In the eleventh episode of season 3 of The Flash, H.R.’s past comes back to haunt him in the form of Gypsy, a bounty hunter from Earth-19 with vibe-like abilities. When Barry and Cisco learn that H.R. could avoid his fate by challenging Gypsy to a fight to the death, Cisco steps in and offers to fight her in H.R.’s place. Meanwhile, Iris and Wally team up to take down a dangerous new criminal threatening Central City. Take a look back at the most memorable moments from episode 11, “Dead or Alive.”
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Iris Is Looking into a Story
At the start of the episode, Iris tells Barry that she’s working on a new story. She’s been investigating reports of an arms dealer threatening the city and Barry is worried about her getting involved in a dangerous situation. Iris tells Barry she will drop her investigation, but she has no intention of doing that. Instead, Iris goes to Wally for help taking down said arms dealer. (After spending half the season reminding us that Iris and Wally were a brother-sister crime-fighting duo in the Flashpoint timeline, it would have been incredibly disappointing if they didn’t eventually team up in this one.)
Gypsy Comes for H.R.
The metahuman who arrived in the last moments of the previous episode is Gypsy, a sort of bounty hunter from Earth-19. Gypsy manages to track H.R. to STAR Labs and shows up to “collect” him. In trying to stop Gypsy from taking H.R. back to Earth-19, Cisco discovers that they have similar abilities, only Gypsy’s vibe powers are far more advanced than Cisco’s. Gypsy tells the group that H.R. broke the law on their Earth — inter-dimensional travel is apparently banned on Earth-19 — and she gives him an hour to get his affairs in order before she takes him back home. Alas, it turns out that the punishment for H.R.’s crime is death. H.R. tells the team that the only way to avoid his sentence is to appeal for trial by combat. When H.R. goes to surrender to Gypsy, Cisco intervenes and challenges Gypsy to trial by combat. He then has 24 hours to prepare.
Barry and the Team Help Cisco Prepare for Battle
Cisco’s training sessions are not going well, so H.R. tells Barry they need to stop Gypsy before the fight. H.R. placed a tracker on Gypsy, so Barry goes after her. Unfortunately, Gypsy gets the drop on Barry so she winds up taking H.R. as collateral to ensure that Cisco shows up for their battle. Luckily for everyone, Julian comes up with a strategy that will allow Cisco to beat Gypsy by pinpointing the moment when she will be at her most vulnerable.
Iris Walks into Danger
Iris wants Wally to use his speedster abilities to get a look at the file Joe has been compiling on the arms dealer. (This leads to a hilarious scene in which Iris’ rambling about expanding her family with Barry — her way of distracting Joe while Wally steals, photographs and replaces the file — makes Joe think Iris is talking about having kids. He is beyond relieved when she clarifies that she’s just thinking about getting a pet.)
When Wally asks Iris why she’s chasing this story, Iris says that she wants her life to mean something and she can accomplish that by leaving her mark as a journalist. (This is a really good episode for Iris.) It also helps that Iris believes she’s not destined to die until four months from now. This belief has her taking some unnecessary chances like going into the arms dealer’s lair without backup. Thankfully, Wally gets there in time to stop the arms dealer from killing her and they secure him so the police can take him into custody.
Joe Is Still in the Dark About Iris’ Future
Poor Joe remains oblivious to the fact that his daughter may be killed in a few months’ time so he is confused about why she would risk her life for a story. I still don’t understand why Iris has chosen to keep this from Joe or why everyone else is going along with that decision. It would make more sense if Joe was in poor health and needed to avoid stress, but that’s not the case here. Joe has the right to know that his daughter might be murdered in the near future so he can work with the team to do everything in his power to keep that from happening.
Iris Shares Her Fears with Barry
Like Wally and Joe, Barry is concerned about Iris’ newfound recklessness when it comes to her own safety. Barry thinks it’s about Iris’ fear of dying at Savitar’s hands, but Iris tells him that she’s not afraid of dying. Iris then opens up to Barry and explains that what she’s really afraid of is ending up like her mom. She’s scared of leaving this life without having left anything behind. Iris wants her life, however long or short it is, to matter. Barry says that Iris’ mom did leave something behind in her two amazing children. He also promises her that whatever the future holds, they will face it together. (I love the show for having Iris point out that it’s hypocritical of Barry to act like he’s the only one who gets to risk his life to stop the bad guys. I just hope Iris is a bit more cautious about her acts of heroism in the future.)
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Cisco vs. Gypsy
During their battle, Gypsy vibes them to several different universes, giving us a glimpse of Earth-2 and Supergirl’s world. Yet the best thing about their fight is that they spend the whole time flirting. Thanks to Julian’s advice, Cisco ends up becoming the first person to ever defeat Gypsy in battle. According to the rules of Earth-19, Cisco gets custody of H.R., but he declines his right to take Gypsy’s life. Alas, Gypsy says she will have to tell her superiors that she killed H.R. which means he can never return to Earth-19. She then makes once last dramatic exit before returning home. (Gypsy is an interesting character and she has great chemistry with Cisco so I hope we haven’t seen the last of her.)
Can Wally Save Iris?
Early in the episode, Cisco and Caitlin show Barry a 3-D reconstruction of the scene of Iris’ murder as Barry saw it in his vision. According to their calculations, Barry will only have 0.21 seconds to cover the distance needed to save Iris from Savitar’s fatal blow. Julian lays out the math of just how fast Barry will need to get in order to save Iris in that brief window of time and it will be almost impossible for him to do so. However, as Wally has been increasing his speed at an incredible rate since getting his powers, Barry realizes that Wally just might be able to get fast enough to save Iris’ life.
What was your favorite moment from this episode of The Flash? What did you think of Gypsy? Do you think Gypsy and Cisco are a good match? Are you glad H.R. will be sticking around? Does anyone else share my fear that H.R. cannot be trusted? Will Iris come clean to Joe about her possible future death or will he find out some other way? Let us know your thoughts in the comments section.
The Flash season 3 airs Tuesday nights at 8/7c on the CW. Want more news? Follow our Flash Facebook page.
(Image courtesy of The CW)
Contributing Writer, BuddyTV
