Barry faced an unexpected visit from a former enemy on The Flash Season 2 Episode 11.
Elsewhere, Cisco enjoyed some extra-good vibration… Patty put her brain to good use… and an unfortunate incident brought the Wests together.
Let’s run it all down, shall we?
Back present time, Eobard Thawne sought out Mercury Labs’ Christina McGee. He needed to use her tachyon tech in order to get back to the future.
(We know, we know: How is he actually alive?!? Because this marked his first trip back in time… therefore, he had not yet become the Nora-killer who got “erased” on the The Flash Season 1 finale. Got it? Good.)
Cisco, meanwhile, aspired to fine-tune his unique ability, which Harry solved by figuring out that an adrenaline rush is its trigger.
So Harry came up with a cool visor for Cisco to use, a visor that enabled Cisco to see that Eobard eventually kills McGee… nearly four hours from the moment he saw it.
We’ll get back to that shortly, but first: Iris went to her sick mother’s bedside after learning about her battle with cancer.
We had to fight back the tears as she forgave her dying parent and as she later reached out to Wally in order to reunite the family before their mom passed away.
It took Iris telling him about Eddie for the estranged siblings to bond over loss and for Wally to eventually let go of his anger and show up at Iris’ doorstep, asking if she’ll go with him to see Francine one final time.
As for Caitlin?
She shared with Barry the news that Jay is dying, recommending they track down his Earth-One doppelganger to get some healthy DNA to transfuse… or something along those lines.
Barry, however, failed to find our Jay.
After learning of the search, Jay took Caitlin to the park to point out his counterpart: bespectacled Hunter Zolomon, who evidently was adopted and raised under a different name.
Alas, since the speedster process mutated Jay’s DNA, Hunter is sadly of no value, although his DC Comics origin story sure makes one’s mind go… zoom. (Get it?!?)
After Barry mentioned that he and Joe assist the S.T.A.R Labs team sometimes, Patty investigates and realizes that Barry’s cases often involve The Flash. They also contain details that the CSI had no way of knowing.
Joe remains quiet when asked about these pieces of information, as does Barry… even after Patty says she’ll stay in Central City if he just tells her the truth.
Patty laments his silence, leaves for Midway, but then phones in a false alarm to Barry about a gunman.
When he arrives and Patty learns his secret, she assures him that she understands and everything is “good,” but she still leaves.
Finally: Cisco tracks down an activated tachyon gizmo and Barry races to the scene to stop Eobard from killing Christina.
Barry wins their battle and Reverse-Flash gets locked up, but Cisco’s nose bleeds subsequently worsen. He starts to seize and actually phase away.
Harry deduces that this is happening because they affected the timeline by capturing Thawne – and therefore must release him and get him back to his future.
Barry hesitates, but understands. He sets his mother’s killer free and then combines their speed to catapult Thawne to where/when he came, instantly reviving Cisco.
Thank goodness, right?
Go ahead and watch The Flash online via TV Fanatic if you need to catch up on anything you may have missed.