"The Flash" review — The end of the DCEU begins with a limp, not a run
A Note on Ezra Miller — One of the great shadows looming over The Flash is the allegations and charges of criminal activity laid against the film’s star, Ezra Miller. These accusations include, but are not limited to, harassment, disorderly conduct, assault, burglary, and grooming of a minor. My role with this article is to discuss the film for its own merits and weaknesses, not the actions of its star. I encourage all audience members to make informed decisions about what they chose to view and which artists they chose to support.
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“You wanna get nuts? Let’s get nuts.”
Landing with all of the grace of a dead fish projected from a cannon on a dining room table, so Andi Muschietti’s The Flash limps its way into theatres. Jumping on the bandwagon of multiverse stories so prominent in the superhero wave at the moment, The Flash is perhaps the worst of this new trend. The film is utterly lifeless in its execution, playing through the predictable, recycled beats of a superhero film. It ventures fully into the uncanny valley with some genuinely horrific visual effects that make this film stand out as particularly bad among the onslaught of superhero films. Hell, the film even executes its moments of pure fan service and nostalgia are executed horribly. It’s another lacklustre entry in a profoundly hit-or-miss (mostly miss) franchise. Thankfully, this iteration of the DC film universe officially comes to an end this December with the release of Aquaman: The Lost Kingdom. So, does any of this actually matter anymore? Why am I here?
Meet Barry Allen. He’s a forensic scientist by day and a superhero by day. After an accident in a crime lab involving some chemicals and a rogue lightning bolt, Barry gained superpowers, namely the ability to run at inhuman speeds and access to the “speed force,” an extradimensional energy source. Audiences who have been following the DC Extended Universe (or DCEU, the unofficial name given to DC’s shared film continuity) for a while now will have met Barry already. He made his debut in some security footage in Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice (2016) and a cameo in Suicide Squad (2016) before taking on a supporting role in Justice League (2017) and the re-cut Zack Snyder’s Justice League (2021). Despite having the nickname of the “fastest man alive,” it’s taken quite a while for Flash’s first live-action, big-screen outing to manifest. A movie adaptation of The Flash has been in discussion since the late 1980s with a multitude of writers and directors entering and exiting the project since. This particular version of the film, with star Ezra Miller attached, was announced in 2014 with a projected release date of early 2018. But a deeply troubled production process and a global pandemic led to the project being delayed again and again before production finally started in April 2021 with It: Chapter 2 (2019) director Andy Muschietti at the helm (the fourth director officially attached to direct the film).
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| Maribel Verdú and Ezra Miller in The Flash. Photo: DC/Warner Bros. |
The Flash begins a few years after the events of Justice League. Barry is struggling to maintain his life as a superhero and a forensic scientist while also seeking to get justice for his father, Henry (played by Ron Livingston), who has been imprisoned for killing Barry’s mother. As The Flash, he has been working closely with Batman (played by Ben Affleck) and Alfred Pennyworth (played by Jeremy Irons) but feels like he’s nothing more than a “janitor” for the Justice League. The film kicks off with a bang when the Flash is called in by Batman to help save a quickly collapsing hospital in Gotham City while Batman takes care of the goons who did it. This opening action sequence is the best part of the movie. That’s not to say it’s a great action scene, it’s just the best one The Flash has to offer.
In this film, Scotland’s Glasgow fills in for Gotham City, which is an excellent choice, adding a lovely layer of age and character to the architecture. There is some creative action choreography as we get to see Barry’s physics-defying powers in action, although the scene is marred by some very strange-looking, digitally created babies (which is only a foretaste of how ugly the effects will become by the third act). Ben Affleck returns for what is likely his final turn as the Caped Crusader and Jeremy Irons gets a little bit of play as Alfred Pennyworth, which just highlights how good these two are in these parts and how underutilized they are in this film and the DCEU saga at large. However, before he goes, Affleck’s Batman gets one final chase and some great fisticuffs in. This scene also serves as the debut of Flash’s new costume, a truly horrendous eye-sore that colours the whole movie. A more high-tech, ring-kept upgrade to the suit he wears in Justice League, this CGI monstrosity is such an ill-fitting design. It clings far too tight onto Miller’s digital body with a chunky helmet on top. The design makes Miller’s head appear far too big for the body it’s attached to. It is an unfortunate downgrade from the suit previously seen in Justice League.
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| Photo: DC/Warner Bros. |
After the fight, we get pulled into Barry’s personal life. Despite being able to run close to the speed of light, Barry can’t seem to make it to anything on time. He is continually late for his shifts and has a near inability to develop any meaningful human connections. Meanwhile, Barry is trying to secure new evidence that will help his father’s upcoming appeal trial, a process that is not very promising. That night, after a tearful phone call with his father, Barry gets pulled into the depths of the speed force, including a “chrono bowl,” which allows him to travel backwards in time. He immediately knows what he must do — he must travel back in time to prevent his mom from ever dying.
