Title: The Flash: “Elongated Journey Into the Night” Review
Release Date: October 31st, 2017
Network: The CW
Genre: Superhero, Drama, Action
The Flash puts in another hilarious showing this week, as guest stars Hartley Sawyer and Danny Trejo put on memorable performances.
“Elongated Journey into the Night” begins with our favorite Flash couple, Cisco and Gypsy, sharing an intimate moment. That is until Breacher, Gypsy’s father, arrives, none too pleased to see his daughter dating again. Danny Trejo’s look alone is intimidating enough to make any man run for the hills, so his straight-faced, menacing performance sold Breacher perfectly.
Though Cisco tries to get along with Gypsy’s father, he insists that he is going to hunt him down to see if he is worthy of his daughter’s affection. As much as I loved Danny Trejo’s acting, and while there were plenty of laughs and interesting moments as a result of Breacher’s plan to hunt Cisco, the overprotective father story has been done thousands of times before. The way they integrated the two storylines together at the end didn’t really seem to fit too well either, as we have no idea what Breacher is talking about alongside Dibny when he talks about his people invading their planet.
Alongside this, the Mayor being corrupt cliche was pretty blatant as well. With no mention of him before this episode, it was pretty clear his role was introduced simply to further the plot of the shows titular character.
That character, Ralph Dibny, was easily the star of the episode, as Hartley Sawyer put a hell of a lot of eccentric acting and passionate into the disgraced detective. The easiest way to explain Dibny is that he felt like a mix between Jim Carrey and a less boozy, ignorant Jessica Jones. Since his introduction, I could tell I was going to like Dibny, despite Barry’s immediate aversions regarding him.
All of that was before he was revealed as The Elongated Man, one of the goofiest – but also one of my favorite – characters in DC comics. A hero capable of stretching his cells, and thus his limbs, giving him the ability to perform amazing stretchy feats. As a result of this, we get plenty of hilarious reactions from Dibny and those around him regarding his lack of control over the powers at the outset. Handshakes, Sneezing, and even farting resulted in some misshapen mishaps for our stretchy friend.
At first I wasn’t entirely a fan of his backstory, as it made Barry seem like a hypocrite, assuming he was a villain simply because he didn’t like him. Once they fleshed things out for each side though it made for a very in-depth, layered story, one which made each character’s feelings and actions towards the others justified.
It was also considerably refreshing to see that not every Metahuman that was on the bus would turn out to be evil. On top of that, I can’t wait to see more Hartley Sawyer, not just for his awesome powers – which result in ridiculous scenes like The Flash running up his stretched out arm – but because Sawyer is a hell of an actor. My hope is that he will see a larger role in the team, more like Cisco and less like Julian Albert.
I’m very interested to see how Sawyer’s role on the bus will be explained in the future as well. We’ve seen glimpses into this season’s villain, The Thinker, almost every episode so far, with Barry’s return and each of the 12 Metahumans it created all being a part of his plan.
Alongside the fact that Sawyer was told to investigate the mayor by The Thinker, the end of the episode revealed that seeds have been planted him for a while though, as The Thinker has actually been mentioned a couple of times before this season of The Flash. My only wonder is why he would give The Flash and his team such a capable ally in The Elongated Man?
Verdict: “Elongated Journey into the Night” combines humor, great acting, and an interesting character as a means of overcoming some entertainment cliches that could otherwise have weighed the episode down. Not only does the addition of Ralph Dibny’s mean more solid performances from Hartley Sawyer, it also subtlety moves along the main villain via using past and current scenes to further the intrigue surrounding The Thinker.
What did you think of the second episode of season four of The Flash? What scene or scenes did you like the most? What are your predictions for the rest the season as the mysteries begin to pile up? Be sure to let us know in the comments below. Also, be sure to check back next week for the next episode of the season,”Girls Night Out” immediately after it airs on The CW at 8 PM ET next week.
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