The Flash: Trajectory
March 23, 2016 3:08 PM - Season 2, Episode 16 - Subscribe

Having arrived in town intent on creating maximum chaos, Trajectory’s antics are misinterpreted as having been perpetrated by the Flash himself. Barry thus must quickly uncover the mystery of who is the girl under the mask — as well as what is driving her mad desire for speed and destruction.
posted by Ivan Fyodorovich (22 comments total)
 
I know Trajectory is fast, but that hair had to take a while, right?

Also, how about Iris' reversal on the date-with-boss situation? I know the show is probably going for "awkwardly expressing interest", but all I could read was, "Worried about being fired by boss for embarrassing him, so letting him recover some self-esteem."

Oh, and you don't get to be mad at people for keeping secrets, Barry!
posted by ODiV at 3:32 PM on March 23, 2016


I was thinking about how apparently Iris is going to check off all those "don't date your [X] boxes.
posted by Ivan Fyodorovich at 3:47 PM on March 23, 2016 [4 favorites]


Once again, Flash takes a brave stand in favour of the status quo and killing women with superpowers.
posted by happyroach at 12:06 AM on March 24, 2016 [1 favorite]


Was Iris' outfit a little "daring' for the office?

Things may have changed, but, man, in my day we worse 'come fuck me boots' to clubs.

Speaking of clubs: ugh. That club. That was less convincing than Arrow's Verdant.

OTOH, I kept seeing Iris' boss as Wyatt Cenac (Daily Show's former Senior Black Correspondent) and it made the show better. But I also kept seeing Cisco's T-shirt as the Hall of Doom from Challenge of the Superfriends, so....

Trajectory was kinda pointless, no?
posted by Mezentian at 4:16 AM on March 24, 2016


Was Iris' outfit a little "daring' for the office?

Things may have changed, but, man, in my day we worse 'come fuck me boots' to clubs.


My wife, who has been dealing with the inappropriate shortness of lots of maternity clothes, loudly announced "well she can wear something that length!" when she showed up on screen. The boots didn't really phase me though, they were a little high for the office, but not outside the normal relationship between TV clothes and real life clothes.

Trajectory was kinda pointless, no?

She's not actually dead is she? She evaporated. There's no body. It's comics so there being a body means "she'll get better," but no body means I don't think she's dead at all. I might be wrong though.
posted by Bulgaroktonos at 5:51 AM on March 24, 2016


I wondered if Traj was dead. But they made such a fuss about her suit, and whatnot: I lean towards dead, since no one else is running around naked.
posted by Mezentian at 6:21 AM on March 24, 2016


And now her suit is sitting all alone, waiting for someone to step in? Maybe someone who was just injected with a speed drug that kickstarted her previously dormant powers?
posted by ODiV at 6:56 AM on March 24, 2016 [4 favorites]


Oh, you're quick!
posted by Mezentian at 7:08 AM on March 24, 2016 [9 favorites]


OTOH, I kept seeing Iris' boss as Wyatt Cenac (Daily Show's former Senior Black Correspondent)

They both seem to go to the same barber don't they? At least for me it was the hairline and beard that made me think of WC.

Were we supposed to think that Jessie's metahuman sensor was triggering for Wally?
posted by phearlez at 8:25 AM on March 24, 2016


"The boots didn't really phase me though..."

Faze. I'm a staunch descriptivist but phase for faze is maybe where I'm going to stand athwart history and yell "stop!"

"Were we supposed to think that Jessie's metahuman sensor was triggering for Wally?"

I kept wondering about that. We were supposed to think that it was Barry, but also maybe that it was someone else.
posted by Ivan Fyodorovich at 1:49 PM on March 24, 2016 [1 favorite]


I plead that SOMEONE* hadn't made the coffee yet.

*Me
posted by Bulgaroktonos at 2:05 PM on March 24, 2016 [1 favorite]


I figured. :)
posted by Ivan Fyodorovich at 2:17 PM on March 24, 2016


I don't think Trajectory is totally gone either. I do like that actress though, never seen her in anything else before, I hope she gets to come back.

I don't think Barry was mad at Jay's secret so much as he felt betrayed. But thinking back on the run-out-to-waterfall-and-scream scene, it seemed a little out of place in terms of the emotions and the location. Someone convince me!

Ivan, you're really stepping up the tag game here with this show and iZombie! :-)
posted by numaner at 8:27 AM on March 25, 2016


Heh. I fret about the tags and so I've just decided to copy the sidebar stuff from the show's Wikipedia page and cull it to what I think is important. It's not like I ever use tags, but I keep thinking that people will want to be able to find threads with them.

