Why Barry's Weird Doodles On The Flash Probably Didn't Come From The Speed Force

the flash season 4 episode 2

Spoilers below for last week's Season 4 premiere of The Flash.

During last week's Season 4 premiere of The Flash, fans got to witness Barry Allen (or what we assume is Barry Allen) escaping the Speed Force and readjusting to the Team Flash lifestyle in Central City. But not before spending a chunk of the episode spouting out rhyming quasi-prophecies and drawing strange symbols all over the place. While it was easier to latch onto his comments about diapers and judges, it turns out those doodles might not even be a Speed Force thing, as similar ones appear to be seen on both new villain The Thinker and another villainous character. WTF?

Before Barry donned his new Flash suit and got inspired to save Iris from the Samuroid, an act that seemed to "unlock" his inner Barry-ness (so to speak), he spent a while doodling a bunch of different shapes, lines and dots in various ways, seemingly without a whole lot of rhyme or reason behind it all. Fans were looking for some kind of coded language to be involved, and Cisco's "This house is bitchin'" message seemed to render the symbology moot. But an eagle-eyed Instagram user pointed out that similar symbols could be seen on The Thinker's face as a tattoo or form of scarification. Check them out below, both under his right eye and above his left eye.

On both sides, it looks like there's a diamond with one or more lines coming off of it. And not to get all adult here, but the one above the left eye kind of looks like a sperm, what with the curvy line and all. As well, there are other smaller line markings. Interestingly, however, these specific symbols don't appear to have any exact replicas within all of the doodles that Barry drew on whatever wall surfaces he could find.

The same is possibly the case with Norvock, the glassy-eyed creepster that appears to be Caitlin's boss at her dive bar side-gig. When he attempts to interrupt Cisco's conversation, we can see that he's got some interesting tattoos (or whatever) on his knuckles, complete with a dotted circle with lines coming out of it.

So what does this all mean, exactly? Well, it's obviously possible that it's all just coincidental and innocuous, without any specific relationship between Barry's doodles and the symbols seen on The Thinker and Norvock. But that's not really The Flash's M.O. most of the time, so we're betting there's something more to it, and that Barry's temporary obsession has more to do with The Thinker's mental prowess than the Speed Force's timeline tricks.

Plus, it's almost certainly meaningful that the symbols are slightly different from everything that Barry has written down. Why? Because what if Barry is writing all these things down as a way to figure out/remember what the symbols on The Thinker's head are? No clue what would happen if he figured it out, mind you, but it would probably unlock something big and game-changing. What do you guys think it could all be about?

The Flash is all new every Tuesday night on The CW at 8:00 p.m. ET, and we're hoping that something gets explained during tonight's counseling-heavy funfest. In the meantime, check out our fall TV premiere schedule to see everything coming to the small screen soon.

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Nick Venable
Assistant Managing Editor

Nick is a Cajun Country native and an Assistant Managing Editor with a focus on TV and features. His humble origin story with CinemaBlend began all the way back in the pre-streaming era, circa 2009, as a freelancing DVD reviewer and TV recapper.  Nick leapfrogged over to the small screen to cover more and more television news and interviews, eventually taking over the section for the current era and covering topics like Yellowstone, The Walking Dead and horror. Born in Louisiana and currently living in Texas — Who Dat Nation over America’s Team all day, all night — Nick spent several years in the hospitality industry, and also worked as a 911 operator. If you ever happened to hear his music or read his comics/short stories, you have his sympathy.