As Barry continues to train Jesse in the ways of being a speedster, a new metahuman emerges — Sam Scudder, the Mirror Master, determined to settle an old score with Leonard Snart, Captain Cold, and he enlists his old lover Rosa Dillion, the Top to help him do so.
Tropes:
- And I Must Scream: Sam Scudder has been imprisoned in a mirror for three years before he was released (but it seemed like last night to him), so naturally he's pissed off at Snart.
- Antagonist Title: Doubles as Team Title, referring to both Mirror Master and Top.
- Appropriated Appellation: Rosa likes Jesse calling her "The Top" and adopts it as her alias.
- Battle Couple: Mirror Master and Top are an evil variation.
- Better as Friends: Wally initially proposes this to Jesse after she kisses him because she will be leaving soon. He changes his mind at the end of the episode though.
- Big Damn Kiss: Wally and Jesse share an understated but rather amazing one.
- Boom, Headshot!: Before the Paricle Accelerator explosion, Snart planned to shoot Sam in the head while he was lying over a mirror in the floor. It's averted when Snart's gang decide to leave.
- But Now I Must Go: Harry and Jesse go back to Earth-2 to continue to help it recover from Zoom's reign of terror.
- The Cameo: Wentworth Miller as Leonard Snart.
- Civvie Spandex: Mirror Master wears a suit rather than his trademark green and orange costume from the comics.
- Continuity Nod:
- In the flashback, Snart was going to kill Scudder and Rosa for wanting out of his crew, just like he killed a goon for doing the same in "Going Rogue".
- Barry quotes Oliver's training lessons.
- The team uses Eobard Thawne's hologram trick against Mirror Master.
- Barry mentions how Snart "left with some friends of ours on a trip."
- Contrasting Sequel Antagonist: The old Rogues were just thieves who got their hands on powerful weapons, the New Rogues are metahumans. While both groups only have enough ambition to rob banks and commit petty theft, the old Rogues had the benefit of Cold's tactic fitness while Scudder is hotheaded.
- Curb-Stomp Battle: In their second ecounter, Jesse quickly spins Rosa around and knocks her out before Rosa can get a single hit in.
- Designated Girl Fight: Top only fights Jesse.
- Does This Make Me Look Fat?: Iris asks Barry this question about her pants. While he's stuck in a mirror.
- Dramatic Irony: Barry and Team Flash keeps mentioning that Snart is gone. What they meant is that he's on a trip, unaware that he is now dead.
- Droste Image: Barry was able to defeat Scudder through the "Droste effect", involving the placement of several mirrors parallel one another while surrounding Scudder.
- Eating the Eye Candy: Caitlin appreciates Sam as a "good looking guy...for a criminal".
- Fan Disservice: Caitlin has a Shower Scene during The Stinger. However, her freezing the water in the shower, followed by the reveal with the ghostly pale skin, ice blue lips and coldly white hair reveals she's closer and closer to becoming the dreaded Killer Frost.
- Foregone Conclusion: Caitlin's reaction to her ice powers. After seeing her routine in her apartment, she's no longer stunned or upset when her powers flare up, she merely does her best, snipping out the white strands of her hair after every shower for example, to hide it from her friends.
- Gender Flip: The Top was a guy named Roscoe Dillion in the comics. Here, she's Rosa Dillion.
- Gut Feeling: Harry notes that he's always trusted his gut when hiring someone, and his gut tells him H.R isn't their guy. He's overruled.
- His Name Is...: Harry was just about to utter a warning to the group when the portal to Earth-2 opens.
- In Spite of a Nail: It seems that every Harrison Wells in the multiverse is obsessed with Big Belly Burgernote Caitlin: Some things never change.
- Internal Reveal: A minor one, but Barry lets Joe know that Snart travelled away with some friends.
- Interrupted Intimacy: Joe nearly walks in on Barry and Iris making out.
- Irony: Caitlin's hottest scene in the series to date has her freezing everything around her.
- Legacy Character: As the title "New Rogues" suggests, Mirror Master and the Top are filling the void left behind by Captain Cold, Heat Wave, and Golden Glider.
- Locked into Strangeness: Caitlin gets a skunk stripe after her moment of Power Incontinence, though she quickly cuts it out to try and hide what's happening to her.
- Locked Out of the Loop:
- Nobody on Team Flash is aware that Snart is dead. As far as they know, he's still traveling with the Legends.
- Caitlin still keeps her friends in the dark about her new powers. Rather telling, since she secretly uses them to help free Barry from the mirror.
- Mentor Archetype: Barry becomes this to Jesse. He gives an almost identical list of critiques to ones he heard from Oliver Queen, and is amused to realize he's become like him as a mentor.
- Modesty Towel: Caitlin is wearing one when she discovers she's slowly turning into Killer Frost.
- Ms. Fanservice: Caitlin herself provides a lot of leg shots this episode, and concludes it with a nice Shower Scene...which quickly goes wrong.
