The Flash: How Barry Allen will get his speed back

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Warning: This story contains major spoilers from Tuesday’s episode of The Flash. Read at your own risk!

The Flash is about to repeat history!

In the wake of losing his speed to Zoom (Teddy Sears), Barry (Grant Gustin) had trouble reconciling a powerless life, made more difficult in the wake of Caitlin’s (Danielle Panabaker) kidnapping. With everyone on edge that Zoom could return at any moment, Harry (Tom Cavanagh) set out to find Jesse (Violett Beane), but was taken captive by a metahuman who had beef with Earth-1 Wells over the particle accelerator explosion.

Light bulb: That‘s how Barry can get his powers back! No, seriously, Wells wants to recreate the explosion. Because that‘s a good idea?! Executive producers Andrew Kreisberg and Todd Helbing offer up scoop on why that’s not a good idea and what’s next:

Why would anyone think another explosion is a good idea?!

“The next episode is about the ethics of doing that,” Kreisberg says. “Harry thinks that between his particle accelerator explosion and what he learned from what the Thawne version of Wells did, he thinks he can contain it and just get Barry his powers back, but it’s complicated and dangerous. Everyone, including Barry, has to decide if this is the right way to go, considering the craziness that ensued last time. They’re faced with a damned with you do, damned if you don’t [situation], because Zoom is about to unleash a rein of terror on the city.

Are we even sure this will work?

“That’s part of what the next episode is about is, ‘Are you out of your mind?!'” Kreisberg says. “‘This is insanity and we’re trusting everything on Harry’s say so that it’s all going to be fine.’ That’s part of what makes next episode so exciting.”

Raise your hand if you think it’s a good idea.

Actually, you may be surprised by some of the reactions Team Flash (and others!) will have to this idea. “John Wesley Shipp returns as Barry’s dad in the next episode,” Kreisberg says. “There’s a great scene that’s between Barry’s three fathers, essentially — between Tom Cavanagh, John Wesley Shipp, and Jesse L. Martin — where all three of them are debating what their son should do. Not all of them have the take on it that you’d expect, and that’s what makes for such an interesting scene. Once Barry decides to do something, I don’t think Joe thinks he can be dissuaded from doing something; that’s the Barry that Joe has come to know, love, and respect. Given what they’re up against, Joe, who’s always been so protective of Barry, surprisingly is the one who says, ‘Maybe we should give this a shot.'”

Why does Barry’s dad come back?

“Barry reaches out to him, that he’s lost his speed,” Kreisberg says. “He needs his dad, he needs his advice, because Barry is at a crossroads of what he should do or what he shouldn’t do, because he’s being presented with a monumental decision that could not only affect him and possibly kill him, it could kill everybody in S.T.A.R. Labs, it could set off another chain reaction and affect everyone in the city. The last time they took matters into their own hands, they created this whole problem with blowing a hole in the universe and opening the breaches. They’re all a little bit gun-shy. Their faith in themselves and their faith in their decision making is a little bit lost… Barry reaches out to his dad for hope and advice.”

But seriously, how did Zoom get away with fooling everyone?

“What we’ve always said is we didn’t feel like this season was a repeat of last season,” Kreisberg says. “We think that this season happened because of last season. They wanted to believe it. He told them everything. The way he talked about Zoom, the way he lost his powers, they took a lot of it on faith. A lot of that was because they wanted to believe it. Barry lost his mentor when Wells turned out to not be who he said he was. Barry was looking for that partner, and along comes Jay, who is willing to share secrets and teach him. Caitlin, for her part, had lost Ronnie, and there was this knight in shining armor coming along to sort of replace him. He was able to do it because they let their guard down and wanted to believe it.”

So then who was Jay Garrick?

“The answer to that question will be answered down the line,” Kreisberg says. “It’s worth not talking about.”

But you can tell us who the Man in the Iron Mask is, right?

“No,” Kreisberg says. “The answer is going to blow your minds. Honestly, the two things I’m probably most proud of this season are Harry and the identity of the man in the mask.”

We finally got a new member of Team Flash who isn’t evil — probably!

“Jesse is for sure now folded into the team,” Helbing says. “Caitlin is missing, so Jesse’s smarts and scientific know-how, she’s really able to fill the shoes of Caitlin and provide the science background and specialty that the team is missing.”

When will Wally find out that Barry is The Flash?

“There are still a few more episodes of him being how Iris was last year,” Helbing says. “It takes a while before he gets fully caught up to what’s going on.”

Any chance Jesse and Wally will become the speedsters they are in the comics?

“Right now, the show is called The Flash,” Kreisberg says. “For the most part, Barry Allen is the only Flash. Obviously there’s expectations for both of their characters; whether or not they’re realized is part of the fun and joy of watching the show. It will never be Spider-Man and his amazing friends, it’ll always be The Flash.”

Why kill off Killer Frost?!

“We loved what Danielle did with her, so when we were designing this episode and we had Zoom kidnap Caitlin, it seemed like a fun thing to do to be able to have the two of them together, and to have Caitlin actually experience time with her,” Kreisberg says. “It gave us an opportunity to deepen both characters, but ultimately she had to go. Even she said, the only reason he had to keep her alive was she was a living remembrance of him caring about [Caitlin].”

How is Cisco handling his powers?

“He feels emotionally like he’s in a good place,” Kreisberg says. “You’re going to see a couple Spider-Man moments where he’s trying to make it happen, and it’s not happening the way he wants it to. There are more Greatest American Hero technical issues, glitches coming up this season.”

Any nods to Kevin Smith’s films in the episode he directs?

“Jason Mewes guest stars,” Kreisberg says. “There’s one scene in there that’s literally a scene out of a Kevin Smith movie.”

The Flash airs Tuesdays at 8 p.m. ET on The CW.