What I’m Watching: The Flash

The Flash: Season 5, Episode 16 “Failure is an Orphan” (B)

It’s definitely not a great idea for Nora to be making recommendations to everyone based on what she knows to have happened from the timeline that she left and likely altered by coming back to the past, and, surprise, surprise, things didn’t go as she expected. The notion of Barry talking to Cicada honestly both about his legacy and about being a father was a good one, but then everything had to be derailed by the fact that there’s another Cicada out there who, just like Nora, appears to have traveled back from the future to wreak havoc in the past. I recognized Sarah Carter right away from her role on a show that I used to like at the beginning but quickly lost interest in, “Falling Skies.” It’s hard to know how or why that happened, especially as Barry was able to get Cicada to trust him, but that’s just going to be one more obstacle to overcome and explain over the course of however many episodes this show has left this season, which is likely between five and seven. Seeing Joe and Cecile work together well was affirming since couples haven’t always done great in a professional setting on this show, and even though they had their hurdles, they came through them to put the human lie detector to the test in the best way possible. I’m not sure what comes next, but I do think that it’s about time that Nora stopped lying to everyone and came clean about what she’s really doing and why she’s working with Eobard Thawne.