It shares the nightmare about the main antagonist, the introduction of a new D-List villain and a surprise arrival in the stinger. It’s leaning super-heavily on these tropes, in fact.

Still this episode does have some great scenes, the major one being Barry revealing what he saw in the future to the team which results in an immensely emotional scene in the Time Vault. Gustin and Patton, ironically, kill it in this scene and really give the scene some much needed gravitas.

Meanwhile, Wally gets his first official collar as Kid Flash, taking down Deadshot-lite, I mean Plunder. It’s good that we’re finally progressing with Wally’s journey and people have basically stopped giving him shit for wanting to do it.

Julian also returns and accepts Caitlin’s offer to join Team Flash so it’s going to be great to see Tom Felton make funny with the rest of the cast. Spoilers: he fits right in.

We end this episode on the arrival of the gorgeous Jessica Camacho (of the Sleepy Hollow tv show fame), portraying Gypsy and, much like her, we jump straight into the next episode…

Dead or Alive kicks off with shenanigans as Barry and Wally deal with gun runners and Julian is exposed to what an utter shit-show Team Flash is tactically. Also Cisco does a pretty decent British accent!

The two major plot points for this episode are Iris trying to get a story and Cisco protecting HR from Gypsy. To my surprise, Iris’s story is actually compelling! Armed with the knowledge that she won’t die for a few months, she goes full retard and almost gets shot for her troubles but it is nice to see Iris have some agency and act like a badass so I’ll let it slide.

The other is Cisco and Gypsy’s blossoming rivalry/romance! Jessica Camacho is probably the prettiest and most badass guest-hero we’ve had so far, essentially being a veteran version of Cisco, who finally debuts his super-suit in pitch darkness. Boooo! Their fight isn’t very well choreographed (It’s Cisco; he’s a lover, not a fighter) but we do utilise the pair’s vibe abilities and jump around the multiverse like Sliders.

Flash Fact: One of the universes they jump to is Earth-38 and crash through James Olsen’s office at CatCo Media! I hope that gets referenced in the next episode of Supergirl!

Ultimately; HR is saved and Gypsy heads back to Earth-19 with arms full of coffee and a promise that Cisco, and us, will be seeing her again soon. Overall, I preferred Dead or Alive over the previous episode and the idea of more Gypsy has me giddy!

The stinger reveals that Barry, in a good acknowledgement of his own shortcomings (and his recent time fuck-ups), says that the ever-quickening Wally will be the one to save Iris from Savitar. Next time we see that training begin when they face-off against a new meta who is Untouchable.

Man, I was all set for this to focus solely on Caitlin and her mum issues but, to my surprise, we had three distinct contenders for monster/villain of the week so kudos for playing with my expectations, show!

First up, New-Wells can fuck right off! I can appreciate Tom Cavanagh varying up his performance but jaysus, this guy is insufferable. I did enjoy the double fake-out of New-Wells first being an author-slash- scientist and finally revealed as a fraud. I still don’t like the character though. He talks like he stepped out of Alan Moore’s Crossed +100 and I’m still convinced he’s a bad guy. He could be a Durlan for all we know, it wouldn’t be the first CW show this week with a shape shifter in focus.

I’m kind of disappointed that the giant kaiju hologram wasn’t A) some manner of alien and 2) that it’s creator wasn’t even given a god damn name! This has all the hallmarks of the third Toyman, Hiro Okamura, but alas; this nuance character is just there to make Julian eat crow. Speaking of…

The writers aren’t going to let you live down being Draco Malfoy are they, Felton? Once again, I find Tom is giving it socks but this time as a despicable narc and later as a repentant puppy and for the best reasons. In a city full of dicks with superpowers, you’re going to be a bit embittered that a decent person like you didn’t get powers too. The whole feeling powerless speech he gave struck a chord with me and I hope we see more of him soon.

Has Caitlin always had a troubled history with her mum or was that changed by Flashpoint? Honestly, I can’t remember and that really is the show’s fault because the fact that I can’t remember anything about her family but can with Cisco shows that she has been woefully underdeveloped in that department. It’s nice that we get another swerve as you’d expect Dr Tannhauser to be all evil but she’s actually a pretty decent mum and it’s that insidious Nigel that get a touch of frost. Ha! Nigel… But we’re seeing her slowly progress and a hint that maybe her Killer Frost identity is seperate to Caitlin herself.

This episode flew by and kept me guessing the entire time as to who would finally be the titular monster but it turns out the greatest monster of all is man. We’ll be back in two weeks, because of the US Presidential election, when Wally is going to be throwing Shade.

