The Flash Season 3 Finale recap: The past catches up with Barry

Season 3 started with Flashpoint and ended with Barry paying the price for it. This season was mainly about trying to safe Iris and changing the future. But who thought after half a season of trying to find a way to save her, H.R. would be the one to do it?

We all know Barry went back in time and created Flashpoint by saving his mother in the season 2 finale. Zoom was defeated, but both his parents were dead and our favourite speedster didn’t want to live with that. When he finally realised he couldn’t stay in Flashpoint forever, the timeline as he knew it had changed. People were changed, Diggle had a son instead of a daughter (for the Arrow watchers) and most of all: Dr Alchemy/Julian had made his way into town.

I was thrilled when the announcement at ComicCon of Tom Felton joining the show as Alchemy/Julian was released. The little rivalry between Julian and Barry was one of the best parts of the entire season. He might’ve been a villain at first, but he was being controlled by Savitar and ended up as a part of team Flash anyways.

Back to the season 3 finale. “Iris” had just been stabbed by Savitar and everyone thought she was dead. Half of the season was about saving her and we all knew that her death couldn’t actually be real. Our theories became reality when it was shown H.R. switched places with Iris by using his transmogrifier (the tech-thingy he brought from Earth-19, which allows you to change into someone else). Apparently, H.R. had found Savitar’s lair by himself with the help of the part from Savitar’s suit (which team Flash earlier this season had obtained and had been shown before to lead them to Savitar’s current position). This lead to him being killed and not Iris.

So,  Iris remained alive. While Cisco is still off battling Killer Frost, Joe, Barry and Iris check the vault. The article “Flash Missing Vanishes In Crisis” is written by Iris West-Allen again. They’re too excited to even care about Barry (still) disappearing in 2024, but let’s not ruin the moment. Of course, the moment is ruined anyways as Savitar inevitably finds out about H.R. taking Iris’ place, since everything Barry knows, Savitar knows. This results in Cisco being taken by Savitar for his plan B to alter the Speed Force Bazooka so he can become immortal and prevent the paradox from hitting him.

Meanwhile at S.T.A.R. Labs, Julian tells team Flash he and Caitlin’s mother found a cure for Caitlin. Barry decides (mostly because of  Snart) to stay a hero, so he offers Savitar his help to stay alive and promises him a family. Not that I dislike Barry, but he shouldn’t have assumed something like this would work? I mean, he’s the super villain you’ve been facing for months and who just killed H.R. and wants to kill Iris, Barry. Anyways, when Savitar walks into S.T.A.R. Labs Julian gets really mad. (At least he was still using his brains and disliked the idea of helping Savitar). What followed next really bothered me. They asked Tracy to help Savitar, while he just killed her loved one. Of course she says no at first, but Harry from Earth-2 comes to save the day and convinces Tracy anyways.

Potential new villain: Cliff Devoe, the Thinker

As predicted, Savitar betrays them all (and basically blew up S.T.A.R. Labs with the Philosopher’s stone) and continued with his plan B. Barry was too naïve to think being nice to Savitar would actually work, even if he still has a part ‘Barry’ inside of him. Savitar did mention a potential villain for next season, though: Cliff Devoe, or the Thinker.

Not much later, Cisco is rescued by Gypsy and reunited with the team. Gypsy is such a badass woman and I need her as a regular. Just putting that out there.

Next, Killer Frost and Savitar are trying out the Speed Force Bazooka Cisco supposedly altered into a splicer. Of course, Cisco didn’t and altered it into a skeleton key which opens the Speed Force. It results in Jay Garrick getting released from the Speed Force.

We now finally (!!) know the reason why Savitar needed Killer Frost for his plan: so she could freeze anyone coming out of the Speed Force trying to stop Savitar from becoming immortal. I expected something so much more, but it’ll do. They get the cure to Caitlin, but she doesn’t drink it immediately as Cisco gets attacked by Savitar and she steps in to save him.

“All these months you were trying to save me from him. Look at that. I saved you.”

Savitar and Barry have a little fight scene and Barry vibrates himself into Savitar’s suit and pushes him out. On the edge of killing Savitar, Barry destroys the suit instead and triumphantly walks away from him. As Savitar stands up (doesn’t he ever die?) and tries to use his speed to get to Barry, he gets shot by Iris. One of my favourite moments from the finale followed as Iris said to Barry: “All these months you were trying to save me from him. Look at that. I saved you.” Girl power.

Finally, the team buries H.R. He had always been the ‘replaceable’ character, because we’d still have our Harry from Earth-2. Personally, I got attached to H.R. He was totally different from all the other Wells’ we had encountered with before and the Cisco-H.R. dynamic was great. H.R. came to Earth-1, basically faking he was a genius. Drumsticks and drinking coffee were his things and recently he fell in love with Tracy, but he never really knew what he was supposed to do with his life and felt lost. He felt like he was the reason Savitar found Iris at Earth-2 in the first place (which is somewhat true, although it could’ve happened to anyone like Cisco said) and he felt like he needed to remedy that. As his tombstone read:

He finally found out why he was born: to save Iris. I think he was one of the best characters this season and he will be missed for sure. He shouldn’t have gotten killed in my opinion, but if he had to go, this was the way to do it. When Tracy found out H.R. was the one actually dead, he told her he loved her and it was heart-breaking. Tom Cavanagh did a great job portraying H.R. and I’ll be looking forward to him being back (supposedly fulltime?) as Harry, because I missed that guy.

At the funeral, Caitlin/Killer Frost makes an appearance too. She tells the team she’s not going to drink the cure. She became more like a ‘Caitlin Frost’ right then and there and I’m excited to see where her story will lead to.

Just when you think team Flash can live in peace for a while, the Speed Force gets unbalanced because there is no prisoner in there anymore. The Speed Force, portrayed as his mum, comes to get Barry and tells the team he won’t go to “hell”, but that he’ll go somewhere to “rest”. Barry then sacrifices himself and yet again, Iris and Barry are separated. Can’t they be happy together for once?!

When I first watched the finale, I was disappointed. Iris and Barry were separated again, H.R. was killed and they tried to help Savitar which he used to his advantage. After watching the finale again in parts and writing about it, I feel like they did every character justice (as far as justice goes) and they really did a great job with Caitlin/Killer Frost.  I don’t think we’ll be saying goodbye to her or Barry any time soon.. He’ll probably be in the Speed Force for the first couple of episodes but he’ll return. Cisco came through with the weekly jokes we needed and I liked how he believed so firmly in Caitlin not being Killer Frost. Tom Felton is still the best addition in the cast they made this season and I wish to see him more often in the show.

I’m excited to see what’ll happen in season 4.

With our favourite speedster now in the Speed Force “resting”, what will happen to team Flash? What about the potential villain for next season, the Thinker? What are your thoughts on this season finale?

Let me know!