The Flash – Blocked

By: Malasha Parker

The episode opens with us seeing the masked man from last week, unmasked. We get a flashback of how the fight between him and Gridlock (Daniel Cudmore) went. He ultimately came out on top, killing Gridlock with his lightning bolt-shaped dagger.

Nora (Jessica Parker Kennedy) and Barry (Grant Gustin) are sitting in the center of the everyone as they reveal the reason why Nora came back in time. She admits that the negative tachyons were put there because of her. When Nora shows them the newspaper article of his long disappearance, Joe (Jesse L. Martin) puts it together that the reason Nora returned was to spend time with her father because she doesn’t get to in the future. While everyone else seems saddened by it, Iris (Candice Patton) takes the more optimistic approach and says that the article doesn’t mean anything because they’ve changed it before so they’ll do it again. When everyone leaves, Iris voices to Joe that now she realizes why Nora never wants to be around her and is always following her father around. Joe tells her to just keep busy and Iris leaves. Cecille (Danielle Nicolet) calls from the room, where she reveals that she can’t hear anything from Jenna’s thoughts anymore. Her powers may be gone.

At S.T.A.R. Labs, Cisco (Carlos Valdes) is watching old holograms of Cynthia (Jessica Camacho) when Caitlin (Danielle Panabaker) walks in questioning him about it. Cisco voices his sadness about it because he can’t just forget her. He’s still connected to her in a more extreme way because of their vibe powers. Ralph (Hartley Sawyer) comes in and asks him to vibe Caitlin’s father’s death certificate. In an effort to deflect, Caitlin suggests that they help Cisco get over Cynthia so that he can vibe the death certificate. Ralph has a plan.

A man is in a warehouse trying to steal guns when a woman by the name of Vanessa Jansen (Erin Cummings) comes in and uses her powers to kill him.

Barry is discussing the crime scene with Captain Singh (Patrick Sabongui) when Nora comes up declaring herself CSI intern. Barry tells him that he hired an intern because of all of the cases that have accumulated while he’s been gone. Captain Singh tells him to make it official when he gets back to the office and Nora is left to help Barry with the case. She says that she found some of Barry’s old things and decided to come help. She spots something that looks like a pound of flesh and proceeds to touch it. Barry warns her that she can’t contaminate the evidence and she asks him about a futuristic device that they obviously do not have. Barry tries to pick it up but he realizes that he can’t even move it.

Iris comes up behind Singh after hearing him discuss something with a cop and asks about Gridlock. He tells her he’ll give her insight off the record just this once. He reveals that Gridlock never made it to the Iron Heights because the convoy was attacked by what they believe to be another metahuman. The guards are still in the hospital.

Ralph presents “The Book of Ralph” where he offers the steps to getting over a break up to Cisco. They start going through them and pick to start with step twelve– getting a makeover.

Iris visits Officer Matthews at the hospital to get information on William Lane. The officer tells Iris that he’s read her blog and knows that he calls him Gridlock. He tells her that he doesn’t remember what happened. He says that Gridlock was beaten then stabbed. Everyone was still alive except for Lane.

Cecille has figured out that she’s losing her powers and offers a device to help her hear the thoughts of whoever is wearing it. She suggests putting it on Jenna and Joe is not okay with that idea. Cecille admits that her having this connection to Jenna allows her to be a perfect parent. Joe tells her they will figure out another way to work out her powers.

Back in Barry’s CSI lab, Barry and Nora are waiting on the DNA analysis. Nora mentions how Iris took the news about Barry’s disappearance better than she though, and Barry just says that Iris is as tough as they come.The discover who the arms dealer is and get a match on her location. They both go to take her down and when they get there she is already there with someone else. Barry tells Nora to scan the perimeter while he takes on Vanessa and the gangster, but Nora does her own thing and ends up in one of Vanessa’s cubes. Vanessa throws Nora across the city and Barry chases after her. He safely gets her to the ground and out of it.

At S.T.A.R. Labs they get back to business and try to track down Vanessa. Iris asks Nora is the satellites are back up again, but he isn’t responsive. Caitlin says they didn’t track her, but they were able to find an anomaly that they’d never seen before. After an awkward moment between Cisco and Ralph, Caitlin tells them that the matter that she traps people in is so compact that even speedsters can’t vibrate through them. Cisco, Ralph and Caitlin leave and Iris goes to CCPD to use Barry’s computer to help her with a lead.

Barry helps Nora train with the basics – Math. Cisco undergoes a “metamorphosis” by getting a complete makeover from a friend that helps Ralph. Ralph mentions the death certificate again and Caitlin gets upset and tells them not to worry about it. While Barry is teaching Nora some basics, she asks how to do a supersonic punch and Barry informs her that those kinds of things are way above her skill level. She just wants to be like him and when she goes to show him just what she can do, she accidentally hits him with lightning, sending him through the glass.

Iris gets to CCPD and finds the video footage from the Gridlock attack. She can’t see exactly who’s attacking him, but she hears a distinct sound.

Barry goes to Joe to tell him how Nora is doing the opposite of everything he says and trying to go big with everything. Joe mentions an incident that happened when Barry first moved in with him. Barry says it’s different because he was just trying to impress him and then Barry realizes that’s exactly what Nora is trying to do with him. She has only seen him as a brilliant hero and that’s why she’s trying so hard to be like him. Joe tells him this and encourages him to just help her through it and to make sure she knows that Barry loves her. When Barry leaves, Cecile comes from around the corner and kisses him, feeling inspired from his speech to Barry.

Cisco finds Caitlin at the Central City Jitters and asks her why she doesn’t want to investigate her dad’s death certificate. She says that if he has been alive all this time, then it means that he doesn’t want to see her. Cisco admits that Cynthia isn’t the one and mentions that some truths you can only hide from for so long. He tells her that it’s not too late for her and her dad, but she has to at least face that truth or she’ll spend the rest of her life wondering.

Barry shows her some old videos of himself. He tells her that it takes time to grow your skills and that she will get there but she has to slow down. She apologizes for not listening and says that she just wanted to make him proud. The gangster comes back for the guns that he didn’t get to steal from Vanessa  and they face off.

Iris finds Barry and Nora at S.T.A.R. Labs and mentions that she may have found something. Barry mentions that they need something to catch the pockets of compressed air and Iris says that the news barometer is big enough to catch it. Iris tracks it and they get a hit exclaiming, “Go Team West-Allen!”

As the fight finally breaks out, Vanessa dodges all the bullets. Barry and Nora show up and get the cuffs on Vanessa, but she gets them off and traps The Flash into a cube which she immediately starts to shrink. Nora realizes that she gets tired and starts zooming around while Vanessa tries to blast her. The finally get her restrained again, but they don’t get her away quick enough because the masked man with the lightning bolt dagger shows up and stabs Vanessa in the back. XS leaves Flash, Vibe and Elongated Man on the scene while the masked man somehow takes away all of their powers. They all fight and when Cisco tries to pick up the dagger, he can’t remove it from the ground. Caitlin asks what the sound is and Iris realizes it’s the same as the one from the video. XS runs up and instead of calling Barry by “The Flash,” she yells out “DAD!” This stops the villain in his tracks and he walks away before stabbing Barry.

Caitlin finally lets Cisco vibe the death certificate and they see that her mother was the one that forged the papers. Iris informs everyone of what she found while investigating Gridlock and shows them the video. She tells them to listen and Nora says it sounds like a Cicada. Barry turns to her and asks who that is and Nora just stares at him with a horrified look.