TV Review: ARROW – The Scientist (CW)

This is it. The episode we’ve all been waiting for since it’s was announced months ago.

The introduction of Barry Allen (AKA the Flash) to the ARROW universe.

In the last episode we saw Brother Blood, inject one of his followers, Cyrus Gold, with an experimental drug. In this episode we find out that the drug has given Cyrus super strength, enhanced speed, limited invulnerability, and the ability not to feel pain. Brother Blood requires more chemicals to reproduce the drug and Queen Consolidated manufactures one of them. So Cyrus goes to retrieve more, and this brings it to the attention of Oliver.

As it turns out Oliver has seem something similar, and seeing how it’s his company that was robbed, he’s determined to stop Cyrus from gathering the rest of the chemical.

The appearance of Cyrus as a meta-human brings CSI technician Barry Allen from Central City to Starling City. Barry also has ulterior motive for tracking down this case. This causes tension between Oliver and Barry.

But can Oliver stop Cyrus, and still avoid Barry? That’s the big question right there.

This episode was so worth the wait. Grant Gustin totally nails the Silver Age Barry. The hard luck and lovable character that can not seem to make it anywhere on time. That’s the Barry I grew up with. Now in this episode, Barry hasn’t gained his super-speed powers, but you can see the build up to it. And Barry’s motivation for following this case came from Geoff Johns’ retcon origin story in FLASH: REBIRTH. It totally sets up for Flash’s own TV show.

Two complaints I’ve heard about Gustin as Barry is first he’s too young. Don’t worry about this. I personally spoke to producer Marc Guggenheim, and they made him younger to be a complete opposite from Oliver.

The other complaint is that Barry isn’t blond. To this, I say, get over it. Blond or not, when you see the episode, you’ll see the core character of Barry is still there.

The main theme of this season is still there. Oliver going from vigilante to hero. But we see in this episode, sometimes the path is not an easy one to follow.

And now the Comic References to be on the lookout for:

• Kord Industries – The second Blue Beetle’s (Ted Kord) company
• Cyrus Gold – In the comics, Cyrus is actually the zombie like Solomon Grundy.
• Nanda Parbat – A paradise land and home to Deadman
• A certain yellow blur – Not telling on this one. You’ll have to do the math.
• A.R.G.U.S. – An U.S. federal agency and an offshoot of Homeland Security introduced first in the New 52. In comics it stand for Advanced Research Group Uniting Super-Humans, but in the world of ARROW it stands for Advanced Research Group United Support
• David Singh – Barry’s boss in the New 52

This episode was awesome, but left us with a major cliffhanger that will be resolved next week. Personally I’m going to find it hard to wait.

But to bottom line it, this is the one episode you do not want to miss. And it set up things wonderfully for upcoming Flash TV show.

ARROW – The Scientist airs on the CW on Wednesday, December 4th, at 8 PM EST.

Special thanks to the CW for provide us an advance copy.