The Flash Review: Memorabilia (Season 5 Episode 12)
Though it’s initially sold as a group effort to stop Cicada by way of healing his comatose daughter Grace, The Flash Season 5 Episode 12, “Memorabilia,” is largely an exploration of the vagaries of memory wrapped around a West-Allen family therapy session.
This is, largely, okay — even great, actually — as the show’s Inception-esque dive into the memories of two damaged children in Grace and Nora wrestles with ideas of perception and understanding in surprising ways.
And, as it turns out, neither of these girls’ memories are quite what they seem.
The basic premise of “Memorabilia” revolves around a piece of peak comic-book technology, something called a Memory Machine that allows people to mentally journey into the memories of others and will somehow allow Team Flash to heal Grace.
The Flash forces Caitlin to recite some technological gobbledygook to explain how this works, but at the end of the day, it doesn’t matter.
The only thing we need to know is the idea that while the machine should ideally be used in pairs, it also means each set of partners can maybe see into one another’s memories at the same time.
Since Nora’s keeping some big secrets from her family, her panicked decision to go into Grace’s mind alone makes a certain amount of sense, even if we all know that at some point over the last five years someone on Team Flash should have learned how damaging it is to literally never talk to one another about their issues.
Memory-hopping as a narrative device is pretty interesting, and The Flash uses it to great effect, pulling off a couple real surprises and a rather deft look at the ideas that make up our memories at the same time.
We’ve all assumed Grace is a passive victim in all this, but she isn’t, actually. Or at least not in the way we think.
Nora not only discovers that the younger girl can hear things in her comatose state, but that she sees her uncle Owen as a hero on a righteous crusade.
It’s understandable that a girl who lost her parents and ended up in a coma at the hands of metahumans might not have the friendliest views of them, but the fact that Grace has basically absorbed her uncle’s meta-based bigotry is certainly unexpected.
(And also likely a hint that the reason Cicada seems to never stop killing — thanks for that lesson, Flash Museum — is because there’s more than one, and Grace picks up her uncle’s mantle at some point in the future. You heard it here first, y’all.)
Elsewhere, we finally get a look at the future Iris that Nora’s told us so much about, who’s every bit as awful as previously described.
But, that Iris isn’t any more real than Grace’s idea of her pancake-making uncle Owen, and is the creation of an angry young girl who needed someone to blame for her father’s absence.
We’ve spent half of Season 5 wondering how the Iris we know now could become the mother that Nora frequently describes. “Memorabilia” tells us that woman doesn’t exist – or at least not precisely in the way that her future daughter has described her.
Does Iris make difficult choices? Probably. Will she decide to suppress her daughter’s powers if her husband disappears?
It’s certainly possible, given that Barry himself decides that forcibly depowering another meta — even if it’s a bad one — is something he’s willing to do in the name of the greater good.
That’s a question for the future to sort out. But “Memorabila” does indicate that nothing is set in stone.
After all, Iris is starting the Central City Citizen several years before she’s supposed to, and Nora’s already learned that her preconceived ideas about the kind of person her mother is can be wrong.
Can Iris change the future and correct her daughter’s flawed memories? (Can you even correct a memory, given that each person’s perspective is unique and will likely recall something in a way particular to them?)
It should be interesting to see where The Flash takes this particular storyline, especially given that Nora’s presence and Iris’ actions are changing the future so drastically.
Stray Thoughts and Observations
- The Team Flash ice skating trip that kicks off the episode is capital A adorable and the exact sort of thing this show should do more of. Look at everyone being friends!!
- Fun fact: Danielle Panabaker tweeted that Caitlin’s ice skating sweater was specifically a replica of a Killer Frost outfit from the comics. Awesome.
- In a similar vein, Cisco and Ralph’s bro-date? Equally adorable, and a great reminder that it’s possible for characters to have interactions that don’t involve lectures or lessons, but just natural, hanging out-style friendship.
- The idea that Iris’ blog — which we have seen her work on for approximately five minutes this season – is so successful that it’s going to become a print newspaper is hilarious bizarre, especially to those of us who follow modern day media at all, which is currently downsizing and shuttering both print and digital outlets at a frightening rate.
- I can’t believe that after all this, there wasn’t even the slightest question on Barry’s part about why Reverse Flash would be running around his daughter’s memories??
What did you think of this episode of The Flash? Share your thoughts in the comments below!
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The Flash airs Tuesdays at 8/7c on The CW.
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Lacy Baugher
Lacy is a pop culture enthusiast and television critic who loves period dramas, epic fantasy, space adventures, and the female characters everyone says you're supposed to hate. Ninth Doctor enthusiast, Aziraphale girlie, and cat lady, she's a member of the Television Critics Association and Rotten Tomatoes-approved. Find her at LacyMB on all platforms.