Oh my god, Barry! You really screwed the pooch on this one. I mean… You messed up a whole bunch of stuff because of your stupid, irresponsible, selfish dicking with time and the absolute worst thing you did was YOU BROKE CISCO!

Hoo-boy, Paradox is a real game-changer for the most part. It introduces numerous changes to the canon, establishes (and all-too-quickly resolves) some major conflict and sets up the main antagonist(s) for the season.

Can we stop explaining time travel and alternate timelines now? Do the stupid people in the audience get it? Because if I see ONE MORE GOD DAMN explanation that isn’t simply ‘Back To The Future II’, I will drop this show. It was nice to see Jay again though.

Flash Fact: Jay reveals that they’re in 1998, shown by Dawson’s Creek playing on a TV in the diner. John Wesley Shipp played Dawson’s father on that show too!

Welp, the Arrow fans who don’t watch The Flash are going to be confused about that John Diggle Jr reveal, huh? I heard Diggle was going to be effected by Flashpoint but I didn’t think genderswapping his baby would be it. That’s such an odd choice but I guess that explains John Diggle Jr being Green Arrow in the future that was shown in Legends of Tomorrow.

Tom Felton joins the cast starting with this episode and already the sexual tension with Gustin is thick in the air. According to Tumblr anyway… But seeing the Ex-Malfoy playing a good guy is immediately suspicious but he does have good reasons for not liking Barry which will no doubt be worked on as the season progresses.

We finally get a look at Doctor Alchemy (voiced by Jigsaw from the Saw franchise, Tobin Bell) and it appears he’ll be responsible for creating new metas, since that pool of pipeline metas is getting rather dry. Not too much to say so far but considering he can grant powers, we may see another instance of Barry losing his powers but I really hope not.

Overall, Paradox is solid but is more of a set-up for the new season and next week will see that kick off with a brand new Rogue and the return of another rogue-ish character in Magenta.

Let me tell you a tale of Dragon*Con’s Saturday night. I have gone to this convention four years now and every single Saturday night at it has resulted in some sort of embarrassment for me. This year was probably the least embarrassing, however, this time there is video. So in an attempt to break the cycle, I present it to the world.

Myself and JJ Hawkins are karaoke fiends. He is far more experienced than I, this being only my third time to take to the stage, but what I lose in previous effort I make up for with enthusiasm and waist-coats. So we arrive at the KJ’s booth at 9pm to sign up… with gusto. And then we wait. And wait.

We both start to drink a lot and get a little angsty by the time 1am rolls around. But then, finally my name is called. And who do I see in the front row? None other than the 7th Doctor himself Sylvester McCoy!

I had managed to spend an hour or two with the man at the Con and had gotten to know him enough that when I got up to the mic he immediately proceeded to heckle me before the music even begins! No pressure. You can see me hand my drink to him at the start of the video.

I present it to you now with the caveat that you have heard me sing on podcasts before and you understand I do not have any sort of vocal ability.

Then, in the few seconds of ego buzz that I enjoy after jumping about like a lunatic (and while I get my drink back from The Doctor) a certain… someone, takes to the stage.

That’s right folks, Michael Rosenbaum hits the Dragon*Con karaoke scene and sings “Man In The Mirror”. Lex frickin’ Luthor steals any thunder I may have been able to walk away with. In fact, if you look back at the video you’ll see him talking to the KJ towards the end of my song. He’s the guy in the green top.

But you know what? No matter how bad I had it, it was worse for JJ. Because he was next up.

Wanna see how he followed all that?

For those of you who don’t attend Dragon*Con… shame on you. This is only a molecule of the madness you can look forward to every year.

Listen, we all had great plans to update DOOM with our adventures at Dragon*Con every day. But you know what? You try it. It’s not easy. However, our friends at The Unique Geek did a (slightly) better job by posting these videos which were a joint effort between ourselves and NeedCoffee.

Each morning at the Con, myself, Rox of Spazhouse, Leigh and Jon (behind the camera) met up to talk about our experiences for a few minutes.

Marvel at how we weren’t always able to leave the hotel room in time! Gasp at the spelling errors in our names! And enjoy as we get a little nuttier each and every day as the madness of Dragon*Con takes it’s toll on us.

FRIDAY

SATURDAY

SUNDAY

MONDAY

The second of our Dragon*Con reports comes in the shape of a new My Old Balls! This time, our favourite crazy cowboy is joined by some friends and considering this was done on the Monday of the Con, I think you can tell the damage this weekend has done to us all. Enjoy… if you can.