'The Flash' Season 8 Episode 1 Review: Team Flash gears up for fight of their lives

Team Flash has a new problem to solve as they come face to face

UPDATED NOV 17, 2021

Grant Gustin (The Flash) and Brandon Routh (Atom) in 'The Flash' (The CW)

Spoilers for 'The Flash' Season 8 Episode 1 'Armageddon' Part 1

Season 8 of The CW’s hit show ‘The Flash’ is finally here and the network just aired the premiere episode. Just like we expected, there were a lot of revelations made during the episode and the makers also introduced one of the villains for this season.

During Season 7, Team Flash fought the Speed Force and saved everyone. However, the threat is even bigger this time around because the menacing villain they are going to face this season is actually like someone they have never met before. Team Flash is going to meet Despero (Tony Curran) this time around, who has come from the future and has a knack for conquering worlds.

'The Flash' Season 8: 5 things to know about The CW's superhero show

'The Flash' Season 8 Episode 1: Barry learns shocking truth about him and 'Armageddon'

Despero has come to Earth accomplish one specific task: Kill The Flash? But, he has a solid reason for doing that. Despero is capable of seeing the future and in the future, he has seen that Barry Allen (Grant Gustin) will start Armageddon and destroy the planet. So, he can’t let Barry do that and he has to kill him. He even shows Barry what he is going to do. The episode ends with Barry trying to convince Despero that he is not bad and he has spent his entire life in saving people. Despero gives him a week’s time to show him if he has a pure heart. If he doesn’t, he would kill him.

Tony Curran as Despero in 'The Flash' (The CW)

The episode laid a perfect foundation for the things to come. This was also the first time viewers got to know about the first meta-human villain gang that terrorized the city. It was called Royal Flush Gang. As a fan, I would literally want to see a story about them and also, how did the city manage to get rid of them. That would be something interesting to see.

Coming back to the episode, it had some really emotional moments, especially when Ray (Brandon Routh) reveals that he will be opening up a foundation to honor Chester’s father. Viewers might have felt that the episode was a little slow, but it’s just the beginning and things have started to get intense because Barry has only one week to prove that he won’t destroy the world. All in all, the premiere episode of Season 8 was a good start with a lot of potential to explore a wide range of things.

The scene where Barry fights the Royal Flush Gang was shot beautifully and reminded me of how Barry used to have fun with smaller villains during the initial part of the show.

Let’s see how things get wild from the next episode.

‘The Flash’ Season 8 returns to The CW with a new episode every Tuesday at 8 pm EST.