There are times when watching the Flash seems like it's actually a tale of one young man's descent into madness. After all, when you get too deep into the weeds of time travel, I would think that any specific timeline would have just as much validity as the one you left. So how could you justify changing one thing (or everything) when in the end it's all rendered irrelevant by the simple fact that time travel exists? Being a time traveler then is the ultimate self indulgence because you would in fact be choosing which reality was (in fact) the reality for everyone else.
I was expecting more of Flashpoint--the season three premiere, which happened last night on the CW. But I wasn't necessarily disappointed? I just thought it would go on for longer than it did. That's (I think) when it hit me: the idea that this series (and everything connected to it) is just Barry Allen's emotional journey in determining which reality is the one that viewers consume. Maybe the entire DC universe is actually just Barry Allen's version of events because he alters one thing here and there through time and doesn't seem to be able to control himself.
As for the death and life of his mom, I'm not sure why Barry caved so easily in letting his ultimate enemy go back into time and kill his mother after he worked so hard to save her. He apparently was losing memories of an irrelevant timeline and would eventually even forget that he was the Flash. However, why was any of that important? Barry's relationship with his parents has been a really strong point of the show. It's full of richness and depth, and it spins the coin on the all-but-worn-out plot of a hero being an orphan with no parents.
Barry Allen being played by a millennial is kind of perfect. He wants everything, but when things aren't the perfect story that he feels he deserves, he's left to contemplate the hollowness of his own existence and then must strive to change it.
I watched it last night and there is a lot more to Flashpoint than they could cover in an episode. Or five.
ReplyDeleteNo IWSG?
Oh I forgot that was this week. I've been extremely busy lately. I'll post my IWSG on Friday.
DeleteCrack that whip!
DeleteIt was pretty lame. You forgot that Wally died. Barry made the heroic choice to take the suffering upon himself in lieu of Iris and Joe.
ReplyDeleteI got a different vibe (heh) from the show. Barry's selfish choice was to go back into the past and change everyone's future for his benefit. When he saw how much his changes would change the world for the other people in his life, it would have been even ore selfish to keep his own happiness at the expense of everyone around him. Unless I am misunderstanding what you meant, your millennial comment seems like a cheap shot at something I saw as heroic.
ReplyDeleteWell of course the Flash is the ultimate hero. But my comment about "millennials" basically comes from my own experience with them. They all seem to have these incredible expectations about how their life is supposed to be and how everything is supposed to be amazing. When it falls short, it's like the end of the world to them. They complain and feel hollowed-out. They don't seem to realize that what they're asking for is the "best" in any given situation. In my experience, expecting the best is just not realistic. You can get it some of the time if you work super hard, but all of the time? So many nopes. I think you've lived enough years to realize what a shocker real life can actually be.
DeleteAnd to add to that...yes...I'm saying that people should learn to "settle" more. Life is about "settling" for something that is not the best. Barry is the poster child for the millennial generation. They refuse to settle and end up making things so much worse than they actually are.
DeleteI haven't been watching The Flash. But, I've thought many times about the question of time travel, fixing bad mistakes in the past. I don't know that I'd want to do that. Some things in my life that I like might be sacrificed just to change one or two bad moments. For me, I just need to live in the present. Its fun watching others struggle with the question though.
ReplyDelete