The Flash 5x21 : The Girl With The Red Lightning review

Be warned there will be *SPOILERS* involved in this review. With that being said let's get into it. 

The penultimate episode of The Flash's fifth season has come and gone and with it we're given one heck of a twist ending going into next week's big finale. It begins with Eobard Thawne and the timer outside his prison that we've been seeing ticking down for a while now. Well it finally hits 0. The guard who we've previously seen also walks into the room and mentions how it's been 15 years. And also how it's ironic that the same thing that gives him powers is the same thing that is going to be the end of him. The last thing we see of him for a while is a gurney outside his cell which he will be loaded onto. Back at Star Labs and after learning last week that Cicada was going to turn the meta human cure into a weapon Barry and co try to come with a solution in helping meta humans in the city. Eventually coming up with setting up a distribution center at CCPD. Joe even goes to get permission from Captain Singh who agrees but will be out of town thus leaving Joe in charge. And it's later at CCPD where floods of people literally fly into the main area of the building. Being left in charge doesn't seem to be going all that smoothly for Joe however as Cecile catches him ringing up Captain Singh even though he's supposed to be helping meta humans. With pressure piling up at CCPD even more pressure is building between Cicada and the rest of Team Flash. 

Reports of various break ins and robberies have been notified and of course it's all the handy work of Cicada. She is gathering all the tech needed to complete the device capable of dispersing the cure and taking all powers away from every meta human in the city. Cicada even catches The Flash off guard again as inside a facility Barry thinks he is about to get the upper hand on her but turns out she's already taken the tech she needed but did leave a nice explosive surprise for him to handle. Of course he escapes but given how fast he is The Flash always seems to be one step behind. Back at Star Labs and earlier while out with The Flash XS experienced Red Lightning again the closer she got to Cicada. Turns out that it isn't her angry triggering the lightning change but infact Cicada. The two share some sort of connection as we know that stems from earlier in the season when Nora went inside of young Grace's mind. Barry and Iris try their best to be protective of Nora but ultimately she is a grown up and decides to enter Cicada's mind again thanks to the tech that Caitlin used to communicate with Killer Frost. Nora enters and sees the grown up Grace who has Central City in complete chaos. She blames The Flash family for everything that's happened. From the Particle Accelerator all the way to the ending of last season when Nora helped Barry with Devoe's plan. Cicada's rage is evident and Nora says that it is something she will have to deal with alone as they will stop her. Well things aren't off to a promising start however as the team learn that Cicada has gathered all the key elements to create her meta human cure weapon. This leads to Nora once again using the same tech to see through Cicada and she learns that she is on her way to CCPD with the weapon. And that's where she shows up minutes later, inside a packed, scared and overly crowded CCPD which just so happens to be full of meta humans. Team Flash learn of this and head to CCPD to try and help. Before leaving Nora gives Barry the gun that Cisco developed last week which will destroy Cicada's dagger thus stopping the power dampening powers it possess. 

The episode draws to a close at CCPD where Cicada enters all Supergirl like according to Ralph. She draws all the power from the meta humans in the room and uses it as a battery of sorts to power her dagger more so she can insert it into the weapon. Chaos soon follows however as Cisco tries to stop the weapon from going off Barry, Ralph and Killer Frost all do battle as Killer Frost freezes over the room that Cisco is in. It doesn't last long as expected however as The Flash is thrown through the ice wall by Cicada who says it's too late to stop the weapon. But Cisco obviously stops it much to the surprise of Cicada. But that's not the big twist I mentioned at the very beginning. The big twist comes with Ralph who earlier said that something doesn't add up with this new Cicada and her dagger. And as they are all fighting her in the CCPD building Cicada mentions how she didn't get her dagger until she came to the past. Ralph eventually figures things out and we see the Reverse Flash again loaded and ready to be shipped out in a gurney. We see him again and the dagger is resting on him as a way to dampen his powers. With the weapon stopped Killer Frost slides the mirror gun to The Flash so he can destroy the dagger. He shots it but just as he does Ralph shouts out to not do so but it's too late. The gun is already shot off and it ends almost instantly right there. Wow..I mean what a way to end it. A true cliffhanger going into next week's season 5 finale. So I'm guessing if the dagger gets destroyed in this current time Reverse Flash will be able to escape from prison as his powers will come back as the dagger will disappear. All along he has been playing pretty much everyone (as expected) but it's still such a cool reveal and the best twist this show has done in years in my opinion. Next week's finale looks set to be huge and I now can't wait after that ending. The episode as a whole was fine. Nothing spectacular but it was a good set up to the season finale next week which looks set to be huge like I said. Until then Team Flash!

★★★