‘The Flash’s’ biggest villain is Barry Allen

For two seasons the team on “The Flash” has fought Reverse Flash (Tom Cavanagh), Zoom (Teddy Sears) and a long list of metahumans and criminals that have done nothing but terrorize Central City ever since the particle accelerator exploded.
Are any of those they’ve locked up in their personal prison or banished to another dimension any worse than Barry Allen (Grant Gustin) himself, though?
In the Season 2 finale, he proved once again that truly nobody was safe when it came to going after what he wants. Once again Barry ran back in time to save his mother from being killed — going through with it this time — with little care for what ramifications it would have on those he loved or the world at large.
This is a lot like the Season 1 finale where Barry creates a wormhole to allow Reverse Flash to return to his own time, because it gives Barry the option to go back and save his mom. While he doesn’t in that moment, his actions do create a black hole that not only threatens to tear the city apart, but opens a breach to Earth-2, which is the cause of all of the terror Zoom rained down.
That’s right, if not for Barry trying to save his mom in Season 1, all of the Earth-2 troubles could have been avoided. That’s a lot of blood on his hands — including his own father’s. Of course, that didn’t stop him from trying it yet again and following through this time.
It’s easy to see Barry’s side of the argument. He lost his mom at a young age and now his dad. He has the ability to save one of them and wanted to do so. However, it’s irresponsible.
Barry knows what can happen if you alter the past. He’s seen it first-hand. That doesn’t stop him, though. Instead he goes for what he thinks will give him the best personal ending — even if it means losing the relationships he’s forged with Joe (Jesse L. Martin) and Iris (Candice Patton).
These two were his family growing up, and Barry and Iris admitted their love for each other once again in the finale. Still, he decided to potentially erase that — and a multitude of other things — to save his mom.
It’s a decision you want to be able to understand and accept, but it’s hard to look at Barry and not see him as the villain of the story sometimes. All too often he thinks he’s making the right decision and things are just going to get worse as a result.
Now with the show potentially adapting the “Flashpoint” storyline for Season 3, chances are he’s going to learn just how massive his sins are thus far. You might save your mom Barry, but it’s entirely possible you’ll also unmake the world as we know it.
At the very least, this is early in Barry’s story as the Flash, so he has plenty of time to take his lumps now and grow to be the scarlet speedster the comic book world knows and loves. First thing’s first though, Barry. Time to start making smarter decisions.