- The Multiverse: Earth-38 (Supergirl's Earth) isn't mentioned, since Barry already looked for S.T.A.R. Labs personnel when he was stuck there.
- Mythology Gag:
- The Earth-2 Mirror Master is Evan McCullough, the second Mirror Master in the comics, but he doesn't have powers, and has a ray gun instead.
- Sam Scudder is a Badass in a Nice Suit, just like in the previous Flash series.
- The quest for an Alternate Wells, and the inevitable Hilarity Ensues, plays out just like Legion tryouts.
- The Top's powers in this adaptation is inducing vertigo instead of spinning, but Jesse Quick gives her a super speed runaround that sends her for a whirl to defeat her.
- The Top's powers, involving a state of mind, are not actually that detached from the comic book version: in the modern age, the Rogues who have gone straight were actually victims of the Top's Heel–Face Brainwashing.
- No Good Deed Goes Unpunished: Caitlin uses her budding powers to covertly help Barry escape and the end of the episode implies it had the result of speeding up her transformation into Killer Frost.
- Not So Above It All: Harry again beats Cisco to the punch of naming Mirror Master. In the end he also hugs Cisco, showing that he really cares for him despite their constant bickering.
- Nothing Can Stop Us Now!: Sam Scudder asserts this but Rosa Dillon points out the Flash can.
- Other Me Annoys Me: Harry is decidedly unimpressed with his counterparts in the multiverse. Amongst them are:
- A Cowboy Wells, who seems to have a Dark and Troubled Past.
- A Steampunk Wells, that even Cisco thinks is too nerdy.
- A mime Wells, which everybody hates.
- Hipster Wells from Earth-19 or "H.R" who's so laid back that it makes Harry uncomfortable. Ultimately this is the one they chose.
- Power Incontinence: Caitlin accidentally freezes her shower water.
- Pragmatic Adaptation: Rather than have spinning powers, the Top merely induces vertigo in people.
- Put on a Bus: Harry and Jesse return to Earth-2 at the end of the episode, however both claiming they will come back and visit every now and then.
- Red Herring: The "Previously On" has a recap of Barry's heart to heart with Felicity about him changing time, which leads the audience to believe that Captain Cold is coming back as a result of the Cosmic Retcon, but it's not. Notably "Arrow" did the same thing with "A Matter of Trust" to sucker the audience into thinking that's how Deadshot can be alive (but it was only John's hallucination).
- Remember the New Guy?: Barry defeated Top before but it wasn't shown in the previous two seasons.
- Replacement Goldfish: Harry wants to go back to Earth-2, so he helps the team find another Harrison Wells to help lead the team. The one they picked is more laid-back and likes to be called "H.R." And yes he's also obsessed with Big Belly Burger.
- Revenge: Scudder wants to kill Snart for trying to kill him, but once he finds out he's left town he decides to turn Central City into his own playground.
- Retro Universe: Two of the Harrison Wellses live in, respectively, The Wild West and Steampunk styled Earths.
- Sharp-Dressed Man: Scudder is a handsome man in a great-looking suit. And boy, does he know it.
- Ship Tease: Joe and the District Attorney Cecile are clearly interested in one another.
- Shout-Out: Cisco makes one to Twin Peaks.
- The Stinger: Caitlin goes back home to her apartment only to find out that her turning into Killer Frost has now moved to the physical changes, specifically the white hair and blue lips.
- Suspicious Spending: Snart's and Scudder's criminal partnership broke up after Scudder disregarded Snart's order to lay low after a heist and instead started immediately spending his share of the loot on fancy suits for himself and jewelry for Rosa.
- Terrible Interviewees Montage: The possible replacement Wellses all annoy Harry, Cisco, or both.
- Thinking Up Portals: Scudder's power is given a technobabble deduction of being able to generate wormholes on any surface with a high degree of solar reflection (which, wouldn't have to be that high since he's shown using a glass wall at one point).
- Trailers Always Lie: The synopsis made it seem like Captain Cold would be returning to the show, but his only appearance is in a flashback at the beginning. And as a hologram to fool Sam Scudder.
- Troll: Iris enjoys teasing Barry while he is in the mirror and at the end she acts like she is all shocked when Barry is finally able to kiss her in front of her dad. It's her way of getting a little payback.
- Wham Shot: Caitlin's lips turn blue and her hair start's turning white during The Stinger, just like Killer Frost.
- Even worst her seeming acceptance of the fact that this is her life now.
- Writers Cannot Do Math: Barry's supposed fastest speed is again mentioned as being Mach 3. In season 2 Barry could normally run at mach 2, and at one point managed to reach mach 3,3 and then got tachyon enhancement which increased his speed about four times meaning his top speed should be at least mach 8, if you take it being four times faster than his standard, or over mach 13 if you take it as four times his top, either way it should be way more than mach 3. Thought it may be that Barry was holding back.
- Year Inside, Hour Outside: Scudder says as much about his time trapped in the mirror; 3 years may have passed but it only feels like last night to him.
