Gorilla Warfare

Like many of episodes of the Flash this season, “Gorilla Warfare” gets its title from a comic book story arc of the same name. If you think Grodd’s powerful in the show, a gander at the picture above suggests he’s almost unbeatable. In Gorilla Warfare Grodd manhandles the Flash and Green Lantern.

Barry in Harrison Wells’ wheelchair

At the beginning of this episode Barry cruises STAR Labs in Harrison Wells’ old wheelchair. I’d be surprised if Wells—I’m sorry, he was actually Eobard Thawne pretending to be Wells—left a gift in his chair, but this wasn’t the first allusion to Flash’s first season.

Harry playing the role of Reverse-Flash

Harrison Wells from Earth-2 donned the Reverse-Flash suit this week, pretending to be the Harrison Wells/Eobard Thawne of Earth-Prime. Man, we had a lot of blasts from the past in “Gorilla Warfare.”

The Princess Bride

This one wasn’t that much of a secret, The Flash had more than one reference to The Princess Bride, all of which occurred in scenes with Cisco, but DC also has an inside joke. Carol Kane, who appeared in The Princess Bride as Miracle Max’s wife, is also Oswald Cobblepot’s mother on Gotham.

Grape Ape

Leave to Cisco to call Grodd the Great Grape Ape. I love it. The reference may have gone over some viewers’ heads as The Great Grape Ape Show was a 30-minute Saturday morning cartoon that aired on ABC from 1975-1978.

Say Anything

What’s up with Cisco and older references? I had a mad Say Anything flashback when Cisco held a pic-a-nic basket full of gifts for Kendra high above his head, while Peter Gabriel’s “In Your Eyes” played. Comic fans may have superimposed a boombox above Cisco’s head, since Vibe is no stranger to them.

Flash costume ring

The Flash costume ring was namedropped this week. Wells’ wheelchair may not be superpowered anymore but I wouldn’t mind a revival of Flash’s costume ring.

Hawkgirl

The Flash teased us with fully costumed Hawkgirl. We get a better look at Kendra Saunders with wings, but she doesn’t do anything with them. We’ll have to see the Flash/Arrow crossover to see Hawkgirl in action.

Vaughn Pharmaceuticals

The Vaughn name could refer to Easy Co. member Vaughn who served as a Heavy Machine Gunner.

Or the name could refer to Brian K. Vaughn, a comic book and TV writer, as one of Vaughn’s employees was referred to as Brian. Hmm.

Cortexin

Grodd stole a few drugs this week but one has significance: Cortexin. Cortexin was used in Kamandi as the drug that gave apes their human level intelligence. Who knows how we’ll see this play out, but our next secret might explain where.

Gorilla City

Oh, we got a great Grodd teaser at the end of this week’s episode. Gorilla City is a city of intelligent apes but they pretend to be no different than other apes—I wonder how Harrison Wells Earth-2 knows about them—so they can protect themselves from humans. One of Gorilla City’s citizens, Solovar, holds the secret of gifting apes with higher intelligence, the aforementioned Cortexin. I don’t know if Flash will go this route, but there’s plenty of story to work with here, and I wouldn’t mind Grodd as next season’s big bad.

Did you miss our Flash review? Here’s a link. Thanks for reading.