The story takes some narrative inspiration from the 2011 comic storyline Flashpoint, which was the title of the film for about eighteen months. That story also features Barry going back in time and saving his mother, but the result of that is Barry creating an apocalyptic version of the present. Here, the new present-day features just slight alternations from the main timeline. After he meddles with the past, Barry gets stuck in an alternate 2013 where his Mom lives, but now has to deal with a ten-year younger version of himself, while also assembling the Justice League to fight off the invasion of General Zod depicted in Man of Steel. At this point, we’re already about 45 minutes into the movie and we’ve just started the main action. As you might be able to tell, a lot is happening narratively in this movie and not all of it fits very well. Whereas Flashpoint can launch straight into the time-travelling, multiversal shenanigans thanks to Barry’s powers and the concept of the multiverse being very well established in the comics, the film has to play catch up with the audience, which means that it takes way too long to get to the real action of the movie.
Ezra Miller plays a weird buddy dynamic with themself as both the prime-Barry and the 2013-Barry, a dynamic that works some of the time, although is marred again by some very obvious CGI doubling. Somehow The Parent Trap (1998) and Dead Ringers (1988) are still the movies to beat for a lead actor in a dual role. Miller’s performance is pretty hit-and-miss as well. Some of the comedy is played well, at other points it’s just grating. Miller occasionally hits some excellent dramatic beats — the scenes with Maribel Verdú’s Nora Allen are stellar — while falters in others. Now, things don’t go so well for the Barrys in assembling their Justice League as prime-Barry quickly realizes that saving his mother means that a lot more than just his parents’ fates have changed. They do, however, make two allies — Batman (this time played by Michael Keaton) and Supergirl (played by Sasha Calle).
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| Ezra Miller and Michael Keaton in The Flash. Photo: DC/Warner Bros. |
Keaton’s return as the Dark Knight has been one of the most marketed and anticipated elements of The Flash. This is Keaton’s first run at the character since 1992’s Batman Returns. Here, Bruce Wayne hung up the cape and cowl after making Gotham City one of the safest places in the world. But now, he will be reluctantly taken out of retirement to help Barry rescue Superman and stop Zod. It is important to note that Keaton’s Batman is not the same version of the character we met in the Burton-helmed Batman movies and he plays the character quite differently. While Keaton brings a sense of aged wisdom to the character, it is a little strange to see his CGI body-double swoop around frozen Russian army bases and a fight with a hostile alien force with almost inhuman agility. Hearing Keaton regurgitate his old catchphrases is completely disheartening.
The Barrys and Bruce Wayne head off to the Arctic to a Russian military facility that they believe is holding Superman. The “surprise” (which was revealed in the trailers), however, is that Superman doesn’t exist in this universe. Instead, they meet Kara Zor-El, Superman’s cousin and fellow Kryptonian, who has been imprisoned by the Russians. Sasha Calle’s Supergirl is a totally wasted opportunity. An afterthought in an overwritten, overcrowded movie, Supergirl is nothing more than a plot device disguised as a character.
All of this builds to one of the worst third acts in recent memory. Filled with some of the grossest visual effects in a movie full of gross visual effects, the action takes place in a character-less, interest-less open plane that feels like an unrendered video game environment. Michael Shannon’s Zod is here, although Shannon really only functions as a thing to punch and not a character. Muschietti by this point has lost all credibility as a filmmaker delivering action sequence upon action sequence deprived of stakes or personality. After watching this film, the news of him being tapped to direct Batman: The Brave and the Bold is incredibly upsetting. My nightmares are filled with images of the over-lit, poorly-shot, daytime-set, and unfunny monstrosity he will unleash.
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| Ezra Miller and Sasha Calle in The Flash. Photo: DC/Warner Bros. |
Eventually, the action disappears into the speed force as the two Barrys, now both with powers, argue over how to save the world. There is a strange “crisis on a handful of Earths” happening here as the time-travelling Barrys are threatening much of reality. While I won’t give them away, the few “cameos” here are horrific and insulting. This conflict leads to some cliched dialogue about “acceptance” and “moving on” that we’ve heard a million times before as the movie reaches for the non-existent pathos it never deserved in the first place. There is a great deal of irony in having this film released so close to Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse as the films occupy a lot of the same thematic and narrative space. The difference, however, is that Across the Spider-Verse is an artful and surprising movie that much more deftly handles the themes of regret and trauma. Finally, back in regular reality, The Flash closes out on one of the worst final shots in a blockbuster film
With its gross visual effects, okay-to-insulting action scenes, half-written characters, over-stuffed and predictable narrative, underwhelming execution, and false emotions, The Flash is just another bad addition to a growing pile of stinkers from the DCEU. It proudly cements itself in the legacy of Suicide Squad and Black Adam (2022). Despite wanting to be a freeing, joyful run, The Flash is about as pleasant as a twisted ankle.
So, if you want to watch a superhero movie about fate, trauma, and changing your destiny that features some delightful multiverse shenanigans and great action sequences, check out Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse. If you’ve already seen it, give it another watch. Just don’t waste your life with this.
The Flash is now playing in theatres everywhere.
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