest of the Scoobies got there. (And I wish there were a better term for them because they deserve to be comingled either with the cartoon Scoobies or the Buffy Scoobies. They just aren't cool or smart or funny enough.) But once it became a struggle with Sam, there wasn't a ton of time to call the cops. They were debating as to what to do when they thought he was dead, and then he immediately sprang up and started to choke Rebecca. If you take the facts as we saw them, Sam told them to get out. As the homeowner, he can rescind the invitation to these people for any reason or no reason. Staying after the homeowner has told them to leave is trespassing, even if they were like "We'll leave as soon as you calm down.". Of course, since they could tell any story that they wanted, they could just say that they were welcomed in the home initially but then Sam went cray and started attacking them.

Actual attorney here, and I'll expand a little more about what I said above. Felony-murder IMO would not likely apply here among the Scoobies because there was not a conspiracy to commit the underlying felonies relating to the breaking and entering and stealing the computer data. (Interestingly enough, Nate hypothetically could be on the hook for felony-murder because he and Rebecca did have an agreement to get the computer data, and it seems like that agreement involved the understanding that she would do so by committing a felony.) Rebecca did not have any plans with any of the Scoobies to break in to the home. One could argue that a conspiracy to steal the flash drive was formed while the Scoobies were struggling over the flash drive itself. Wes told Lauren to get it, Lauren actually took it, Laurel and Michaela ran away together. I personally think that is a relatively weak argument, especially because it's unclear what any of the three ultimately planned to do with the flash drive. As portrayed, when Sam went over the stairs looked like an accident to me. It didn't even seem like Michaela pushed him. And with Sam choking Rebecca, he was using lethal force in defense of property. My understanding (although I've not done research in this) is that would be an overreaction. You are only justified in using lethal force in self-defense if faced with lethal force. So I would think Wes would be justified in striking out in defense of Rebecca. But even accepting for argument's sake that there would be enough for felony murder under the actual facts of what happened, this is all unbelievably silly because the five people there are the only ones who know what actually happened in the house. They can pretend that there was no flash drive, make up whatever story they want about why Sam went crazy and started attacking them. Surely coming up with a cover story that seemed plausible and clear self-defense would be easier and better than the extreme lengths that the Scoobies went to in order to cover up the non-murder.