What I really wish is that I had the motivation/energy to actually write some kind of episode synopsis myself instead of just copying the official ones. But I really don't. I'm very impressed that other posters do.
posted by Ivan Fyodorovich at 12:27 PM on March 25, 2016




I was thinking about how apparently Iris is going to check off all those "don't date your [X] boxes.

Cop dad's partner [X]
Boss [X]
Brother [?]
...
King Shaaaaark [?]
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 9:24 PM on March 28, 2016 [2 favorites]


I agree with that The Mary Sue piece entirely and emphatically -- except that I don't understand how anyone could write this without mentioning that the show has been using Iris as a love-interest plot device from the beginning and, much much worse, has never once acknowledged that it is all kinds of wrong for foster siblings -- who were raised together since before puberty and through adolescence -- to be romantically involved.

The show has treated Iris as interesting and valuable only insofar as she's important to the men around her, particularly in that she's long been Barry's secret crush. The show thinks this is normal, that it's healthy and touching. The show thinks that Joe's lying to and overprotectiveness of his middle-twenties daughter is a sign of his virtue and nobility. The show mostly only finds a use for Catelyn when it's in service of her love and devotion to a man.

This show is incredibly patriarchal, it barely sees the women characters as people. So of course it would think that it was okay for her boss to want to date her and that somehow she was in the wrong for misunderstanding the situation. She turned him down! A man, with power over her, who wants her! Why wouldn't she realize the error of her ways and tell him that she was actually interested?
posted by Ivan Fyodorovich at 11:25 PM on March 28, 2016 [3 favorites]


I liked cop Iris so, so much better. She had something to do!!
posted by smoke at 1:32 AM on March 29, 2016 [2 favorites]


FLASH Facts: Trajectory - She never listened to Nancy Reagan.
posted by brundlefly at 12:33 PM on March 29, 2016


much much worse, has never once acknowledged that it is all kinds of wrong for foster siblings -- who were raised together since before puberty and through adolescence -- to be romantically involved.

"All kinds of wrong" seems a bit harsh. Odd. Uncomfortable. Needing to be addressed. All those things, sure. But I think it's a perfectly moral and acceptable relationship for two adults to enter into.

Now, I think it's a dumb thing for a television show to set up. It trounces on enough social mores that it requires a lot more explaingineering than turns out good stories. I don't really understand why they felt the need to set it up this way and I wish they'd write it off.
posted by phearlez at 2:19 PM on March 29, 2016


I don't really understand why they felt the need to set it up this way

It is, I think, a really good example of the corrosive effects of unexamined patriarchy and its unconsidered effects. I mean, Barry Allen + Iris West is canon, 30+ years' worth. As soon as the show creators decided that this Flash was gonna be Barry Allen, then obviously Iris West gets added as a love interest - "Barry Loves Iris" is just how it is, unquestionable, forever and ever amen.

Then they went through and started tweaking things to create their own take on The Flash - particle accelerator explosion, The Wests are black, Joe takes orphan Barry in to live with them, so on and so forth. But they never stopped to consider whether any of the tweaks they were making could or should affect Iris as a character. It probably never occurred to them, because they weren't thinking of Iris as a complete, complex character, just as "Barry's Love Interest." And I bet if you told them, "Hey, this Iris + Barry thing is really disturbing because of how you've tweaked your initial parameters of the story, and you should really just drop it", they'd just stare at you blankly because "Barry + Iris" is unquestionable canon, you can't change that any more than you could take Darth Vader out of the Star Wars OT.

Plus, honestly, the show's on a network that clearly places a high value on *DRAMA!!!!* over emotional plausibility (cf. the last couple seasons of Arrow . . . .)

So, thus, given that the show creators and runners were raised in and live and work in a patriarchal culture, they're more than a little blind to the problematic aspects of this version of Iris + Barry, because they haven't thought enough about Iris as an actual three-dimensional character, because she's a woman. And I'd bet money that if it ever comes up, the network execs would and are encouraging them to gloss over it, because anything that keeps the romantic tension between Barry and Iris while still keeping them apart is an engine of *DRAMA!!!*, which they want in their shows.

Or, y'know, what Ivan says above, plus canon, = 'Barry + Iris' regardless of how dumb or creepy the set-up is . . . .
posted by soundguy99 at 9:30 PM on March 30, 2016 [2 favorites]


My favorite part was when Trajectory ran out of speed and Flash stood there and watched a normal-speed person inject herself with the evil speed drug right in front of him instead of snatching it out of her hands.

For a while the show almost convinced me otherwise, but I've come back around to thinking it's impossible to make a movie or show about a hero with super-speed. Writers just can't resist writing conversations can only happen if the Flash stands there like an idiot not using his powers.
posted by straight at 1:14 AM on April 16, 2016 [1 favorite]


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