TV Show Review: The Flash, Season 3 Episode 17, “Duet”

Details: Airs on the CW. About forty-five minutes long, not including commercials.

I’ve been looking forward to this episode ever since I heard about it. I love musicals. I also love superhero shows. Smashing the two together is something that appealled to me.

In this episode, a new villain forces Supergirl and the Flash to team up and and sing their way out of trouble.

If you are aware of the cast for the CW’s superhero shows, you’d know that a lot of these people not only have musical theater backgrounds, they’ve been on Broadway and on shows like Glee. So when you’re hearing them sing, that’s them singing. They don’t need voice overs. They can do it themselves. What I appreciate in this episode is that they didn’t try to force the actors without singing and dancing backgrounds to sing and dance. They let them play a role in the episode in the other parts. For those who can sing and dance, they gave them their time to shine.

Most surprising to me was Carlos Valdes. I had no idea he was that good of a singer prior to this episode. I was aware of Jesse Martin however. Martin was in Rent both on Broadway and in the film adaptation. It was also fun to see Darren Criss. Criss was on Glee, but I will always remember him from the Harry Potter Musical (it was a parody he was a part of, I think it’s still on Youtube). Addtionally, Grant Gustin and Melissa Benoist are pretty good at soft shoe.

Overall, this was a fun, campy episode that gave me exactly what I wanted. I don’t want to see this happen every episode, but seeing an episode like this every once in a while is refreshing and fun.

Score: 7.5/10