Ever since Barry and Iris’ wedding got interrupted by alt-reality Nazis last year (ah, comic book shows), The Flash has had an intriguing character to slowly peel away at: Jessica Parker Kennedy’s “mystery girl”. She’s spent this whole season popping up in weird places, but this week gave us our biggest clue to her identity yet.
Barry and Iris, blissfully unaware that a far more intriguing mystery lies beyond their tussle with the Thinker. Image: The CW
Her brief arrival at the end of this week’s “Therefore She Is” was frankly more intriguing than any of Team Flash’s ongoing tussle with DeVoe has been lately. Mystery Girl briefly became Delivery Girl at the end of the episode, showing up to drop off a gift for Joe and Cecile’s baby shower – only to make a hasty getaway when she sees Iris coming to answer the door. And we mean hasty…
Welcome to the speedforce family, Mystery Girl. Image: The CW
Because she’s a speedster. One more for the pile of them on The Flash! But the revelation of Mystery Girl’s powers does at least narrow down a few theories as to who she is, particularly those that believe she’s a descendant of Barry and Iris.
Interesting to note: Her speedforce lightning crackled both the usual yellow and purple, just like Iris’ when she briefly had Barry’s powers (and one of the best superhero costumes in the DC/CW universe) a few episodes back.
After all, in the comics, Barry and Iris went on to have twins, Dawn and Don Allen, who inherited their father’s superspeed, although Barry died during Crisis on Infinite Earths before they were born.
That’s always been one of the most popular theories, especially given that we first encountered her in Crisis on Earth-X as an excitable waitress at Barry’s wedding.
But as she’s appeared more and more – bumping into most of team Flash at Jitters – there’s been an underlying hint that there’s something a bit more ominous to her. She took notes in the weird speedforce symbol-language after meeting Ralph and Cisco, and a cryptic meeting with Caitlin and Wells seemed to paint her as someone who isn’t entirely up to something good, which would be weird if she is Iris and Barry’s kid.
Jitters, great place to meet speedforce heroes from the future, apparently. Image: The CW
But who else could she be, if she has that weird mix of both Barry and Iris’ speedforce colours? And why is she deliberately avoiding Iris when she was fine, even excited, to meet Barry? Learning that she is a speedster may push us ever closer to honing in on Mystery Girls’ identity, but I guess we’ll have to wait for the promised answers to come in The Flash‘s season finale – just 21 days away, as Mystery Girl noted about Cecile’s due date this week.