“The Fury of Firestorm” is episode four of season two of The Flash.
In the previous episode, “Family of Rogues”, the wormhole to Earth-Two was stabilised. However, Dr Stein burst in to flames just as he did when he was merged with Ronnie as Firestorm. Then the flames turned blue and the professor collapsed. Whatever is wrong with Stein is clearly not low blood pressure. Later, Harrison Wells, a different Harrison Wells, came through the wormhole.
This episode opens two years ago. Barry is narrating about how when change comes into your life, you can either embrace the change and move forward or fight it and be left behind. It’s after a high school American football game, and the quarterback is pretty happy, as they won the game, and his touchdown is said to be responsible. The coach (Kirby Morrow) tells the boy, Jefferson Jackson, that there were scouts watching in the stands, and after Jackson’s touchdown, they all pulled out their mobile phones. The coach says that Jackson will be able to get a scholarship at any college he wants.
This is the night of the particle accelerator explosion. Jackson sees it and tells everyone to run. A friend of his, who is on crutches, falls over and Jackson stops to help him. Both get inside the tunnel before the energy wave hits, but Jackson doesn’t manage to shut the doors in time and gets blasted across the room into a wall.
In the present, Dr Stein is emitting flames and seizing. Cisco gets him stabilised, for now, but he has been trying to reengineer the stabiliser that Dr Wells built, but doesn’t know what Well sued as a power source (because it was an experimental tachyon device that Thawne stole from Mercury Labs in “The Man in the Yellow Suit”). Cisco doesn’t know what to use as a power source. He’s going to try the one from Wells’ wheelchair, but that got mostly drained during “Rogue Air”. Cisco says that they have a few days at most to work out a way of saving the professor.
Caitlin has already found something she thinks will work. Stein’s body bonded with the F.I.R.E.S.T.O.R.M. matrix when the dark matter wave hit him, and his body is now composed of highly reactive molecules. These molecules need something to bond with to keep the professor stable. So they need to find another participant to take Ronnie’s place. Cisco doesn’t think that’s going to be as easy as making a Tinder app.
Caitlin has already been doing some research. She has two potential candidates who might be compatible. Both were hospitalised due to the explosion and both look to have undergone the same genetic changes as Stein. They also share his blood type. One is a scientist – Caitlin’s clear favourite – and the other is Jefferson Jackson, who is now working is a mechanic. Although he had a 4.0 grade point average. Caitlin wants blood samples from them both, so Barry goes and gets them. Although he admits he might have skipped the part about asking for permission.
At the precinct, Patty greets Barry. She would have called him, but she hasn’t got his number yet (although he does have hers). She wanted to show him something that was found in an alley. Some really sharp teeth that a witness said was from a man shark walking on land. Barry says that sounds like bad science fiction; she counters with or awesome science fiction. Patty thinks it would be fun to work together again. Barry responds that he would love to work on anything with Patty, but meta-humans aren’t really his thing. Not exactly true. Afterwards, Joe asks Barry why he’s flirting with his partner.
Caitlin believes both candidates to merge with Dr Stein are compatible, as the dark matter explosion mutated their genes in the same way. She clearly prefers Dr Henry Hewitt, the double major, to Jefferson Jackson, former high school quarterback turned mechanic. Barry says they should meet with both, so he and Dr Stein go and meet with Jackson – posing as representatives from the really, really new (and nonexistent) Department of Safety. They say they are compiling data on the particle accelerator explosion. Jackson says that’s when everything changed for him; the accident damaged his knee so he would never play pro ball. He’s also not interested.
Caitlin has brought Dr Hewitt in already and is impressed by him. Cisco comments that Hewitt’s okay, but got an ego the size of Texas. So they go ahead and attempt the merge. This doesn’t work and Hewitt takes it badly, storming off. He seemed like a bit of a jerk to say the least. Not the sort of person you’d want to share a skull with. However, it looks as if the attempted merge did have an effect on Hewitt. Which causes problems. This means Jackson is the only possible candidate – but he doesn’t seem interested.
Iris is looking through photos before she meets with her mother, Francine. This doesn’t go that well, but Francine didn’t tell everything. The new Dr Harrison Wells is sneaking around S.T.A.R. Labs, and stealing stuff from Mercury Labs. Where he is recognised by Dr McGee, who had known Harrison for 20 years. So she’s calls in Joe, for one thing to check that Wells is really dead. Which Joe affirms. Joe decides to keep this secret from Barry for the moment. The new Wells is looking suspicious, sneaking around and stealing things, but this is coloured by Eobard Thawne’s act as Wells. No-one knows what a real Harrison Wells is like. If this is a real Harrison Wells.