We've known for awhile now that he was getting a little too close for comfort, but I don't think many of us were expecting Reverse-Flash to kill reporter Mason Bridge on The Flash quite as early in the season as he did. We didn't even see much of Mason in this episode, and I think we all assumed he wasn't in danger after surviving the previous version of this altered timeline, but Harrison Wells apparently had just enough perspective on the research Mason was collecting to consider him a major threat. Just as Mason was getting closer to unraveling the mystery that is Harrison Wells, the Reverse-Flash showed up in his office, demanded to have any and all files regarding the case, and then promptly shoved his hand through the other man's heart (a signature move that doesn't seem to get any less disturbing no matter how many times we see it).
The first thing the show has made clear here is that Mason's life has been traded for Cisco's: in both cases the men got too close to his secret, and in both cases Harrison shut it down before they became more of a threat. But unlike Cisco's death in the previous timeline, this one had a much more devastating consequence for Harrison that he probably didn't anticipate, now that Barry is genuinely suspicious of him for the first time. So suspicious, in fact, that he didn't even mention it out loud when he first saw the headline reporting Mason's disappearance even though he was sitting in the middle of S.T.A.R. labs.
The preview for next week's episode only seems to hint at this suspicion growing even stronger, so now it becomes a matter of what exactly Harrison will do or say to regain Barry's trust. Obviously he still needs him to get back to his time, or Barry would have been so much dead meat by now. So the real question here: Is Barry going to believe what he says? Or will he question him until he uncovers the real truth? And just how much is he going to risk losing before the truth finally comes out?
Images: Diyah Pera/The CW
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