THE FLASH “Dead Man Running” Review: Barry Comes Clean

The Flash — “Dead Man Running” Pictured (L-R): Carlos Valdes as Cisco Ramon, Hartley Sawyer as Dibney, Danielle Panabaker as Killer Frost, Grant Gustin as Barry Allen and Candice Patton as Iris West – Allen — Photo: Jeff Weddell/The CW

THE FLASH “DEAD MAN RUNNING” REVIEW

By Justin Carter

The decision for Flash’s October episodes to prominently feature a blood-controlling villain apparently means the show’s going to lean into the horror movie tropes that come with such a baddie. Or at least, doing as much as they can within the constraints of network television. 

This week’s “Dead Man Running” picks up immediately from the last episode’s post-credits tag and features that cannibal zombie Ramsey Rosso accidentally birthed with his new meta powers, forcing Barry and Killer Frost to team up and hunt it down as it goes around Central City consuming any dark matter it can find.

Frost, lacking Caitlin’s subtlety, already knows that Ramsey is up to some stuff, but Barry manages to connect with him thanks to the fact that they’re both on borrowed time. Barry is thankfully not stupid enough to fully take Ramsey at his word and wises up once he catches Ramsey getting ready to steal some STAR tech with dark matter inside it. 

Having Ramsey and Frost in near proximity to each other both weave nicely into Barry’s incoming Crisis…well, crisis, about his oncoming death in two months. They both want to live; Ramsey wants to avoid dying the same way his mother did and Frost is getting pissy once she  learns she could die in two months despite not actually being a real person for terribly long.

After defeating the blood zombie by filling it with dark matter until it explodes (gross), Barry throws Frost a birthday party in STAR Labs, in a scene that’s both endearing and lasts not nearly long enough. 

It’s during this party scene that Barry and Iris break it to the team that he’s slated to die during the Crisis, thankfully putting everyone on the same page and laying the groundwork for some hopefully interesting character work to be done in the next few weeks. Hopefully. 

Additional Notes

• We finally get our new Harrison Wells, and he is…basically sci-fi Nathan Drake, completely with a utility bracer and searching for something called “Eternium.”
• Meanwhile, we meet Ralph’s mom and she’s been dating a guy named Marv Perez (nice) and lying to Ralph about all the men in her life who she dated and dumped. 
• Next week, more blood zombies, just in time for the actual Halloween.