“Grodd Lives” is episode twenty-one of season one of The Flash.
In the previous episode, “The Trap”, a trap had been set to show that Harrison Wells – or the person pretending to be him – was the person who murdered Barry’s mother, so that he could then be arrested. However, Wells appeared to get past the trap and was threatening Cisco. So Joe shot and killed him before he could harm Cisco. After Which, Wells turned into the doppelganger meta-human captured in “Who is Harrison Wells”. Then Wells called Barry.
They thought they were setting a trap for Wells, but Gideon’s room showed that he had cameras everywhere, and knew everything they were doing. So it wasn’t really a trap. Then Wells went after Iris, just as Eddie was about to propose to her. Barry arrived in time, so the Reverse-Flash took Eddie with him. There were flashbacks to just after the particle accelerator accident, and it seems that Wells does genuinely have feelings for Barry now, but he can never forgive him for something he did. Or, rather, will do. Just what did/will the Flash do that made the Reverse-Flash hate him so much? Wells still needs Barry to get home to his time.
When the Flash touched Iris, she felt a jolt of electricity. Just like she did when she touched Barry when he was in his coma. So she realised that Barry was the Flash. This episode begins with Iris talking about what you do when you discover that your best friend has a secret, or a universe of secrets. Do you confront him, or do you remain silent?
In the precinct, Captain Singh is asking Barry and Joe about some gold robberies, and just where Eddie is. Joe tells the captain that Eddie is taking some personal time and, when the captain leaves, asks Barry if he’s found Eddie yet. The answer is no. Iris comes and speaks to Barry in his lab. She says that she was told not to tell anyone, but she’s telling him that Eddie has been taken and that the Flash said he would fix it. But he hasn’t. Iris says that the police and her father need to know the truth. It seems clear that Iris is asking questions on two different levels, but not to Barry.
A transport is being loaded with gold when a man in some sort of armour approaches and fires a missile from a launcher, blowing up a jeep. At S.T.A.R. Labs, Barry is asking if Cisco plans to keep all the cameras that Wells was using to spy on them, because it seems a little creepy. Cisco tells him that the first rule of mechanical engineering is to never waste good tech. Then he gets notified about the attack at the gold reserve. Barry arrives on the scene but, when he approaches the armoured man, suddenly gets images of what looks like some type of surgery being carried out projected in his head, causing him to collapse. The attacker has also been affected, then stands up again in an oddly robotic manner and leaves.
Back at the labs, they are discussing what happened when Iris arrives. Barry is still in his suit, but Iris already knew. This gets a bit awkward. Barry and Iris go to talk and Cisco and Caitlin manage to justify a reason for listening in. Iris tells Barry she’s not angry, just disappointed. She isn’t happy to find out that both Joe and Eddie knew as well. Iris suggests that they all stop trying to protect her.
Another shipment of gold is being transported by an ice cream van when the mystery attacker appears again. Barry shows up and knocks him down, and removes the mask revealing General Eiling. The general was last seen at the end of “Fallout”, when Wells took him to see a giant gorilla, Grodd. It looks like the gorilla – who has a bone to pick with Eiling for experimenting on him, as was revealed in “Plastique” – didn’t kill Eiling as it looked like.
Back at S.T.A.R. Labs, the general is both behaving and talking oddly. He says that Eiling is bad, and hurt him, so he hurt Eiling back. And says that he isn’t Eiling, but Grodd. Caitlin and Cisco know who Grodd is, a gorilla that Eiling experimented on to try and create telekinetic and telepathic supersoldiers. Something Wells really didn’t like and so shut down the experiments completely. After the particle accelerator explosion, Grodd was missing from his cage. The explosion looks to have affected the gorilla as well.
Eiling has been missing for the past three months and it looks as if Grodd may be with Wells – at least from the outside. Which means that Eddie may be with him too. So they need to know where to look, and Iris helps here, for she knows that two sewer workers went missing – they were attacked by Grodd at the end of “Crazy for You”.
So, the plan is to go into the sewers to look for a giant meta-gorilla who probably has telekinetic and telepathic powers. What could possibly go wrong with that?
Eddie is still being held by Eobard Thawne/Wells for some fairly unknown reason. When the Reverse-Flash has been seen in the yellow suit, his eyes glow red. It seems that isn’t a property of the suit, but of Thawne himself.